Unapologetic, Unpretty, Un-pit-iful

Social media has given rise to the dreaded selflies, and love it or hate it, they are not going away any time soon. While the content of a selfie is always the same, the context can vary innumerably, and the way in which a selfie is presented says everything. Take for example, the term "belfie," adapted from "selfie," it is used to describe a more specific region of the self… the butt. It is a huge trend among female Instagrammers, the most famous "belfier" being non other than Jen Selter, whose ass defies all laws of skinny-jewish-white-girl anatomy. God bless her.

That being said, a woman's physique, her face, her hair, her makeup, her clothing, is yet again put on display in some ridiculous objectification of a female. Pieces of her are picked apart and placed under a microscope; a giant, virtual microscope for all who come across to analyze. And as image sharing becomes our main form of communication, female notoriety becomes less and less of a meritocracy. Not that it ever was to begin with! But the practice of valuing a woman based solely on her appearance certainly isn't aided by rampant social media whoring.

Sometimes I am myself irresistibly drawn by the lure of selfie sharing.  There are times when I'm desperately tempted to participate after a good squat session at the gym. I can't help but stand in the mirror with my phone chanting, "Must… resist… belfie!"

So it seems an unlikely place for a feminist movement to arise, especially one as subversive and "un-pretty" as this. Ladies and gentlemen- the armpit hair. More specifically female armpit hair. Allowing one's feminine hairy bits to grow freely is hardly a new feminist concept. But growing it out and dying the hair all sorts of bold colors is another story. Rather than privately abiding by one's personal preference this new practice DEMANDS that people take notice of the choice. If you saw a woman standing in front of you in line at the grocery store with bright purple armpit hair you would do more than just stare. This trend is not conventionally beautiful, but it is thought provoking to say the least.

When I first discovered this story I was taken back by the images of women proudly flaunting their hairy pits. It made me slightly uneasy. I of course was not alone in this as I surveyed the responses from the public which ranged from being mildly off-put to outright disgusted.

I had to think about why this is a subject of such contention to begin with?

Even when scripted film or television attempts to portray a survival scenario, (think films like Alien or Blue Lagoon, or series like Lost or The Walking Dead), taking pains with details like unkempt hair, a dirty face, tattered clothing, there is always one thing that remains uncompromised in an outright betrayal of authenticity-the women always maintain pristine pits.

Having bare armpits was not customary in the United States until the early 1920's, coinciding with the time when sleeveless dresses were coming into fashion. In fact it's been more specifically attributed to the May 1915 issue of Harper's Bazaar, in which an ad was featured with a young woman in a sleeveless dress posed with both arms over her head. From that point on, shaved pits have become de rigeur to femininity.

But what if the advertisers had not shaved her armpits? What if every ad thereafter portrayed women with their arms raised, hair and all? It is possible that this perfect hairless paragon would never come about. And if it didn't, would we still be as put-off by such images of a female body? I'd like to think not. As I sift through the pictures of these female hipster revolutionaries I find that the novelty wares off rather quickly, and I am no more bothered by the sight of armpit hair than I am by a bad haircut. It just… is.

Don't fear, people. I don't anticipate a one-upman's trend of outgrown lady-mustaches or uni-brows. There is a purpose behind this movement and it is not by any means to be beautiful. It is meant to tell other women that it is okay to let your body be. If you want to keep your armpit hair, keep it! If you don't, shave it! The point is that it is your choice! And I'm on board with any movement that gives personal choices back to women.

Panera Bread, Potato Blood, and Loneliness

I've switched locations today in an attempt to mix things up; give myself a new environment, a new flow of creativity. So now I'm sitting at a Panera bread wishing I had just stuck to Starbucks. There's no music to drown out the sounds of unofficial lunch meetings and girls in "study groups" taking selfies. Instead of the beautiful whir of espresso machines there's just the clanging of silverware on plastic trays. I would say it feels like my high school cafeteria except this is "fancy." As in, I just spent $9 for a coffee and a scoop of tuna wrapped in a piece of lettuce fancy. Glutton for punishment I am!

Anyway.

I was supposed to see friends last week. People from college I haven't seen since last Christmas. We were all excited until the time came to solidify our plans- at which point everyone turns into the tentative, noncommittal weirdos that have taken over our generation like the pod people. We were supposed to go bowling and then go out for drinks. Bowling would at least give us all something to do, something to interact with and bond over. Nothing gets people relaxed and laughing like a little friendly competition.

Oh right, and alcohol. As expected, everyone bailed last minute on the bowling idea and decided to just meet for drinks. I've come to realize that if plans involve anything outside of meeting at a bar to get hammered there is no interest. I ended up bailing on the meetup altogether because a) I have no interest in meeting people in a place where I can barely hear myself think and b) Just before I was supposed to go I... had an accident.

I was attempting to make some homemade sweet potato chips using my handy little mandolin slicer and I mandolin sliced my fucking thumb. Curse you, kitchen gods!
Don't' get me wrong, it's an excellent tool, but a word of advice: Do not use it without a hand protector. Blood soaked sweet potato is awfully tangy. So that put a damper on the night. Of course my sliced thumb was also a convenient cop-out. Technically I could have gone… but at the same time I just couldn't.

A recent study was published to the Psychological Bulletin entitled Loneliness is a disease that changes the brain's structure and function. Taking an excerpt from the brain research digest,

"Functional imaging evidence also shows lonely people have a suppressed neural response to rewarding social stimuli, which reduces their excitement about possible social contact; they also have dampened activity in brain areas involved in predicting what others are thinking – possibly a defence mechanism based on the idea that it’s better not to know. All this adds up to what the authors characterise as a social "self-preservation mode."

