Colors

This last time I went to my Local Yarn Store (LYS), I had a specific plan in mind. I usually do and I'm often foiled. They almost never have the yarn I'm looking for. Don't get me wrong, I love my LYS, it's fantastic, it has a huge selection packed into a nice space, but apparently I just find those yarns they don't carry. Usually, I'm able to find a good substitute since you can usually do that.

This last time, not so much. It turns out the tank top I was wanting to make (It's summer! I won't go into the fact that we skipped over spring and how that's a really awful indicator that climate change is... yeah I won't go into it. It's summer!), they definitely don't carry that yarn (surprise!), but the gauge measurements were wonky so they couldn't translate to what type of yarn I needed. And when we finally figured out ballpark, all they had was wool. Who wants to wear wool in summer? (Unless, I guess, you're in one of the poles.) So I was foiled. But I couldn't just leave, slumped shouldered and order the yarn online. Nope. I needed a project for the NEXT day. You see, I was travelling to Maine this past weekend and my scarf/shawl thing was just plain far too boring.

It's pretty, but I'm about a third of the way through and I tend to lose interest around then on most of my large projects. Also? It's just plain repetitive. Which is part of the problem in general on large projects for me. But it is pretty and I will finish it. But first, I needed a new project, for this weekend.

Since I couldn't do the tank top, I had to find something in the patterns they were offering. I flipped through a bunch of different options, one woman decided an afghan was the way to go. I'd like to do an afghan, but I'm currently unemployed, so I don't have the budget for an afghan. Anyways, I was flipping through various resources until I wandered over to the Afghan binder of patterns, flipped it open and, voila, I found the most magnificent pattern.

An Entrelac Pillow. Not an afghan. BUT a type of knitting I've never done before and have always admired. It's something I've been wanting to do for a while now. And this seemed like just the thing. A giant rectangle of entrelac, no other interfering shaping, just a square. I'm using Cascade 220, which again makes me a horrible vegan (vegans and wool supposedly don't mix. I may or may not eventually get there). I tried to choose somewhat sedate colors, ones that might fade into the background.

But I may be fated to fail in every project in this regard. See for yourself:

I don't normally choose greens. And I tried to choose not bright greens, but it appears that, alone, the greens may not seem all that bright, but when you put them together...

Why I hike

I follow Husky Hiker on my blog reel or whatever it's called. Today, he posted a Why I hike as a response to the question/challenge put out by Tom Mangan at Two Wheel Drive (a blog I'll probably start following soon).

Since I've moved all my food related posting over to vegan appetite, I figured my next post should be about hiking.

So. Why I hike. I hike for the feeling it gives me when I'm moving. I hike for the views I get when I least expect them. I hike for the release of emotions I experience, both positive and negative. I hike to feel the burn of my legs. I hike because it feels natural to move my legs, cover a distance. I feel connected to history, I feel connected to the earth around me. I hike for the others hiking. I hike to see things I would never see in a suburban environment, like black bears and moose 10 feet away from me. I hike for the beauty. I like the burn of hiking up a mountain, rewarded by either cold rain or the best view you could ever ask for. For the surprise of practically running from Mizpah Springs Hut to Lake of the Clouds Hut. For the shock of walking up to McAfee's Knob. For the luck of having a warm, super clear day on top of Katahdin, for the views of Katahdin over a lake. For seeing the wackily named outhouse in the 100 mile wilderness, for the pizza at Partnership shelter in Virginia, for the lovely older section hiker with the amazing stories who is finishing the last 50 mile section he has left and going to Trail Days afterwards.

I hike for my sanity. I hike for me.

Disordered Eating, Part 2

I don’t know exactly when my disordered eating began, but I was always a picky eater as a child. I was an introvert and did not make tons of friends naturally. I was anxious about many things. I remember a conversation I had with my parents at what seemed like a late hour to me (after my brother and sister and I had been put to bed) about death and what it was. I was terrified of death. Still am, really.

Somewhere in there, something in my brain started thinking that if I ate certain foods, I felt better because they tasted that delicious. And I played soccer, but that didn’t prevent weight gain, nor did it do much for my clumsiness or my socially awkward persona. I had a really good friend who stood up for me (as I tended to be the brunt of teasing at points), but I really started turning to food. Food just tasted good. Especially the sugary kind (which isn't so surprising, I suppose-especially with having watched this video- that it wasn't a surprise that I tried to make myself happy with sugary foods.

In high school, I had a few really good friends, but my best friend stressed me out as much as she was a good friend. I still turned to food to calm myself, sedate myself. I think sedate is a good word in this instance. Because by eating sugar and lots of carbs, I can simultaneously cause a sugar rush and cause myself to be sluggish, slowing me down, putting me in a funk and creating yet more desire for food to ‘perk me up’. It is such a circular process.

