____! It's what's for dinner...

Well, it's official, i've got Veganitis, aka. Vegan on the brain, known to most of the world as Vegentia. I would like to move more in the vegan direction i think. It'll be hard, but it seems worth it.

The more research i do on the meat market, the more eating animals absolutely disgusts me. Now, let me say here and now that i do not believe that eating animals is wrong. Physiologically we are designed to eat animal flesh, in moderation it is very healthy, and i don't think all animals are the same as humans and we should treat them like brothers. HOWEVER, and that's a big however, the modern meat market is a thing of shame, and the conditions the animals "live-in" (i should say exsist really, even if that...) are WRONG.

Quite frankly, the demand for meat is so strong that farms are forced to jam animals in together, use even the dead ones for food, not waste time cleaning and rush kill animals in order to meet the needs of the people. If you ask me, we should all as a whole be eating less meat anyway. It's not healthy to eat the way many americans do, and as the meat demand goes down, perhaps farms would then be forced to lower their animal counts and provide better living conditions and sanitation. (Yeah right, i know, like THAT will ever happen.)

There is ABSOLUTELY no reason why workers in filthy conditions have to shove a metal feed pipe down a goose's throat, most often breaking it's beak or ripping it's neck open from the inside, to forcefeed it grain so that it's liver becomes bloated, colorless, and painful to the animal so that we can have foie gras. (Foie gras is actually banned in many states, starting in cali in 2010 or 2012 [The Governator signed this one folks, good for him] it will be banned, and is outlawed in the UK as well.)

It's that kind of stomach-turning, tear-jerking, humanity-questioning violence that needs to stop. I'll let you in on some information about exactly what goes on in the farms and slaughter houses of the modern meat market, but until then, you might want to "Meet your Meat" here: http://www.goveg.com/factoryFarming.asp . BEWARE, it's not for the faint at heart.

My intention is not to turn the world vege/vegan, just to perhaps inform you on what you don't see when you pick up a steak at the market.

(And you can ask any of my friends that i've NEVER pushed them to become a veggie like me, and i never will. What you do is your own perogative, i'm happy to lend you some advice, but only if you really want it. But please, keep an open mind, it never hurts to learn!)

~The Toast (unbuttered)

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Holy mother of the risen Christ.

I just answered the most condescending phone call ever. This woman called up, asked me if this is the "Discovery Shop Headquarters" (Yes it sure is, is there something i can help you with?),

if we are the one who handles all the Discovery Shops (i said no, only the ones here in california),

my name (Michelle),

so we're a thrift shop (No, we like to think of ourselves more as a "unique resale experience", with higher quality items than you would find in a thirft shop),

she then accosted me saying "You take donations and resell them, that is a thrift store sweetheart." (Okay, is there something i can help you with?)

"Now tell me, what's your name again?"(Michelle)

"Michelle, is there a supervisor there right now?" (Are you looking for a Discovery Shop Supervisor or an American Cancer Society Administrator?)

"Don't keep saying things to me, you listen. I want to know if there is a supervisor there right now, and you'd better not lie to me missy." (Yes there is someone here right-)

"What is her name?" (Lisa Tempel)

"Is she actually there, or are you lying to me, are you just going to put me through to her stinking voicemail."(Actually ma'am our voicemail processor is down, but i know for a fact that she's sitting at her dest right now and i will get her for you.)

"I DON'T GIVE A FLYING FUCK IF YOUR VOICEMAIL IS DOWN, YOU PUT HER ON! You are going to let me talk to her, and you're NOT going to put me on hold you TWIT!" (Ma'am, there's no reason for that language, i will not tolerate it, if you do not calm down and speak to me in a resonable fashion i am going to hang up this phone.)

"JUST FUCKING PUT HER ON!!!" (Please calm down, i'll not put you on hold, i will get up from my desk and tell her myself.)

--string of 4 letter words and muttering-- And then Lisa picked it up.

OMFG, i started to get teary not because i was hurt, but because i was so mad i couldn't bash her freaking head in at that moment. Ugh!!! I was shaking cause i was so wanting to hurt her, and poor Lisa is such a nice person, i didn't want her to take it.

Grrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrr!!!

[Follow up: Lisa never did figure out what the lady was in a tiff about. She said she was nasty and called her names too, wouldn't let her get a word in (I'll be happy to help-)"Well if you would just SHUT UP i'll tell you what's goddam wrong!". Apparently the lady said a volunteer was a liar, never said who or at what store, then was going to tell Lisa the name of the person and their phone # and then swore at her and hung up.]

F*cking hell people! GROW UP!

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Merry...

