Tag: Food

If you’d like to see how quickly the civilized world is degrading, look no further than the Comments section of any on-line local news story.  What starts as a forum for community members to express their opinions of how much clothing a barista needs to wear, quickly spirals into political pissing-matches, name-calling, race-baiting, Obama bashing, and general dumbassery.  It’s the kind of language that if used in a public place across a table would get the speaker either removed from that city council meeting and/or punched in the face many times.  Many, many times.

For example, after reading this article about a man arrested for cutting into safes and being caught, here is one of the comments… Is it about the detectives?  The criminal?  Let’s find out!!!

Thats why I read the story. Wasn’t anything near a safe. Maybe sheeple boxes, but definitely nothing I would have much less use for storing anything but crap in.

Keyboard Badasses.  Qwerty Warriors.  Internet Assassins.  Trolls.  This dude’s lettin’ people know ain’t nobody gonna do nothin’ to his safe that’s not a piece of crap no-how.
The anonymity of the internet allows people to express, at times, a linguistic acuity within a spectrum of “skull half-full of sloth vomit” to “prison-educated neo-Nazi.”  And it’s all because we gave people with access to the internet a “voice” via the Comments section.  And that’s how we’re using it.  #ApocalypseNowPlease

SlothdumbBut lately there’s a growing genre of internet input that I am calling full “BULLSHIT” on.  It’s the “Epically Hilarious Customer Review,” which started, I think, with the Amazon reviews of the Bic “For Her” pens.  The reviews took a sarcastic tone early on, and for good reason.  While Bic aimed at a pretty pen women would enjoy, the interwebs took it to a new level, submitting reviews such as this one from “Amy O’Rourke:”

“For years I had dreamed of penning a masterpiece and yet, when it came to that blank piece of paper the harsh offensive masculinity of the pen was just too intimidating. Finally it seems someone has actually considered what it is like to be female in this cruel world and how easily our little minds can be intimidated and denied the opportunity to do our life’s work. Five stars. “

And this one… from a”daveyclayton:”
“I bought this pen (in error, evidently) to write my reports of each day’s tree felling activities in my job as a lumberjack. It is no good. It slips from between my calloused, gnarly fingers like a gossamer thread gently descending to earth between two giant redwood trunks.”

Right… Because lumberjacks use parentheses and words like “gossamer thread gently descending…”

Now comes the Haribo Sugarless Gummy Candy reviews.
Sugar-free candy is loaded with an artificial sweetener like a sugar alcohol, which is a solidified, probably indigestible form of the gas kinda like your intestinal flora create when it can’t digest something properly.  Primes the pump for some serious issues in the back of the factory.  If you like to fart, I mean like LOVE TO FART… I mean like “Competitively Fart”… eat some sugar-free ice-cream the night before a road trip with a friend.  You’ll set a record for decibels and oxygen displacement.

So the reviews start off with a few funny ones, then somebody went all-in, and it got a little viral heat on the web.  Then people went batshit and piled on and WOW, all of a sudden the internet is not only full of people who have a real gift for literarily expressing bodily functions, but THEY ALL SEEMED TO HAVE EATEN THE EXACT SAME CANDY WITHIN A FEW DAYS OF EACH OTHER… ?  Is that possible?

Does a sugar-free gummi bear make you shit in the woods?
That’s why you gotta soak ’em overnight in tequila.  Pfff… amateurs.  Go back to your parent’s insurance coverage, noob.

Call me a buzzkill, a jerk, a loser, a pooh-poo’er, a handsome-as-hell-despot-of-backlashing-to-attempts-at-comedy, I don’t mind.
But here-forthwith, I put into this internet record a declaration on all “Hilarious, Epic, Embarrassing, Overly-Detailed Product Reviews” as BULLSHIT.

Please leave a comment.

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So I’m like 3 months away from my 40th birthday, and I have a particular goal of dropping 20 el-beez.  LB’s.  Pounds.  Lard Bricks.  I wanna drop ’em by the Friday prior to the Super Bowl.  I know I can do this, but I’m also stumped about how my droppage seems to have stalled.  Admittedly, the past weekend of Halloween and eating like a foraging bear (candy, date night, pizza party and cake for the youngest’s birthday) didn’t help.  I put on 3lbs since last Thursday morning.  3.  It’s probably retained water and frankly I could feel it and my face looked it.  So if my body will store it that easily, it can lose it that easily.