In college, I kept attempting to exercise and lose weight. It did not work all that well with the exception of the summer between junior and senior years when I lost 15 pounds (which I promptly gained back and more because of the stress of college). After college, I worked in two kitchens. The first focused on natural/healthy foods and I'm pretty sure I managed my weight fairly well (although I didn't weigh myself). The second was more about speed and fewer people doing more things-so good nutrition went out the window, really. So that didn't help. I gained weight despite my best efforts.

After that, I went home to do a temp job at my dad's company. Night shift. I got a membership to a gym as a christmas gift, which I was grateful for, since it allowed me to workout without having to suffer in the cold in the dead of winter. I did re-discover just how much I hate gyms. Monotonous and boring. I prefer to get my workouts more naturally. Or by appeasing my short attention span...

I just barely managed to keep even over the 6 weeks there-I even lost two pounds. How very exciting.

And then the biggie-I hiked the appalachian trail! I lost twenty pounds in the first six weeks, all while pigging out. Not exactly the healthiest way to lose weight in the long term. The weight loss slowed to more of a crawl because I ate more than I needed in town-in the effort to make sure energy levels were good on trail. I eventually lost ~40 pounds.

The first two months after the thru-hike saw me working out furiously, and succeeding at maintaining my weight. I gained a little back in November/December. And then I gained more in January and February. I was terrified of this, after having lost all this weight. I didn't learn how to eat on trail. In fact, i indulged in all sorts of bad habits. So I've been a bit lost in the sea on how to eat correctly in order to NOT gain weight. I'm hoping that I've turned a curve and can start in on the healthy eating/plenty of exercise now. Maybe those jeans will get a little more comfortable.

If I'm lucky, I'll be lessening the effect food has on me. Wish me luck.

Disordered Eating, Part 1

I have disordered eating. I refuse to say an eating disorder because it makes me feel like an invalid, sick, and out of control. In a way, I suppose that it is out of control. I feel out of control all the time. I watch myself eating stuff and I wonder why I’m eating it. I’m not experiencing pangs of hunger, I’ve eaten very recently. I’m not worried I’m not going to be eating for another two days. It doesn’t even make me feel good. I feel gross afterwards.

I have dealt with this style of eating for the last decade of my life, or more, really. Since I’m not even quite a quarter century old, I’m fairly positive that’s a decent chunk of my life right there.

I’ve called it emotional eating before, and I’m fairly positive that my feelings are very, very, tied into what I’m eating. But that’s not all that’s going on here. Sometimes, certain foods will trigger me to eat more of them. Sugar, for example. I’ve recently gone through an entire thread on a forum at theppk.com entitled “No sugar support thread.” I was quite skeptical at first, since I like my sugar. I like cookies, muffins, sweet things in general. But as I read it, and I watched (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dBnniua6-oM) this video, I became more concerned. Some of the ways I was eating could be linked into the amount of sugar I was eating. It’s only started this week, but I’m attempting to reduce the amount of sugar I consume every day. For several days, it worked quite well, but I seem to have hit a wall. I’m also a baker by nature. I love playing with ingredients to create new cookies or improve vegan chocolate chip cookies.

Sugar hides itself in so many ways though, that I’m not concerned with consuming no sugar. That’s just not going to happen. What I am looking to avoid are High Fructose Corn Syrup and refined sugars. So my nature valley bars? The ones that always make me feel like I should eat more after having one (yes, that’s definitely a sign I should have stopped getting them ages and ages ago. I eventually did until I got a box last week at the grocery store. No, I don’t know what I was thinking). Well it turns out they have brown sugar in them. And the sugar content for two bars (in one package) is startlingly high.

I still consume fruits without worry. Those are natural sugars, ones our bodies are intended to consume. The fruits have nutrients in them that I shouldn’t get from anywhere else. So far, I’ve felt decent with the exception of last night and this afternoon. Because an addiction to sugar is not the only thing I have to worry about. Unfortunately.

I eat when I’m stressed. I eat when I’m worried. I eat when I’m bored.

I should confess a few things here and now: I’m a natural worrier. Also, I’m unemployed. So I’m stressed about job hunting, I’m worrying over the fact that I don’t have a job and I have a crap load of free time on my hands.

Yeah. Basically I’ve got the trifecta going and there’s not a huge amount I can do about it, unless I magically solve my disordered eating. Dear magical food fairy, can you please take away my disordered eating so that I eat 6 small meals a day that are perfectly balanced? And so I don’t resort to food when I feel anxious? It really doesn’t make me feel better, despite what my brain says to my hand, guiding it to my mouth with that delicious chocolate baked good.

