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"Hi! Would you like to try a delicious, gluten-free, dairy-free ravioli?" asked a woman standing behind a small table in the pasta section of the grocery store. The table was set with a dozen small cups that each contained one ravioli. She raised one of the cups and thrust it at me with a fork. The ravioli looked innocuous enough, and I had skipped lunch to go grocery shopping, so I was hungry. But I paused before accepting the offering. I had been on the receiving end of grocery store samples before, and they had typically never been a good experience.

"Sure," I finally said, thinking it was just one ravioli; how bad could it be?

I took the cup and popped the ravioli in my mouth.

Two seconds into chewing I realized I had made a terrible mistake. The ravioli tasted like a soggy sock. Not that I ever eaten a sock before but it's what I imagined a sock would taste like. My dog, of course, loves socks, which often made me wonder, when I found him glomming on one that he stole from the laundry basket, if I was, in fact, missing out on something by not eating a sock. But since the dog also eats rocks and slugs, I don't think he's a very good barometer of things that taste good.

I looked around to see if there was a way I could extricate the ravioli from my mouth without calling attention to it and insulting the ravioli lady. There were napkins on the table. Next to the table, there was a small garbage can with the remains of the ravioli cups and some wadded-up napkins. I wondered how many of those wadded-up napkins contained the remains of other people's ravioli who had come before me and decided, like me, that the ravioli tasted like a soggy sock and was not something they wanted to ingest.

The ravioli lady looked at me expectantly.

She held up another cup and smiled. "Would you like another?"

I couldn't answer because the ravioli was still in my mouth, and I realized I was going to have to do something drastic.

I swallowed it.

I immediately realized I should have spit it into a napkin and thrown it out instead, but I was concerned about hurting the ravioli lady's feelings. I'm not sure why I was so worried about that. I was pretty sure she didn't make the ravioli herself or hold stock in the ravioli. I assumed it was just her job for the day to hand out samples of ravioli and entice people to buy the product. But then again, maybe she volunteered for the job because she liked to make people happy with free food. If that were the case, however, maybe I should let her know that she might make people happier if she gave out samples of chocolate instead.

The lady held out another cup of ravioli for me, clearly mistaking my grimace for pleasure.

"Would you like one more?" she repeated. "We have plenty."

I shook my head as politely as I could.

"Thank you, no," I said as I began to move away from the table. "I'm full."

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Tracy Beckerman is the author of the Amazon Bestseller, "Barking at the Moon: A Story of Life, Love, and Kibble," available on Amazon and Barnes and Noble online! You can visit her at www.tracybeckerman.com.

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