I Need a Prescription for Ice Cream
March 30, 2023
Read time: 10-15 minutes
Diet and exercise are foundational to my life. I like it. I lift heavy weights. I eat green foods. I try to run long distances. I play hockey here and there. What can I say? I’m a guy’s guy. I move my arms and legs around in all sorts of ways. I put food in my mouth at a comfortable caloric rate. Lots of proteins. Lots of greens, vitamins, and minerals. And sometimes, those calories are chicken wings and beer. Like I said, I'm a guy’s guy.
But sometimes, being a guy’s guy and adhering to diet and exercise can be exhausting. I sit on the couch at the end of a long day of being a guy’s guy and drown away into my phone. My hand goes into my pants and my brain turns off. I look at TikTok. I scroll along Reddit. You know, guy's guy type of stuff. It’s the end of the day and time to put my feet up.
The other day, with one hand on my phone and one finger up my nose, my synapses flared. I started to think of ice cream.
“Oh gosh,” I thought, “what a great idea!”
Now I get it. Is ice cream a guy’s guy type of food? Yes. Yes, it is. Ice cream is probably the 8th wonder of the world. Seriously. Who thought of this stuff? I read stories of ice cream being available in the 1800s and it blows my freakin’ mind. Like how? How did they do it before refrigeration? When our forefathers ate the stuff, it was like God materializing on their taste buds. These guys ate bread (maybe) and sand 364 days out of the year. But one day, the state fair would come to town. That day, the fellas would have so much ice cream, milkshakes, sorbets, and frozen yogurts, they wouldn’t know what to do with themselves. And those guys shot deer, went to church, and had 10 kids before they were 18 years old. You know, to run the farm.
These were those guys' guy’s guys. And they loved ice cream.
***
In the freezer at home, we had a couple of pints of dairy deliciousness. In one pint was Private Selection’s “Denali Extreme Moose Tracks.” In the other pint, Ben & Jerry’s Phish Food.
The Denali Extreme Moose Tracks is loaded with GOBS of chocolate fudge chunks buried into chocolate ice cream. It’s quite rich. That means each bite is packing a haymaker. Just make sure, when you eat some Denali Extreme Moose Tracks, to get some chocolate gobs with each bite. And don’t worry, there are plenty of gobs to go around. Private Selection knows how to do their ice cream.
Ben & Jerry’s Phish Food is a classic Ben & Jerry’s flavor. It can go overlooked because of its non-traditional name. But anyone who has had Phish Food knows that it’s worthy of being a staple for the Ben & Jerry’s brand. What’s in it? Chocolate ice cream, gooey marshmallow swirls, caramel swirls, and chunks of chocolate fudge in the shape of fish. A classic combination of an annihilation of chocolate mixed with marshmallow and caramel that would make Augustus Gloop wet his pants.
Folks, I did my research on this one. Phish Food is rated 4.8 out of 5 stars with 180 reviews on Ben & Jerry’s website. Think 4.8 stars is nothing to sniff at? Think Ben & Jerry’s juices their numbers? Here are their ratings…4.8 out of 5 stars is a tough get. 4.8 stars out of 5, plus ranked number 7 for Ben & Jerry’s Top 10 flavors of 2022? Any night that I am hankering for ice cream, Nutty Buddys, Reese’s Cups, or Milano cookies, Phish Food is always a contender to walk out of the grocery store with me.
***
So, there I was. Debating between chocolate or more chocolate. Debating between Moose Tracks and Phish Food. I was stuck between GOBS of chocolate and gooey marshmallow. Tough decision.
Then, ahhhhh, another brilliant idea came to mind. Why not eat both?
So, I did.
I had anywhere between 5-10 spoonfuls (straight from the carton) of Moose Tracks. Then 10-15 spoonfuls of Phish Food. It was as indulgent an experience as any I’ve ever had in my life. After I was done, I went to grab a napkin, dabbed it on my face, and found streaks of chocolate all over the napkin. Apparently, I was so excited, I only got 99% of the chocolate ice cream in my mouth.
After I cleaned up and put my ice cream away, I sank back into the couch, flung on TikTok, and I was a happy-happy fella.
Time passed.
That is where the story begins.