It's Back! AT Day 13

I woke up at NOC and managed to wake Silver up (I never sleep all that well in new indoor places-the shelters are all starting to feel similar, so I sleep well there) accidentally. We ate a delicious breakfast at the restaurant, piddled around with the Picnic sisters while waiting for the outfitters to open (got in a little after 4, when they closed) at 10am. Finally, it did so I ran in to get my packages. Decided I was an idiot for wanting my snowshoes and had to head over to the offices to send them back. Which I did, after I bought a dinner or two plus some snacks-this was supposed to get me through the majority of the smokies after all.

Ended up taking a while, but the hike today would be a short one, even if it was ALL up hill. Silver had left a half hour before I did and I didn't expect to see him. And so I didn't. The first part was a decent hike, a few blowdowns, but nothing awful. And then, a couple miles in, it just became completely awful. As it turns out, we arrived a few days/a week too early, because the recent storms had created severe blow downs that hadn't been cleared. I had to climb over/around/under rhododendron bushes and trees that had fallen over. The sides of the mountain were completely wrecked from previous hikers doing the same thing and I'm positive they had to reroute at points. It was complete misery trying to get through it.

And then I ran into Count (named for reading Dracula, I believe) who had turned around. he had needed to be halfway to Fontana Dam on this day but he couldn't find the trail, so he was going to shuttle around tomorrow. Told me to call him if we could find it in the morning. (note-I think I can find his number still in my phone) Met some 'day hikers' (overnighters) who were heading down a half mile before the shelter and finally pulled in, seeing Silver. Ate my dinner just as the picnic sisters came in. Mashed potatoes so kindly donated by silver, seeing as how I'd not eaten them before from a package. He got half since I couldn't finish it all.

Fell asleep to the sound of the picnic sisters playing bananagrams. We all stayed on the second story of the shelter.

One interesting thing I remember: a tree by the spring fell over just after Bou came back from getting water. Very lucky she wasn't hurt.

Carry it as long as you can

As many of you know or have realized, I follow a vegan diet. I would also be the first to say that I am not the healthiest vegan out there. And I'd like to change that. But that isn't the point of this post.

One time long ago, in some Quaker meeting, a Friend once asked of another Friend (I believe it was John Woolman) of the evils of slavery: (something to the effect of) When do you wish us to lay down slavery? To stop owning slaves? This Friend's response was: Carry the burden as long as you can.

These words have such an incredibly strong effect on my way of thinking, of viewing the world. You might ask why the immediate response is not "Immediately! Slavery is awful and horrible and cannot be abided any longer." It is because, I believe, personal culpability and personal ownership over a decision was very important to him. People needed to understand in their hearts that the action was wrong. He set a personal example, by refusing to draw up legal documents transferring ownership of slaves amongst a wide variety of other actions, he spoke to others of how wrong it was, he refused to be served food by slaves in certain types of cups and plates (silver and such) because of the abuse of slaves to mine that ore. (I am referencing Wikipedia, so some of this may be false)

He travelled for long periods of time and often to spread his word that slavery was wrong, that Quakers should not be participating in the trade of other human beings. It is something that Quakers pride themselves on, that they were among the first to fully oppose slavery. John Woolman was one of the first of the first.

But back to the "Carry the burden as long as you can" statement. I have started thinking recently about this phrase in conjunction with my life as a vegan. I eat in a vegan life style (I ate six eggs last week from very healthy well cared for chickens in a backyard. Sue me.). Some parts of it, though, are not quite in line with a vegan viewpoint: I still eat cheerios and honeynut cheerios, both of General Mills, which, one of my vegan books claims, infuses their delicious cereal with some kind of ingredient that either is of animal or is made from animal product. So, not vegan. I know this.

I am well aware of this. But that doesn't stop me from eating them, because, I, personally, think they are delicious and I was unwilling to sacrifice it. Today, I realized that I shouldn't be eating honey nut cheerios, especially as honey was part of the name. So I will continue to eat cheerios, but this box of honey nut? It's going to be my last. I am laying down that aspect of the burden.

Another part of my non-vegan life is knitting. I refuse to give up wool in my knitting, quite frankly. I don't find myself horrified at the use of wool and so I'm quite fine with continuing to use it. There may come a day in which I am no longer willing to condone the practices of the wool industry, but it is not today and I doubt it will be tomorrow. I am still carrying that burden, because it is not so heavy that I can no longer carry it.

That being said, I also have pictures! And a recipe! For gluten free, vegan chocolate chip cookies!

I made these this afternoon after suddenly feeling motivated to make chocolate chip cookies that happened to be gluten free and vegan. As someone who does not eat gluten free all the time, but is vegan, I found myself casting around for gluten free recipes. I only found one that listed the variety of flours to use in a recipe (as opposed to a general baking mix you can buy in a store that pre-mixes a bunch of flours together) and was not happy, as it focused too much on one type of flour, in my opinion. What I have noticed in previous observations of gluten free recipes, is that good recipes tend to have a mix of flours. So I decided to do it myself.

