A friend has just told me it is National Chocolate Week this week. Regular readers will be familiar with my chocolate trials and tribulations, but who am I to turn down any reason to celebrate the wonders of the humble cocoa bean? It is obviously my duty (and honour!) to take part.
To mark this sublime event, I hovered for far too long in front of the chocolate display at my local supermarket yesterday. I had just been for my monthly blood check and was in need of a little treat to cheer myself up. I trundled out the old MS excuse to myself, ‘hey, I deserve it, I’ve got MS’. This can work on pretty much anything – another glass of wine, extra helping of roast potatoes, another hour on the sofa.
So there I am, moving swiftly past the Christmas displays, the huge boxes of Thorntons (I’m not that greedy), on to the single chocolate bars. Furtively, I snatch a family-sized Dairy Milk, shoving it under my healthy yoghurts, fruit and low-fat cheese. At the check-out, I tut, saying ‘kids, eh?’ as the chocolate is swiped through, neatly blaming the chocolate on The Teenager. Result!
Gwyneth Paltrow once said in an interview that she stops herself having junk food by eating naked, in front of a mirror. Ha! The biggest mirror I have is in my hallway, I have a glass front door and I don’t think my postman would appreciate the view. I prefer the Fridge Plan. Put your chosen contraband in the coldest part of the fridge. This makes it much harder to scoff in one go. Clever. Plus, whenever I open the fridge door, The Teenager miraculously appears next to me, peering over my shoulder and I have to hastily hide it behind the ketchup again.
But I know it is there, and I know I will very, very quietly rescue it, silently open it, and sink into chocolate oblivion. Again. *Sigh*.