So what’m I gonna do?  Doing the same thing and expecting different results is the definition of violent minds meeting great opposition to mediocre dreams ~ Oprah Lincoln. Or whomever said it, people mash-up and misquote so many Faux-tivational quotes these days, even with the internet to validate against.  Ridiculous.  I have a dream that one day we will not be judged by the choosing of our quotes but by the accuracy of their citation.

So my plan is as follows:

  1. Eat less crap: I need to be strict with my intake.  Depending on which expert you ask, nutrition is 80% of the success towards weightloss.  Some say 70%.  I’ll gun for 76.47% and see where that lands.  I can’t afford a “cheat day,” so maybe, MAYBE, one cheat “thing” a week.  But not 1 crap-pile a day for 3 days.  Come on, dude… Come on…
    You can eat like this if you are THE ROCK. Or turn your heart into A ROCK.
    You can eat like this if you are THE ROCK. Or turn your heart into A ROCK.

    It’s hilarious the games we play with ourselves about crap eating.  “Oh just a little isn’t gonna be a problem.”  Right.  Put a cake out at your workplace and sit by it.  Nobody will touch it, no matter how many people come by.  Now walk around the corner, and hear the woodchipper that is your coworkers scraping the last of the buttercream off the lid.  Do right by you, but no games, Geoff.

  2. Eat more boss:  My ideal meal is about like this: Roasted salmon with broccoli, Brussels Sprouts, sweet potatoes. And then right to bed.  I need to get away from food, and in the house the best place to get away from food is when I’m asleep.  So, eat well, then stop eating.  I like the Paleo path best, and I rarely eat breakfast.  I’m not hungry until about 11:30 anyway, so why force food into my face when I’m usually behind schedule anyway?  No, skipping breakfast doesn’t slow down your metabolism when you’re like me, which is “kinda fat.”  So shut up.
  3. Lift Some Heavy Shit: No, not my ass off the couch, ha ha, so funny I forgot to laugh.  I finally have found the joy of proper squat technique, dumbbell deadlifts, and pushing heavy stuff around.  I did circuits for a while and looked good but wasn’t very muscular for a dude walking around over 240.  For cardio I like either HIIT on an elliptical, hill sprints, or road raging.
  4. Sleep More:  I seriously have to get to bed earlier.  11:17pm ain’t cuttin’ it.
  5. Stop worrying about it: I need to chill out a bit on this.  I know what I need to do, so now I just need the consistency of doing it.  This isn’t a diet, this is a lifestyle.
  6. Stay Motivated As All Hell:  Not sure what I need to get super motivated, like whatever blind self-allegiance Guy Fieri has that keeps him from assessing his life.  I need that.  Maybe it’s seeing 4 of 6 abs.  Maybe it’s being under 12% bodyfat for the first time since kindergarten.  Maybe it’s just that I need to prove to myself that I can do this.  The ultimate goal is to drop 35lbs by April 2014.  Mostly, I need to do this for a better quality of life in a few years as my boys get older.  They aren’t going to do LESS in life from here on out.

So I’ll post some stuff here in the “20 by 40” posts about what’s up with my bod and how it’s going.  May even get some “BEFORE” and “LATER” pics if I’m feeling froggy.  Sorry, this was kinda boring and self-indulgent, got low blood-sugar, gotta find some work cake.