The cookies look really nice, like real chocolate chip cookies, which I found promising. The taste was good, quite like most chocolate chip cookies, if slightly more bitter. As normal for gluten free, the texture.. left something to be desired. It wasn't awful, but it was definitely grainy. Overall, I'm pretty happy with my attempt!

Gluten Free Vegan Chocolate Chip Cookies
3/4 Cup Sweet White Sorghum flour
3/4 Cup White Rice Flour
1/4 Cup Chickpea flour
1/4 Cup Potato Startch
1/4 Cup Tapioca Flour
1 tsp xanthan gum
1 tsp vanilla
1/2 Cup Earth Balance, melted
3/4 Cup brown sugar
3/4 cup white sugar
~3 tablespoons almond (or other non-dairy) milk
1/2 tsp salt
1 tsp baking soda
Dash of cinnamon
Chocolate chips (Ghirardelli's semisweet are the only vegan ones I have access to. But whichever you have)

Now, usually, cookie doughs have you mix the liquid ingredients and the sugar first. I was so focused on finding a balance of flours that I just threw everything in together and mixed it, adding a little almond milk until it became the sticky crumbly texture that I figured was good for chocolate chip cookies.

Bake for 12-13 minutes until tops are just becoming golden. Let cool on cookie sheets for a few minutes before transferring.

For your viewing pleasure, a few dishes from ages ago: Havana beans and Rice:

 Monkey bread, deconstructed

Black beans for the beans and rice. They look purple, which I find hilarious.

Random Tuesday

Since it's been so long between updates and I have no big news to share, I thought I'd share random tidbits:
1. I made the PPK's blackbean quinoa chipotle raspberry dish, ate a little and proceeded to avoid it for ~two weeks. I opened it and it stank. Almost blew me away stank.
2. I have one arm strap and edging left to do on my vest that I've been working on for three months.
3. I made dinner last night with my first attempt at seitan from last friday. Specifically, this recipe. I also conveniently made the PPK's Mexican hot chocolate snickerdoodles. I'm not sure if I'll ever finish them, since there is literally a teaspoon of cayenne in there. And you don't taste any of it until about 20 seconds after biting into the cookie.
4. I found a new exercise plan for myself (I've been flailing around recently, trying not to gain weight but panicking and sending myself into eating binges) from bodyrock.tv. Uses only a very few pieces of equipment, and exercises can be modified with some thought if you don't have those pieces of equipment (except for the timer thingy. I bought one of those. It'll come this week). I'm hoping it gets me stronger in general, which will lead to a nice hiking/backpacking season! :-D
5. I may have a job that is part time. Very part time.
6. I still need more jobs.
7. I hate applying for jobs.

Jobs

Today, I went on an interview for a Financial Services Representative.

I am proud to say I did not make it through the interview and cut out after the info session. Because yes, I am THAT awesome.

Or, in other words, I'm more likely to be one of those dirty hippies yelling and screaming at the wall street types than be one of those wall street types.

And I figured it would be good interview practice. HA.

In other news, I'm starting to have more ideas for writing, so that's good. Even if I'm not actually writing...

Mourning

I'm in mourning.

Yesterday, I came up with the fantastic idea that I would bike into boston. Good idea, as I've been eating too much and not exercising enough.

I've winterified my bike as much as possible, wore as many clothes as I could and still look-well if not awesomely well put together-decent enough for being amongst other people (it included long underwear and a fleece).

Biking in was great! It was still sunny, traffic wasn't the pits. The bike lanes were hilarious-I'd be in one for about 100 feet and then it would veer into a snow bank.

No thank you, I don't want to crash my bike into snow. No cars hit me, I am still whole-except for my right hip, which is slightly sore.

Anyways. I was downtown at this event called "Dating While Feminist, Part Deux" which was a really neat panel/small group discussion about the issues that come up in dating someone, expectations and what life is like as a feminist dealing with people who are a)pseudo-Feminists-using the name but not actually feminist b)proto-feminists-refuse to use the name...but are way cool Feminists despite that c)Unconverted-those people who haven't really had interaction with feminists and feminist ideals beforehand d)sexist pigs-UNTOUCHABLES! AHHH.***

But yeah. That's not really the point of this post.

Let's go back to what I first said. I'm in mourning. I started biking home last night ~9:45. As you can imagine, we're not on the South Pole nor is it June 21st. So, it is completely dark at 9:45. Except for all those street lamps. And headlights. And store lights. Perhaps I should rephrase that? There is practically no source of natural light. So it's kind of dark.

I had a head lamp and a red flashing light attached to my backpack for safety. My father made me a holder for the bike light, as I managed to break the strap off the original holder when I was trying to get it off my old mountain bike onto my new, spiffy commuter bike. It was this giant square metal/plastic thing that screwed on to the handlebar of my bike.

