Nutella

We first discovered Nutella in Italy. We were picking up supplies in a local grocery store and thought it was the local equivalent of peanut butter. Imagine how happy we were to be wrong when we opened the jar and smelled chocolate!

It's made with hazelnuts, not peanuts, and a side-by-side comparison shows it stacks up more or less the same as peanut butter nutritionally. It has more sugar and carbs, but less fat, and since there is also skim milk in Nutella, it has calcium where peanut butter has none. It also has cocoa, so guess who wins in my book?

It's hard to find in this area, but the commissary stocks it. I grabbed a jar on impulse after a long absence when I was shopping for Christmas dinner, and Vicky and I have been hooked since! We're going through a jar a week, between the two of us. (The jars aren't THAT big--only 13 oz!) My most surprising discovery is that Nutella tastes sweeter on celery. I would have thought that the Nutella would make the celery sweet, but the first thing you taste is the sugary chocolate. In fact, it's almost too sweet, which is good, because it keeps me from eating too much. One stalk of celery is more than enough. It's also very yummy on an English muffin with banana slices on top. And with Bunny Tracks ice cream. Now the 'jar a week' thing becomes obvious!

Errrrrgggghhhhh!!!!

Can't *bang* nail *bang* down *bang* this *bang* plot! Slimy little bugger!

So I have this young pregnant Army widow. I was sure the story was about how she works through her grief during her pregnancy to make a new life for herself and her children (she also has a toddler). I knew the doctor who tried to save her husband after he was wounded would figure heavily into the picture, but it turns out he has issues, too. He's a widower, you see, and never fully dealt with his loss. So the story is as much about the doctor as it is about the widow, and it keeps getting cooler, but it's so convoluted right now! I want to write one chapter after another, and it's so not working out that way. I broke out Holly's Plot Clinic this afternoon, but I didn't get to work as long as I would have liked. For some reason, my family wanted dinner. I think I'll be heading upstairs soon to take another run at it.

Are you wondering yet where this idea came from? I was in the grocery store one day--over a year ago--and as I was leaving, a rather cute guy left from the next aisle. Being as graceful as I am, I didn't see him and almost bounced off his shopping cart. My first thought was, "Glad I'm not pregnant!" and the scene where the widow does the same thing with the doctor popped into my head.

And they say that writing is an art, not a mental illness. Thank goodness for that!