TBD...

I was trying to think of ways to make this a more interactive situation. I didn't come up with much. One thing I thought of was to post pictures. Like, I had one that I took of this ginormous bruise I got from testing that whole theory about wet things being slippery and played it fast and loose around some icy front porch stairs. But the picture looked obscene. It wasn't terribly obscene. I mean, while it IS on my backside, I covered my crack with my hand. So you weren't looking at anything that you could identify as my backside. And yet somehow, the bruise itself looked – obscene. Another word doesn't really come to mind and I'm thinking another word couldn't do it much justice either. The bruise is finally dissipating but there is still a mighty knot in the square center of it. I considered taking a picture of my guts pre-exercise and excising sugar. But that felt more obscene than the picture of my bruise looked. So, I nixed that idea. I could post a video of me reading stuff to you but you are busy – reading the stuff I just wrote for you. I would offer up a twitter party but I still can't get the hang of twitter. Other people have stuff to say on there all the time. And they know real hashtags and everything. So, I'm thinking I would be a lousy host. Also, not for nothing but it is a little disheartening that there are uhm, dead people that have a larger following than myself. I realize it's not a popularity contest but still. It's one thing to say it's not a popularity contest and another to lose – to dead people. For now, I'm stumped. I am open to suggestions. I don't want y'all to get bored or anything.

I wanted to clarify what I said last time about cutting out sugar. I will still be eating fruit which has natural sugars in it. I'm not actively looking at labels and upon seeing sugar in the ingredients winging it across the store and going on a rant wherein I profess the unholiness that becometh sugar. I know you might have been a little worried about that. I can understand – I did call sugar a demon. And I have already alerted you to some mental health uhm, inconsistencies that I manage. So, to sum up. The way I'm tackling Resolution 10 is that I'm quitting the regular, nay, near constant, eating of goods that have the main ingredient of sugar and are touted as items called: chocolate, candy, cake, cookie, confectionery. Hmmmm... so, perhaps cutting out all “C” items from my diet. But I actually do like cauliflower. I'm going to have to think this through. I would like to report that I was snap brilliant at this resolution. Pretty much right after Princess' birthday I just abstained. I didn't buy any discounted goodness – and there were plenty of opportunities, I'll have you know. Whenever I got tempted to eat a “C”, I would pop in a piece of gum. Because it starts with “G”. It was all good. Until last night. Last night I pulled out the giant $1 tube of crushed peppermint sugar cookie dough and cooked some up for the kidlings. Do you know how good cookies smell when they are cooking? Are you kidding me? I thought I could just eat a half of one.  But I didn't stop with one half. The upshot is that I didn't eat the rest of the tube. I was able to keep it to a respectable 3 cookies. Holy spitcoly they were good. But I felt awful afterwards. Hindsight is just useless. No, really. I can't think of why it even exists. There is no good side to hindsight... Today, I'm trying NOT to dwell in it or decide that the pooch is screwed anyway (seriously – where did THAT term come from?) so I might as well bake up that whole tube AND the one that I got that is gingerbread flavor. Not gonna do it. As far as I know. I probably have over 6 more active hours left in this day and seeing as how Hubs is out of town and I have to do dinner and bedtime on my own again tonight, I'm taking it moment by moment. And you know what they say about when the Hubs is away... Jenny just has to survive. That's sort of what happened last night. Flying solo with a houseful of people all acting like they have their own personhood – well – it took a toll. Like tollhouse cookies... mmmmm.... tollhouse cookies....

Here is some more stuff related to food that I wanted to talk to you about. First, I wanted to mention that I have definitely been giving a lot of thought to being vegetarian. I've taken it as far as actually considering being a vegan. I really really want to encourage everyone that has the capacity to see “Forks Over Knives” (especially you, Paula Deen). I cannot tell you how impelling the information is. Plant based diets definitely have the appeal of health going on. I mostly think that I could do vegan except when it comes to cheese. I don't have a strong fromage need but it's big enough that I think about NOT eating it and I get all nervous and go find a cheese stick to calm myself. Also, one of my rituals when I'm in the grocery store is to peruse the cheese area to see if any Brie is marked down. Okay. So cheese is a bigger draw than probably I'm admitting to myself. Just in general milk products could be my overall downfall. I like butter. I like what butter does when you put it on other food stuffs as it makes them taste buttery. I also like cream. I like it whipped. Or in frozen form. But I'm not supposed to eat it in frozen form anymore. Or whipped form either. Because whipped cream without sugar is really, uhm, pointless. I could curb an awful lot of pining for chocolate if I was a vegan. Seriously – chocolate made without milk is really, uhm, pointless. Carob is no match. And if you think it is, it's quite apparent that you have never had the real deal. So, I think that we have established that I'm in no position to pledge allegiance to a vegan flag. As far as vegetarian goes, I could pretty much see myself being successful. I already know what my weak spots would be. My dad makes brisket. I know that God actually made brisket. Silly. And I know that plenty of other people have cooked brisket. Silly. What I'm saying is that between my dad's rendition of brisket and my dad's rendition of corned beef – well, it would be challenging to eschew meat products all together. However, Dad lives far away and I can't get tempted too frequently. It's real hard to ship that stuff. I thought that bacon might be a tough animal to give up but I think I could do it. Pigs are really gross after all. But their ribs make for good eating. Which is why I'm making this Orange Chipotle Slow-Cooker Rib recipe for Super Bowl Sunday. Maybe I have a bigger meat affinity than I realized. You're giving me a lot to think about here...

