Decemystery (2024) 8: The McDonald's Blob

 

When I started this blog, I had zero intention of covering unsolved mysteries. Absolutely none. That was a spur-of-the-moment thing I did for reasons I don’t even remember. The inaugural Decemystery back in 2018 was something I vaguely recall doing for the heck of it; the exact reasoning is now in and of itself a mystery. If I did mention it at any point, it’s been lost amidst the sea of other stories I’ve covered—and I dislike the original Decemystery because of its poor quality.

This impromptu decision to write about a mystery a day eventually led me to slowly but surely amass a backlog of over 5,000 mysteries I’d like to cover. I’m unsure if I’ll write about them on this blog. It’s more likely that I’ll write a series of books where I cover them, but that’s a story for another time in the far distant future. For now, let’s get back on track.

While I have fleeting memories of Decemystery 2018, most of them are of no importance and amount to little more than me typing away haphazardly without much thought about what I was doing. I believe there were a few times I considered abandoning the project, but I thought that wasn’t worth it. Besides, I thought it’d be cool if I completed it—and I did!

That said, while I view the quality as poor nowadays, I recall wanting to do Decemystery again in 2019. Except, then I didn’t; I canceled it. Then, like an indecisive buffoon, I uncanceled it.

Once again, I can’t remember the events that led to the cancellation because I deleted the blog post. I’m sure there was some reason related to mental health or time constraints, but it matters not because I managed to complete it without missing a day.

That brings me to the point of this retrospective intro. Whenever I reflect upon the evolution of this blog, there’s something that stands out to me—namely, the aforementioned Decemystery 2019.

Indeed, the Decemystery that nearly got thrown out the window is arguably the most pivotal moment in the blog’s history. Why? Well, it was the Decemystery where I opted to broaden the stories I covered. I didn’t stick to normal unsolved mysteries; I began including entries from the “Conspiracy Iceberg,” an iceberg chart that has a plethora of conspiracy theories on it.

This can be seen right out of the gate. The inaugural entry of Decemystery 2019 was “Golf Rumors,” a popular Conspiracy Iceberg entry that has more variants than I care to count. I also went over four other stories that month: Cameraheads (which has since been solved as it was a piece of lost media), The Patterson-Gimlin Massacre (which I want to rewrite), “Is Lord of the Rings Based on a True Story?” (again, I want to rewrite that one), and Project Blue Beam.

Adding on to that, I also covered the 2006 Volleyball Incident, which I’m pretty sure was going to be a part of Decemystery 2019 but was nixed for reasons that elude me. Look, it’s been five years, and I don’t have a journal. I’m sorry.

So, what does all of this have to do with today? Well, I wanted to make Decemystery 2024 special. I’ve had an arduous year, and I didn’t want to keep going through the archives of About like I didn’t care anymore. So, I figured I’d go through the two Megalists I wrote and find five of the weirdest conspiracy theories to cover.

And boy, oh boy, I succeeded. Believe me when I say that I looked for the weirdest stories; I made sure that they made the five cases we discussed last year look like child’s play.

So, with all of that in mind, I say it’s time that we celebrate not only the wonderful month of December but also celebrate the evolution of this blog throughout the years. And it all begins with the wonderfully weird story of The McDonald’s Blob! Come along, dear reader; let’s see what lurks in the shadows of those iconic golden arches!

I’m Lovin’ It!

The exact origin of this story is a mystery, but it can be found on various conspiracy icebergs across the Internet. The earliest mention of it I can find is on 4chan—specifically, a post made on /x/ (4chan’s paranormal board) on January 9, 2020. This response offers up not one but two variations of the so-called “McDonald’s Blob.”

The first and much shorter version is that the conspiracy is related to Grimace, who I briefly mentioned in yesterday’s write-up. For those who are unfamiliar with Grimace, he’s canonically “Ronald McDonald’s best friend.” Or so says the McDonald’s wiki, which is a thing that exists and makes me question if there truly is a wiki for everything.

This wasn’t always the case. Grimace was originally an evildoer who stole people’s milkshakes. After serving 20 years in Alcatraz, though, he turned his life around. He also lost two of his arms for some reason. Maybe he pawned them off to the ghosts of other inmates.

Jokes aside, Grimace’s history isn’t the most remarkable thing. Like many mascots, he’s gone through a lot of changes, but his appearance—aside from the reduction in arms—has remained the same. He’s a large, purple biped who fulfills the role of being a dimwit, apparently starting every sentence with “duh.” As for a visualization of his appearance, here’s a picture of him.

