Hero or Villain - the 100 Calorie Snack Pack

I roam the aisles of the grocery store a virtual newbie to the whole weight loss thing. I spent a lot of years carrying around a lot of weight that I've now decided it's time to lay down. In order to do that, I need to change some nasty habits beginning with eating food with actual nutrition enclosed.

But this is a marathon, not a sprint and habits are hard to change. I need a little bridge from the all junk all the time plan to the new junk-free lifestyle I aspire to. Enter 100 calorie packs.

Time was, a large bag of potato chips, for me, was about a four serving bag. Now as I hold this tiny box of cheese balls no bigger than a shoebox, I realize there are six servings enclosed in little envelopes. I have a long way to go here.

So I ponder this little box, which costs more than the big bag of cheese balls. There are six servings in there, and 16 in the bag. I've bought this box before, and those envelopes are really, really small. But that's a serving, and I'm struggling with portions, so maybe I should get it. But it's $1 more and has 10 fewer servings.

Then I ask myself the bigger question. How much am I willing to pay for will power? I could just as easily buy the large bag and just decide to not eat more than a serving's worth at a time of these little cheesy temptations. But will I?

This time, I decide to trust myself. Well at least partially. I buy the big bag, but I also buy a box of snack sized storage bags. I take the bag home and immediately do some math, taking the portion size down to 100 calories and figuring out how many little balls go into a bag. Then as I start dividing them up into these little baggies, I begin to feel like a drug dealer of some kind. And in a way I am. I'm dealing myself fat and salt in controllable little helpings.

I feel a little silly doing it, but it works like a charm. But it took me about 45 minutes to finish this whole operation. How much did I save? The big bag's contents end up costing about $.24 a serving (including the cost of the baggies), and the small box servings would have been $.67. So an equivalent amount of the little pre-packaged servings (16) would have set me back $10.72. My effort saved me $6.73.

I would have spent that time watching tv anyway as I did while I divided up the packages. While I did have to split them up into bags, I didn't eat any while I was dividing them and was good about eating only one bag at snack time. So, I choose to look at it as being paid $6.73 to watch tv for 45 minutes, and I feel like I have at least some will power. Gaining control is a beautiful thing.