I was in mint condition, but now I'm melting ... melting

Tuesdays are my favorite day of the week. I don't have any board meetings, rehearsals, or physical therapy. The house cleaners don't come. And now that grass cutting season is over, the lawn guys leave me alone, too.

What do I do on my favorite day of the week? Mostly I like to putter around--maybe do a few errands. Today I did so many--involving shopping for and then stringing Christmas lights all over my yard--that I became dangerously under-caffeinated. So at 5:00, after I dropped my son at his cello lesson, I decided to get myself some coffee.

I went to Caribou Coffee to get a seasonal latte. Something Christmas-y and festive. (After all, there should be some pay-off for the time I spent leaning out my porch windows stringing colored icicle lights along the window boxes.)

I picked the Mint Condition latte made with dark chocolate.

I didn't want to be ridiculously decadent, so I ordered the drink without the whipped cream. But then the barrista forgot and included it. I refused to let her throw out the drink and make me another. I'm earth friendly and green (and a cheap bastid) and anyway, what the hell, right? I usually drink my coffee with 2 percent milk and Splenda, and in the words of an advertisement so old it actually predates the internet: if I'm going to go blonde, I'm going blonde all the way.

Well. It was the best thing I've ever tasted in my life. Seriously. Coffee, milk, dark Guittard chocolate, mint flavoring ... even chopped Andes candy sprinkled on the whipped cream. This thing was an orgasm in a coffee cup. All it needed was some booze and it would be the perfect food.

Down towards the bottom of the cup, I started to wonder whether it was possible that I'd actually lost my appetite for dinner. I realize this sounds unlikely. But I felt strangely full. And my stomach hurt. In fact, I think my pancreas was hurting as well.

I staggered home to investigate and discovered that in the space of about five minutes, I had chugged a couple of candy bars. Maybe three. Because this


represents a whopping 590 calories. Or--in another way of looking at it--my dinner.

No wonder I tried to get my husband to cook. No wonder I didn't want to look at food. Or smell it. Or think about it.

On the bright side, with my 590 calories, I also got 11 grams of protein and 35 percent of my calcium for the day! Which means that when I keel over with a heart attack from chugging 41 grams of fat, I won't break a hip bone.