The idea of this variation is that Grimace “freaked people out.” This appeared to be true as “Evil Grimace” was introduced in 1971 and replaced by the lovable oaf we know nowadays a year later. This comes from an article written in 2012 for QSR Magazine, which mentioned that children were scared of the four-armed freakazoid.

Honestly, I wouldn’t say this isn’t that remarkable; rebranding happens often, and McDonald’s would usurp governments to keep a family-friendly image. That’s pretty much their thing; they’ve gone so far as to reject films if they’re too dark. There’s an article from Vocal about when this happened with 1992’s Batman Returns, along with a section on the Kid’s Meal Wiki that showcases what would have been featured with Happy Meals, albeit briefly. Also, yes, there’s a Kid’s Meal wiki. One of these days, I’m going to find a wiki dedicated to me, and I’ll have officially seen everything—until I once more haven’t.

So, there you have it, the first version of this story. I suppose if you wanted to be blunt and say that Grimace is a blob, then this would be the McDonald’s Blob we’re looking for. But let’s not get ahead of ourselves; we have one other variation to go over, and it’s a whole lot stranger.

Once more, the source is 4chan; take everything we’re about to discuss with a grain of salt as a result. According to posts (one of which was hyperlinked above, while the other is pretty much the same), a McDonald’s employee—who I will refer to as Becky—was instructed by her boss to dispose of the kitchen’s grease each week behind the building. For whatever reason, there was a specific spot where he wanted her to put it.

Out of curiosity, I decided to Google how McDonald’s disposes of their grease, and, surprise-surprise, Becky’s boss wasn’t following the standard protocol that McDonald’s has, which is to recycle it and use it as biodiesel for their delivery trucks. I’m going to go out on a limb and say that Becky’s boss wasn’t very good.

Anyway, as the weeks went on, the “grease and muck” built up. This led Becky to see animals eating and drinking the backdoor gourmet meal. The two examples given are rats and foxes, both of which I believe would consume this kind of stuff. Don’t quote me on that, though, as I’m not a zoologist. I haven’t performed any experiments by dumping weeks of cooking oil behind a building to see if animals will eat it.

On its own, this wouldn’t be that odd. Unsanitary, yes, but not weird. Rats are known for scavenging for food, especially in urban environments (while we don’t know where this occurred, I believe it’s worth noting that). That said, I don’t know for certain if either would consume this. Maybe if food was scarce, they’d eat it. Man, animals are odd.

Anyway, after some time, Becky’s little cavalcade of animal visitors wasn’t exclusive to the local wildlife. No, she began seeing pale, naked humanoids “slurping the stuff up.” Because, yes, Pale Crawlers also crave the delectable taste of weeks-old cooking waste.

Now, to quickly digress, it sounds like Becky wasn’t only seeing Pale Crawlers. Both 4chan posters note that she saw “some weird cryptids,” which leads me to think there were others who came along. Alas, they didn’t elaborate on what they were. That said, all I can imagine is Bigfoot with a bowl and spoon approaching Becky like he’s Oliver Twist.

“Please, ma’am, I want some more.”

Maybe that’s why Bigfoot isn’t seen in public more often. He’s afraid that he’s going to be denied his not-so-healthy serving of maggot-infested grease.

Anyway, digression over—and, unfortunately, so is the story. Yeah, we didn’t get a literal blob, but one can surmise that the title was either referring to Grimace or the buffet that Becky had created behind the carbohydrate factory known as McDonald’s.

Whatever the case may be, I like this story, even if it is on the shorter side. It reminds me of an urban legend that you’d hear about a poorly run restaurant or diner in a seedy part of town. I wish I could remember some from when I was younger, but my memory is so hazy that I’d likely need to reach out to old acquaintances, and I don’t know if any would remember me.

Oh well, no big deal. With the story over, I think it’s about time we head into the theories. There aren’t many, but we still have a lot to discuss. So, come along, let’s put our thinking caps on and speculate on what, exactly, the truth behind this oh-so-mysterious conspiracy theory is!

The McTheories

1. It was made up for a conspiracy iceberg

Although the wording is different, this is a fancier way of saying that this was a hoax; not even the Conspiracy Iceberg can escape the all-encompassing maw of the hoax theory.

Setting aside the silliness, this is arguably the most obvious explanation. After all, these iceberg charts are made by Internet users, and they’re incredibly popular on platforms like YouTube and Reddit. It stands to reason that the person who first introduced this theory did so with the idea of pranking people who read the chart’s entries.

