The Candy Dish!

How many of us have a candy dish in our office?  Show of hands?  Ok, I can't really see you raising your hand, but I will tell you that we have one.  Actually, there are several.  Our office is a nightmare for anyone trying to watch their weight.  We have cake & ice cream once a month; bagels, pastries and fruit every Friday and then there are all the other parties throughout the year.  But let's get back to the candy dish.

There are a couple of secretaries who have them, but the one with the most enticing array of candy and chocolate is the one at the reception desk.  Did you catch that word chocolate?  Oh yes, this candy dish isn't just some hard candies.  Oh no, it contains mini Reese's peanut butter cups, fun size Mounds and Almond Joy, mini Snickers...you name it, it has probably been in that candy dish at one time or another. 

Have you ever seen any stats on the office candy jar and what it can do to your weight?  Let me share a bit with you:

Sweating It Off

Eating just two pieces of candy each workday adds about 480 calories to the bottom line over a work week. To burn that off, a 160-pound person would have to:

• Walk (2 mph): 157 minutes
• Ballroom dance: 132 minutes
• Golf (carrying clubs): 88 minutes
• Backpack: 56 minutes
• Run (8 mph): 29 minutes

A 2006 study shows that office employees ate nearly8 pieces of candy each day when there was a candy dish available. 

Three tiny peanut butter cups dent your diet to the tune of 120 calories plus 3 grams of saturated fat. 

I remember an article I'd read a few years ago about how much weight the average person gains when they have an office candy dish and eat candy from it daily.  I wish I could find the actual article and the stats, but it was astounding. 

So, when 2013 started, I decided that I was not going to touch the office candy dish anymore.  And I haven't.  Honesty, I have not eaten a single piece of candy from that candy dish.  I also haven't taken anything from the not-so-hidden stash that is used to refill the candy dish, with the exception of one hard candy when I had a cold/sore throat a few months ago and couldn't find a cough drop.  I have taken gum from the drawer, sugarless.  I am very proud of myself and my friend, who is the receptionist and the one responsible for filling the dish, is pretty amazed and tells everyone how I don't eat it. 

I was eating at least 5 pieces a day.  And those 3 mini peanut butter cups, yeah, that was more like 6 or 8.  I love chocolate and peanut butter together, so those were my weakness.  Along with the Almond Joy.  And then at Easter, it's the malted milk Robin's Eggs. 

But I'm not doing that anymore.  I won't say I never eat candy, but I don't eat any from the office candy dish anymore.  That was the epitome of mindless eating.  Now I look at it every time I walk by, which so far today has probably been about 20 times, but I don't touch it and honestly, it rarely "calls to me" anymore. 

(if I find that article and those stats about how much people gain, I will update this post.)