Every so often, if you’re lucky, something comes along that provides a moment of clarity, that makes sense of the nonsensensical, that bursts through the gnawing doubts that plague your life. For me, that happened the other day when I came across the following headline: “Cheese can be as addictive as morphine.”
Well, that explains everything.
I’ve always thought my attraction to cheese went beyond the simple enjoyment of, say, the ambrosial zing of a good sharp cheddar. After all, doctors — who’ve spent a lot of money on medical school — have advised that I avoid foods that could raise my cholesterol. And yet when I encounter a cheese tray I not only don’t keep walking, I have to resist the urge to dive in head first, like Augustus Gloop in Willy Wonka’s chocolate river.
But as it turns out, I’m not just a gluttonous hog with poor impulse control. Dr. Neal Barnard, president of the Physicians Committee on Responsible Medicine, told the Ananova news service that cheese is addictive because it contains small amounts of morphine from cows’ livers. If that’s true you think you’d see a lot more people ordering liver and onions, but I’m sure Dr. Barnard will weigh in on that shortly.
The problem has been compounded for me by a very nice woman from my office. Every office has a woman like this — she’s ostensibly not in charge, but if she ever quit the entire operation would collapse, and management would be left staring at each other around a bare conference table, wondering why there were no bagels as the competition siphoned the gas out of their cars.
Anyway, this woman instituted “Cheese Tuesdays,” during which she puts out cheese and crackers for the assembled workers.
To read the rest of the story, please go to: Wicked Local.