On top of this, one of the 4chan posts refers to Becky’s alleged encounter as an “old creepypasta.” While that term is sometimes used loosely (if not erroneously) when referring to any horror tale online, it’s possible this story could have originated from someone merging the story of The Rake with McDonald’s (be it for laughs or in a baffling attempt at being scary).

Alternatively, it could’ve been an urban legend that sprang up in the wake of the creepypasta genre’s rise to popularity. The Rake first came around in July of 2005 and has remained in the public eye ever since. It’s possible that this was a modern-day attempt at making an urban legend tied to McDonald’s, which is far from a novelty. The restaurant has an absurd number of myths, legends, and claims surrounding it, like that they use dog food to make their burgers, chicken, or both.

These claims could be what spawned this story, and there’s one other reason to suspect that. Over on IcebergDB, which looks to be on its last legs because the page is missing a lot of detail for me, the summary of the story adds that Becky’s story might’ve been a reference to something called the mutant laboratory meat urban legend. There’s then a Wikipedia link to an entire page related to McDonald’s urban legends.

As for the “mutant laboratory meat” legend, I’ll keep it brief since I’m citing Wikipedia, of all things, and that’s not exactly doing me any favors in the way of looking like a worthwhile source.

Around March and April of 2000, a rumor was spread across Brazil through email, claiming research conducted at Michigan State University revealed that meat used by McDonald’s was from genetically modified animals. Just typing that, I’m receiving flashbacks to the Clarissa chain letter that was popular when I was younger. Man, I do not miss those days.

These animals, which were (and presumably still are) being held in a secret laboratory, sound like rejected designs for a Dead Space game. Apparently, they were creatures that lacked legs, horns, bones, eyes, tails, and most (if not all) hair. They also sported heads the size of a tennis ball. I’m trying to imagine what these things look like, and I’m just imagining a blanket of unprocessed meat.

Despite their impractical bodies, these animals were fed through tubes that connected to their stomachs and were presumably fed whatever they needed to create those irresistible hamburgers Ronald McDonald will inevitably order you to consume.

The fun doesn’t end there, though. The email continued by saying that those unfortunate enough to see these things claimed they were “very unpleasant.” Yes, they use the word “unpleasant.” Look, I’m not going to harp on word usage because this originated from Brazil, and the translation likely led to that word’s inclusion, but I think something like “abomination” is more apt.

Although the idea of eating genetically modified meat may sound enticing to some who are looking for a thrill in their diet, the email claims that the meat from these animals can cause severe health effects on people, such as illnesses that “manifest themselves in a way similar to AIDS.” These diseases also have symptoms “related to Alzheimer’s.” I’m not a doctor, but I don’t think this is how diseases work.

The email ends by urging people to boycott McDonald’s “until it sells actual beef.” Well, dear email sender, I reject your call to action. Now, put my fries in the bag.

With that little digression now over, I think you could make a strong argument centered around that legend being merged with something like a creepypasta monster, resulting in Becky’s odd experience with the cryptids behind the McDonald’s she worked at. However, where that story is nowadays—if it even existed, is a mystery.

So, that’s it, right? It was someone making up an entry for their iceberg chart, either because they read a scary story or to pay homage to the long history of McDonald’s urban legends. Well, no, there’s still the matter of Grimace.

I don’t know if many of you remember the little history lesson I gave at the start of the story, but the idea that the McDonald’s Blob referred to the big, adorable, purple thingamabob (I have no idea what Grimace is meant to be) was not something I was going to leave hanging. No, I wanted to save him for now, as his version of the story is much harder to discuss—mainly because I have nothing to work with.

Grimace’s rebranding as Ronald McDonald’s best friend is a fact. There’s no denying that. There is no grand conspiracy behind that. Children didn’t like Grimace’s original design, so McDonald’s changed him to be a more lovable character. So, why was it mentioned in that 4chan post?

Well, I don’t know.

The most obvious explanation would be some Mandela Effect hoopla; the person who created it misremembered something about Grimace and gave the entry a weird name. Or they outright forgot Grimace’s name, remembered the story, and added it in hopes that someone would remind them of who Grimace was.

There’s also the possibility that the creator thought that Grimace was a monstrous blob who consumed milkshakes. If they’d been a child in 1971 when he was introduced, it’s possible he only knew (or remembered) him as the “McDonald’s Blob.” In my eyes, this would make sense. Human memory is imperfect, and it’s exceedingly imperfect if you’re trying to remember something from your childhood.