I got a tummy ache. It was a bad one. A nauseating one. The type of tummy ache that kept me up at night. The type of tummy ache that made me unsure which way to face the toilet. The type of tummy ache that put me on all fours and hanging on for dear life. It was the type of tummy ache that made me pray for Promethazine. I was in between a rock and a hard place with only one way out…time, time had to pass. Time needed to pass in order for me to be back in a sober state of mind and move forward to a life with digested ice cream.
***
It was not the first time I had done this to myself in a lifetime. It turns out, I am a repeat offender.
I am a sinner of guilty pleasures.
I am an unholy dieter and an abomination of inconsistency.
I am a contradiction of dedication to a life of healthy eating habits.
I am a bum.
For me, this is the second time I have strayed from the path of righteous diet and exercise. But never again.
***
A couple of years ago, I was, once again, bent over on all fours because of a sugar-induced overdose. It came from the same repeated behavior.
Proteins.
Greens.
Proteins.
Greens.
Exercise.
Proteins.
Greens.
At that point in life, I decided, there was no room for sugary and delicious foods. There was no time to eat ice cream. There wasn’t a place to bake a warm and scrumptious chocolate cake. Peanut butter fudge cookies? No thank you. I was on a mission. And the steps looked like what I just laid out above.
Proteins.
Greens.
Proteins.
Greens.
Exercise.
Proteins.
Greens.
Listen to Metallica.
Shave my head into a mohawk.
On and on and on.
I had a goal in mind. There was an endgame to this repetition. That goal was to look like Brad Pitt in Fight Club. I decided Brad Pitt in Fight Club was the pinnacle of civilization. It was time to cut loose. So, I followed the code…the code of proteins and greens! Proteins, greens, and a routine that looked something like this.
After months of annihilating my body and depriving myself of any sort of mouth pleasantries in life (ice cream and brownies), I decided to show my face to my family again.
My family and I got together in Bloomington, Indiana to visit my sister at school. In Bloomington, they have a local cookie shop called Baked. At Baked you can get any kind of cookie you want. Chocolate dough, sprinkles, fudge, and mint chocolate chips? Yup! Peanut butter dough, chocolate chips, and caramel drizzled on top? Uhhhh, YUP! It is a galaxy of cookie deliciousness. And it’s open until 2 am (4 am on the weekends).
Did I eat just one cookie? No. Why? Because who’s about to eat only one cookie? Three cookies seemed like a normal number.
And I ended up in the same place that I ended up in this past week. Face down, hands up, and a tummy ache in my belly. I thought to myself, “Where is my mind?”
***
There is a clear and obvious pattern here. I hop into a way of life…proteins, greens, and lean mean fighting machines.
Then, I eat cookies.
Or, I eat ice cream.
And I die of internal combustion.
It’s happened before. Now, it’s happened again. Today, I’m officially putting my foot down. I am giving up my bad habits. This has been the final straw.
It is clear, going on long-term withdrawal from ice cream, candy, and hot fudge sundaes is not good for me.
Today, I am committing to eating a healthy amount of sugary crap in my life.
Come on now, this is reality. Fight Club is a movie. It’s made up. Shoot, even Brad Pitt in Fight Club is made up in Edward Norton’s head! He’s fiction inside of fiction. Trying to look like a guy who is a fictionalized version of fiction is deranged. And putting myself through cycles of death from sugar-induced bodily explosions once every few years is not worth it. Especially in a life that deserves ice cream.
Look, if I can’t come home at the end of a long day of work to a bowl of ice cream, what is all of this work for? What is the point of living? Same thing goes for all of the finer things in life. If I can’t come home from a long day of work to put my hand in my pants and go on TikTok, why do anything at all? Don’t I want a good life? Don’t I want to be a guy’s guy? What would our forefathers say?
So, I eat ice cream.
And guess what? Tomorrow night, I’m eating ice cream. And the night after that? Ice cream. Pretty soon, I will have eaten enough ice cream and built up my tolerance to not worry about ice cream-related tummy aches anymore. With all the luck in the world, I will look like a healthy version of Bob from Fight Club.
Time for a Joke:
I was late to fight club.
Someone told me I missed the rules,
but they said not to worry about it.