Coffee with Christine: Chocolate, the Super Bowl, and Valentine’s Day

On the New Health Regime: Basically, I’ve reached a plateau. I’m sure it has nothing to do with my affinity for calories or with my recent tumble off the wagon and into the chocolate fountain.

On chocolate: It all started on the last Friday in January. We went out to dinner, and I was pretty much forced on pain of death to order a peanut butter pie for dessert. It’s true and complicated. I made a valiant effort to pass the pie on to the small people, but they weren’t interested, so there I found myself with a piece of perfectly good peanut butter pie.

“No problem,” I really thought, “I’ll just eat around the chocolate drizzle, the chocolate peanut butter cups sprinkled on top, and the chocolate crumb crust.”

This worked quite well in an awkward sort of way until about midnight, when LCB and I were deep into a movie, and I realized I was hungry. The chocolate parts of the pie were sitting in a takeout box in the fridge.

Suddenly, I decided that abstaining from chocolate was an over-valued personal goal. So, I ate the rest of the pie. On the cusp of my twenty-sixth day without chocolate, I caved.

On the Super Bowl (which involved chocolate and Downton Abbey):  Some of you will love this one. Two days before the Super Bowl, I heard that a recent poll had found that veggies were the most common Super Bowl food on people’s party food list. Seriously? Who did they poll, vegans? Carrot farmers? My I-feed-my-baby-avocados sister? Upon hearing this, LCB and I decided to uninvite any veggies to our family Super Bowl party in an act of protest. Seriously. This, of course, meant we had an opening in our guest list, so I made The Pioneer Woman’s dark chocolate brownies. I blame Ree, really, for flaunting them all over Facebook earlier in the week.

They were really, really good; in fact, they were so good that the next day I found myself staring dolefully at the two emergency dark chocolate brownie mix boxes sitting in my pantry.

We had the game on in the background of our eating until about 8:45, at which point we ditched the Super Bowl for the more civilized pursuit of preparing to watch Downton Abbey. By preparing, I mean we secured all necessary sustenance (more wings and more brownies), used the bathroom, and told the small people we were no longer accepting excuses for getting out of bed, as those might serve to distract us from the show.

By “we,” I kind of more mean “me.” But LCB owes me on account of my indefatigable support during his Prison Break days, so he goes along for the ride and laughs so hard and long at Maggie Smith’s lines that I inevitably can’t hear the next six lines of dialogue.

Just saying.

On the Daddy/Daughter Dance: Baby-girl and LCB went to a Daddy/Daughter dance last weekend. The highlight, as some of my Facebook buddies know, was when LCB took home the gold in the Daddy limbo contest, beating out a sixteen-year-old (brother, not father) in the process. I’m still searching for evidence beyond the testimony of a few dozen people.

More on chocolate: LCB took a picture special-like, just for all y’all. It’s true. Last Friday night I fell asleep reading the paper, my hand in the proverbial cookie jar we all have been warned about. Except in this case, it was, quite literally, in the very same candy dish I showed you when I announced my chocolate downfall. Yes, I was sitting on the couch reading and yes, eating chocolate. I remember closing my eyes and leaning over, too tired to do anything but fall asleep right where I was. And at some point, I did wake up and go to bed. But the next day, while reviewing pictures on my camera, I found several unflattering shots of me.

When questioned, LCB grinned sheepishly and said, “I thought your readers would want to know.” I deliberated for nearly a week before deciding to post one. It was only when I recalled my post where I revealed how I humiliated myself in a local bank that I realized I long ago stepped outside the bounds of internet decorum.

The man almost can’t take a good picture of me to save his life (trust me, I can back up this assertion), but he’s a regular Old Faithful when it comes to capturing moments like this.

On Valentine’s Day: We’re preparing for the day as we always do, with the small people assembling their class valentines tonight while LCB and I exchange looks of, “So, are we doing anything this year?”

Ah, well, not to worry. Leftover Valentine’s chocolates go on clearance on Saturday.  

Happy Valentine’s Day, everyone!