I've been exercising somewhat. When I get on the elliptical, I spend an hour on there. But I haven't been on it the past 3 days. It actually bothers me that I haven't been able to make my way there. Not because I enjoy it. But because I really really really don't want to hold onto the softiness that is embedded around my middle region. Apparently turning 40 and well into almost 41 has changed the way that the food I eat sits on me. Also the way that fat sits on me. Also the way that the fat won't come off me. It's just so hard to do something SO contrary to who you are and not see immediate results and still do it and not knowing when, or even if, you will see results. And by you, I mean me. Because you look fabulous darling.

My spending fast was a success last month (Resolution 1, subsection A). However, my spending was not a success last month. So, I'm sort of mostly extending my spending fast into this month. I have already bought something that is NOT used for eating or cleaning. BUT it is going towards being creative – on the day that I actually make it (reference Resolution 6). I got fabric to make my money envelopes ala Dave Ramsey's Financial Peace University. So, I spent money to make money holders so that I can get better at spending money. See how that works? No? Well, you should take a trip up inside of my head because it is ringing all kinds of make sense bells up there. For the record, that damn gorgeous purple Coach purse is still at the consignment store. But it is no longer 75% off. I don't know what sort of hidden meaning is supposed to be inferred from that situation. Am I supposed to go buy it now? It's just sitting there. All available and gorgeous. Is it temptation? Or is it a prize for bypassing it the first time? But how can it be a prize if it isn't 75% off now? I'm confused. You might be wondering HOW I know that the purse is still there. It's because that consignment store has an area where the clothing is $1 and I went in there yesterday to take a look. That's correct. Right after I deposited the paycheck. Here's what I came to realize. I have a love hate relationship with clothing. I see cute outfits and want to adorn myself with them promptly. I love to go shopping for clothes. About every 5.65 weeks I decide that I don't like the way that something fits me and feel frumpy and start replanning and replacing my entire wardrobe. Also, I hate wearing clothes. Mostly in the summer. Or during hot flashes. But it's only in the summer that I get to challenge the whole how much is enough to be A) a God-fearing woman called to modesty despite sweltering conditions and B) not mistaken for a 'ho. My ideal is to get away with two pieces of clothing at any given time. However, the more weight I hang out with (and I mean that literally as well as figuratively...) the less I'm able to accomplish that. And, if I'm going to be honest, probably the older I get the less successful I am at wearing my bare minimum. Unless one item is a mumu. And the other contains the word “uplifting” in it's description. I have been on a nude beach once and went the way of the natives. I was like 20ish when that happened. I ache for that kind of freedom. Think about it. It pretty much accomplishes everything that those uniform rules set out to do – it equalizes the economic divide. Bonus- no bra straps pinching this way and that. No decisions to make. No one cares a lick about the variety of body shapes and sizes. It's a beautiful thing. I'm so pissed at Adam and Eve right now. I walked out of the consignment store empty handed. Hubs and I had to have a tough talk about money because my stupid church had to go all 4 weeks solid of a series on money and brought it all out into the open so that we had to have tough talks about money. Stupid money. Stupid church. And by stupid church, I mean awesome church. Here is some HI-larious video footage from the series for you to enjoy.

Speaking of series, let's ruminate on the brilliance that is Burn Notice. *sigh* I don't know what to tell you. It's not solving any of the world's problems but I really don't care. It's a 45 minutes of action and romance and loyalty and save the day and weaponry and cool dude and bad-ass little Irish chick and Bruce Campbell. It's a full on recipe of awesome. The other night, Hubs and I finished season 5. And ever since, I have felt like a lost soul bumping around bewildered and waiting for what happens next but they don't even start filming until March and those episodes air in the summer and I don't know when I'LL get to see season 6 because we don't have cable. So, if you see me and I look a little forlorn, you will know why.