Unfortunately, I don't have the headlamp anymore. Its parts and batteries are bits of smooshed litter on Mass Ave, somewhere in Cambridge at this point. I feel awful, contributing to litter.. But would you stop to pick up pieces in the middle of a busy street with a T bus right behind you? No? I thought not. Moral of the story? Buy a head light that doesn't slip easily and don't break the strap off the original holder.

But bike at night. It's great fun.

***Seriously. Don't pay attention to what I'm saying. It's all made up. Well-the definitions are real enough. But not the terms. I made those up. Don't repeat them!

Ethical Dilemma

Sometime this month is February Vacation. I had the mother of a friend of my sister's call and ask me if I would like to house sit-to the tune of $50 a day. That's good money for 6-7 days when I'm unemployed.

This household has a number of pets-a few dogs, some kind of reptilian or bird like pet inside. Or maybe a cat. I don't really remember.

They also have chickens. Yes. Chickens as pets. Which is not so odd a commodity-it seems they are growing in popularity. I've even tried to talk my parents into getting chickens.

But I'm vegan. She told me I could have all the eggs those chickens lay that week. I politely responded that I was vegan..

However. I became vegan mostly because of animal rights issues, although health and especially environment play into it. These chickens are not going to be slaughtered just because they've stopped laying eggs as productively. They are living a good life.

...So do I eat the eggs? Or do I not break veganism at all....

Recent Foods

This weekend (and today) were a weekend of cooking and baking. Which seems to be the norm since I have become vegan. So, I'm going to show off. Hope you forgive me. Also, I think I need to get over my carb fetish. What's that? you're surprised I have a carb fetish? You shouldn't be. I love carbs far too much for my own good. Eat them too much.

But anyways.
Saturday
On Saturday, i got home from from the Sessions Committee for New England Yearly Meeting (the group that organizes New England Quaker's business/social annual gathering held in august... www.neym.org) to which I was nominated back at the very beginning of the year at Young Adult Friends midwinter. I went with two other YAFs and met two more there. It was nice to see them so shortly after having seen them earlier this month. There was a lot accomplished at this meeting and needless to say, I am stoked for yearly. Except for maybe the food. I might be eating cereal and salad with no dressing all week. We'll see..

But this entry is about food. So, onwards, my friends.

The first thing I made was a gluten-free vegan cornbread slightly adapted from glutenfreegirl.com's recipe for cornbread. It came out absolutely delicious. Tasted exactly like any cornbread I'd ever had. Or almost, at least. It was slightly slightly heavier.

Yes, it is next to a very heavily glutenized loaf of bread. As no one in my family actually NEEDS to eat gluten free, this isn't an issue at the moment. We do love our wheat flour. Everyone agreed that this cornbread hit the spot, however.

I also made the Vegan Girl's Guide to Life Twice baked Chipotle sweet potatoes. The skins fell apart, probably because I didn't follow the instructions precisely when it came to removing the flesh to mix in the chipotle seasoning.. So they look a bit funky, especially the foil 'skin.' Sorry for it being sideways. I'm feeling too lazy to go back and fix that in iPhoto and it won't let me here. As you can see, we still have a vestige of christmas hanging around.

Onwards. After this, I made vegan banana bread in preparation for Sunday morning (I have no pictures of the loaf, whole). What's that you say? What did I make for sunday morning? Well, onwards, I shall show you!

Sunday


I woke up Sunday morning with not a hankering in the world for Banana Bread French Toast. Funny, since I'm usually all over hot baked goods for breakfast. Not this morning, no sirree. So I went to go snowshoeing instead for an hour and came back, took a shower and finally convinced myself that I should just make the damn french toast. After all, I'd already made the banana bread. What could hurt? I could always give it away to someone..somehow.

So I made it. Dude. DUDE. I think my life is changed. I can't believe i didn't feel like eating french toast for breakfast. I must have been crazy. Look how crazy delicious this is:

Yeah. I know. This recipe is easily found in Vegan Girl's Guide to life. I changed nothing. 

I knew I was heading for a pizza party later that day, so I made pizza to bring with me! I was going to make the same thing as I'd made way earlier this month, pizza with sweet potatoes, caramelized onions and spinach. Last minute, I decided what the hey, I'll substitute mustard greens for spinach even though I've never had them. 

Still not sure that was a good decision, but it is one of the healthiest pizzas I've ever seen:

(Yes, the mustard greens are under the sweet potatoes and onions) Also, there's red sauce under there. Very very onion-y red sauce. I killed the onions yesterday, having forgotten to get more on Friday. Whoops.

I also made my lunch for the week, Kale and Chickpea Tagine with Quinoa. Only without the quinoa because we apparently left it in New Hampshire over Christmas. Whoops. So I'm eating it with plain white rice. Forgive me for not taking a picture of the rice. You've all seen it before. Also, I forgot to take a picture of it while it was hot, so this is post-refrigerator, wilted look.

