Day 3 of Vegan Challenge: Gelatin

Day three is about labels, reading them and learning what those ingredients really are. Best advice: read the label, buy the stuff with the least stuff in it and make sure you recognize the stuff.
Easy enough.
Lard: pig stomachs.
Lanolin: derivative of sheep wool.
Urea: used to give pretzels that familiar brown tint.
Gelatin: wait a minute...
I know what gelatin is, right? Jell-o? "Watch it wiggle", Bill Cosby commercials, good stuff.
Nope. According to Patrick-Goudreau, gelatin is made of slaughterhouse leftovers, like skin and bones and oh my gosh who-knows-what-else. I believe the author, but I don't really want to.
Because marshmallows contain gelatin.
Marshmallows? Aren't they supposed to be just fluffy sugary goodness? Made from love and happiness and extra light?
Now I have to find an alternative for my S'mores.
And gummy candy and vitamins, they all have gelatin, too. Makes sense, of course, I just hadn't thought gelatin-of-my-youth was a problem.
This "thinking about it" stuff is no fun.

Day 2, Vegan challenge

Today is noting how to compare between vegetarian and animal proteins and how the cost trickles up to health costs, et cetera. Not very exciting stuff.
I did try the Morning Star Meal Starter, the sliced "chicken" for dinner. I told my son, Bubs, it was poultry but didn't use the air quotes. He didn't exactly fall for it. But he's particularly particular when it comes to food, so he's not the best judge of taste. I liked it. Covered it over with beans and zucchini and bell pepper and called it a gastric feast.
Then I went running for five miles.
I was a carbon emissions violation waiting to happen...

Day 1, Vegan Challenge: It's on

According to the book "The 30-Day Vegan Challenge", Day 1 is purge the cabinets day, find out what foods I already have that are vegan and acceptable so I can eat something and not die.
I have: peanut butter, noodles, marinara sauce...that's pretty much it.
Obviously I'm off to the store for all things vegetable and non-animal-fied!
Whoo hoo! Watch the tracks of my Mighty Taurus as I round the corner of nutrition!
I still have three-fourths of a gallon of cow milk. Today I might be more vegetarian than vegan.
One things I rely heavily on is the author -- Patrick-Goudreau -- and her advice that being vegan isn't about being perfect -- Whew! -- but trying as hard as you can to make conscious choices.
With that in mind my challenge lessens a little, perhaps to a more attainable level for this city girl.

Okay, Vegan World -- here I come

I read Foer's Eating Animals. I'm probably redundant, I've told so many stories from this book.
Stories that make me say ick.
ICK! I tell you.
I'm off eating animals for the duration of the memories of those stories, anecdotal evidence of the world of animal "husbandry" that exists outside the domain of my grocery store freezer aisle.
Horrendous.
So why not jump with both feet into veganism? I see no reason not to.
I'm taking a 30-day challenge to do so. Starting tomorrow.
I'm pretty sure.
I still have this unopened package of Oreos that I have thoughtfully walked past all day. It is indeed unopened, I repeat, and that alone is a remarkable feat for me. I'm an Oreo junkie. AND they're double stuff. I've ignored twice the stuff!!
So. Tomorrow the journey begins into the world of meatless Mondays and Tofu Tuesdays. I'm off!
Wish me luck...

Day 2: What Would Madonna Do Workout

I'd like to say tonight was easier.
But no. No, it wasn't.
I didn't do the cardio portion again -- my Bubs is sick and I couldn't get out of the house to gallop a while.
That's my excuse. I'm using it.
But I upped my weights to blueberry pie filling, a solid 18.5 ounces.
Whew!
And I did the full 100 reps.
Yep, they call me Big Rock. That's 'cause I'm so strong.
No. No one calls me Big Rock. Or even Little Pebble.
Never mind the whining I did putting those cans back in the pantry. Those shelves were high! At least three feet up!
My weakened muscles were spent, I tell ya. Spent.

Madonna Workout

A free periodical, Living Well Today, was perched charmingly on display inside the front door of the local Homeland. The front cover featured Madonna, recently seen during halftime of the Super Bowl, next to a teaser about her workout, how she achieves her marvelous figure, and how I, too, can do her workout and look just as good as her.
Whaaat?? Count me in!
I grabbed the mag and headed back out the door without my requisite package containing the promised soy milk for my little man, Bubs. (Needless to say, later I made a return trip to the store for the aforementioned milk, but really that's a sidebar to this story, the promise of having thigh muscles that pop walnuts.)
Once home and in appropriate workout attire -- a pair of old shorts and an even older t-shirt, 'cause who am I trying to impress? -- I opened the pages to the training schedule and outlined workout.
First: cardio. 30 minutes of alternately sprinting, galloping, and skipping.
Uuuh...I'm 40 plus a minute or two years old. I can sprint, sure ... slowly ... but in my head I run like the wind.
Skip? I stopped that when I was five.
Gallop?? I am not even sure what that means. I visualized a sort of limp in which I put a foot in front and drag the other behind, like a dead limb. It's not a pretty picture. And do you go a ways and then alternate feet? Huh?
Move ahead.
Second: strength. 5 exercises, and a sixth for the expert.
No problem, I'm strong. Bring it.
1. Hold a three pound weight in each hand, arms at your sides, and bring them up over your head, forming a Y. Lower. Repeat. 100 times.
I don't have three pound weights.
I have a 15.5 ounce can of corn and a 16 ounce can of little green peas.
No one is watching. That will work. And I go.
I'm lifting. I'm laughing a bit at myself as I sling vegetables up and down and the weight seems so very light as to be ineffective.
And I'm just that conceited until I reach rep number 33 and I think my veggies have gained weight suddenly; maybe the cans are bloated, all my hurling them about has reconfigured their...juice...stuff...that they float in...
Around rep 50 I feel like I have reconfigured and that my muscles have atrophied to those of a woman twenty years older than me.
The corn is a little higher than the peas, because of that half ounce I guess, but by a little I mean a little.
Rep 76 brings me to Uncle. I shuddered just trying to put the veggies back on their respective shelves in my pantry.
Exercises 2 through 5? They can wait. They can wait a long while.
I'm off to vomit.

I See Green

My five-year-old son just painted his fingernails with a green Dry Erase marker, and wonders why he can't keep it that way forever. I envision green spots all over the furniture, the walls, the car, or perhaps those green spots are anger. Hmmm. While I clean his hands, I'll mull over which it is...