Posts Tagged "diet"

My Scale and I Are Back on Speaking Terms

My scale and I are not on speaking terms. DearKidLoveMom.comDear Kid,

My scale and I are back on speaking terms.

You didn’t know we’d had a falling out? Let me tell you about my scale.

Regular scales wait until someone steps on them, then the scale calculates their weight. No personality, no taking liberties with facts, no diabolical plans.

Not so with my scale.

My scale is alive. It can’t move by itself, but it definitely has a mind of its own.

And it’s stubborn.

It can’t be coaxed into showing the weight I want to be. Which isn’t surprising, since most scales stick with reality rather than sharing my view of the world.

But my scale isn’t really interested in reality as much as it’s interested in messing with me.

My scale makes a daily decision before I get near it. During the night, the scale sits quietly thinking of ways to inflict its own personalized torture. Then it picks a number.

Not an entirely random number. It has never suggested I weigh 7,000 lbs. nor has it ever guessed 6 lbs. Pretty much everything in between is fair game.

Some days, it shows numbers relative close to what I expect to see. Other days, not so much. Let me tell you what happened two days ago.

I got on the scale and yelped. What? I gained 7 lbs. overnight? No way. Then I realized I was still holding a book. Ah. I put it down, reset the scale, and stepped back on. Same number.

Are. You. Kidding. Me?

That book weighed about 17 lbs. It was enormous. It was practically dictionary sized (remind me to explain what a dictionary is). It was the weight of the first 5 volumes of the Encyclopedia Britannica (I’ll explain that one too).

The scale smirked ‘That’s your number for today.’

I stepped off the scale, walked down the hall, snuck back in (changing my cadence so the scale wouldn’t know it was me), and stepped on. Same number.

‘Told you.’

See what I mean?

I decided to snub my scale. I turned my back and walked out. The scale smiled. It knew it had won.

Fortunately, today it shows I’ve lost half a pound, so we’re back on speaking terms.

You have suggestions. I know. I can hear you thinking them.

Your first suggestion is that I get another scale. Not going to happen right now. I know how this scale thinks; I don’t really want to train a new scale. The scale you know is better and all that.

Your second suggestion is that I refrain from weighing myself every day. You might as well suggest I wear ugly shoes every day. Not going to happen in this decade. In fact, the reason I like my current diet is because it requires me to weigh myself every day.

The big problem (yes, I know it’s a big problem) is that my scale has control over me. It’s true, it’s unhealthy, and I have no plans to change my attitude or belief system. (Anyone who wants to tell me not to judge myself by my scale needn’t bother. I don’t judge myself by the scale. I judge my weight by my scale and I believe my weight is important. Without weight, gravity would have nothing to hold on to. I would just like gravity to have a little less to hold on to.)

Love, Mom

P.S. Please don’t try to explain that gravity causes weight. This is a blog about my scale and for purposes of this discussion, Oreos cause weight, not gravity.

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Discussing the Tour de France (History and Cheating)

Dear Kid,

All about the Tour de France. DearKidLoveMom.comOnce upon a time, someone thought it would be a good idea to strap two wheels together, balance precariously between them, and pedal through a lot of mountains until they fell over from exhaustion. Then steroids were invented and they called the ride the Tour de France.

I consulted My Friend the Internet to learn about this year’s ride. There will be 9 flat stages (Flat stages are for wimps because even I can ride a bike if the terrain is flat. I can’t imagine why they include flat stages in the Tour), 3 hilly stages, 7 mountain stages (definitely NOT for wimps), 2 rest days, 1 individual time trial, 1 team time trial, and a partridge in a pear tree.

The longest Tour was in 1926 and covered 3,570 kilometers. This year’s race will cover 3,360 kilometers. No one knows how many miles that is which is fine because we don’t understand much about L’Tour. (We know more about Words on Tour than we do about the Tour de France.)

Not only is there a long tradition of cycling in the Tour de France, there is a long tradition of cheating. Not just the more recent steroid and drug cocktails, but really creative cheating. Like early on, one of the cyclists hopped a train for part of the journey. And in 1953, Jean Robic traded his water bottle for a bottle filled with lead so he could have extra weight to help him zoom down the mountain.

Tour_de_FranceUntil the 1960s, cyclists would drink alcohol during the race to numb the pain. According to My Friend the Internet, alcohol was banned because it was considered a stimulant. (Of course, according to the rest of the world, alcohol is a depressant, but whatev.)

Tour participants burn a lot of calories. And by “a lot” I mean about 5,000 calories a day. For the record, that is more calories than I burn in a month. Which is a really interesting reason to consider becoming a world-class cyclist.

Happy Tour.

Love, Mom

 

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Candy Corn, Cincinnati, and the Greatest Diet Ever

Dear Kid,

Once upon a time, there was no such thing as candy corn. There was candy. There was corn. But the two remained independent.

Then in the 1880s, George Renninger of the Philadelphia, PA-based Wunderle Candy Company got tired of keeping veggies and dessert separate and created candy corn (which of course has everything to do with candy and much less to do with corn).

The history of candy corn, how Cincinnati is involved, and the greatest diet ever. DearKidLoveMom.comGeorge may have been the first, but Gustav Goelitz is the true father of candy corn. He’s the first candy maker to begin commercial production (1898) in – wait for it – Cincinnati, OH. Yep, candy corn’s real life began here in the Queen City.

Back in the Day, candy corn was made by cooking sugar, water, and corn syrup, adding fondant (for texture) and marshmallow (for softness) and then pouring the hot deliciousness into big buckets 45 pounds at a time. The 45 pounds was then applied directly to my hips. No, wait. It just seems that way.

The candy was poured (one color layer at a time) into molds (shaped like corn kernels—sort of), cooled, and sold. Turns out veggie candy was popular and the Goelitz Candy Company made other veggie shapes for a while. Fortunately, they got over that and vegetables went back to being made out of marzipan which is how it is supposed to be.

During WWI, Herman son of Gustav moved to California and formed the creatively named Herman Goelitz Candy Company. Continuing the creative process, Herman made candy corn. Lots and lots of candy corn.

These days over 25 million pounds of candy corn are sold annually. Most bypass retail locations and head directly for my hips. No, wait. It just seems that way.

“Indian corn” is candy corn with a chocolate bottom. This is an approved (by me) version of candy corn.

There are all kinds of imposter-type candy corn (candy corns? candies corn? yark! What’s the protocol here?) including a blackberry cobbler candy corn (in Canada), Christmas “reindeer corn,” Easter “bunny corn,” Valentine’s “cupid corn,” and patriotic “freedom corn.” These are all ridiculous, but probably require much research on my part. Especially the blackberry cobbler corn.

Candy corn has 3.57 calories per kernel. I estimate it takes about 4 calories to chew and digest a single candy corn. Which means this may be the greatest diet ever invented! I just love estimation.

And I love you, too.

Love, Mom

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