No good will come of this

I was up at the front desk and when Tanya got back from her break, she told me that the Kefa Kafe now carries gelato. I've only had gelato once since I got back from Italy and I miss it a lot. Gelato can be described as Italian ice cream but that's like saying that Christmas is a winter-time holiday. Informative, yes, but somehow insufficient.

When I was there (Italy, not Kefa's) in 1999 our little group would sight-see from gelato stand to gelato stand. Unlike here in the United Supersize of America, the Italians will sell you a little bit of gelato at a reasonable price, roughly about a quarter cup for a some small handful of Lira, probably just a few million. Or billion. (Shopping in Italy, pre-Euro was like buying everything in pennies.) Now it would probably be roughly a quarter cup for a Euro, so even though I had a bit of gelato every 40 minutes or so, I left Italy 3 or 4 pounds lighter than I arrived there.

Anyway, I'm hoping to reach a particular weight goal by Friday, so hearing that the little coffee shop around the corner had installed a gelato freezer isn't the kind of news I should have. So I - at first - resolved to be strong and not go there until next week. But then Tanya started mentioning flavors and she said pistachio. I can take or leave chocolate. But pistachio gelato! So I grabbed my wallet and headed out the door, telling Laura (my boss) that I was sneaking out for a treat.

I got to Kefa's and J'accused my way in. "You are evil!" quoth I. "But wait," she said (considering how often I go there and how nice they are to me, you'd think I'd know the names of the two ladies who own the place, but no) "gelato has only 4 grams of fat per serving and ice cream has 12 to 16!" (Further internet research - take that for what you will - tells us that gelato has 4 percent butterfat to ice cream's 12 - 16%. Thanks, Cool Beans.)

"Uh-huh." I said skeptically, not willing to stipulate that a lower fat gram count made her any less culpable here. And - just for comparison sake - let's remember that four grams of fat is David's fat allowance through the end of the world series, more or less. I tried a sample size of the pistachio (Pistachio!!) and then settle on a chocolate/caramel split. (Caramel!!). We agreed that this was entirely her fault and not my own, I paid, I left with my treat.

And I walked back to the office by way of a mental detour to Italy in the summer of 1999.

Ahhhhhhh.