October, November, and December, have one thing in common: holidays directly associated with tons of food.

Think about it. October has Halloween, which means cheap chocolate in little bite-sized packages that somehow make it easier to justify eating a truckload of them.

November has Thanksgiving, in which there is turkey and dressing and ten different varieties of cooked sweet potatoes and yeast rolls and cranberry sauce and pumpkin everything. It’s a national excuse to eat more food than is good for you on one day.

Then there’s December, with its beautiful Christmas season. Note I did not just say “Christmas,” but “Christmas season.” That tallies up to over a month of feeling completely justified in consuming whatever treats are brought by your coworkers. If we could have our way, the spirit of the season would burn more calories than running a marathon a day.

Trouble is, it doesn’t. And by January, we have to suck in just to pull our running shorts on.

The bright side is (and there’s always a bright side) that the extra pounds help keep us warm in winter. I almost deliberately eat a little more just to keep from being as cold as I might be otherwise. Then I hop on the treadmill and think, hey, it’ll balance out, right?

Right.