I earlier wrote about my theory on men, women, and cheesecake. You can find that entry HERE.

Last night I developed a new theory on men, women, and the last piece of pizza.

Frequently a customer will leave some pizza on their plate and request a takeout box. No problem. And, if there are two pieces left there is no amount of cajoling that will cause this person – male or female – to finish up. I think this is because deep in the lizard brain we are capable of saying to ourselves, OK you can always eat one more piece but you cannot decide to eat two pieces. If there are two or more pieces left, men and women are the same.

When there is just one piece left, this is where men and women differ.

Women will not eat the last piece. If they have decided that they are done then they are done. Perhaps this is because they are more forward looking, I don’t know. Perhaps this is because they are better able to anticipate the sweet joy of having this one piece the next morning or the next day for lunch, I don’t know.

Men, if you push them, will eat the last piece. They have stopped with one piece left because they don’t want to look like gluttons. But if you push them, the man-brain takes over and they must accept the primitive alpha-gorilla challenge. They must show that they are manly. They must demonstrate their superior strength but stuffing in the last piece. This is probably because - from an eveolutionary standpoint - they don’t want the weaker members of the wolf pack to get that last piece and have the strength to breed, I don’t know.

We’re like that, us men. If you can turn anything into a contest we will fall for it. Try, “I bet you can’t eat that last piece.”