A Brief Tale In Which I Am Influenced In My Eating Habits By An Audiobook

I've been listening to Mark Kurlansky's Salt on audiobook in my office. It has been fairly interesting, better than The Basque History of the World, which I just couldn't get into. The thing that is frustrating me about the book though, is that whenever I listen to it in my office I get crazy cravings for salty foods. Monday it was pretzels. Yesterday it was Cheez-its. Today it was Goldfish crackers. I'm not even really hungry, but after listening to that book for an hour or two, I can't help myself, I have an intense urge to devour anything salty that can be found in the break room. After indulging myself, I am of course very thirsty, which leads to drinking lots of water, which leads to bathroom breaks, which leads to pausing the audiobook, which leads to my computer freaking out and refusing to play the audiobook, which leads to me having to restart the disc I'm on and skip through to where I was; meaning that I get to listen to even more information. About salt. And more salt. Salted cod and salted herring and salted anchovies and salted (corned) beef and ham and pickles and lots of other salty foods that I don't even like!

Then this afternoon there was a headline on the MSN homepage for an article about sodium-heavy foods, and in the Bill Bryson audio book that I was listening to in the car on my way home, he took the "Salt Way"--a path from Winchcombe to some Roman ruins, named the Salt Way because it was a path used by (you guessed it) salt traders. Salt, salt and more salt.

I think it's time to go get some Cheez-its.