So basically, loneliness has the proven potential to perpetuate itself. Lonely people self isolate. I can obviously attest to this. So how to break the cycle?

Anyone? Anyone? Bueller? 

The Morbid Anatomy Museum: So Dead Inside

The location is an oddity in itself. Situated in a warehouse on the 3rd avenue industrial strip in Gowanus, one would not expect to find a museum. But as of last June, The Morbid Anatomy Museum has found itself a home at the corner of 3rd and 7th in a building that has since been updated with some glass windows and a thick coat of black paint; now a lovely, stark contrast to the mucky shipping containers and storage units surrounding it.

Upon entering you are welcomed into a small gift shop/café where you can sip a hot cappuccino next to a freshly taxidermic fox or a specimen jar of rodent foetusus. It's comfortable. Upstairs there is an exhibit space and a small library, downstairs there is more exhibit space that is also used as a room for lecture series and events. In this gift shop alone you can get lost in the many curiosities that line the shelves for purchase. But I found it quite interesting to look around and observe the people who were coming to the museum. There were of course the folks that you would expect to see in a place like this- each representing some combination of steampunk, goth, and modern hipster. Likely people predisposed to the dark, historic and scientific. Appropriate.

But sprinkled all around was, well, everybody else. The woman staring intently at the wax moulage of a syphilis outbreak looks like the woman you'd find sifting through the sale rack of sweaters at Banana Republic. The man calling his friend to take photos of him with a framed taxidermic bat is the same man you'd find yelling drunken profanities at a Rangers game. All of these people under one roof brought together by none other than… morbidity.

In our modern culture death is something with which we have a strange relationship. Or rather, a distant one. Death is morose and Victorian, it's unpleasant and therefore treated like it doesn't exist. We push it out of our consiousness unless otherwise forced to acknowledge it. But deep inside we all know it's there. It is as present in our lives as being alive; two sides of the same coin. Luckily there are some of us, like the enthusiasts directing the museum, who are more ostensibly fascinated by death and all that surrounds it. They've created a space that allows others, (who for one reason or another are not as enamored), the chance to indulge the secret part that exists in all of us- Morbid Curiosity.

So if you're not afraid to explore this dark and beautiful realm, be sure to stop by The Morbid Anatomy Museum. It will be well worth it. Even if all you get out of it is a few photos of dead bats!

Thoughts for the Day

I shut my eyes and I can see the glowing outlines of the veins inside my head. If I keep them shut too long they'll fade away. Also I'll look like a crazy person sleeping in a Starbucks on a Thursday afternoon. I've done stranger things I suppose…

Everything is now red and white and redolent of cinnamon sugar coffee syrups. Thankfully we've yet to be bombarded by the caterwauling Christmas music that seems to begin immediately after the the first pumpkin is smashed on November 1st.

So why am I here on a Thursday afternoon? Well, I've switched jobs. I no longer work at said restaurant on the upper west side. In fact that lasted all of a month. I don't have time for mean queens and catty girls who will never know the feeling of real joy as they try to get by in the big city by out-bitching one another. Not to say that I'm a joyful individual but at least I take my misery out on MYSELF. Come on, people. Get with it!

I now work three days a week at a place in Astoria that touts epicurean cocktails not served since the prohibition era made by adorable vest-clad "mixologists" behind a dimly lit up cycled wooden counter. It's a hipster's wet dream.

So, how do I fit into this? Well our glorified little bar also offers table service where we'll bring you well plated cheese fries and quesadillas at prices likely three times what they're worth. But I have a lot to be grateful for. I no longer have to commute into manhattan. I no longer have to deal with a cesspool of alcoholic misanthropic twenty-somethings. Okay… the alcoholic part still remains. But I'm beginning to accept that every person I encounter who is of an age within 10 years of mine is a high functioning alcoholic. I think it comes with the territory of living in a society that inundates its young a steady feed of fantasy for which to strive but could never actually attain. The alcohol suppresses the gnawing reality of the broken dreams that now define our lives.

It's survival of the fittest in a system that cannot properly thrive without the firm, inextricable bedrock of the poor and underclass. What a juxtaposition. A society that force-feeds a lifestyle unto those who can least afford to sustain any semblance of it. I'll admit, if I see someone who has achieved even a reasonable amount of comfort or success, I'm wary of who that person has stepped on in order to have arrived there.

So what motivates me? Nothing really. Maybe pervasive loneliness. Boredom. Swimming through a perpetual state of just being "over it," tapping my veins to see if anything will give me a sense of life again. As of late it's been nothing. I'm numb just like everybody else. Hyper-connected and wholly unaware of what's really going on. In ten minutes I'll leave this place to go to the gym, not to stay in shape but to give myself something to do. Something that feels productive. Positive. After all, how could going to the gym ever be a bad thing?

I could clean my shit storm of a room. Or better yet offer to clean my shit storm of a house in which I've lived rent free for the past 12 years or so. I could apply for a job that actually requires a resume. Maybe sign up for some volunteer work. But I just don't see the point.

I do however see the point of running aimlessly on a treadmill until I stop hating myself... even if it's just for a moment.

The Snoring Dead

The highly rated AMC series, "The Walking Dead," is something I've been meaning to watch for quite some time. "After all," I thought, "it's been on the air for five seasons now, it's gotta be good!"

Ignoring the fact that this plague they've constructed contains inconsistencies you could drive a boat through, there is such a substantial lack of plot that I am dumbstruck the show has lasted this long. Each episode drags at a snails pace with the same scenarios repeating over and over again. The migraine inducing sounds of hacking, rasping, dead folk are far overused. Although perhaps giving the zombies such a prominent voice detracts from the weak dialogue between the living.

