For fans of the American ice cream institution known as Good Humor, the inability to purchase several of the brand's more popular dessert products due to a major supply shortage is no laughing matter.

Unilever, which manufactures Good Humor's frozen novelties, blamed the lack of Toasted Almond, Candy Center Crunch and Chocolate Eclair bars on a warm spring that saw customers dipping into the stock prematurely, and the impending closure of its manufacturing plant in Hagerstown as part of a national consolidation initiative.

The in-store versions are safe; the shortage only affects the kind found on ice cream trucks.

Spokesman Jeff Graubard said the company expects the matter to be resolved "by mid-summer," but July could not get here soon enough for some.

"The Toasted Almond's such an old-time thing from the 1950s," said New York-based ice cream truck company owner Brian Collis. "It's just such a basic thing we've always had. Now everybody's missing it." Collis says the Good Humor shortage has caused his sales to drop by five percent.

At least one lawmaker isn't taking the Ice Cream Apocalypse lying down.

Long Island legislator David Denenberg (D-Merrick) held a news conference yesterday to voice indignation at the shortage. "The biggest thing on their mind is ice-cream," said Denenberg, referencing the thousands of Nassau County children who are in dire need of the sweet stuff. "It is not the Nassau fiscal crisis."

Reporters who asked how a temporary ice cream bar deficit was more important than the county's multi-million-dollar budget deficit were rebuffed.

Meanwhile, one child in attendance who was asked how she felt about the crisis shrugged it off. "I will still go to the ice-cream truck," she said.