Oh, Chocolate Loveliness OR I Should Clean My Closets More OR WTHWIT?

Recently, I was cleaning out a closet and found a stash of stuff meant for Christmas.  (Except we kind of missed Xmas 2011, didn't we?  In actuality, this stash probably missed Xmas 2010, too.)  It included a plastic candy cane full of Reese's Peanut Butter Cups.  How long has it been in the closet?  Well, we've only lived in this house for six years, so not longer than that.  But I don't remember buying the candy-cane thingy, so at least a couple years old.

Look, swirly chocolate.  If you keep looking at it you'll begin to
imagine you're a chicken or maybe that you're hungry for
potato chips.  Something like that.  It's hyp-not-ic.

I looked at it.  HIM looked at it.  Cressy was off doing something else so she didn't look at it.  I said, "How long is chocolate good for?"  HIM said, "I do not know."  I said, "I'm willing to sacrifice myself for the glory of chocolate."  (Or something very much like that.)  HIM said, "No, no.  I can't have you doing that.  I'll do it."  We debated who was going to throw themselves on the sacrificial alter of chocolate for a bit before Cressy said, "What are you talking about?" because if we're out of her sight for more than ten minutes, she knows something's going on.  HIM hid the chocolate because Cressy doesn't truly appreciate the chocolatey goodness.  I said, "The equilateral triangle's side of a hypothalamus.  Or is it a hippopotamus?"  Cressy said, "What?"  I said, "Don't worry about it."  Cressy said, "Okay, Spongebob's on, anyway."

HIM and I stared at the chocolate intently.  We were supra-intent.  (That's more than intent and less than ultra-intent.)  (Well, I couldn't look away.  I was blinded by all the gold wrapping.)

I just drooled on myself.  I have to go get a towel to wipe it off.
Also the cat's looking at me like I lost my mind.

I mean, OMFG, there had been Reese's Peanut Butter Cups in my house, just sitting there, not being eaten, for not just weeks, but fricking years!  I don't think this has ever happened before in the history of all Fat Women.  (On a side note, who the bleep is Reese and why does he have ALL the peanut butter cups?)

I'm quite certain I don't forget that there's chocolate in the house.  (Except this time because I'm in charge of buying Christmas stuff, so I know HIM didn't buy it.  However, I could be mistaken or my brain is starting to fail.  Either one.)  I'm like Rainman when it comes to goodies in my house.  I can make a list.  Ruffles, Hersey's Kisses, Girl Scout cookies in the freezer, and some Hersey's chocolate bars on top of the refrigerator.  I know exactly where they're at and how much is left.  If someone eats some, I'm all over it.  Recently I discovered a full cookie box of thin mints in the pantry and it was like striking oil.  I did a Fat Woman dance.  (Trust me, this is excitement at its very best.)

Curious about whether the chocolate was still good, I Googled it.  It turns out that chocolate can go stale.  (Since it's the first time this has happened in my house or any house I've ever lived in, I'm aghast.)  I mean how did anyone ever find out that chocolate goes bad?  They said, "Let's wait and see what happens to it."  But the Fat Woman was screaming, "NOOOOOO!  NOT THE CHOCOLATE!  WE MUST EAT IT!  There will be no scientific experiments to discover its longevity!"

And in the Google-ityness of the search, I found an article about chocolate, obviously written by a fat person or a secretly fat person.  (This is a person who longs to eat whatever he or she wants but is afraid of society's castigation.  The pussy.)

Here's the article, in case you want to read the author's take on chocolate goodness and not my sarcastic version, although I can't imagine why: 5 Things You Didn't Know About Chocolate.

Now I will discuss it because I'm fairly certain my brain will explode if I don't discuss it.  I'm compelled.  I'm often compelled.  It's part of my brain workup.

1.  Chocolate can help you work out.  Someone, somewhere took a few minutes to study how chocolate impacted workout recovery.  (Man, where was I when they did that study?)  Chocolate helps you recover just as well as smoothies.  Whoo-hoo!  I have an official excuse.  (I can't wait to see the expressions on all those skinny women at the gym.)

2.  Your period doesn't make you crave chocolate.  (Sorry, fellas.)  I'm not sure how this rumor started.  I could say it was by a woman who wanted coddling during an event of cataclysmic proportion, but it could also be by a man who thought he could be very clever.  "See, sweetie, chocolate during that...time...makes you feel better.  You look like a goddess.  I swear."  Okay, either way, it's win-win, unless the weight issue comes up.  Then the man is unilaterally screwed.

I love re-using this drawing.

3.  Back to chocolate.  Chocolate is not a delicious, sweet, coffee substitute.  I didn't realize people everywhere were drinking hot chocolate like it was coffee.  My bad.  Well, it ain't true.  Coffee wakes you up.  Chocolate not so much.  But the good news is that you can always add chocolate to your coffee.  Or you can add coffee to your chocolate.

4.  Good news for kids.  Bad news for dentists.  Chocolate is not all that bad for teeth!  Yea!  High five!  Fist pump!  Take that, evil dentists everywhere who LIED about chocolate.  This article says that chocolate contains theobromine, an organic molecule that helps to strengthen enamel in teeth.  YEA, theobromine!  I don't know what an organic molecule really is, but I can totally get on board with it!  Let's worship organic molecules everywhere.  Now I'm just getting silly.

I swear I remember my dentist from when I was 12 telling me
this.  Really.  There might have been a machete in his hand, too.

5.  The last is best.  Chocolate contains flavonoids.  Upon reading this, I thought, what the eff is a freaking flavonoid and why does it sound like something an alien would give to you upon kidnapping you for probing?  (Well, that's what it sounds like to me.  Also there's Lou Rawls singing in that mental scenario and black velvet paintings of semi-naked female aliens.  They're obviously aliens from a very sleazy planet.)  Back to flavonoids.  Flavonoids are a phytochemical.  (Another question.  What's a phytochemical and how long do I take the antibiotic to get rid of it?)  Seriously, flavonoids are a good thing.  What they do is use every clever catch word of the ambitiously healthy to inform us who are less than truly informed that goodness emanates from them.  (Emanates from the flavonoids, that is.  Something else emanates from the ambitiously healthy and I'm not saying what it is in public.)  Here comes the clever catch words that will fill you with arrogant, holier-than-thou knowitallness: antioxidant, anti-inflammatory, and cell-protective!  YEA, flavonoids!  I had to spellcheck the hell out of you, but you obviously rock.

Anyway, chocolate good for me.  And it turns out that the Reese's Peanut Butter Cups did not taste bad at all.  But that Hersey's kiss we found in Cressy's dresser drawer, not so good.

In conclusion, if I was being executed tomorrow (Probably for bad grammar, excessive commas, and typos, according to some people.) I would have chocolate and shrimp for my last meal, probably not in that order. (Although I have not yet tried chocolate on shrimp.)