Still the most common gripe I heard about the series, before ever watching it, was that the main characters were killed off too frequently. "Oh no!" I thought, "I'll start to care about one of these people and he or she is going be ripped apart by a zombie." Except that never happened. In all four seasons I've watched there has been so little character development that it's a wonder the writers haven't just killed all of them off at once. With ample opportunities for a storyline or even flashbacks to give us some idea of who these people are and why should we care the writers take- zero. I understand that survival is the premise, which doesn't include reminiscing about a life pre-apocalypse or building relationships with your fellow survivors that are at the very least- interesting. The most important thing is to kill the zombies! But does that make for compelling television? Apparently. So far it's been enough to stay on the air for almost 6 seasons.

Don't get me wrong, the writing is not without some creativity. Zombie annihilation takes all sorts of gnarly and fantastic forms in this series, showing that there is a trace of imagination. As I recall in the most recent episode I watched endured, a "walker" fell through a dilapidated blood soaked roof only to be ripped open on the fall-through. Except he remained hanging from the ceiling by his bloody, tangled intestines. Yes. But of course this predicament was not a concern and he remained dead-set (he-heh) on reaching for the delicious humans beneath him. I also quite liked it when a zombie, surrounded by a hoard of other zombies, had his entire head squished through the holes of a fence while trying to reach the people who found safety at a prison yard. Apparently when you turn to a zombie your head also turns to silly putty. But other than those brief moments of grotesqueness bordering on hilarity the show moves at the pace of… a zombie.

"Nobody ever mentioned just how boring the end of the world was gonna be." Beth, S 4 Ep. 3.

Boy, you said it!

Reflections on Basicness

I'm back! Plopped at a Starbucks in Rockville Centre, a New York equivalent of ol' Malahide. It's just a town over from where I live and is arguably one of the birthing places of the "basic bitch," (a crude and overused euphemism for young white girls who wear a strange albeit costly uniform of leggings, Ugg boots, and North Face jackets. They're known to frequent Starbucks and clog your Instagram feed).

A More Informative Deconstruction of "Basic"

Fourteen year old- ahem- young ladies, like to hang around here because when you think about it, where else do they have to go? I study their interactions like an anthropologist...or creepy, watchful, coffee shoppe loiterer. Whichever term you prefer. They stand in a huddle around the receiving counter, eyes glued to their phones waiting to take a picture of the new holiday cups in which their pumpkin spice lattes will arrive. I can sense how little they know of what really awaits them in life. I see that their beauty is still untampered; unsullied by the self-loathing that is practically demanded of a woman in this day and age. As though I were a mother to these girls, I'm relieved to see only a few of them wearing eyeliner and lipgloss. All this sugar consumption hasn't made their hair thin or their asses fat… yet. Most enviably it is clear that the boredom of life has not yet set in for them. Little things like holiday coffee cups and lipgloss can still provide so much joy. If you could bottle this fleeting phase of a young woman's life it would be worth a million.

Yet in this nascent stage of womanhood, they are already being torn down; by the media, by each other. While I might not relate to their lifestyles by way of both choice and circumstance, I don't see the reason to hate them. Yes, guys. They're privileged and superficial, hardly concerned with what most of us consider to be important matters but wait… they're still people. Harmless. Usually with potential for growth unless otherwise squashed by the hate of those who don't approve of their lives. Some form of this type of girl has existed throughout time, and always will. I think we can get over it  already.

Hey. Oh, Hi!

Didn't see you there. I've just been super busy. I went ahead and applied for restaurant jobs in the city lying blindly about having had "a ton of experience working in high-traffic/high-volume restaurants" and guess what? It worked! So now I'm working full time in a restaurant on the upper west side and I have no business being there. Not to mention- the cost of commuting from good ol' Long Island just to get to this restaurant costs me about 25 dollars each day. Wee! I'm hoping the pay will ultimately justify this insanity.

Wisdom from Within

In the midst of my obsession with this diet I've forgotten that this blog started as a source for daily musings from my day-to-day life. It wasn't meant to be yet another "healthy foodie blog."

Although… I don't have much of a life these days. Maybe that's why I'm obsessed with the diet thus turning my blog into yet another site of food pictures/health related articles.

Ah, yes. Resolving my psychological problems everyday with just a little reflection.

*Ommmm*

See? Why pay someone $100 an hour when you can figure this out with just a little reflection?

And food.

There's always food.


"I won't be impressed with technology until we can download food." ~ A wise but unknown soul

Hormones and Estrogen Dominance...

Because I'm just too much woman for my own damn self.

Today I'm going to talk about hormones.

Hormonal disruption could be one of the biggest health crises that effect our population today. This is because it affects every single one of us. Whether you display any observable symptoms of a hormonal imbalance or not, being alive in the 21st century is all the requisite you need. 

If you can check off any of these then your hormones have been affected:
Drinking bottled water

Taking birth control

Consuming nonorganic produce

Consuming dairy products (treated with or without BGH) 

Consuming processed or sugary foods on a regular basis 

Leading a relatively sedentary lifestyle

Rather than go on a tangent about the way these things affect our bodies, I'll leave you with a video to watch! (Lazy Bryn is lazy). Now there are many, many sources from which you can find this information. I just found Barbara O'Neill's presentation to be pretty well rounded for those who are not well read on the subject to begin with.

