Anything But The Biscuits! Breaking the new year diet…

Diets are all good and well, but you need a few treats in life, don’t you…?

Well, that’s that done!” Sue said, closing the lid of the laptop. “Our New Year trip away is booked, Phil. We’ll soon be spending a glorious two weeks in the sunshine away from the rain and snow.”

“I’m looking forward to it already,” Phil smiled. “Should I go and put the kettle on to celebrate?”

“Good idea, love,” Sue replied.

“I’ll bring a plate of biscuits in too,” Phil offered. “Thanks for buying my favourites.”

“Do you mean those crispy chocolate ones?”

“No,” Phil replied. “My favourites are those cream ones that are squishy in the middle.”

Sue glanced over at her husband as he plodded out of the living room. She thought his trousers looked a bit snug and she’d noticed for a while that he’d been developing a spare tyre.

“Hmm…” she thought. “The biscuits aren’t the only things that are squishy in the middle.”

Phil returned to the living room with a mug of coffee in each hand. Then he went back to the kitchen for the biscuits.

“I won’t put them on a plate,” he shouted. “There’s only a couple left in the jar so I’ll just bring it in.”

There were three cream biscuits left at the bottom of the jar. Knowing how much her husband enjoyed them, Sue took one for herself, leaving two for Phil.

Sitting side by side on the sofa, they drank their coffee while watching their favourite television show. It was set in Spain and the presenter was showing a British couple around holiday apartments he thought they might like to buy.

“Oh, I don’t like the look of that one,” said Sue, pointing at the telly. “It really is far too small.”

“It has a nice pool, though,” Phil replied, dunking a biscuit into his mug of coffee.

“But it’s miles away from the beach,” Sue continued.

“Our hotel is slap bang on the beach, isn’t it, Sue? The one we’ve just booked?” Phil asked, dunking his biscuit a second time. “Sure is,” she replied. “Are you going shopping tomorrow, love?” Phil asked, not taking his eyes off the TV. “I might do,” she said. “If you do, could you buy another packet of these cream biscuits?” he said. “I can’t get enough of them.”

Sue shot her husband a reproachful look.

“Phil…?” she said slowly. “How would you feel about going on a diet for the New Year? I mean both of us, of course, I’d do it too. Let’s call it a New Year’s resolution. It’d do us no harm to lose a few pounds, and it would mean that when we go on holiday we can really splash out a bit.”

“A diet?” Phil cried, almost dropping his biscuit.

“Nothing too drastic,” Sue said. “Just cutting back here and there.”

Phil popped the final bit of biscuit into his mouth and chewed as if his life depended on it.

“But we already eat quite sensibly,” he said, alarmed. “What could we possibly cut back on?”

Sue picked up the biscuit jar. “Well, we could start with these…” she replied.

“But… but you can’t cut my biscuits out!” Phil spluttered. “Oh Sue, no. Not the biscuits – anything but the biscuits!”

However, he knew he was defeated. Once Sue made her mind up about something, that was that.

Sue laid her hand gently on Phil’s stomach.

“We’ve got a month to lose a few pounds before our holiday,” she said. “And you never know, you might slim

It’s not only the BISCUITS that are SQUISHY in the MIDDLE

down enough to get into those lovely blue shorts again – the ones that make you look like Daniel Craig.”

Phil carefully pondered his wife’s words.

“Hmm… they have become a bit tight now, I have to admit,” he said.

“And I might be able to fit into that red bikini again,” Sue smiled.

“Which red bikini…?” Phil started to say and then his eyes widened. “Oh, you mean that red bikini?”

“So are we on, then?” she asked him. “For the next few weeks, we’ll make a New Year’s resolution to cut out biscuits and cakes?”

Phil sighed. “Oh, go on, then, it’s a deal.”

He took the empty biscuit jar from Sue’s hands, raised it up high and gave it a kiss.

“Goodbye, dear friend,” he said to the biscuit jar. “It’s been nice knowing you.”

“Oh, you daft lump,” Sue smiled indulgently.

“I guess we’ll just put it away at the back of the cupboard now, shall we?” Phil sighed.

“Actually…” Sue said. “I was thinking that we could use the empty biscuit jar to keep the money in – the money that we would have spent on buying biscuits every week. How does that sound?”

Just then, Phil’s attention was caught by the television presenter sitting at a wooden shack of a beach bar, tucking into a large glass of ice cream covered with nuts and chocolate sauce.

“It sounds like I can hear my stomach rumbling already,” he sighed.

“We’ll manage, you’ll see,” Sue told him. She was true to her word. With the money they saved by not buying biscuits, by the end of the second week, there was already a layer of coins sitting in the biscuit jar

On the third week, Sue was cleaning the kitchen. As she pulled out the tins from one of the cupboards, something caught her eye, tucked away on a shelf.

She yanked the mystery item towards her and couldn’t believe her eyes when she saw what it was!

It was a half-eaten packet of Phil’s favourite biscuits – the cream ones with the squishy centres.

Phil must have been buying the biscuits himself and hiding them away!

She felt her taste buds start to tingle. She swallowed, hard. Would Phil even notice if she took just one? Oh but she couldn’t, could she? Just one, she decided, just one…

But just as she was about to pop the biscuit into her mouth she heard the front door open.

“It’s just me, love!” Phil yelled from the hall.

Panicked, Sue stuffed the whole biscuit into her mouth and chewed furiously.

Phil strode into the kitchen to find his wife with her back to him, gazing intently out of the window.

“You all right, Sue?” he asked her.

“Mmm… Mmm…” was all she managed to reply.

“I’ve been out for a lovely long walk,” Phil said. “But I’m parched now and could really do with a cuppa. Would you like one, Sue?”

“Mmm… Mmm…” she replied, not daring to turn around to see Phil, or speak to him properly until all of the evidence was destroyed.

On holiday a week later, Phil and Sue took a stroll along the beach in front of their hotel.

“The flight here today wasn’t bad,” Phil said. “Not too bumpy.”

“And the hotel is as lovely as it looked online when we booked it,” Sue replied.

“I’ve packed my blue shorts,” Phil said. “I managed to fit into them, you know.”

He patted his stomach, which Sue was pleased to see wasn’t hanging over his trousers as much as it had been of late.

Sue gave her husband a cheeky wink.

“And I’ve packed my red bikini,” she said.

Phil put his arm around Sue’s waist and pulled her towards him for a kiss. Just then, his attention was caught by a familiar looking wooden shack on the sand.

“I’m sure I’ve seen that beach bar somewhere before,” he said, pointing across the sands.

“You can’t have,” Sue said. “We’ve never been here before.”

But as they walked towards it, Phil remembered where he’d seen it.

“This diet we’ve been on, Sue… you said that once we were on holiday we could eat what we like.”

Sue nodded. “And that money we collected in the biscuit jar? I exchanged it into Euros to splash out on something nice.”

They stopped outside the beach bar to read its menu on a board propped up in the sand.

“It’s not biscuits I’m after this time,” he said and pointed to a picture on the menu. It was a large glass of ice cream and nuts covered in chocolate sauce.

“That looks like the perfect way to start our holiday,” smiled Sue. “How about one each?”

Would he NOTICE if she took ONE? Just ONE biscuit, only ONE