Hello Fellow Travelers!
My "dark passenger" is brown sugar! I had no problem giving up wine (if you need a straw to drink anything drinking fine wine probably isn't on your short list of priorities), but I found a new-to-me adoration of desserts in general and cookies in particular. I was watching CNN and Alan Dershowitz was brilliantly opining on some high-profile legal matter and he used the expression "having his cake and eating it too." All I could think of was,"MMMMM Cake!" Great! I've turned into Homer Simpson!
This is new for me, previous to 2011 I was an exclusive fan of salty/snacky foods. I had little use for desserts in general and no use for chocolate at all. Since 2011 I have had a ceaseless need for cookies, toffee, ginger snaps, and coffee desserts. I dream about Kahlua-infused cake, really dark chocolate and molasses cookies. I used to watch Legal Zoom commercials just so I could see that Janet Lady make and sell her toffee!
Remember how I stopped watching most TV? Well, I still watch pastry shows: "Cupcake Wars" and, no, it's not a show about bakers launching cupcakes at each other, that would be fun to watch. "Sweet Genius" is a dessert competition show that only includes chocolate/candy and cake, so it's a perfect fit for my vicarious needs.
"Cupcake Wars"? I don't think cupcakes can even be described as an actual food! I was at my PS (Patient Spouse's) parent's not too long ago and I was hunting cookies my mother-in-law keeps on hand for the grandchildren! You want to hear what else she had? In a pewter bowl? Probably because the wrappers were color coordinated? Dark chocolate toffee mixed with Dove bites and those (Lindt?) truffles that are on TV. Yummy central! Prior to 2011, I wouldn't have looked twice at that bowl. You know what tastes pretty much just like kahlua? Costco's frozen mocha! I know that because I have had dozens of these drinks. Which brings up another by-product of my sweet rampage that's new to me - fat. Really, I used to tell my size by what size of clothes I wore. Now, seeing as many doctors as I do, I get weighed often. So I know how much I weigh, how much I should weigh how much I want to weigh and because I have no balance, so does Patient Spouse. He wields this knowledge like a Hanso Sword in "Kill Bill" either volume. He can keep me away from sugar all he wants, it won't stop me from thinking about it! "C" is for "Cookie" - The Cookie Monster. There has to be a patron saint of bakeries. There is! St. Honorie! Patron Saint of bakers! How great is that?
My PS hauls me around often, so me being on the lighter side is safer for all concerned. And dental issues! After a particularly nasty fall (You don't want to know. Suffice it to say, bones were broken, so were teeth), I had to get dental work done, because the radiation weakened my teeth along with my newfound love of all things dark sugar created a "perfect storm" scenario in my mouth. A lifetime of perfect dental visits ruined in a single year!
So, there it is. I like to think my of my new ardor for sugar as an example of neuroplasticity (the undamaged part of the brain creating new pathways around the damaged part) at work. Whether it's true or not I have no clue, but it would explain a lot so I'll keep crediting neuroplasticity until someone tells me otherwise. Now that there's a saint involved fighting a war with cupcakes doesn't seem so stupid! Maybe cookies are a perfect food and the Cookie Monster is a visionary! Most geniuses are!
My "dark passenger" is brown sugar! I had no problem giving up wine (if you need a straw to drink anything drinking fine wine probably isn't on your short list of priorities), but I found a new-to-me adoration of desserts in general and cookies in particular. I was watching CNN and Alan Dershowitz was brilliantly opining on some high-profile legal matter and he used the expression "having his cake and eating it too." All I could think of was,"MMMMM Cake!" Great! I've turned into Homer Simpson!
This is new for me, previous to 2011 I was an exclusive fan of salty/snacky foods. I had little use for desserts in general and no use for chocolate at all. Since 2011 I have had a ceaseless need for cookies, toffee, ginger snaps, and coffee desserts. I dream about Kahlua-infused cake, really dark chocolate and molasses cookies. I used to watch Legal Zoom commercials just so I could see that Janet Lady make and sell her toffee!
Remember how I stopped watching most TV? Well, I still watch pastry shows: "Cupcake Wars" and, no, it's not a show about bakers launching cupcakes at each other, that would be fun to watch. "Sweet Genius" is a dessert competition show that only includes chocolate/candy and cake, so it's a perfect fit for my vicarious needs.
"Cupcake Wars"? I don't think cupcakes can even be described as an actual food! I was at my PS (Patient Spouse's) parent's not too long ago and I was hunting cookies my mother-in-law keeps on hand for the grandchildren! You want to hear what else she had? In a pewter bowl? Probably because the wrappers were color coordinated? Dark chocolate toffee mixed with Dove bites and those (Lindt?) truffles that are on TV. Yummy central! Prior to 2011, I wouldn't have looked twice at that bowl. You know what tastes pretty much just like kahlua? Costco's frozen mocha! I know that because I have had dozens of these drinks. Which brings up another by-product of my sweet rampage that's new to me - fat. Really, I used to tell my size by what size of clothes I wore. Now, seeing as many doctors as I do, I get weighed often. So I know how much I weigh, how much I should weigh how much I want to weigh and because I have no balance, so does Patient Spouse. He wields this knowledge like a Hanso Sword in "Kill Bill" either volume. He can keep me away from sugar all he wants, it won't stop me from thinking about it! "C" is for "Cookie" - The Cookie Monster. There has to be a patron saint of bakeries. There is! St. Honorie! Patron Saint of bakers! How great is that?
My PS hauls me around often, so me being on the lighter side is safer for all concerned. And dental issues! After a particularly nasty fall (You don't want to know. Suffice it to say, bones were broken, so were teeth), I had to get dental work done, because the radiation weakened my teeth along with my newfound love of all things dark sugar created a "perfect storm" scenario in my mouth. A lifetime of perfect dental visits ruined in a single year!
So, there it is. I like to think my of my new ardor for sugar as an example of neuroplasticity (the undamaged part of the brain creating new pathways around the damaged part) at work. Whether it's true or not I have no clue, but it would explain a lot so I'll keep crediting neuroplasticity until someone tells me otherwise. Now that there's a saint involved fighting a war with cupcakes doesn't seem so stupid! Maybe cookies are a perfect food and the Cookie Monster is a visionary! Most geniuses are!
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