So if you're interested in learning more about the issue (most notably estrogen dominance), and have a good hour to kill, then you should definitely watch this. It's a pretty good overview of the way our endocrine systems work (or are meant to work) and how dangerous something like too much estrogen can be to our overall health.

*Try to look past the sister wife getup... and the fact that she alludes to homosexuality as an affliction caused by an imbalance. Oh yea and that she advocates premarital abstinence as the ideal form of birth control. It's just… it's just one of the wonders of being a devout Christian and a scientist. I'm still baffled at their existence.

To take Tina Fey's words just a wee bit out of context, 

"It's like watching a dog walk on its hind legs." There's just something not right about it.

Quick Healthy Mexican Dinner

Tonight I didn't have much time to put together anything elaborate so I decided to make one of my favorite dishes- tacoooos! Taco meat is one of the easiest things to cook and therefore one of my favorite. It's low carb, high fat, and super dileeshis.

Deconstructed Taco Dinner!

• In this recipe there will be no shells to toast oh so carefully lest they turn to blackened waste (and let's face it, shells are useless. You only get about one good bite until it just gives up and turns to nachos). 
• There will be no chopping of onions until your eyes bleed just to make a simple guacamole. 
• There will be no sour cream/cheddar/cilantro/tomato/jalapeño/superfluous bullshit on top.

Ingredientes.

For Taco Meat:

1 Pound Organic Grassfed Ground Beef (Or regular ground beef. I won't judge).

1 Packet of your favorite Taco Seasoning (Mine is Trader Joe's brand)

1 1/2 Tablespoons Tomato Paste (Don't toss what's leftover!)

1/2 Teaspoon Garlic Powder

1/2 Teaspoon Salt

*Optional- 1/2 Tablespoon Clarified Butter

For "Guacamole":

Smash an avocado. Put some lemon or lime juice on it. Fin.

Not poop.

Place your ground beef onto a hot pan and flatten it out until it looks like a giant meat pancake. Flip the giant meat pancake after one minute of cooking. (It's okay if it falls apart. You're going to smash it up anyway! This method just ensures quick and even cooking). After the meat is cooked add your tomato paste and make sure it is well spread throughout before adding the seasonings and proceeding with the smashing. Smash.

*I've made this recipe with and without tomato paste, but personally I prefer the flavor that the tomato paste adds. If you choose to use it, you're not going to use an entire can. Here's a way to store the remainder so they're ready to use in perfect serving sizes.

Go to any place that has a salad bar or salsa station (my place of choice is Moe's Southwest Grill), and you should find that they have these little plastic containers stacked up for to-go dressings or salsas. 

Steal a few-*ahem… respectfully acquire some at your discretion, and you would be surprised at how useful they can be at home. In this case, one container perfectly holds the portion needed for this recipe. Just store them in the fridge and when you need one-BOOM! Pop one of these out of the fridge. ¡Que conveniente!

Burrito. Taco-Taco. 

Anyway after all of this fun mexican cooking my mother calls and says she's coming home with Moe's for dinner. 

Fuck. 

What You Don't Know Can't Hurt You...

Oh wait, yes it can.

If you're familiar with the healing principles of the paleo or ketogenic diets, then what I'm about to say will probably not be of any news to you. If you're not familiar, then I hope I can plant a seed of interest!

The typical modern day lifestyle- inactivity combined with most of the materials we put on, around, and inside our bodies- are simply poisonous. From plastics, pesticides, preservatives, hormones, antibiotics, grains, gluten, sugar- we are inundated with chemically altering substances that wreak havoc on our internal systems.

Yes, I'm aware of how I sound right about now. I swear I'm not an agoraphobe who spends her days building a bomb shelter and feeding stray cats. I'm just well informed!

Just look at the number of people in developed countries who suffer hormonal imbalance, depression, diabetes, cancer, heart disease, thyroid disorder, sleep disorders, learning disabilities, Alzheimer's, etc. Is it so unrealistic to consider that these substances could be the cause of our ailments?

I could elaborate on the subject but I wouldn't know where to begin. If I started I fear the writing in this post would expand to a harangue surpassing the volume of Gone With the Wind. Anyway, I do a shit job of paraphrasing what is already being said by countless other spokesmen out there who are far more qualified than myself.

So while I'm not prepared to re-spew the vast amounts of information I absorb on the subject, I would like to share some of the sources from which I've acquired my information. I want to share the materials that I personally have found to be the most honest and informative.

*Disclaimer: You will almost never find two experts that agree 100% on a diet and lifestyle choice. A lot of research out there will condemn one thing while other research exists to support it. Sometimes it's hard to know what's best to do. So just use your discretion and see what works for you. In any case, it is likely that what works for one person will not work for another.

An artfully placed avocado next to my book. Why you ask? It's the law.

The first resource I'd like to share is a book that I purchased last summer while researching the paleo diet. For those who wish to better understand the intricacies of human body functions, along with the corresponding impact that the SAD (Standard American Diet) has on them, I'd highly recommend it. The book is called The Perfect Health Diet, by Paul and Shou-Ching Jaminet. It's not a strictly paleo plan but does advocate most of the paleo principles. What drew me to it and still continues to bring me back, is that it includes actual scientific studies to substantiate its claims.

No, it doesn't just mention a study here and there like every other book on the market with the word "diet" in the title. This book actually contains abridged versions of lab reports conducted by various credible sources (by credible I mean- studies not funded by pharmaceutical companies).

The Nerd Diet.

I'm a girl who likes cold hard facts. It especially comes in handy when arguing on principles that go so against traditional wisdom…

"Whole grain bread is heart healthy!" Really? Direct poor fool to studies proving quite the opposite.