Whatever the case may be, if Grimace was the McDonald’s Blob the iceberg’s creator was talking about, I know of no conspiracy surrounding him. As far as I’m aware, Grimace has never had any controversy after 1972. While I’m sure that some people still find him a bit creepy, I’d say he’s still less disturbing than the Burger King, who looks like he should be chasing me with an axe made out of inedible food.

Ultimately, this theory and the next one will depend on which version of the McDonald’s Blob you subscribe to. If you think it’s tied to the creator referencing something related to Grimace, you may find this theory to be nonsense. However, if you think it relates to Becky’s encounter with a cryptid (or cryptids), then I’m sure you can safely wager a hefty sum of money on this theory.

On one final note, if this was a creepypasta like that one 4chan poster said, I would love to read it. I’d be curious to know how it all plays out. It’d also be interesting to see how the story might’ve led to this theory being included in the Conspiracy Iceberg. It’s not uncommon for people to be fooled into thinking creepypastas are real; I’d love to know if this was a case where the story felt believable.

2. It’s true

Growing up, I recall visiting going to a Denny’s not far from where I lived. It was quite nice, and it had the best breakfast sausage ever.

Alas, the course of time took its toll on the place. That or management became really bad. The last time I went there, my table had a small hole near it that was home to some flying ants. Suffice it to say, it wasn’t very fun trying to eat.

I think the place found its way back to its feet, but only after it was gutted and renovated. I digress, though; my point is that the idea that poorly run restaurants is not a novelty and can lead to infestations of all kinds. Ants, cockroaches, and rats are quite common in places that are run by the metaphorically blind.

As a result of such unfortunate truths, it stands to reason that Becky’s story could be true, right? I mean, it’s not like there’s anything to discuss in the way of Grimace unless we start grasping at straws about what could be the truth behind that. So, could Becky’s story be some covered-up event in McDonald’s long, storied history?

Well, figuring that out would be an absolute nightmare. For starters, McDonald’s is worth over 200 billion dollars. They have enough money to make any unsavory story surrounding their restaurants disappear like a certain International Brotherhood of Teamsters union boss circa 1975.

On top of that, there are 13,529 McDonald’s restaurants in the United States. Globally, that number is 41,822. Now, of course, these numbers are from 2024; I have no idea when Becky’s experience happened. But my point is that trying to discern which McDonald’s it happened at would be a nightmarish task. I’m one person, and investigating tens of thousands of fast-food joints doesn’t sound like my idea of fun.

But, for the sake of argument, let’s say that it was true. After all, that’s what the theory proposes; there’s no point in dismissing it without having a bit of fun. Why would there be no information on it—aside from the terrifying amount of money that McDonald’s has at its disposal?

Well, it’s possible that McDonald’s wasn’t the one to shove the story into the memory hole. Becky’s boss might have kept the whole thing under wraps from his corporate overlords and used the titular “blob” to lure the Pale Crawlers so he could kill them.

If this story happened in a rural area, I wouldn’t be shocked by this whatsoever. While I can’t vouch for it, I’m confident that a rural American would gladly do something like this. They’re built differently, so I doubt an 8-foot-tall emaciated creature with enormous claws that can run like it’s a cheetah would be much of a challenge.

As for why Becky’s boss would have it out for the lanky creatures, it’d be bad for business. Tell me, would you like to have a gore-stained monster peering in through the window as you eat your Big Mac? Or worse, trying to eat you as you eat your Big Mac? If you answered “yes” to either of these questions, then our idea of a nice meal is vastly different.

Dining etiquette aside, another possibility is a much more conspiratorial one. As I’ve said in the past, Pale Crawlers are thought by some to be government experiments gone awry, interdimensional beings, or something that the governments of the world don’t want citizens to know about. So, it’s possible her employer didn’t tell her to keep quiet, but government agents did.

Not for nothing, but I’d love to imagine Becky as some high schooler who’s working her first job ever, and she ends up being confronted by some federal agents—or Men in Black—who ordered her not to speak about what she saw. That mental image has no right to be as funny as it is to me.

Anyway, this possibility would require a fair bit more work. Not only would you need there to be disclosure about such experiments occurring, but you’d also need it to the health inspector to overlook the ever-growing blob of grease and muck behind the restaurant. Unless they were paid off by Becky’s boss or the government, I think that’s unlikely.

With all of that said, there is the matter of the Grimace version of this story. As I said at the start of the theory, there isn’t much to go over. If that version is true, then it’s a matter of how. I already went over the possibilities in the previous theory, so I won’t go over them again; I’d be repeating myself.

