“Try it,” I urged my husband (who had just enjoyed a nice big bowl of cereal).

“No thanks,” Chris said pulling a face at the spoonful of my breakfast, which I held out to him.

I guess I had pulled a similar face only a few seconds before so it wasn’t unreasonable to expect a rebuff to my generous offer.

Today is the third day of my juice diet (of my own design). Both on Monday and Tuesday alike I juiced up an old banana, an apple and a pear with a bit of ice and a drop of semi-skimmed milk, then I drank half for breakfast and saved the other half for one other meal replacement, the idea being that I could enjoy one normal full meal either for lunch or dinner and still save calories.

So far it hasn’t been the most fruitful diet, even though it’s been mostly fruit. Because the scales showed no movement at all this morning I thought I’d change tack and juice up a small carrot, a tomato and a third of a cucumber with some ice. This was quite convenient as I had run out of old bananas but it didn’t look very nice…and it tasted even worse.

“Go on, try it Darling,” I urged again.

“No thanks, Sweetheart,” Chris insisted firmly – with a face like King Kong.  

“Please, I’d like you to try it,” I cajoled.

“But I don’t want to. I’ve already had my breakfast,” King Kong was adamant.

“Why should I have to endure this if you won’t even have a taste to see how brave I am?” I saw no other choice than to capitalise on his affection for me.

Kong thought about it and his eyes softened. He took the still proferred spoon and, with great stoicism, swallowed the tiny amount of cold, puce-coloured mush.

“Not quite as bad as I thought,” he said.

“Well you drink it!” I quipped in Chief Dan George style ( from the film The Outlaw Josey Wales, when the carpetbagger offered Chief Dan George a taste of the elixir he was selling).

After pondering for a moment or two Chris came up with a suggestion:

“Listen Darling, (now in caring, thinking cap mode), if you’re allowed a normal-sized meal once a day why don’t you just split it into three and have it for each meal?”

“That’s a good idea,” I said, “but why shouldn’t I have just a third of the normal amount of different foods for each meal?”

So I began my new new regime by taking out a small bowl and having a handful of cereal with a little milk. It was delicious. Of course, I was hungry again by ten o’clock and I had to reach for an apple. I didn’t cut it into three. Well I didn’t want it to go brown – did I?