Having studied neuroscience in college I'm no stranger to reading through lab reports. But the great thing about this book is that the studies have been simplified to only the most essential information, so that you don't even have to be versed in scientific jargon to understand the information. In addition, every chapter is filled with personal and third-party testimonials about the ways this diet has improved a person's health.

Once you've read even just one chapter of The Perfect Health Diet, it all just seems to make sense. You'll wonder why we ever started eating the way we do now.

Obligatory Fat Bomb Post

Just a quick post on what I made this morning. I've been making these for ages now but I've never thought to show them. These babies are a staple in the keto-style diet so it's always felt a bit redundant to post pictures of it. That being said- here goes…

Aren't they adorable?

Fat bombs! No, it's not my ass I'm referring to but the little calorie packed concoctions that keto-people consume to up their daily fat intake. They're usually comprised of some combination of the following: butter, coconut oil, heavy cream, MCT oil, almond butter, bacon fat, beef tallow (listed in order of most commonly used ingredients).

Unlike most other whole food recipes these are really easy to make and require no baking. Also, they're really, really good.

Family photo.

Ingredients:
1 Tablespoon Coconut Oil
1 Tablespoon Butter
2 Tablespoons Unsweetened Cocoa Powder
1 Teaspoon Vanilla Extract
1/2 Packet of Stevia in the Raw

*Makes two small fat bombs.

Chocolate.

Mix that shit together in a pot and pour it into cupcake liners. Pop it in the fridge and wait 15 minutes. Done. For full flavor effect dash a little bit of sea salt on top.

*If you want to make "Reese's" fat bombs:
When you pour the mixture into the cupcake liners and put them in the refrigerator to cool, reserve half of the mixture in the pot. After about 5-7 minutes the layer should be solid enough to hold a dollop of peanut butter. Plop on that peanut butter then pour the remainder of the mixture on top. Allow to cool another 15 minutes.

I Don't Like Hard Work

So as I mentioned in my last post, I've been gluten-free for about two years now (not including of course my most recent setback at ye' ol' bakery). But as far as clean eating goes, I've always been fairly consistent. So I'm no stranger to having to cook my own meals; I've made countless dishes of kale and quinoa, avocado salsa, shrimp ceviche, cauliflower pizza, herb roasted salmon, sautéed chicken-blah-blah and many other whole food wonders. It's no secret that cooking requires at the very least, time for preparation and an attention span. If you get enjoyment from cooking, even better! 

Before school, work, and stress slowly murdered the cooking enthusiast inside me, I was able to whip up these recipes without a second thought. 

I am currently trying to revive her.

So here's a lil' snap of today's breakfast… okay the ingredients for the breakfast. Once it was fully prepared it didn't look all that appetizing (as most keto-friendly meals tend to look). Also, I ate it before I could remember to take a picture.

Avocado-Cheddar Omellete cooked in butter

However, I did manage to take a photo of my first attempt at homemade ice cream! I tried to keep the recipe as simple as possible using just a few ingredients that I had around and of course- no sugar.

Low Carb Ice Cream with Chocolate "Fudgey Bits" and Peanut Butter

For the Ice Cream:
1 Cup Almond Milk
1 Cup Organic Heavy Cream
1 1/2 Teaspoon Vanilla Extract
2 Packets Stevia in the Raw (can use Truvia or any other sweetener you prefer)
1 Teaspoon Kosher salt

For the Fudgey Bits:
Half a Cup Coconut Oil
Two Tablespoons Unsweetened Cocoa Powder
1 Packet of Stevia in the Raw

*Optional- Two tablespoons organic peanut butter

Mix the ice cream ingredients together in a bowl and allow to set in the refrigerator for 1-2 hours. When you are ready to make the ice cream, mix the ingredients for the fudge bits in a separate bowl. *If the coconut oil is solid, stir them in a small pot on low heat until all ingredients are well mixed.
Turn on the ice cream maker and slowly pour in the ice cream mixture. Wait five minutes before adding the fudgey bits mixture. The stark cold temperature of the ice cream will solidify the mixture turning it into… fudgey bits. Didn't think I'd find an excuse to say fudgey bits so many times. Anyway! After that you can leave your ice cream as-is or add in the oh-so-bad-for-you and oh-so-delicious peanut butter.

Et voilà. God damn homemade ice cream. It tasted pretty good too! It's not cloyingly sweet like the ice creams you'd buy in the stores, and the- fudgey bits… had a slight coconut under taste. But I quite enjoy that flavor, so for me it was a welcome presence.

Next I will attempt to make a dairy free version, as a cup's worth of heavy cream in my body still feels slightly repugnant to me. Yes I'm aware that that's exactly what ice cream is, but now that I've seen what goes into it it just doesn't sit right. Leave me alone.

I must admit though… I kind of enjoyed the process. I do believe the cooking enthusiast is coming alive again!

Ketonly the Lonely

Two years ago I decided to give the gluten free lifestyle a try. Turns outs gluten is actually pretty shitty and removing it from my diet alleviated a lot of the symptoms I was experiencing (some of which I didn't even realize I had until I no longer felt them). Anyway, I found it fairly easy to maintain and never once had a set back. That is until last November…

Between a full time schedule in neuroscience courses, a rigorous rehearsal schedule for an all-too-stressful college production and working part time at a fucking bakery, there was just no way that my hips would stand a chance.

I was exhausted. I was stressed. I was nearing the steep precipice of post grad life with no direction frighteningly fast and it was maddening. Suddenly those baked goods which I was once able to see as just sugar and flour became a godsend. Brownies? No, no- free, fudge-coated-quaaludes. Oh, Oprah... Where were you last November when I stood at the bread counter surreptitiously eating my feelings?