Monday


Only one thing I made today, from the wonder that is theppk.com Their orange-cranberry muffins have been staring at me for a while now, so I finally made them, the applesauce replacement for oil followed. I also did not have fresh cranberries, so I used the dried ones I've had sitting around for a while. I left out the zest because we didn't have any oranges and because I don't like zest (could have used clementine zest).

Yum. This weekend was full of yum.

Randomness

I'm still working on that vest. Went to a retreat last weekend and actually got to a pretty sweet place in the vest, which I am very happy with. But it seems to be moving slowly, especially given that I haven't worked on it since.

I made sourdough bread again yesterday. Left the starter out overnight to proof it, made the dough in the morning, let it rise for FOUR hours, punched it down, shaped it into a loaf and shoved it in the warmed oven to rise again for two hours. Finally baked it. Still heavy and dense, but not as bad as my first try (the second has been the best so far). Time needed: ~18 hours.

I'm writing again! After National Novel Writing Month, I burnt myself out for a month-which is not too unusual for me. It happened last year and frankly, I'm not surprised it happened this year. I'm currently only writing Fanfiction (fiction based on already created piece of work...in case you didn't know. Which I'm positive you do. Just covering the bases) out of the Firefly world (a tv show starring Nathan Fillion, Alan Tudyk, Summer Glau etc that was cancelled far too early in 2002 by Fox and then made a movie in 2005...again in case you don't know, which I'm sure you do). Hopefully, I'll get around to my nano piece as it's kind of whining at me, wanting me to finish it. Surprisingly, I don't think it's crap. Not in the sense that I think the first nanonovel I wrote was crap. It's something I can work with. Like putty sitting there unformed, but the majority of what it needs is already waiting to be formed into a piece of beauty.

I made vegan chocolate chip cookies. They never browned, which was incredibly disappointing. And then they didn't taste very good. But a funny thing happened. The next day, they tasted better. And the day after that, even better. I think the process of going stale actually made the texture/taste of these things better. Which is completely contradictory to anything I've ever heard...

Being Vegan is kind of awesome. My body feels way better, I'm more alert to the world. Last night, I made a dish from theppk.com called Cashew Vegetable Korma.  I halved the recipe, since I wasn't cooking for 16 people and I still have two yogurt containers full of leftover. But it was delicious and I will probably have it for lunch all week.

Food thoughts

I know my blog name doesn't really seem to reflect how my blog seems to have been going in the past few weeks, but I won't apologize. My interests are varied. And fickle, to say the least. I'm still knitting, I'm still thinking and talking about hiking (one of these days I'll actually organize a hike out in Western Mass) and I'm considering writing again (nanowrimo wore me out). For now, food is something that has taken up some goodly time of my thinking.

I realized recently, that dairy may be giving me some intestinal issues. It's that or possibly gluten, which I truly do not want to face. (i'm a bread person) I wasn't spectacularly excited at this new development, but it did give me a kick in the butt.

I should explain. For seven and a half years, I was a vegetarian, after hearing a lovely speech in french on how I should be vegan. I was unwilling to give up eggs and dairy products, so I chose being vegetarian. It wasn't much of a sacrifice-meat has never been a big part of my diet for the most part. That lasted for 7.5 years, in which I did not eat healthfully. Too much carbs. And dairy for that matter.

I changed back to omnivore near the very beginning of my hike, needing high calories without worrying about meat in my foods. I have since been enjoying the pleasures of eating meat. I've also been considering going back to vegetarian.

Naturally, with the realization that dairy could be an issue, I decided vegan could be the way to go. I've decided to go for it and am currently reading a variety of cookbooks and books about being a feminist and vegetarian-hopefully will get the one on veganism by melisser elliott soon.

So, I'm hoping to create a menu for the first few weeks at least, while being vegan. There are so many good ones in these cookbooks I have.

Anyone have any ideas?

Knitting and a sidenote

On Friday, I knew I would be watching all three Star Wars in a row (4,5,6...1,23 don't exist) and I knew that that much time spent looking at a tv screen surely meant that I ought to have something productive to do with me. Such as knitting. I've had Talia on my to-do list for the last month or so and I have the yarn, so why not? I found the pattern on Knitty. I got four skeins of Berroco's Vintage yarn in this bright, brilliant purple. Already, I'm quite in love with my choice of color.

So far, it has come out truly beautiful. When looking at the pictures on the pattern, I had completely failed to notice how detailed the bottom hem is on the vest. And it truly is quite beautiful. I doubt mine is quite as defined as the model vest, but I like it, mistakes and all. It's purple after all. And I am always a sucker for purple, frankly. I can't wait for more surprises with this vest! 

