Your walking around your local supermarket. It’s been a busy day at work and so you haven’t yet eaten your lunch although your work day is now over. You got your list in hand, milk, eggs, tomatoes, cucumber and a few other items. Then a rumble, as your stomach reminds you of your foolish mistake of missing lunch. Then out of the corner of your eye you spot a hint of a wrapper gleaming in the store light. Thinking that you better check it out, you turn your cart and grab the now apparent Aero bar. You know your hungry, and it’s only 89 cents so you throw it in the cart. Then you think, I’m really hungry and you grab another.

Now as you shop around some more you start to notice that although you got that Aero bar to calm your hunger you now have an assortment of other food items that were not on the list. This pattern continues until you get to the till and you look at your purchase, milk, eggs, cucumber, tomato,…., aero bar x2, chips ahoy, oreo, rootbeer, a kiwi, a bag of chips, chocolate milk, soy milk and 2 loaves of bread. Now how did this happen?

I’m sure this has happened to all of us, even the best of us that laugh at others when this happens to them. I had never fallen victim to it until last month when I splurged on a large set of Snickers bars (and devoured 4 by the time I had driven home). It’s pretty obvious as to why it happens but the more interesting thing to note is that why after we do get a snack, we continue to purchase even more as if one is not enough?

So moral of the story, eat before you shop. Have an “emergency” Snickers bar in your glove compartment of your car. Make two purchases when you shop, 1 where you buy a snack right as you come in, and your second that includes all the items on your shopping list. But your best bet is just to eat before you go shopping, or you’ll pay the price.