Keep away from leftover candy

It never fails. You bring your leftover Halloween candy to work to get it the heck out of your house -- only to spend the next week eating other people's leftover candy at work.

Gina Bucciferro, a registered dietitian at Loyola University Health System, has these tips to help:

•  * Eat breakfast. It'll help keep you from gorging on candy and moderate the sugar in your blood.

•  * Bring in healthier snacks, like fruit or 100-calorie snack packs. "So when you're eating a piece of candy, you're truly having it to enjoy a piece of candy, not just because it's the only option," Bucciferro said.

•  * Treat yourself to small amount of candy that lasts, like suckers or LifeSavers.

•  * Beware of high-fat candy, like Snickers and Reese's Peanut Butter Cups. The calories can add up quickly. "If you eat 100 extra calories a day, that's 10 pounds a year," she said. "And most candies are more than 100 calories."

•  * Watch out for the sugar crash. Eating too much candy can lead to an energy thud within a few hours as your body produces too much insulin to take care of the sugar.

Shamus Toomey