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Men give names to boats and even their cars.

I've named my bathroom scale.

I call her Lola. Actually, I call her a lot more than that on bad mornings, but when I'm trying to be nice, I call her Lola. If I'm going to spend good-quality time with her every day, she might as well have a name.

And, you know, Lola is quite some gal. She is totally impervious to bribes, sweet talking, or tears. Believe me, I've tried them all.

If our government officials had her unwavering integrity and honesty, the scandal-reporting industry would go belly up.

For example, I crawl out of bed this morning, pour myself a cup of coffee and pad down the hall to the laundry room where Lola also hangs out. As I enter Lola's room, I hope for a reprieve from her unrelenting reminders that my weight loss has ground to a screeching halt.

"Good morning," I tell her. "Have a good night?"

She doesn't reply. She's resting. Uneasy about waking her up, I lift my toe and gently tap her side. She rouses and whirs to life.

I close the door to the laundry room and carefully remove my robe, folding it neatly and placing it on the top of the washing machine. As much as I love that fuzzy pink robe, it adds a good 2 pounds to my weight.

I lift my foot to step on the scale but then lose my nerve.

I decide to first sweet-talk Lola. "You look nice this morning," I tell her. "All your fancy, little buttons are so shiny from the cleaning I gave you yesterday. See? Not a speck of dust in sight. I sure take good care of you, don't I?"

Maybe she'll appreciate all I do for her and give me a break.

Lola blinks back at me but doesn't reply. She's playing hard to get. I decide to try some praise.

"I'm so amazed at how you figure out all those numbers so fast. You must have been one of the smartest scales on the assembly line. You know, Lola, I had to get tutored just to make it through algebra. I'm very impressed that you can calculate someone's weight and body fat percentage in just a matter of seconds."

I smile sweetly, which is no easy task this early in the morning. "Were you ever in the gifted program?"

I wait for some sign my campaign of positive talking is working its magic. Instead, Lola ignores me. She stops blinking and actually goes back to sleep. It's amazing I was actually successful at sales; now I even put a bathroom scale to sleep.

I gently prod Lola's side again and watch her screen cycle through and wait. When she's ready, I let out a deep sigh and step on the scale, carefully placing my two feet directly on the metal sensors to make her job easier.

A little dashed line runs across her screen as she calculates my weight. Within seconds, she's given me the bad news. Not only have I not made progress, I am now officially backsliding.

I step off. How can this be? I've been doing so good, trying so hard. How can she have the audacity to tell me I've actually gained weight? What kind of heartless woman is she?

I'm not so gentle now as I kick her side, trying to get her to go back to sleep. Instead, she flashes the numbers at me again, taunting me with her news.

Now I'm mad.

I remove every speck of clothing, step back up and wait. She blinks at me, and so I decide she needs some bribing.

"Look, Lola. Give me a break, and I'll take you outside to enjoy the sun for a bit today, OK? You probably get bored here in the laundry room. And you know what? I'll even make sure the kids don't throw their stinky socks on you anymore. What do you say? Have we got a deal?"

She stops scrolling and flashes the same ugly number at me. This woman is tough, but so am I. Two can play this game.

I do what any woman would do in my situation: I start to cry. I tell her about how hard it's been, how much I've been trying to avoid all those tempting sweets. I even sob about how faithful I've been about exercising. She doesn't even look sad.

I give up, get dressed, throw my robe back on and open the door. And then I stop. I walk back over to Lola and give her a good shove. She slides under the dark recesses of the laundry cart, right below the dirty dish towels. I'll give her a day in her smelly solitary confinement and see if she breaks.

And then it hits me. I've been going about this all wrong. What tempts even the strongest of women?

Chocolate.

Tomorrow I'm definitely trying chocolate.