Courtesy of Steinberg's Bake Shoppe- a sugary, gluten-ey, poisonous haven for kosher baked evil.

It only took one month of "cheating," reintroducing foods that I hadn't touched in years, for my body to retaliate. I felt like crap again almost instantly, and I've still not been able to get back to my original state of health.

So now I'm here dealing with the fallout of a merciless semester and zero self-discipline. I have been toying with a low-carb/ketogenic diet for quite a while but as you might imagine, discipline is an integral part of following a diet of any sort, so it hasn't been as effective as it could be. 

But I do my best to abide by the principles and remain as low carb as my mood will allow, and so far it has certainly made a difference in some aspects of my health. I'm no longer dealing with the crippling anxiety that just two years ago kept me from leaving my house. So.. yay? 

Anyway, I figure I might be more motivated to fully adopt the lifestyle if I try to document it. Post some pictures of my crappy looking keto-food, share a bit of my insight, my experiences, etc. and maybe help others out in the process.

I'll admit I've been hesitant to write about it as I hate talking about diets almost as much as I hate adhering to them. But at the moment, my giant ass is about all I've got going on in my life. So it's either write about that, or post links of all the Youtube videos I've been watching as of late. 

I mean… I could do that too. Anyone wanna see a really cool trick you can do with just a can of 7Up and a flamethrower?

Out of My Head

It's 80 degrees outside and I feel heavy again.

I'm back to making lists. Lists of things that need to be done, things I want to do, things I want to have. People I want to see. Places I want to go.

Get a better paying job. Preferably one I can stand.
Lose ten pounds. Okay twenty.
Clean. Everything.
Make time for friends.
Make time for music.
Take chances.

But I really don't know if I'm bold enough to check off that list.

I live almost entirely inside my head.


"I remained too much inside my own head and ended up losing my mind." ~Edgar Allen Poe

Chances Past

Well, I'm back in New York. I'm sitting here looking at this blog wondering how I'm going to fill in all of the days I've left blank. My experience at the Page household was one of the greatest I've had in my whole life. I went from living in a place that made my soul feel weak to a place that made me feel inspired and connected to parts of me that I never knew existed, and other parts I thought had been buried away for good. And I made friends that I will cherish always. I hold the experience so dear to me that I'm just not ready to write about it.

My last day in Ireland… Scarecrow Chic

This month could have been a lifetime. I don't know that it's changed me, but it's certainly made me stronger. 

Thank you, Ireland.

Bipolar Quinn

Tomorrow I leave this place to begin my next venture…

I'm going to stay with the Pages, a family in west Cork who need help with their children and asparagus farm.  The farm is small and there are only two kids ages one and four. Plus I'll actually have my own space. I'll be upgrading from my 8 x 8 closet with a daybed which doubles as a playground for rampant Greirson children, to my own fully stocked trailer/caravan located just off the property of the Pages home.

I already like the sound of this; both children and asparagus in small batches can be healthy.

As it's my last day here in Dublin, Daniel's been kind enough to give me the day off. And though I'm disappointed with my living arrangement I've been quite taken with this town. I'm going to miss the coast, I'm going to miss these roads, I'm going to miss this ocean, I'm going to miss Starbucks.

But I don't want to spend my last day in Malahide shifting my weight on an old green couch mooching wifi and suffering espresso induced heart palpitations.

Last day at Malahide Starbucks

No, I want to go somewhere, I want to do something, and I want to see someone!

So I text Quinn.

Who's Quinn? Oh, how do I begin...

Ever hear of a "meet-cute"? If you've ever seen a romantic comedy you know what they are. In real life they don't really occur so much anymore, now that social media seems to intercept our every person to person encounter. But if you squint real hard at my story, you might just say it qualifies as a meet-cute. If you don't want to squint… just pretend. Please. For the sake of my already tenuous self esteem.

This is how it happened...

Last Sunday I planned to go into the city with time to check out some vintage stores and maybe go to a couple of museums before they closed. My day was going to plan; I got dressed, had a coffee, walked to Malahide station and was about to board my train when I was suddenly overcome by a feeling of doubt. I only checked my route about twenty times on Google maps before I left. I was certain that this was the right train yet I heard a voice in my head, too powerful to ignore. "No, this is wrong," it said. "This isn't right, you cannot get on this train." So I didn't.

The train pulled away and as I watched it ride into the distance it exploded into flames.

No, sadly the truth is a bit less climactic. I sat down on a bench trying to figure out what had just come over me as I resigned to the forty minutes I would have to wait before the next train's arrival. As I waited a young woman talking on the phone sat down next to me. Her voice felt like home. "Wow, is that what Americans sound like? I never realized how strange," I thought to myself.

Well I couldn't resist asking her where she was from and before I knew it our small exchange turned to conversation. As we boarded the next train together we discussed our backgrounds. My new friend's name is Hannah and she is originally from Ohio but she's going to school in Malahide to study history; I briefly mentioned my studies in psychology and neuroscience when a good looking young man with light blue eyes and brown hair wearing a black peacoat walked over to our seat. "Oh, you're cute. Please don't hit on Hannah, please don't hit on Hannah," I think to myself. He sat down eagerly and smiled at me,

"I heard you saying you're a neuroscientist. That's very interesting to me because I'm bipolar."

Be still my heart. See? Meet-cute. If they can't get Meg Ryan to play me I'll take Kate Hudson. Thank you!

