Eat Me.

Anything you can do we can do vegan.

Saturday, September 22, 2007

Chicago... Almost.

It might be another time before we can fully catch up. I missed reporting in on Charleston, Richmond, Fredericksburg, Pennsylvania, Ohio and my home town in Illinos. I also missed home-cooking, fancy dining, disappointments and triumphs. Orchards, berry farms and road-side stands. Old friends, family and new friends. Campfire oatmeal and tea that tastes like fire. The worst winery in the entire world. A slaughterhouse town in Florida populated by zombie truckers.

I have a stack of restaurant menus and brochures from other assorted tourist attractions from our little trip. I haven't had a normal life for so long I might not be able to remember what day it is anymore but by god I am going to remember what it was I ate. Some people say that America sort of sucks. It's big. It's empty for the most part. There are a LOT of rednecks. It takes forever to get anywhere. But I believe you can find great things anywhere if you look hard enough. It might be the simplest thing like the taste of wild honeysuckle in a field. It might be the anticipation of moving on to the next town. And as much as I would love to pass on every simple pleasure and unexpected find I probably have forgotten much of it. I wish I could sit around the table with my family and share the experiences like the snapshots they are.

As for New Orleans withdrawal I haven't had it ... yet. I cried for about three minutes the morning our house would no longer be ours. It was built nearly a century before I was born and I pray it will still be standing when I die. But I miss my friends.

Sidenotes:

Amos and I should also have a zombie blog - we are obsessed. One favorite game goes as such - if you were in the bedroom and there was a zombie invasion what ordinary household object would you use to fight them off? My pick - bedside table. His pick - crowbar. Don't ask why the crowbar is in the bedroom. Maybe because of the oncoming zombie invasion? In which case are there crowbars in every room like New Orleanians have axes in their attics?

Newest amusing blog find: The Delicious Life. A good read.

Things I lost on part-one of the trip (Part-two: Are we going to Canada? Are we going to Guatemala? Are we going to Europe for six months? Who knows!): Pair shoes. Two pairs awesome sunglasses. Half-read Moby-Dick. (Fuck!!! I was loving that book.) Toothbrush.

I am tri-doshic. Very rare. See I am special. This webquiz told me so.

Should I pour glasses of milk for people or act like an asshole because after years of milk-free bliss I finally forgot how much I hate it? Is pouring milk NOT VEGAN?

Saturday, September 8, 2007

St. Augustine - Savannah - Charleston


Boiled Peanuts. Cell Phone Picture.

So we finally did it. We are out. Our things have been packed and shipped and we have packed and shipped ourselves out. We went to Lola's with Joey for our last culinary hurrah and scuffled out of town. (By the way their spinach linguine with pesto and artichokes is vegan. And awesome. Screw the paella!) Leaving a place you have lived for seven years is just strange. Is it sad? A bit. It's really hard to be sad when a few days before you leave someone finds a dead body in a porta-potty uptown.

But we hit the road. Drove along the gulf coast to St. Augustine. Went to the worst winery I have ever been to in my life. I don't remember the name but their regular white wine was sweeter than the ice wine we brought to Lola's for desert. Is that what happens when you grow grapes in an extremely hot and humid climate? Alcoholic Sprite.

Of course the first day in St. Augustine I had to hit up Diane's New Dawn for an avocado and tofu salad sandwich. Rode bikes to the beach. Got a sunburn. Went to the most non-vegan museum in the world with a stuffed lion and shrunken head.

We left this morning for Savannah. Somewhere just over the Florida state line we picked up some boiled peanuts at a gas station. I thought I had had a boiled peanut before but these were the most intriguing item I have eaten in a long time. I didn't expect the peanuts themselves to be soft. They were like red beans in shells. When we got to Savannah we found right away a fantastic Thai/Vietnamese restaurant with a menu that was about 12 pages long and stated at the bottom that they could make any dish vegan. Unfortunately I was dead tired so I didn't enjoy it as much as I should have.

We left Savannah far to soon to come to Charleston to see our friend Anna. And here we will be for two nights...

Saturday, September 1, 2007

Moving Time.

I have to apologize the past few posts were a bit rough. I'm only posting now because it is pouring rain and we have run out of boxes. I guess the only thing I have had time to post is sort of a militant "screw you" to the rest of the world. Maybe it's because sometimes I get sick of cheering other foodies on for things that sound fantastic but could easily be vegan. Or it's packing our house and the move. Or it's because Amos downloaded the movie Earthlings and I watched only the first fifteen minutes of it and had a complete breakdown. (Click here to watch it. But it is terribly disturbing.)

So needless to say I was a bit perturbed when I missed the last part of my going away party because I was so tired from being kept up all night by the meat industry images captured in Earthlings. (Specifically the breeding sows with untreated infections all over their bodies. More specifically the piglets that had been kicked into the waste pits and left to suffocate. The slaughterhouse images don't bother me. Obviously when you slit a cow's throat blood will shoot everywhere. It's a cow. They must have lots of blood.) But back to the point. That's why I stopped eating all animal products because I couldn't handle thinking about it anymore. I continue to not want to think about it anymore. I want all that to be over. So just stop. If you tell me the shirts I buy at Target are made by children and it bothers you I will not shop there. It won't kill me. Not eating animals won't kill you.

And the sooner you stop the sooner I will stop writing these sad socio-political-moral posts that are probably really boring. I'm so bored now I am about ready to puke. Just like after I watched the movie the other night. But not bored. Disgusted.

The silver lining to this story? (See - I am trying to be pleasant...) I can bring the strawberry-almond ice cream I made for our party to our friend's cookout this evening. That means not dragging the kitchenaid out of the SmartBox to make a lame attempt at a baked good which I probably don't have the ingredients for anyway.