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Pretty Much Paleo Pancakes

1/4tsp Baking Soda

1/4tsp Sea salt (It’s all the rage)

2Tbsp whey protein powder (the more grass-fed/organic/isolated the better), vanilla is best

2 eggs (from the closest thing to “homeless” chickens as possible)

1 pretty ripe banana 

1Tbsp Almond or (GASP) Peanut butter

2Tbsp coconut flour 

  1. First, get your family far away from you so you can get some head-space and just make some awesome pancakes for them.  Usually they just slow down everything you’re doing.
  2. Throw the ‘nana, nut butter, eggs into a bowl and beat ’em til smooth.  That’s what I did.  You can do it differently but don’t bitch if it sucks.
  3. Sift in the protein powder, give it a couple turns.  
  4. Sift in the salt, baking soda, and coconut flour.  Turn ’em til smooth.  Maybe beat it again to smooth it up.
  5. Smoooooooth.  Ya feel me?
  6. Let it sit a bit, get all together.
  7. Heat a pan up to just-past the mid-point on the burner.  
  8. Ideally you’re dropping some coconut oil in that hot pan til it melts.  Swirl it all around, coat that pan like the back of a Summer fling on a Tahitian beach resort chaaaaaise.  Smooth.
  9. Then drop some of that batter in there and PAY ATTENTION!  The high-fat content will get the cakes browning up pretty quickly so don’t get yourself in a burned cake mode.  Try a test cake, drop like a quarter-sized dollop in there, see how it goes.  
  10. Taste test!  How’s it?  Good!
  11. Now you can do what comes naturally when making cakes.  Do it up.  Make a few big ones.  Make a couple little ones.  
  12. Enjoy.  Feel the power.  

Nutritional Information:

Calories:  enough
Fat:  good for you and enough
Carbs:  just a bit, maybe like 50g total if you eat the whole batch yourself
     Fiber:  8g or so
Protein:  like 30g or so.

I’m sure a strict Paleotian is preparing a response to this and getting their crossfit shorts in a wad, but please remember:
I’M NOT TRYING TO CHANGE THE WORLD OF PALEO EATING THROUGH ONE RECIPE THAT WORKED OUT WELL FOR ME AND MADE MY KIDS FORGET ABOUT REGULAR PANCAKES.  Also, eat sh*t.

Don’t feed the trolls, feed your beast.

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Donut Do Not

I drive by a TopPot every day on the way to work.  Have never once gone in there.  The half-donut I had after a recent trip was more of a stress munch, and was the only donut I’ve had for a long time (6+ weeks). And I can smell the fried dough every day I drive by, but I never ever stop. 
But today I decided I’m just gonna go get one and get it over with and just ENJOY A TREAT.  Worked hard this week in the gym, did a 40min MRT blowout this morning, feeling good.  Donut ready.
Nothing fancy, just a maple old-fashioned or something like that.
As I park way behind in the garage and have to walk a long way to the door I see a sign that says
JUNE 7, NATIONAL DONUT DAY, FREE DONUTS, ORDER A DOZEN!!!
 
I’m thinking “Holy crap, it’s meant to be!  I finally give in a little and it’s free donut day!  Just ONE donut and I’ve been repaid for my patience!“
So I head on in, and I don’t see a large case like usual, but no bigs, I see some folks huddled around the case, and there’s a group from Northwest Harvest off to the side, taking donations.  Good call, because if folks aren’t paying for donuts, they have money to drop in those buckets!
 
So then I pull my wallet out, gonna get a coffee, too, great coffee at the Top Pot, I’m like 3rd person in line, and I peek around the gal ahead of me to see the case full of….
empty platters.  6 empty platters.  Some without crumbs.  Just bare and exhausted.
Image
 
Oh, wait, no… there were 2 platters holding the following items. 
2 plain cake donuts, 3 plain cinnamon cake donuts, 2 chocolate bars (1 of which the icing has slid halfway off), 1.5 pieces of walnut bread and a blueberry muffin. 
This is God’s donut prank on me.  Well played.
So I balk and turn to leave, still have my wallet out.  Northwest Harvest Greenbean Patrol stops me with the “HAVE YOU HEARD OF NORTHWEST HARVEST” and I have because I used to drop in and volunteer in college, and I drop a dollar and some change in a bucket while the lady says “You can give $10 and provide this much food…” pointing to a sign.  Her partner there is STARING AT THE MONEY IN THE CLIP OF MY WALLET and gives me a look like “Ummm… what’s that?”  And I leave, having just wasted time.  No donut, just accusatory stares.
 