Having lived here for two years by this point Hannah is able to distinguish between a friendly Irishman making small talk and a person who is just... insane. She doesn't hide her disconcertion. But I'm innocent and not quite as wary of strangers so I engage him,

"Oh, really? What medication are you on?"

I've just set in motion the first of what will be many, many, tangents I hear from Quinn. Like many others who suffer this disorder, Quinn has more energy than he knows what to do with. He speaks with such conviction (not to mention volume) that it is impossible to question his sincerity, but it is clear how his high energy can be off-putting to some.

"I don't believe in medication. I treat myself with supplements and mindfulness meditation. People with BPD are usually B3 deficient," he said as he pulled a conveniently placed bottle of Niacin from his coat pocket.
Now, I am not opposed to supplements... except when they're bullshit and don't work. Clearly, for Quinn, they don't work. Not to mention if you saw the dosage on these things you would swear he's using them to treat a manic depressive ox.

But to each his own. Hannah slyly managed to disengage by saying that she needs to show me where to go when I disembark and he catches on, returning to his original seat. Except as fate would have it when I stepped off the train at Tara Street I saw him standing not more than 5 yards away. He was looking over at me and I know he was anxious to continue his impassioned tangent on mental healthcare in Ireland. "Why not?" I think, "He seems harmless. And I can use the company. Plus he's a hell of a lot more interesting than Barry." So we walked into town together and before we parted we exchanged numbers. Oh yea, he lives in Malahide too.

So! That's my dear, Quinn.

Fast forward to today. I'm bored, it's my last day here, I still haven't been to Malahide Castle (yes I'm pathetic) and this is my last chance to go.

We meet outside the courtyard of the castle where once stood a resplendent english garden. It is now an Avoca cafe and tourist gift shop. But remnants of its bygone beauty still line the outer walls in colors that can only be seen to be believed. Lining the ground are bluebells and daffodils and lots of other flowery things I'm not nearly well read enough to name. I should've asked Quinn…

Courtyard Wall outside Avoca

As we wait for the next tour of the castle to begin, Quinn uses his encyclopedic knowledge to educate me on the history of the Talbots, the family who owned the castle, how they tied into the history of the english monarch, the catholic-protestant saga of Ireland, where Ireland stands with England today, etc. He is so bursting with knowledge that if I didn't know any better I would say he wrote the book on Malahide castle. Sure enough, after my history lesson with Quinn, the tour felt a bit redundant.

Malahide Castle

After the tour we take a walk around the grounds while he gives me the abridged version of Oliver Cromwell's "reign of terror" in Ireland. He also slips in some rather ballsy flirting,
"You know when we were walking on the tour I couldn't take my eyes off your ass. You have a really nice bum."
"We're walking around a five hundred year old castle and all you can look at is my ass?" I think.
But I don't even pretend to be offended as the flattery far outweighs his tactlessness.
We make our way over to Avoca where according to Quinn they serve the best cheesecake in town. The restaurant is big and sunlit with glass ceilings and pale floral motifs around the walls. It looks like we're about to have tea in a giant veranda. All the food is displayed behind glass cases like they were waiting for a magazine shoot. This food made to be photographed.

Photographed… not consumed.

Beautiful waste of calories

As I take my first bite into the beautiful slice of raspberry cheesecake I am completely crestfallen.
"I should know better than to trust a man with these things, " I think as I chew over the weak paste of bland graham cracker and slightly sour cream cheese.
While I pick at my photo prop dessert Quinn begins his next tangent about how he would rather take a bullet or go to jail than allow his taxes to pay for legal abortions in Ireland. I attempt a counter argument but he's so vehement about it (not to mention loud), that I consider changing my tactic to just ramming my crappy cake down his throat.

A few hours later, after hearing his take on religion, westernization, overpopulation, and gay marriage (that was a fun one), we part ways. I am exhausted from my day with Quinn but then I think of how much harder it must be for him. While I don't agree with him on most things, I appreciate his remarkable intelligence and his company. To have a mind like his can't be easy.

As the sun sets I walk along the shore of Malahide for the last time. I look out at the strange sea and begin to cry. Three weeks I've been here and now I'm moving on. I know nothing about where I'm headed. I'm feeling calm and anxious all at once. But I'm not lost.

The voice that told me to come to Ireland is the same voice that told me not to get on that train the other day. It's the one that's telling me to stick it out here instead of going back to New York. It hasn't steered me wrong, and I vow to myself that I will always follow it.

Penance

Today the sun is shining and the world is new. I clean the floors all over again after yesterday's escapades in hopes that it will land me back into Daniel's good graces. I ask myself:

Why do I even care?

Who knows.

I walk Gemma home from school and make her lunch: Pasta with butter… and cyanide. Okay no cyanide. But a girl can dream.

I overhear her playing outside with her poor innocent friend, Beth trying to get her to cut open a glow stick using a pair of scissors she snatched from the kitchen. I run outside to stop them which clearly upsets her and she lets me know it by taking Beth up to her room so they can pull all of the clothes out of her wardrobe for me to pick up.

I do not.

Aileen comes home from school at 3:00 and as usual makes her own lunch: four pieces of toast that she eats on every surface of the house except, well, a plate. But I can't hold this against her as compared to her sister she is a dream.

She flits around the house with a folded piece of toast in one hand and a crumpled concert ticket in the other. One Direction is coming to town on Friday and every human under the age of 16 in Ireland is going to be there to see them. Aileen is obsessed. So we sit together and watch a slew of One Direction music videos on my laptop while she sings along and goes all dreamy eyed over the one with the big eyelashes and a Pepe le Pew haircut. I have to say- if I were ten years old today, I would probably love them too. But since I'm not…

Ugh.

