McDonald's was forced to go into damage control after a rogue manager made a statement on the lore of one of the fast-food chain's team of mascots, leading to this absolutely surreal pair of sentences:

"Whether he’s a taste bud, a milkshake or just your favorite purple blob – the best part about Grimace is that he means different things to different people. Whatever he is, we’re just proud our bestie makes people happy."

Here's how we got here: late in August, Brian Bates, a manager of a McDonald's in Windsor, Canada, won the award for Outstanding Manager of the Year. In a puff piece for CBC, Bates discussed the challenges of managing a McDonald's in the COVID-19 era and his strategies for maintaining profitability in a difficult economic time. To conclude the interview, the interviewer tossed in a "fun" question: "What is Grimace, anyway?"

"He is an enormous taste bud, but a taste bud nonetheless," Bates said. "The purpose of Grimace is to show the food tastes good."

Grimace, you'll remember, is the purple, blobular, McNuggies-loving tertiary mascot of McDonald's. He used to be a four-armed villain alongside the Hamburgler before McDonald's sliced off two of his arms and softened him into a lovable, friendly oaf akin to Patrick Star or the Yellow M&M.

It wasn't long before the revelation/bizarre collection of words "Grimace is a taste bud" began to rattle in the brains of social media, leading to coverage in global media publications. Mashable picked up the story and discovered that McDonald's had weighed in on this before. In 2012, the company insisted he was "the embodiment of a milkshake," though "others insist he's a taste bud." In 2014, they said "Grimace lore" featured a scholarly debate over whether Grimace was a milkshake or a taste bud.

@janinegutierrez Grimace is the embodiment of a milkshake, though others still insist he's a taste bud. :)

— McDonald's Corporation (@McDonaldsCorp) May 7, 2012

In addition to their statement given to USA Today maintaining the mystery of Grimace, McDonald's tweeted an It's always WYD meme about Grimace.

it's always "what is Grimace" and never "how is Grimace"

— McDonald’s (@McDonalds) September 8, 2021