So I go to the store because now it’s about getting a donut in my hole based solely on the notion that I will not be denied.  Some guy is standing in front of the donut case and cannot figure out how to get the box together for the dozen-ish he’s gonna bring to his co-workers, I presume.  I say “pardon me” and he doesn’t even move, then a little louder with, “Excuse me,” and again, nothing, so I just open a door while he’s standing there and say “again, pardon me, sir”  very nicely and he barely moves.  I grab a chocolate old fashioned, toss it in the bag, and barely have the door open so that I can let it close while he’s trying to reach in it.  I’m not his donut doorman, that guy and his coworkers can kiss my fritter.  I’m pretty much done with people at this point of the morning. 
 
Get to work, settle in with some coffee, and take a bite of the donut. 
Old.  Stale.  No flavor.  Just old and gross.  At least a day old. 
Threw it away after 2 bites. 
Before this weekend is out, I will have a donut in my hole.
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Eat It

There’s no way I should be hiding all of the truth from people if this is going to be a readable blog, right?  Who wants to read regurgitated horse-S from a guy who sorta speaks his mind if it’s probably not going to bother people?  Truth is, if you’re bothered then I said something that hit a part of you that you’re likely not happy about. You’ll stop reading or you’ll hate me and come back out of spite.  Or you’ll agree and we can say “OK, let’s go forward.”  It’s not my intent to offend anybody – that’s just a bonus.

So about these homo’s getting married…  KIDDING, loosen up.  Every adult should be allowed to enter a legally-recognized civil union and you can call it whatever you want, as long as we’re treated equally and allowed, on our own accord, to screw it up on a case-by-case basis.

It’s my intent to share whatever I can from my personal perspectives on life, parenting, health, and work in hopes it will connect with whomever reads this, and will keep them coming back, and they’ll tell their friends.  Hopefully it will be entertaining, either from a comedy or mildly dramatic view.  But overall it’s unfair to ask for anybody’s time if this is boring and repetitive and another boring “DadBlog.”  I’ve read a few and thought how truly boring the dad’s come across, and wonder if they’re coming off like that to get laid at blogger conferences or if they really are that wussified.  I have plenty of Compromise DNA in me, but a few entries on a few other DadBlogs almost made an “innie” out of my scrotum.

Where-to from there?  How about food!?  Shouldn’t try and ride the horse through highest waters just yet.

We’re having a renaissance of toddler eating habits in our house.  With 1 toddler and 1 nurser and everybody working full-time there’s only so much time and so many hands with-which to prepare food.  Many experts (I know they are because they wrote it on a website!) about toddler eating have said to give your kid what you’re eating, and they’ll come around to it.

Let/Make them try a lot of things.  They won’t starve unless you with-hold all food from them.  As parents WE dictate to the CHILD what’s available to eat.  It doesn’t have to be dungeon gruel and the last of the ox gristle.  But if we gave in to our son’s pouting about meals every time he hit a 7 on the Grumpometer, he’d have a steady diet of cookie-rabbits and juice.  While it would ensure zero hassle at meal time,  it would probably damage my oldest boy’s physical and emotional development.  He’d be on an unhealthy path via nutrition and constant catering to his whims.  The world doesn’t work like that, we don’t work like that, so neither will meal time.

In doing so we’ve had a few shortened lunches and dinners while baby carrots were left on the plate and cries came from the booster seat.  Sometimes a single floret of broccoli designated the entire table a war-zone.  Then eventually a few berries were eaten.  Then a lot more.  Then some brown rice with chopped vegetables became a staple.  And recently the baby carrots diminished by a few by the end of the meal.  He actually lived, acted, and slept very well in the aftermath of regularly having various foodstuffs on his plate.  We usually have a starring role for a nearly-natural chicken nugget trio, a yogurt-fruit smoothie, applesauce, whole-grain pancakes, and the like.  But as a dad who has fought the weight battle my whole life I want to get good nutrition habits into my son from early on.  I can’t do that if I don’t eat healthy.  I’m not perfect – I’ve had sensuous moments with brownies and slices of pizza that I still think of when I’m hungry – but at the very least I want my boys to try all kinds of food, see what they like, then mash it up into a paste and bake it into a cookie shape so they’ll eat it, stay thin, and have a perfect life.  The end.

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