Also, I made a second loaf of sourdough bread yesterday, attempting to fix the problems with the first loaf. I believe it is fairly safe to say that i succeeded. Patience is key. I let it rise for 3 hours and proof for another three hours. Both times in a slightly warmed oven. Of course, turning on the oven to bake it suddenly produced a strong reaction to this wild strain of yeast in my starter and it poofed up even more, which was fantastic! It has a very unique flavor to it. I'm looking forward to being able to find new sourdough recipes to use with this starter I have!

My New Pet

Over the last  year or so, I've become rather enamored of creating a sourdough starter. I tried to several months ago (before my thru-hike) and was spectacularly unsuccessful. I suspect contamination, frankly, after having read something from another website about mold spores.

A couple weeks ago, I bought a giant pyrex mixing cup (eg pretty much a bowl) and it sat on top of the refrigerator, waiting for me, until Wednesday evening. I finally got it down and trepidatiously mixed the cup of flour and water together and let it sit on top of the stove (probably the closest to a warm place in this house). In the last day and a half, it's started to bubble rather ferociously, in my opinion, which is quite fantastic! Unfortunately, I didn't take a picture before using it, so this is a picture after I've put it in the refrigerator (it makes it 'hibernate' so to speak) so it's not quite as excited about bubbling.

As you can see it is very very shiny. (This is definitely a good thing from my perspective.) It filled the entire kitchen with a quite sour smell. Not necessarily a good smell, but hopefully it will translate into delicious tasting sour dough bread. I mixed in sugar, oil, and salt and more flour to form a good bread dough and let it rise for an hour. (A short time even by my standards and short by sourdough standards...soooo we'll see) This was taken a little while after I first formed the dough, once it had been sitting in a slightly warmed oven for a few minutes. Already it was showing signs of rising:

I punched it down added a tiny amount of flour and formed it into a loaf in this small pan (It looks quite good and smells sour already!):

I had to leave for my plans before it was baked, but I took a picture this morning after I had a slice (and others did last night!) so here's a picture of the bread now (Clearly, I didn't let it rise enough...which is why I'm going to try again today!!):

Gluten Free Girl & the Chef

I spent some of last night and most of my free moments today reading "Gluten Free Girl & The Chef" a book from the blog of the same name. I haven't gone over all of the recipes, but the ones I have? They seem really delicious.

I've been thinking about food a lot recently, as I've been in the process of applying for a job in the food industry. So, naturally, being something of a bibliophile, I kept an eye out for books at the library on food-this one was part recipe book, part memoir, part food philosophy. Food philosophy is something that I find really really interesting.

I was first introduced to gluten free as a way of life back in the summer of '09 when I worked at a camp called Farm & Wilderness. It tries to be as natural in it's food process as possible. I found myself making foods that were gluten free.

Since then, the idea has intrigued me. And as someone who (most likely) does not have celiac's disease, I've found it difficult to justify actually messing around with it. I will probably continue to have this issue, unfortunately. But the book was good, because it focused more on food groups those with celiac's CAN eat-such as meats and fresh in season vegetables and fruits and other grains such as teff and millet. All the recipes look quite delicious so far. I'm quite excited to maybe try some in the future!

In other news, I finished my fingerless gloves (knucks found at knitty.com) and embroidered 'damn cold' on them. The embroidery is crap and I'm going to have to re-do that, but otherwise, I think they came out quite fantastically.

Baby it's cold outside?

I think I have heard that song once too many times in the last couple of weeks. While I like christmas, I find the music equal parts charming, lovable and annoying.

In any case, I started the Knucks a while back in late November. And the fingers flew along flawlessly. Joining the fingers together? Not a problem. Knitting down to joining the thumb? No issue there! No, the trouble came from where I forgot to add stitch markers. It turned out to be a relatively simple issue, one that required no tinking or other futzing with the knitting to fix. I just had to put stitch markers in the next round. But the wording of the pattern took a moment to work out where the stitch markers should be. Which was annoying to say the least. They ended up needing to mark where the thumb started/stopped and I kind of stared at the pattern and wondered why the hell it didn't say that in the first place!

And now, once I figured out that one problem, they have been flying off the needles. I'm at the cuff on the second knuck so I have several more rounds to go before I bind off. And then, I believe I am going to embroider 'DAMN COLD' onto them. I got a suggestion from a friend last night and unfortunately I have no memory of what his suggestion was. However-I do know that as soon I found Damn Cold as a suggestion in the pattern, my mind was made up unless something even more awesome came up.

I haven't finished them yet, but I anticipate doing so today. If I were a picture person, I would share them with you. But, sadly, I have neither a good camera nor a good eye for photography.

Next on my queue is Talia and I'm really excited about it. I have this Berrocco Vintage yarn that's a bright purple and while it's not the black that Talia originally has, I don't care. It's PURPLE. How much better could you get? not at all..

As for writing, I have grand plans for today. Though I will say I probably won't get all that much done.

