You won’t find too many people better than Bridgeport’s John Ebert. Ebert, as many of you know, owns and operates more McDonald’s than I can count.

 

Truth be told, he owns 16; 11 in West Virginia and five in Maryland. That's what happens when you know the store's marketing director, but I digress.

 

Don’t believe for a second that the first sentence in the first paragraph of this blog is geared toward me getting a Quarter Pounder with Cheese, a double cheeseburger or the Egg McMuffin for free. Actually, I’m writing this because a few months ago I was perturbed with Ebert for something that I found out is beyond his control and a little more in the control of the public domain.

 

You see, I can’t imagine too many people were more excited than I was when McDonald’s announced that it would having all-day breakfast last year. My all-time favorite sandwich of the three mentioned above is the Egg McMuffin. The problem is that I have problems eating breakfast as it bothers me for large portions of the day (please withhold comments on why I should have a healthy breakfast).

 

For years, Egg McMuffins were usually eaten after being microwaved from an early morning purchase or in the event of a long road trip where traveling started at the crack of dawn. Other than that, I just put the Egg McMuffin out of my mind.

 

Then, the announcement came that breakfast was no going to be all day long. The very first day it was offered I headed up Main Street shortly after 1 p.m. and to the McDonald’s along U.S. Route 50. As I pulled up and asked for my Egg McMuffin I initially thought the young lady said they were out of muffins and they had biscuits.

 

Granted, the bacon, egg and cheese biscuit isn’t a bad option. It’s just not an Egg McMuffin.

 

When I went to pay I engaged in small talk about them “selling out” their muffins. As it turned out, it was here that my heart was broken. I was told that the area locations weren’t serving Egg McMuffins. Rather, the breakfast menu was limited.

 

As I paid and drove to the pickup window in a haze of bewilderment, I saw my friend Lisa Cook, who has handled marketing for the local McDonald’s for as long as I can remember (and provided the above store number information). I believe I queried as to why no Egg McMuffin. Her reply was that “I wasn’t the first to ask” and “maybe it will change” may have been what she said. I didn’t remember. I was too stunned and was only shook out of my stupor when the smell of the fresh biscuit woke me from my doldrums. In short order, the biscuit was history.

 

Still, for months now I’ve heard others wondering the same question. I’ve had others tell me locations where you can get the sandwich that I so desire and theories – as many it seems as the Kennedy Assassination – as to why things were as they are here in our area. I've had (and I'm serious) more than a dozen people face to face or via social media avenues/texting ask me why and could I find out.

 

In order to find out the truth, I contacted Cook. And here’s the deal directly from an email from her.

 

“When McDonald's Corporation launched the ' All Day Breakfast' promotion, decisions had to be made on what each restaurant could offer. Because we are limited in our kitchen area, each market would offer either McMuffins or biscuits. If your area sells more biscuits, then your all day breakfast sandwiches would continue throughout the day as biscuits and vice versa for the muffins.”

 

Ouch. All of Ebert's West Virginia McDonad's are biscuit locations due to the populace ordering more biscuits. In Maryland, it's all McMuffin all the time.

 

In a nutshell, that tells me it’s our own fault. Actually, it’s everyone else’s fault. Although I rarely ate breakfast, when I did, I was a 100 percent McMuffin man. I did my part.

 

So now you know the truth. The truth is supposed to set us free. All it’s done here is make me hungry.

 

Editor's Note: John Ebert is shown with a biscuit, not a McMuffin, in the above photo.