The Rules for Chocolate

• If you've got melted chocolate all over your hands, you're eating it too slowly.

• Clearly, chocolate is a vegetable. Chocolate is derived from cacao beans. A bean is a vegetable. Wait! There's more! Sugar is derived from either sugar cane or sugar beets. Both are plants, which places them in the vegetable category. QED: chocolate is a vegetable.

• Chocolate-covered raisins, -cherries, -orange slices and -strawberries all count as fruit. Eat as many as you want. Fruits are an important part of the Food Pyramid.

• Diet tip: Eat a chocolate bar before each meal. It'll take the edge off Your appetite and you'll eat less.

• If calories are an issue, store your chocolate on top of the fridge. Calories are afraid of heights, and they will jump out of the chocolate to protect themselves.

• Money talks. Chocolate sings.

• Chocolate has many preservatives. Preservatives make you look younger. Therefore, chocolate is therapeutic.

• Put "eat chocolate" at the top of your list of things to do today. That way, at least you'll get one thing done.

• A nice box of chocolates can provide your total daily intake of calories in one place. Isn't that handy?

• If you can't eat all your chocolate, it will keep in the freezer. But if you can't eat all your chocolate, what's wrong with you?

Ask Ms. Chocolate Person

Q. Why is there no organization such as Chocoholics Anonymous?
A. Because no one wants to quit.

Q. How do I get two pounds of chocolate home from the store in a hot car on a summer's day?
A. Eat it in the parking lot.

Q. What is a balanced diet?
A. Equal amounts of dark chocolate and white chocolate, unless your dietician prescribes equal amounts of bittersweet chocolate and milk chocolate. If your dietitian is out of town and unavailable for a consultation, use both regimens for a week at a time, alternating.