Burger King should thank the lady working in the Library who suggested I try the new on-campus location. Their prices are competitive, she insisted.

And who could resist that flame-broiled smell that takes an extra cap of Downy to eliminate?

So, this week I made my first visit. I opened the door, and like many going for the first time, I gasped. “This line is way too long,” I thought.

My keen eyes noticed that most, if not all, of the ordering stands were opened. It didn’t take long to move to the front of the line and soon find a seat.

“Wow!” I thought. “This is nice. What will the folks at BK think of next?”

It didn’t take them long to answer. This week America welcomed the bun-less burger.

Excuse my French, but the idea of a burger without buns sounds completely fried.

Yet, breadless Whoppers are Burger King’s response to the craze for low-carb meals. An advertisement in USA Today on Wednesday showed the King’s signature burger with dotted lines marking the outline of where the bun normally goes.

Some may view eating a hamburger without a bun like eating finger sandwiches without fingers. Impossible!

Don’t worry. The good folks at BK thought of everything. They’ll serve up that same flame-broiled goodness, minus the buns, in plastic salad bowls — knife and fork included.

The skinny for those keeping a food diary: The bun-less Whopper has 3 grams of carbohydrates, compared with 52 for a regular Whopper, the Associated Press reports.

What happened to the good old days when you could eat what you want and be loved for all the fluffiness that followed? I grew up “big boned” as those of us who hated to call ourselves “fat” would say. Thankfully, I went to private school for most of my childhood and wore uniforms. Still, I thought “husky” was a name brand because it was sewn into everything I wore.

My family is full of full-figured gals and hefty men.

Loving yourself as big meant simply that there was more of you to love. I also developed quite a vocabulary of terms to describe myself any way except fat.

Ridiculed and teased by an older brother because of my juiciness, I toned up in high school. By my junior year, the scale chimed in at a staggering 145 pounds — 40pounds less than when I started ninth grade.

Victory, I thought.

The teasing continued.

Suddenly, I was too skinny. “Skin and bones,” my brother began saying.

I didn’t care. My thighs were finally small enough that I wasn’t rubbing a hole in the legs of my pants when I walked any more. I exercised at least four times a week, and I stopped eating red meat, fish, chicken and most anything fried.

The nutrition class I took sophomore year of college changed everything. The professor asked that we remember one thing if nothing else: Moderation and variety, he said, were the key to a healthy diet. It didn’t matter what we ate, as long as we didn’t overeat. What a novel concept, I thought.

Slowly I re-added the things to my diet that had been cut. I continued to exercise and instead of creeping to the refrigerator for an Oreo at 2 a.m., I nibbled on carrot sticks. Life in the food lane never tasted so good. In light of Burger King’s latest fad, I think I’ll keep having it my way: extra sesame on the bun, please.

Kevin Graham is a former Oracle Editor in Chief. usfkevin@yahoo.com