Full of it

Attention, attention, I have an announcement to make: I am pregnant. I am carrying a baby. This is something that I never dreamed was possible, particularly at my extravagantly elderly age of 52. But miracles do happen, even to the old and single. Or particularly to the old and single. 

Now, you are probably wondering how, exactly, did this pregnancy occur. Seems a fair question, even if the only things you know about me are my aforementioned age and marital status. Those of you who know me more, um, intimately, might wonder further about this. Perhaps you remember me having my tubes tied many years ago. Or the subsequent hysterectomy I had just a few years ago.

It would seem impossible, wouldn't it, for me to carry a baby? But that's because you don't know my secret recipe. I know how to make a baby without any of those accouterments you might have thought necessary (eggs, sperm, womb.)

Today, I formed a baby from pasta with pesto sauce and mashed potatoes! Yes, I am carrying a carbohydrate baby. My stomach is beautiful, a perfectly rounded mound of ingested carbs. You can almost see the outline of the cute little napping rotini, spotted with basil and pine nuts.  

(Did I carry extend that joke a paragraph too long? Too bad. I enjoyed it.)

The baseline of my joke, sadly, is true. Carbs make my stomach stick out. Way out. Nearly as far as a pregnant belly would! I've been trying to avoid them (carbs, not pregnancies) for years, ever since my doc suggested I try a low carb, high protein diet due to some liver issues. 

When I am successful at avoidance (wow, an area of life where avoidance is a positive!) I lose weight and keep it off. When I am not successful at avoidance, I get big. 

But I love carbs. I crave carbs. Carbs should be my friends--and probably yours, too. What problem can't be solved by a piece of good bread slathered with butter? Mashed potatoes coursing with melted butter are an obvious fuel of the mind. And we won't even bother to consider how many otherwise challenging lives are lubricated toward ease by a single nightly application of gin and tonic. 

Carbs are clearly important. Meaningful. Needed. And I haven't even started on those other carbs: desserts. Merely consider one type of sweet, my friend. Consider chocolate. Chocolate has antioxidants that make your heart healthy. Chocolate has flavor that makes your heart happy. Science agrees with me! Go carbs!

So I don't understand why we are wasting time trying to negotiate world peace when we could be spending our precious time and research dollars on important issues. Like digestive additives that turn carbohydrates into celery once they hit the stomach lining. 

Perhaps I should launch a national campaign (kickstarter? givememoney.com?) to fund this. I must think. Where is that bowl of Fritos?