Ultimately, I’d say that this theory isn’t that implausible. At least, not by the standards of the Conspiracy Iceberg. Sure, it still has numerous leaps in logic, but speaking as someone whose blog is called “Limitless Possibilities,” I would be remiss if I scoffed at the idea of a Pale Crawler being baited out with leftover McDonald’s grease.

Oh well, I digress. Let’s move on to the meme theory before we leap into my take on this strange tale.

3. The grease turned the animals into cryptids (or interdimensional monsters)

This was proposed by a friend who goes by “2001 Honda Civic” on Discord (and who made the blog’s banner), and I loved it so much that I felt the need to include it. He posited that the grease from McDonald’s is so bad that it turns regular animals into monsters. Honestly, I can see where he’s coming from.

However, I’d argue that it turns them into something more. They aren’t just monsters. No, they’re interdimensional monsters! I bet someone out there thought I’d break my streak of mentioning interdimensional beings because this was a Conspiracy Iceberg entry. No way am I letting that happen! I said I’d include it in every write-up, and dang it, I will succeed! Now, on to my take!

My Take

Like many Conspiracy Iceberg entries, I think this one was made up. While certain aspects of it strike as less absurd than something like Fox is Here, you’re still talking about a cryptid (or multiple cryptids) waltzing out of somewhere to eat a bunch of leftover McDonald’s grease—and nobody noticed outside of one employee. An employee whose gender isn’t even consistent in the 4chan posts I found.

Indeed, this is something I left out for now because it didn’t fit anywhere. In both of the hyperlinked replies, the 4chan users initially refer to Becky as a “he,” before consistently referring to her as a “she.” This could’ve been an honest mistake on the first user’s part, but it makes me wonder if there were earlier posts that weren’t archived for whatever reason. After all, the first user did refer to it as a “creepypasta.”

That said, I have no idea when or where this theory came from. Normally, I’d speculate it sprang up from 4chan, but I’m not sure in this case. My guess is that it was likely done by an iceberg chart creator who wanted to include a nod to the urban legends surrounding McDonald’s I mentioned earlier.

Maybe one day, I’ll try to find the original chart that mentioned the entry. For now, though, it’s one of those things that remains lost to time (as far as I’m aware). Why? Well, go look up the number of iceberg charts that exist nowadays. There’s one for practically everything, including multiple charts for McDonald’s alone. As stated earlier, I’m one man, and I only have so much time that I wish to allocate to looking for stuff like this.

The doubtfulness I have about this story aside, I do feel the need to concede that the idea the creator of the theory could’ve been referring to Grimace and forgotten his name. Is it likely? Eh, I don’t know. It feels a little odd that someone might’ve forgotten Grimace’s name and couldn’t look up “that purple McDonald’s mascot,” unless they forgot it was even tied to McDonald’s. However, stranger things have happened. I mean, look at the numerous examples of false memories on subreddits like “Tip of my Tongue.”

But, yeah, that’s my take on this whole thing. Despite it likely being made up, I have to admit that it’s easily one of my favorite Conspiracy Iceberg entries. It reads like an old-school urban legend, and it fits in with the other strange tales people have woven about McDonald’s—be it in the form of urban legends of creepypastas. Yes, people have written creepypastas about McDonald’s. Someone tell me when we get a Panera Bread creepypasta.

On one final note, I want to circle back to something I mentioned in the intro to this write-up. No, the irony of how a blog centered on covering mysteries has now become a mystery isn’t lost on me. I must also admit that I love it. I think it adds a unique flavor to the whole thing.

Conclusion

And so, another Decemystery entry draws to a close. This one was an extraordinary amount of fun to write, though I have to admit that the limited number of theories made it a bit awkward to conclude. I supposed I could’ve added more breathing room for myself by dividing the theories based on the versions of the conspiracy, but I didn’t want to pad this out and overcomplicate things.

Despite that little hiccup, this was yet another case where I was reminded of why I love to write. The ability to have as much fun making little jokes while also telling a truly bizarre story that I stumbled across fills me with a lot of happiness and it makes me all the happier knowing that someone, somewhere, will read this and enjoy it.

Of course, it sucks that I couldn’t come to a concrete conclusion as to its origins or what it was about. But, hey, that doesn’t matter. Sometimes, the best part of a story like this is experiencing it. I firmly believe that’s the case with the McDonald’s Blob. The fun wasn’t in solving it; the fun was going along for the wild ride it provided.

But, with that said, it’s time to round this out. So, I ask you, dear reader, what do you think the McDonald’s Blob was—and what version of it is the truth? Was it Becky’s story? Or was it tied to the lovable oaf, Grimace? Tell me in the comments—and as always, stay happy, stay healthy, and thank you for reading!