I've been upping my Pinterest surfing a bit lately. I have all sorts of ideas for my crafting. Also for my next tattoo. Or 15. I have plenty of veggie recipes to try out. And stuff I have poked fun of. I've figured out that someone owes me a time machine so I can go back and explain to everyone who ever made fun of my glasses that I was actually a hipster – a fashion visionary ahead of my time. Because as far as I can tell, hipsters are just people who picked out killer specs. Maybe you have to like Mumford and Sons also to be one. So far, nothing has left its mark on me like this little find on Pinterest. It haunts me so much that I have begun to wish that there was a way to actually tattoo music onto your soul. Probably it is really only a matter of time before we can install an “i” device into our body and it would accomplish much the same. But if I could figure it out – hearing this resonate through my bones – it would make even more sense than hearing it through a mechanism some how. It would seem natural – like it was supposed to be heard this way and often. I love lots of different kinds of music. Except country – not any of it, not even a little. Or gospel- no disrespect to the One they be respectin'. Or jazz- which is a little puzzling because the way they skat in that genre is full up my nonsense talking alley. Also, I don't like rap so much. I'm down with old skool but once they started talking about shootin', bluntin', pimpin', thuggin' and fu... I mean bumpin' uglies – well, it just wasn't fun anymore. And, okay, whatever category Zamfir and Yanni fit in – I don't much like that either. Maybe it would be easier to tell you what I DO like to listen to. Look, that's not the point. The point is that I have heard a fair share of voices and instruments working together and very little has the ability to sink into my soul like this song has. So, I thought I would share it with you.

I'm going to let you in on a little secret. I don't exactly know what my final two resolutions are going to be. I have lots of ideas. Trust me, there's a whole lot of change that could be happening up in this here girlie. My conundrum is that I don't know how to pick the final two from all the ideas floating around. I could have a contest. But as twisty-uppy as my brain ever is, I'm well aware that concepts are not actually tangibly alive per se. So, it's not like I believe that I could have some sort of Survivor style competition and the last lit torches get to have the honor. Maybe that would be a good interactive thing to do! Maybe I should let all y'all decide what my last resolutions should be. Why don't you, my adoring couple of dozen public, weigh in? Huh? Why don't ya? Or maybe just one resolution. I haven't worked out my control freak resolution/issues yet.  

Back it up...

Where were you?? I waited all night but you never came, so I left. I've been worried sick! Are you okay? What? That was me? I didn't show up? Oh. Uhm. That is correct.

Yesterday I went to this killer grocery store extravaganza called Jungle Jim's. I may have driven 5 minutes to get there or I may have driven 2 hours to get there. You will not be able to hone in on my co-ordinates based on the information I supply to you. Nosy. Stalker. Anywho, I needed to stock up on Amish chicken breast. I put out an all-call on facebook as to whether or not that was a marketing buzz word for jacked-up hormonal cruelty chicken (yes, yes, vegans – I get it. Eating any animal is cruel. I know. I know.) or if it was a legit thing that would be a viable alternative to billion dollar a pound organic chicken. The first answer I got was that it was chicken raised without electricity. I don't know if she was being serious or funny but that is hilarious. And true. And hilarious. The next answer was a bit more informative and was the long and short of it. It's not mass produced by big business meat peeps. And that is a big deal. I'm telling you. Watch some of my recommended food docs and it changes you. Food, Inc. Wow. When I called up the Jungle Jim's meat department, they clarified that the Amish chicken they carry is antibiotic and hormone free. It's also gluten-free. Which I find very fascinating. So, Amish chicken – not made of wheat. I trucked it on up there (you don't get to know what kind of car I drive!! Nosy. Stalker. Also – I have like 17 kids and I'm a mom so do the math. Yes, it's a mini-van. But I am a COOL mini-van mom. Like the kind that puts reindeer antlers and a Rudolph nose on my car for Christmas but then I remember to take off the antlers but NOT the nose so I spend plenty of the new year driving around with a ginormous red nose attached to my hood. It's alright. I just pretend it's a clown car.). I bought about 12 packages o' Amish chicken because it was $2.99 a pound. A dollar more than my previous target price for chicken but I think that is a price worth paying. I've done my part to raise a few barns. My total for that trip was $165. Yeah. So what that means is that I have already spent ½ my grocery budget and we are only 4 days into the month. BUT I don't have to buy much in the way of meat for at least the rest of the month and a big portion of next month and here is why. Venison. I have about 2 deer worth of meat in my freezer right now. It's pretty guaranteed to be organic. The price was unbelievable. And it's fresh. I know that because it takes a lot to get used to the smell as it's cooking. I still have to mix in some regular mass produced ground meat to cut the flavor a bit when I'm making chili and pasta and such but I'm hoping that I can decrease the addition gradually as time goes on. The other reason that my food bill was so high is that I bought 13 boxes of Kashi waffles. Yes. 13. Because they were $1.49 a box and that is well over ½ off each and that's what Hubs eats for breakfast every morning – a peanut butter and jelly waffle sandwich- so we go through quite a few waffles. I'm playing it fast and loose with the expiration on those babies but it's Hubs eating it, not me. What? He'll be fine! I bought more fruits and veggies and plan on making juices and some kale chips with my goodies. Speaking of which, I thought I would include juice recipes with you as a public service. Last night the juice was made of fennel bulb and stalks, blueberries, strawberries, two golden delicious apples, ginger and Swiss chard. I enjoyed it very much! We now return to our regularly scheduled blog entry. Uhm, I also bought some clearance Christmas goodness. Look. If you saw a pistachio toffee bar made with Belgian chocolate, Wisconsin butter, sea salt and pistachios for .99 what would you do? What would you do? Well, if you would walk away, you are a far stronger self than I. I bought that sucker. I ate it too. And I'd do it again. Probably you would have walked away from the .99 Bahlsen gingerbread assortment cookie bag that made you nostalgic for when you lived in Belgium too. Pphtt. Whatever.

When I went to Jungle Jim's, I wore a pair of shoes that I don't wear much. I really like them but there are others that I like even more so they don't always make the cut. But I wandered around for well over 2 hours (what?? I'm a search and seize shopper!) and those shoes have NO arch support. Or heel support. Basically, their whole existence is based on being foot covering and nominally cute. I have been having MUCH back trouble lately and that did not help at all. One might say that in fact, it did more harm than good. I might say that. I am saying that. It killed my back. I've got to figure out something to do to have a better back. I think yoga would help. I don't have a foundation as to why that would be better than another form of exercise. I think it's purely based on the fact that you are nearly required to wear some of the most comfortable pants around while doing it. It says so right on the apparel – yoga pants. Also, it's a fairly relaxed atmosphere with no jumping up and down staring at the instructor who has every bit of business jumping up and down because she is all taut and tone and such. Yoga instructors look all taut and tone too but it's not as in your face as jumping up and down is. It feels more attainable to look like them. Even if it's not. Probably I should wear some more sensible shoes. Like today, I should be sporting a pair of Birkies, but I'm not. For one thing, I'm not a hippie or over the age of 60. For another, the only pair I own have all myriad color stripes. They don't go with my outfit. And finally, some might count this as reason three, but I don't- Hubs hates them. Like wants to throw them out hates them. That's okay. He has some apparel that I do not care for. Of course, it's apparel that I have moved to a different portion of the closet to see if he notices and looks for it so that I can take it a step further and just toss out already. So far, he hasn't noticed. Fingers crossed! Also, I get compliments on those shoes EVERY time I wear them. Compliments trump hate, every time. So, I've checked out orthopedic shoes and we have a problem. They are NOT cute. If you have foot or back problems, you are not allowed to have stylish or trendy shoes. And if you are allowed to have trendy or stylish shoes, it's because you severed an arm and a leg to pay for them. I might be reduced to buying a Dr. Scholl's product that compels men to proclaim that they are gellin' like a felon or some stupid non-nonsensical rhyming comparison. Anywho, I spent most of last night laid up on the couch trying to be still and trying not to burn myself with a heating pad. And playing Cleopatra's Pyramid card game on my iPhone. Because none of my Words with Friends friends are being too friendly. Ahem. Play your words, friends!! Quit acting like you have a life and such! Sheesh. Productive people are soooo... inspirational. Yeah. That's what they are. So, that's the scoop on where I was last night and why I didn't come out to play. Perhaps that was the perfect posture from which to write a blog entry. But I didn't do that. Because I was kind of still feeling sheepish about my day what with spending $165 at the store. And because of this next bit...

