My current obsession with food.

I swear to you, I can't surf around 101 Cookbooks or Smitten Kitchen without uttering the words, "ExCUSE me?!" at least seven times per visit when I look at their recipes. Because who wants to eat Amazing Black Bean Brownies... really? I should be offended by this. And then I totally want to eat them. Why this is appetizing is beyond me. But I am sure that blogs like this inspire me to spend as much time in my kitchen as is humanly possible.

Also, when I walk into stores like Williams Sonoma or Sur La Table I can't help but get a thrill at the thought of a huge kitchen filled with every cooking gadget under the sun, and me inventing culinary delights so ethereal that the heavens open wide and the angels sing upon my creations.

I think the world might actually be coming to an end. I want to do things like sew, cook, and plant a garden. When did I become a vegetarian, chocolate-obsessed, weird brownie-baking, lentil-consuming, Martha Stewart wannabe who actually wants to eat the aforementioned ingredients... all in the same recipe?

...

On another note, I made Cody eat a whole steamed artichoke the other night, and it was *nearly* disastrous. Not quite cooked all the way through, but not entirely a loss for a first-timer. All in all, a thoroughly weird experience. When he got to the part where he had to slice and dice his way through the furry mess to the heart, he sat there with a very concerned look on his face, staring at what was left of the artichoke, and said, "I think I just ate a wombat."

No job, no house.

For the past week, I have been trying very hard to not be bitter at my former boss for letting me go last Monday. VERY hard. And I've found it to be nearly impossible. I have to take responsibility for my terrible judgment call the preceding Friday for calling in to take a personal day (GOD FORBID), but it was certainly an offense I didn't anticipate would result in being accused by my boss of blowing him off on a Friday immediately followed by, "That was your last day. Here's your paycheck." I could go on and on about all the reasons I think this situation was handled with outrageous (mis)judgment, but I'm sure it's best to leave that for my anonymous blog and/or venting sessions with my closest friends and family.

It isn't so much that he fired me for inconveniencing him that hurts the most; it's that as a result of my loss of income, Cody and I lost the house we had been mentally occupying and building our future around for the past several weeks. While I had heard that buying a home is an emotional process, I had no idea that losing one would ever be this hard.

My heart is breaking for another reason: the couple who owns the house has been trying to move to Arkansas for who knows how long (when we first started looking, the home had been on the market for 437 days). Before we came along, they had another buyer who started the process and didn't qualify either. I don't know the details of their situation or why they are moving or when they need to move, but I can only imagine how hard it is to be disappointed repeatedly on such a major life change as moving across the country. I actually kind of want to go knock on their door and tell them how sorry I am for messing up their plans. Fortunately, I think that they would have to admit, just as Cody and I have, that God obviously had something else in mind for all of us.

This past week has been devastatingly hard, and yet a perfect illustration of how sometimes the hardest thing and the right thing are the same. Cody and I are so ready to have a permanent home for us and our pups, but as we faced this astronomical change in our circumstances, we came to the realization that 1. We must have been in denial about the numbers, and 2. God is clearly saying, "Not right now." When I say we were in denial about the numbers, I don't mean that we wouldn't have been able to pay our bills; I mean that we ONLY would have been able to pay our bills with little to no wiggle room for a life. We would be house-poor. We became very thankful at the timing of this, because if the process was already finished when it happened, we wouldn't have been able to pay our mortgage. We would much rather lose the home under these circumstances than foreclosure.

We are ready to bounce back though. My dear mother-in-law has opened her home to us in order to pay off our loan and build up more savings for a down payment, and over the next year or so, we should have that finished. We are both so thankful for her support and generosity. We will have more freedom to travel and fulfill commitments we have already made without any stress, like going to see our grandparents in Oklahoma and Illinois, and be in my friend's wedding in Minnesota next summer, and perhaps even a couple more (wink wink). While having no income for now is not ideal, that will change, and my time has been freed up to pursue the things I want to do. I have developed a plan for this next phase of our lives: find a part-time job, build my Web site, do some freelance writing, network, build my pet business, and be able to stay home more with the fur-kids.

For now, I am still being stubborn and bitter about the circumstances that caused us to lose the house. Every time I picture what I thought our lives would have been like in that house I get very, very sad; but those feelings are gradually being replaced by lessons in patience, responsibility, gratefulness, and humility. Clearly, Cody and I aren't the best at listening to God for guidance, because look at the drastic measures He had to take to get our attention. All we can do now is thank Him for being so blatantly clear this time, and work at being better at seeking His wisdom from now on.

Yes, please.

Watched this video, responded in accordance with the title of this post, made a list:

Things I am going to accomplish:
1. Work from home. Our brand new, beautiful Gilbert home :)
2. Build my pet business.
3. Be a writer.
4. Make a living doing these things. A darn good living.
5. Help my husband go to seminary or work in ministry. He is the reason so many of my dreams have come true, and I want to do the same for him.

Call me a poser all you want. I really don't care. If these women can do it, so can I, whether it's through this blog or livelaughlovedog. I'm a firm believer in being able to accomplish your goals if you set your mind to it- and with God's blessing, IT WILL HAPPEN.