I almost went backpacking this weekend, but that fell through. I have this new pack, the Granite Gear Vapor Ki (It's purple) and am really really excited to try it out, even though it will probably be my summer backpack, as it only holds 30lbs and 59 liters. If I'm lucky, I'll be able to lighten everything up to  use it in winter. As it is, I cannot wait for summertime to come again!

Yes, as you can see, I have not posted since October

Despite passing the 50k mark on November 21 (about the same time as last year), I had yet to come back to this blog. I've thought about it! I swear I have.

Anyways. Nanowrimo went quite well. Last year, I went into Nano with a rough outline of plot points I wanted to hit, several characters backgrounds and how I thought it was going to end. I never got to the end, I got about halfway, maybe, when I reached the 50k and decided that was it, I wasn't going any farther.

I also knew as November drew to a close that this 'novel' would be one of the ones you shove in a drawer, as far back as you can and let everything pile on top of it. In other words, I don't want to throw it away, but I NEVER WANT TO SEE IT AGAIN. Ever. It is just that awful. The timing is awful, the characterization is awful and something about the whole thing is just plain disgusting. But that's ok.

I learned this year, that yes, even though it's Nanowrimo, that the story is going to suck major *insert appropriate cuss words here,* that just having had the experience of attempting to write a novel gives you a better idea of pacing. Gives you a wee bit better idea of characterization and subtlety (even in real life, I am not known for being subtle. I prefer IN YOUR FACE. Much easier and I'm kind of a social-idiot when it comes to the subtle meanings of anything).

What I am trying to say here is, that even though my novel is complete crap, that it needs to be rewritten, repaced and replotted, this one actually has hope of seeing the light of day again. I do not want to stick it in the drawer, let dust and stuff pile up on top of it. No, this one I am going to replot, I am going to re-write and re-pace.

...Just not tonight. I'm scared it's going to eat me.

Happy Halloween!

I think this is the scariest day of the year. This year, at least.


Not because I've seen terrifying costumes or movies or whatnot. I've mostly tuned out of the Halloween hype. It isn't really my thing. In fact-the last time I dressed up was two or three years ago when I dressed as Nymphadora Tonks at college for an evening.

No, I'm terrified, because Nanowrimo starts tomorrow (er, tonight at midnight) and I might know the name of my story and the names of the main characters, but I know NOTHING about them. I don't really know where this story is going and I'm worried that because this is my second year and I won so easily last year that it'll be different this year. I'll get 5K and quit. I don't want to. I like the basis of this story. I feel like it's much better than the last one, more realistic for me to tell it.

But I still have no idea what I'm going to write. And I haven't done ANY research, so a lot of what I say will be made up and will have to be corrected at some point to reflect some historical accuracy.

At least my computer no longer has wireless internet, so when I bring it around to write-ins I can't distract myself by the internet. But I also can't use Write or Die when I'm not home, I can't check wikipedia or google to see some fact or another.

I think I need to spend today getting to know Jesse/Jessamine.

AT Day 12

Neither of us started out the day believing we would reach the NOC at the end of the day. (Us=Silver & I, as the only residents of the shelter the night before)

We reached it, 16 miles later at 4pm. Instead, we were looking forward to supposed trail magic a few miles north. Sadly, it wasn't there. we theorized the snow storm, since it was obvious he had been (even circle of dry ground surrounded by snow).

we kept going and passed the next shelter, where people were still packing up. It had been full to bursting + tents the night before. I was glad I hadn't gone. We kept going, chatting with some of the other thru-hikers. we took a break on a hill side, letting some pass us and another at a dirt road-side. Pretty. Also, Silver and I were somewhat hiking at the same pace, somewhat at different paces. When we reached wesser shelter, it was too early to stop. We figured we'd go on to the shelter before NOC, stop in briefly at NOC to get stuff and keep going the next day.

I caught up to Silver at that shelter. There was a tree poking through the roof. I could tent-but it seemed just as logical to do the last mile into NOC. I called to make sure there were bunks in the hostel. There were. Good.

We passed the Picnic Sisters-who had passed us while we were at the last shelter and we had passed again. bou was limping because of her shoe. I offered to hike behind her, but she waved me on.

When we reached NOC, it became impossible to find the office where we signed in for a hostel room.

Bou and Fro arrived and we still had trouble-Fro scouted out and eventually, I pointed out a far off buildign that could possibly be it. There was nothing else, so we went there. Indeed, it was. Wow.


Took a little while to sort out rooms-instead of being a large bunk room, it was a bunch of small rooms. Since Bou & Fro were officially hiking together as sisters, we let them bunk together while Silver and I shared a different room. Slightly awkward, but fine.

Had a delicious dinner at the restaurant-good burger and fries.

Decided to take a shower, but was scared off by the dirty disgusting shower stall and no towel.

Then bed.