Hannukah.
Hahaha.
Gotcha.
But seriously though,
I'm not Jewish.
So Merry...
Whatever,
To-
Whoever,
Thanks for reading my blog.

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Oh you devil rock!

Deamon mineral!! CRUEL MISTRESS OF THE SEA!!!!!

I am, of course, talking about salt.

Yes, salt... the only white powder i've truly given my soul to, (Ok ok, so not all salt is white, but i've gotta make some kind of analogy/metaphor/quip/joke/jitter don't i?) Getting back to the point: Ah, there comes a time every month (wink*wink) when i just can't get enough of the stuff. I do believe the great Margaret Visser put it best when she wrote "Salt is the only rock directly consumed by man. It corrodes but preserves. It desiccates but is wrested from the water. It has fascinated man for thousands of years, not only as a substance he prized but as a generator of mythic and of legendary meaning. Its contradictions only intensify its power and its links with the experience of the sacred." (DiRuscio).

(Haha, you like that MLA format don't you!?)

Ahem, without salt there would be no beef jerky, soda pop, spaghetti sauce, canned soup, potato chips, chocolate, cheese, peanut butter, ham, ketchup, athletic drinks, bread, pickles, olives, anchovies, capers, or pretzels!!! There would also be no solace from the red harpy of Eve for me... But wait, that bag of pretzels doesn't list a daily "salt" intake, hmm, it only says sodium. Well, everyone knows that sodium is the other name for salt right? WRONG!!!

The name "Salt" describes any ionic compound in which the anions and cations are balanced to provide a neutral product. Just so happens that this form usually looks like a crystal, though not always. But, you wouldn't want to grab a hunk of salt and start grinding away over a steak (or tofu steak if you're me) cause not all salt tastes, well, salty. In natural hard salt deposits, about 1% is edible and the other 99% is so mottled with large amounts of trace minerals that it's not very useful for flavoring. Instead, you can spread it on your snowy walkways or make some salt licks for your pet cows (they don't mind the minerals at all).

Table salt, or "edible" salt, is born of 2 very dangerous things: Chlorine gas, famous for those bomb attacks during WW1, and sodium, which happens to explode when exposed to moisture (Bet you didn't know that did ya?). Sodium itself needs to be submerged in kerosene, (yummy i know), so that no one loses an eye or leg trying to season some veggies.

Then how do we get explosive sodium into toxic chlorine gas so that we can bbq? Well, turns out nature did the hard part for us. Sodium Chloride can be found everywhere! Well, almost everywhere, in yup, you guessed it, the oceans. When evaporated, naturally or mechanically, we reap the sweet, er, salty benefits. (We do get some table salt from rock deposits, but it's extremely rare to find un-contaminated salt in large enough quantities).

So there you go, more about salt then you ever thought you'd be willing to read but stuck through because it actually is interesting, or because you're trying to humor me.

Some fun salty snacks (for your mind only):
>>>In the 1920's iodine was added to American table salt tohelp prevent hypothyroidism, which was near epidemiclevels at the time. Today, it's nearly nonexistent.
>>>England towns that were once salt centers have wichin their names (Norwich, Greenwich). In Germany andAustria, salz or hall are used.
>>>Many American frontiersmen, including Daniel Boone,were taught how to make salt by Native Americans.
>>>During the Middle Ages salt was used as a symbol of purity not only because it could preserve things, but because it was often the whitest thing around.
>>>Some of the oldest roads still in use in Europeand Africa were originally built to move salt.
>>>The old saying, “he’s not worth his salt” comes from the days when Roman soldiers were paid a “salary” just for buying salt.
>>>Back in the Dark Ages, people thought that spilling something as pure and sacred as salt might bring on demonic attack from behind. The only cure was supposedly to take some salt and throw it over your shoulder.

For more information on salt you can check out your local library, HAHAHAHA just kidding... Here's some links you lazy asses:
Good Eats: Eat this Rock http://www.goodeatsfanpage.com/Season7/Salt/salt.htm
Wiki's Salt Article http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Salt
Salt Institute : Kinda technical, but really good! http://www.saltinstitute.org/15.html

~The Toast

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Nothing's really burning today, unless you take notice of the annual consumer-driven xmas blaze quiety singeing my buttocks as i la-la-la with my fingers in my ears trying to make it go away. Thanks to an agreement to not buy presents within our friend group, and the inevitable f*ck up of ACS to get my paycheck to my bank (which is in Hawai'i, and no, i will not f*cking get a bank account here, it's not my perrogative to help you out when i signed up for direct deposit and YOU screwed up AGAIN, and have no idea why!?) i have thus survived the mad dash to the cash register. However, ACS's lovely holiday Oopsie! also has me eating ramen every night. