Today has been an atypical Sunday. Normally Sundays subsist of catching up on sleep, drinking a pot of coffee, sitting on ass watching old episodes of Saturday Night Live, washing a load of laundry, and going to the grocery store to get something that requires zero effort to cook for dinner. But today…TODAY! I cleaned the entire house (with the help of the hubs and kid), cooked lunch, mowed almost our entire five-acre yard, got everyone’s clothes ready for morning, and cooked a dinner. A simple dinner that took very little effort, but I did have to do more than open the box or can. I even have enough energy to do the dinner dishes and update this blog. And all without a drop of caffeine.
And surprise, my knees, neck, and elbows, which normally creak and kill when there’s so much as a cloud in the air, don’t hurt.
I am happy to say that the first week of this vegan-like diet has proven to me that I am actually capable of producing my own energy. I thought that that was long gone, with my posters of New Kids on the Block. I’ve never not drank coffee; not since I was eighteen. And since twenty-one I’ve been a full-on java junkie…a barista once threatened to cut me off. I’m not joking.
I say “vegan-like” diet because I would make a very bad vegan. If there is a Memorial Day cookout, I will probably go, and after a couple of margaritas, I will probably not stick to veggies. Dude, I live in the south, and if the sun is out and it’s warm, you and your neighbors may not be grilling, but I bet you can’t drive more than a mile without someone grilling something, right there in your face everywhere. Every time I smell barbecued chicken, it’s torture. And last night, I was cooking some really tasty tofu chilequiles-type mess for dinner, but alongside it, I was making taco meat out of ground beef in the neighboring skillet, for everyone else. I didn’t eat any of the beef, and wasn’t really tempted, but tonight I used that skillet to make my “vegan” dinner. I just can’t see going out and buying separate cookware. I know some people do that…but man, I washed it with Dawn. There’s no meat on it anymore.
Also, I have made a couple of boo-boos. Did you know…
1) “Veggie Slices” cheese has casein in it? Isn’t casein the stuff in dairy that you’re trying to avoid in the first place? Hence your buying of Veggie Slices?
2) Dairy is hiding in places you would least suspect it…like bread. The other day, I bought a loaf of some Arnold whole-wheat bread that was on sale. As I was nom-ing a delicious sandwich, I glanced at the list of ingredients and there, in bold letters, it said “Contains Non-fat Milk.” WTH for?
3) O’Soy yogurt gets its live cultures from milk.
I am going to continue eating these products until they’re gone, however, because while I am aware of the unethical treatment of animals in dairy and meat farms, I would also feel dumb for throwing out twenty dollars’ worth of food just because it has a fraction of a percentage of dairy in it, when gas is four dollars a gallon. Eventually I hope to have the time and resources to successfully grow everything I eat, so that I can dine without the guilt of knowing that my food is flavored with the tears of baby cows…but until then, I guess I’ll just pay better attention to food labels before I make purchases.
But otherwise, I think that I have done fairly well at avoiding refined sugar and flour, and purposefully-ingested animal products. Next week, maybe I will have enough energy to keep the whole house clean, do my own auto maintenance, start a band, and write a book. 🙂
(Edit: Speaking of labels, I got halfway through the antibiotics I got at the health department for my kidney infection…then I thought to look it up on Wikipedia and found out that there is reason to believe that this medicine has a carcinogenic effect on humans. Why would anyone prescribe this for anything? So do I stop taking it, or what? What is medicine if it makes you trade one sickness for another?)
myludicrousuterus 