Vegetarian Challenge: Update 1

Well... It's officially been three days since my random decision to be a vegetarian (for the month of April, anyway), and I must admit that it's much easier than I expected. Believe it or not, this once self-professed carnivore can actually see herself doing this long-term, although I can't say I will be perfect at it (I do, after all, have some of my-favorite-food-on-the-planet that made its annual journey from Iceland sitting in the freezer waiting for me to devour it. You may want to vomit right now, but I think it's pretty irresistible. Doing everything I can to hold myself back until May 1).

I've started reading all kinds of vegetarian know-how books, and I've been a lot more conscious of what I'm eating. The thought of eating meat catches me a bit off guard now, and buying eggs and drinking milk that are not labeled "hormone-free" or "free-range" just doesn't feel right anymore. These particular items are a little more costly than one on a normal coupon-binge would hope, but in light of this test, it is worth it to me now. And yes, it is in the name of compassion for animals. How non-ultra-conservative and uber-hippie of me (don't panic, Dad. I have not gone off the deep end).

I've learned a couple of things about cheese, my more acceptable other-favorite-food-on-the-planet, and that is that it is not always vegetarian. Apparently some cheese makers use rennet to coagulate the cheese, and it is not often clearly labeled for those of us who don't want to eat animal products. The good news is that some rennet is animal and some is not, and though it may be one or the other, sometimes it is not specified as one or the other. For instance, tonight we are going to our dear friends Jason and Jessica's house for a fondue night in celebration of their baby news, and the swiss fondue we are bringing has... drumroll please... RENNET in it. Despite this knowledge, I am going to feign ignorance and pretend like it is VEGETABLE RENNET and not the other kind.

I think you should pretend that too.

When a Carnivore Contemplates Vegetarianism.

I have always considered myself to be a full-fledged carnivore. A meat-and-potatoes girl, if you will. I grew up eating hot dogs, ribs, dried fish (an Icelandic delicacy... and my favorite food on the planet. Go ahead. Gag. I'm used to it.), filet mignon, super crispy bacon... pretty much everything, with the exception of chicken. We only ate that once in a blue moon. And I have an uncanny aversion to chicken because every time I eat it, I have yellow, slimy chicken fat, or cartilage, or veins, or some other nast-a-rama on my plate that I have no desire to put in my mouth, but usually do when it's too late. This usually results in chewed-up meat spit out on my plate that I'm sure no one wants to look at, and me running to the nearest toilet, gagging the same way you would if your nose ever encountered my-favorite-food-on-the-planet.

On the flip side, I never, ever liked salads. Ever. Lettuce bored me to tears. If you set a salad in front of me (maybe with the exception of a Cobb or a taco salad) and expected me to eat it for lunch or dinner, I would silently contemplate in my mind if you were crazy, and if you actually expect that to satisfy my current appetite for breaded Icelandic cod and carmelized potatoes, or a BBQ beef sandwich, or a gyro. If I'm in a good mood and feel like being nice to you, I'll eat it, and then secretly eat something else later. If not, I'll scoff at the absurdity of salad for dinner, and then tell you that I'm gonna go eat some real food. (Hi Mom! I love you! And your salads!)

But lately, my cravings have been taking a very strange turn. I think I have had so many bad meat experiences that extend even beyond my run-ins with chicken that I'm starting to fear eating meat, period. You have to admit, there is nothing worse than eating a piece of savory brisket, biting down and discovering that ALAS! That was not meat, but pure, unadulterated fat that is squishing around in your mouth, and who the hell doesn't cut this #$&%! off the meat before they serve it to humans?! THERE IS NOTHING WORSE THAN THIS.

Of course, my husband would tell you that he is married to the pickiest eater alive (who also eats dried fish). He deliberately refuses to make choices on what we eat, even if I explicitly tell him to go ahead and make the decision, because there is a 95.78% chance that I will either not like it or want something else. If confronted with a plain ol' piece of meat, I will trim every miniscule trace of fat or anything strange-looking from it, no matter how long it takes, an inherited trait that is consistently attributed to my dad by my mom (watching the two of us eat together can be quite entertaining). But oh, man, the looks Cody gets when I watch some of the things he voluntarily puts in his mouth. I have a zero-tolerance policy for such madness.

So on that note, recently when I go out, I find myself ordering things like tofu, or veggie sandwiches, or anything with beans and cheese (there are no words to describe my everlasting love for cheese). And I start to wonder if I am unconsciously becoming a vegetarian. Like if it's happening to me and I have no control over it. Then I start to think about things like well-done bacon, or my beloved dried fish, or Ruth's Chris Steak House, and I think, "No... no, no, no. That could never happen to me. I am a self-professed carnivore." But then I think about how much I love animals, and how sometimes when I eat ground beef there are bones or cartilage in it, and I get grossed out. That thought is usually followed by a ponderance of whether it is easy to eat entirely vegetarian when in restaurants, or planning a menu, or eating at the home of a friend or family member. My BFF Amber is a vegetarian, and the brilliance otherwise known as Stacy recently made the switch, so I know that it's a bit of a lifestyle overhaul. Could I really make those kinds of adjustments?

Amber suggested that I try it for a month. So I'm gonna attempt it. I don't know how long I will last given that I have not won any awards lately for self-discipline, but for the month of April, I will make a noble effort to eat meat-free meals. If anyone can make any good recommendations for vegetarian cookbooks, shoot them my way.

I'll be reporting on my progress, successes and failures over the next month. No. 2, over and out.