I gain .00001 pound every few minutes

My dad once sent me a scientific study that proved it was possible to gain weight without eating anything. (And he wasn't reading the National Enquirer, either.) Apparently, merely smelling something delectable -- baked goods, cheese, even a fragrance as mild as jelly beans -- triggered a physical response in the body, and the chemicals it produced added a fraction of a pound each time these pleasure centers were activated. I filed this information in my "Why the Universe is Unfair" folder, but I thought of it again this morning while I was getting a coffee that I could nurse through a three-hour interview. I swear I could smell the baked goods at Caribou through the glass case. (OK, no more italics.) I must have been hallucinating. I have been staying away from such things for the last week, save for one chocolate croissant, and these were probably withdrawal symptoms. And while I know I would have to sniff about 100,000 croissants to gain a pound, there seems something perverse about this kind of cruel chemistry.