pegkerr: (Both the sweet and the bitter)
pegkerr ([personal profile] pegkerr) wrote2008-03-28 12:24 pm
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Chocolate insanity

I usually have a small amount of dark chocolate every day. My habit is to have a smidgen right after lunch: one dark Dove square, for example, or four dark chocolate espresso coffee beans. Just having a small bit, but having it every day, usually keeps the chocolate craving entirely manageable.

Not this week. Oy. Yesterday, I ate lunch, and then overcome with mad cravings, went down to the Spoon River Restaurant, where I know that they have a take-out refrigerator near the register. Found a single serving Ben and Jerry's Chocolate Fudge Brownie ice cream, bought it, and scarfed it down.

This was not enough.

Then I prowled over to Caribou Coffee where I purchased a tin of Bittersweet Chocolate Wedges (70% Cacao). Usually, one of these will last me over a week.

I ate the whole thing, 50 grams of dark chocolate.

The carnage didn't end there. When I got home, I fell upon the package of Dove Dark Chocolate Easter Eggs left over from the girls' Easter baskets. I blush to tell you how many eggs my inner Mongo devoured. And that still wasn't enough!

At 11:00 p.m., I wandered into the kitchen and cut a healthy piece of the (chocolate) pudding pie Delia had baked and put into the refrigerator.

Today, it has been half of a chocolate muffin. When I say "half," this means twice what you should actually eat; it's one of those hugely oversized chocolate-muffins-on-steroids, like something from Panera.

I must stop the madness somehow.

*Ponders.* It's cyclical, really; it's just particularly bad this month. Things should settle down in about a week. Well, taking out everything having anything to do with my endocrine system might help, but that seems a tad extreme.

It may also be a subtle indication that I'm perhaps just a wee bit stressed right now. Just a bit.

[identity profile] skg.livejournal.com 2008-03-28 05:46 pm (UTC)(link)
I just went through this same exact thing--I was scarfing chocolate like a mad fiend, and for similar reasons (stress, hormones).

It has subsided for the moment, but I can still feel it simmering just under the surface of my skin...
naomikritzer: (Default)

[personal profile] naomikritzer 2008-03-28 05:54 pm (UTC)(link)
Ed would shake his head over the fact that you are eating DARK chocolate. He is convinced that milk chocolate offers the stressed-and-depressed a greater pharmaceutical benefit. I think he is also under the impression that it MUST be in the form of Hershey's Kisses. (Clearly, you should try some, and see if the urge to self-medicate subsides.)
naomikritzer: (Default)

[personal profile] naomikritzer 2008-03-28 05:55 pm (UTC)(link)
(I also prefer dark chocolate, mind you. Ed prefers milk chocolate, and he really likes Hershey's Kisses.)
maribou: (Default)

[personal profile] maribou 2008-03-28 06:04 pm (UTC)(link)
There are worse vices in which to permit oneself to wallow.

[identity profile] cesario.livejournal.com 2008-03-28 06:05 pm (UTC)(link)
Considering the way I tend to deal with stress, your dark chocolate splurging really sounds quite sane to me. For instance, you seem to have separated the concepts of "Stress-management" and "self-destruction" which I have not yet done.

[identity profile] papersky.livejournal.com 2008-03-28 08:40 pm (UTC)(link)
I was just reading the Mayo clinic page on migraines, because this one has been going on for a week today and I'm sick of it. One of the things it says is that they're caused by a serotonin weirdness, probably the opposite one from depression, or as I've long thought, the migraine blowouts I get may be what keeps me cheerful. Anyway, they mention serotonin and estrogen and chocolate as being connected, so maybe your body is sending you a timed self-medication message?

[identity profile] huladavid.livejournal.com 2008-03-28 08:58 pm (UTC)(link)
I'm giggling over the image of your "inner Mongo".

[identity profile] wordswoman.livejournal.com 2008-03-28 08:58 pm (UTC)(link)
Chocolate muffins always make me wonder about the real difference between a muffin and a cupcake.

The answer, I've decided, is frosting. So long as you don't frost it, you can pretend it's a muffin.

[identity profile] von-krag.livejournal.com 2008-03-28 11:37 pm (UTC)(link)
Cupcakes use a much lighter batter, rather like a sponge cake. Muffins use a quick bread batter able to hold fruits, nuts etc.

chef tony

[identity profile] kijjohnson.livejournal.com 2008-03-28 09:01 pm (UTC)(link)
You're making me want to eat vast quantities of chocolate now.

(BTW, I have been home from work since Monday, and sleeping til noon or one each day. I miss our phone calls, too, and I can't wait to be well again. )

[identity profile] pegkerr.livejournal.com 2008-03-28 09:07 pm (UTC)(link)
I sent a text message, and then I tried sending a picture message for the first time. Did it go through?

[identity profile] bohemianspirit.livejournal.com 2008-03-28 09:24 pm (UTC)(link)
Hahaha! I can relate. ;-) A day or two after Easter, coming home from work in the early morning, I stopped at Walgreen's, ostensibly to get a small package of Peeps. I bought:


  • a small package of Peeps
  • two Russell Stover coconut cream eggs (covered in dark chocolate)
  • two Russell Stover raspberry cream eggs (covered in dark chocolate)
  • two Russell Stover marshmallow bunnies (covered in dark chocolate)
  • seven (yes, seven) Russell Stover dark chocolate cream eggs with dark chocolate shells -- similar to Cadbury eggs, but all DARK CHOCOLATE!!!111!!!!@&##!!!


You get the idea. ;-)

I went home and ate one coconut cream egg, one raspberry cream egg, one marshmallow bunny, and two dark chocolate cream eggs. My stomach was churning, hours later. I ended up giving the rest of the candy (except the Peeps, which still sit unopened in my cupboard, and two of the dark chocolate cream eggs) to my sister [livejournal.com profile] jemby. I'm not sure if I was being a Good Sister in so doing.

PS - Want a Russell Stover dark chocolate cream egg??? :-D

[identity profile] msagara.livejournal.com 2008-03-28 11:56 pm (UTC)(link)
It may also be a subtle indication that I'm perhaps just a wee bit stressed right now. Just a bit.

Just a bit =/. I don't know if virtual tea is at all helpful, but I'd like to offer you some, and a few moments of peace and quiet as well.

I will say, though, that I now have an intense and irrational need to eat Dark Chocolate, and will probably head out of the house to pick some up before the convention tomorrow...

[identity profile] pegkerr.livejournal.com 2008-03-29 03:27 am (UTC)(link)
Thank you for the virtual tea. In fact, I think I'll go make a real pot right now; that sounds quite nice.

And oh dear! So sorry to have infected you with the dark chocolate craving!

[identity profile] mayakda.livejournal.com 2008-03-31 04:20 pm (UTC)(link)
It might be the self-medication thing, or it might be a a food craving nutritional thing (like pica).