I also went to a store that rhymes with Appall-Mart. I hate, HATE that I need anything from that store. And if I take the time to really evaluate the situation, I don't NEED anything at that store. But from time to time, you can't buy some things at the grocery, not even at somewhere as awesome as Jungle Jim's. And I can't afford to shop at environmentally friendly (what IS that?? You have to be rich to love the planet properly. Slow down, one soap box at a time...), ergonomic, recycled from batteries and diapers, vegan store of home products. We needed a space heater for “the Saudi”'s room. He comes from a desert and finds our climates below the 120 degree mark a bit chilly. His space heater stopped working so, being the hostly hosts that we are, I needed to replace it. Now, I'm trying to hold true to that stuff in my "about me" box that says that I'm not here to judge. So, if that link embedded in my Appall-Mart reference just offended you, well, I don't know what to tell you. I'm merely showing you someone else's impressions of the situation and letting YOU judge. And really, if you are going to go out in public like that, you are just asking for it. I'm just keeping it real. Have you ever noticed when a thug, I mean a person, says that he or she is keeping it real, it's always about anyone and everyone but themselves. It's true. But, I'm here to keep it real, for real. I'm calling myself out. And it's not easy because I am no jokes ashamed of myself. I felt like the most appalling thing at that mart. Here's what happened. I heard a woman yelling at her kid. And, that is NOT stand-out behavior at the mart. People yell and curse at other people, including children, all the time there. Unfortunately, you let it become the soundtrack that you ignore as you speed through like a bat out of hell to get out of there already. But I happened to glance over and caught her spanking her little boy. We could have a HUGE debate on the merits and demerits over spanking. But this isn't about that. This is about the fact that after she spanked this roughly 3 year old little boy, she yelled at him more about being quiet. You know, because she was spanking him and humiliating him in public and he was crying because he was hurt. Then, she spanked him again and told him to walk right. I stood frozen. I wanted to yell at her. I wanted to stop her from hurting that little boy- because whether he was all weather padded and couldn't feel the spanks or not, if he wasn't feeling it physically, it was making it's mark emotionally. But I didn't yell at her. I didn't come to that boy's rescue. And it makes me sick to my stomach thinking about it and it makes my soul ache to relay it. So, here is my next resolution:

4. Be a Stand-up Girl.  Did you know that there are people who put their lives on the line to rescue girls out of sexual slavery in India? They set up stings and try to fight a mostly fully corrupt police force to rescue girls so broken that they sometimes run away from the rescuers and return to the life they have resigned themselves to. These people work undercover with people who would happily kill them to protect a BILLION dollar industry. One of the men who worked with this organization is on staff now at my church. He heads up the initiatives that our church is doing to help combat this atrocity. I am in awe of Don and the things that he has seen and what he has put on the line to make things right. He has a wife and kids and they all lived in India while he fought for justice. And here I am, in my own neighborhood, looking at someone without his own little voice getting hurt and I'm being a coward. Why? Well, for one thing, the neighborhood I live in, it's not all the time safe. This mart serves one of the poorest areas in the city. As well as one of the most dangerous. Yeah. I was afraid that I would piss someone off that would hurt me. I put my life first. And, I think about the fact that I put Hubs and my kids first along with me. If that woman decided to hurt me, to some degree, that hurts my family. Would I really have been risking my life if I had called that woman out and told her to stop? Probably not. But I was too chicken to find out. Fear is the faith of the enemy. You can determine if that is the enemy of awful, disgusting people who prey on the innocent or if it means a far more looming darkness of the opponent of God. For me, they pretty much equal out to be the same. Either way, the same holds true. Fear is used to oppress and keep the status-quo, or to downgrade the status-quo to even worse. Bad people count on apathy, fear, and people burying their heads in the sand. God's call is to wake up and stand up and fight – especially for those who have no fight left or who have been rendered voiceless. We are called not to be worriers but to be warriors. It's not enough that Hubs and I are pouring money into our church to funnel out to fund homes where these girls can be rehabilitated. It's not enough for me to be careful about where I spend my money so that I am not supporting industries or countries or individuals who objectify, dehumanize and use people up and throw them away. It's not okay that I leave the voice to others. That I leave the back-breaking hard-core out in the field dismantling a hydra work to others while I shuffle around or straight up run away. God made me a warrior. If you know me, you know that I can be combative. If you are Hubs, you know that I am nearly always combative. I don't think that God made me the warrior that people in organizations like IJM and Invisible Children or so many other outstanding organizations are. And that doesn't come from a place of denial or fear. God makes all kinds of people in all kinds of ways. Some of us are supposed to be out in the field and some of us are supposed to be supporting them. But we are all called to say stop. Stop treating God's child this way. Stop treating my brother or sister of the human race this way. I don't care if you believe in God or not. Okay, I do care but that's a story for a different day. Whether you believe in God or not, you likely believe in a benevolence that we are all supposed to uphold to have a society. Whether you are Democrat or Republican or any color of the spectrum, we are all in this together. Me. I gotta take a stand. I have to start saying Stop. STOP!

So that's it for today. I have a back-bone to build. Smooch.