's motd Friday April 9, 2010

[Guest guest]

IS IT LUNCH TIME YET?

Friday, 09 April 2010

I was raised to eat...by the clock! My busy day of eating began bright and early at 7AM with breakfast. After some bacon and eggs, I was off to school. At around 10:30 that morning, we got a morning snack break. Later, lunch time for us came just after noon. Oh, I just about got a neck ache everyday, turning my head to look at the clock hanging in the back of the classroom. When is that darned clock gonna strike noon?!

After school, I'd run home and have another snack as soon as I walked through the door. And at 6PM, we'd all have dinner in the dining room before heading to the living room for bowls of ice cream to eat while watching TV.Yep, that was my life. And I'm pretty sure many of you were raised to eat by the clock, too. But as we've gotten older, many of us have added a lot more snacking to our daily schedules. Some of you snack in the car on the drive to and from work. I'm amazed at how many people I see eating in their cars. A lot of them even keep food in their cars, maybe hidden away in the glove compartment. (Hey, you never know when you might break down in the middle of the desert! LOL.)Then there are those people who keep food at or on their desks at work. Some of them have little candy bowls sitting on their desks filled with those "cute" mini-candy bars. Mr. Goodbar, come my way!And a lot of people stop someplace after work to pick up a little snack to tide them over until they get home and have dinner.

R-i-i-i-i-n-n-n-g! Oh, it's the phone. I wonder how many people end up grabbing something to snack on while settling down for a phone conversation with their mom or a best friend? Last week, I called a lady who really was trying to lose weight...I thought. That is, until I heard the sound of potato chips crunching in her mouth on the other end of the phone.And of course, there're the millions of Americans who wake up in the middle of the night and reflexively head for the kitchen for the infamous "midnight snack." But during that bout of what may as well be called "sleep eating," they can easily consume the calories contained in a full-size meal!Now, add all of those meals and snacks up and we're talking a weight-gain adding up, too! Listen, you can't eat that many extra calories a day and not gain weight. Some of you have turned snacks into mini-meals. That's why you need to journal what you're eating or pick up a FoodMover here in our store to help you. You need to be able to keep track of just how many calories you're consuming each day.

I know some of you work from home or are stay-at-home moms. (Which is a job all by itself!) But the danger is that when you're home all day, your kitchen is always just a matter of steps from where ever you may be working in the house. And let's face it, that fact makes it very easy for you to sneak to the kitchen and have yourself a little...snack!That's why you have to be strong at home, at work, or in the car driving past the 30 fast-food joints you'll see on the average drive around town. Remember this today, and keep saying it to yourself: I am stronger than the food! I want to eat to live and not live to eat!I know you know what the best snacks are. That's right, how's about some fresh fruit or maybe some chopped up pieces of colorful vegetables.

Polly want a carrot?Love,