I've officially done my penance.

Shit Storms

Today was a bad day. A bad, bad, bad day.

The morning started as it usually does. At about 7:30 I wake to the sounds of pans clanging, doors banging, and a nine year old screaming like the house is on fire. It goes like this:
"No school today?" Sean asks before answering definitively, "No school today."
Well that solves that.
Except it doesn't, and Daniel is forced to burst his little bubble but not without a resounding
"No! No! Naaaaaoohh!"
I've gotta give it to him; Sean's got some serious pipes.

No, what made today different was that the weather was rainy and depressing and (no thanks to the morning cacophony) I felt too exhausted to get out of bed until 10:00am. Now this should be of no consequence as I usually have the house to myself; I can get out of bed whenever the hell I please provided that I can finish what needs to be done by the time I have to bring Gemma home.  But today Daniel stayed home; the bad weather meant that he would have to drive Gemma back from school.

As I feared, my late arousal did not sit well with him and instead of just saying, "Nice of you to get out of bed you lazy, twenty-two-year-old, american, ingrate," he did the next best thing. He told me that (in addition to my usual chores) I would have to mop and vacuum all the floors in the house.

Before I could say, "Daniel, your children wreak havoc on this place under normal circumstances. Why do you need the floors cleaned today when there is a torrential mudslide outside your door?" it occurred to me that his motive was not to get the floors cleaned. It was to give my sorry ass some busywork.

So instead I responded: "… okay." I mopped and vacuumed and cursed and waited for the inevitable.

When Daniel returned with Gemma the rain let up and the house was spic and span. Gemma was a good little girl while daddy was around, giving her strange performance of lovable baby and melting his big, stupid, heart. She even played outside like a normal child until she came in squealing, "Papa, I have to poo."

After her deed is done she calls, her voice filled with maniacal inflection, "Paaaaapa! Oh, paaaapa!"
"Wipe my bum." she cracks the proverbial whip.

"Smack her, Daniel just smack her," I think to myself. But Daniel abides, flushing her waste and apparently all self-respect down the toilet. Before he leaves for the office he turns to me and, perhaps feeling a pang of guilt for my prodigal punishment says,
"Bryn, thanks again for hoovering today. I really appreciate it. I'll see you guys later!"
My heart stops as I look over at Gemma and see the glint in her eye.

Fuck.

No more than five minutes after he drives away she comes to the door, dripping in mud. No, not dripping in it- basking in it. Mud on her pants, mud on her face, and in her hands two fistfuls of dirt and grass. Written on her sneering face I see the words,
"Your move, bitch."

So I walk over to her and say, "Not my problem," before kicking her in the head.

No, sadly I had to resist. I practice my diaphragmatic breathing and take her to the bathroom to get her washed and changed while she stands there looking pleased with herself. I even concede to get a different pair of pants when the first ones I choose fail to appease the beast.

Then off she goes on her merry way while I wash her clothes in what is now my third load of laundry for the day. Sean and Aileen come home, I make them lunch, and they play outside while I cook dinner wearing my Betty-Draper-gown and pounding gin by the glassful.

Okay minus the last part. But as far as I can tell, all is well at the Grierson's.

Or so I thought. Now it's important to note that "playing the baby" isn't an act reserved for the family alone. Gemma's infantile fantasy extends into all parts of her life. When she's playing outside with her friends I often hear her crawling around saying "Goo-goo, gaga."

Excuse me while I goo-goo gag.

Anyway today Gemma decided she would extend her talents into the realm of method acting. As it starts to downpour again I hear the children in the complex jumping around and think, "Aw, listen to those little Irish kids playing outside even in the pouring rain." Except they aren't playing...

It turns out that while I was cooking and cleaning like a Stepford wife on speed, the "baby" was out there shitting her little pink pants. The jumping around I heard was actually the sound of four year olds on damage control; cleaning up Gemma's mess using all the towels, rags, and yards of toilet paper they could grab from the nearest bathroom.

Crime scene

By the time I get down to see the poop filled catastrophe and the frightened little faces of Gemma's friends (her's of course is as smug as the sky is blue), Liam is standing in the doorway shooting me the look of death.
Yes, Liam, I am responsible for this. Sorry I don't have an exorcist on speed dial.
He takes her upstairs leaving behind a trail of her soiled clothes along with the site of the failed cleanup for yours truly to dispose of.

Thank you, Liam.

Now here's the thing. I am a good person. I am an honest person. I understood what my responsibilities were before committing to do this and I've far exceeded them. I do not mind doing two, three, even four loads of laundry a day. I do not mind making your beds, cleaning up toys, vacuuming your house, cooking your meals, and walking your godless sister home from school. But I have a limit. And I've just reached it.

I put dinner on the table, throw my laptop in my bag and head out to the church of Starbucks before I have a nervous breakdown.

It just so happens that today is also the day I decided to make my blog public. But I did so hastily and without any revision of the posts that were on here. Without going too into detail let's just say that I managed to hurt someone that I never intended to. Strike two.

As I have my ass handed to me on that matter I also receive the anticipated phone call from a very perturbed Daniel. Too tired to argue and knowing that anything I say would be regarded as an insult to his parenting I just apologize. I spend the rest of the night walking the coast trying to hold myself together and waiting for my strike three. On terrible days, the blows always come in threes.

Well it happened when I came home, got into bed, and tried to start writing this post. My lap top went completely black and for a moment could not be revived. When I got it started again I had lost a few programs off of it including Microsoft Office. Too tired to care.

I hate this day.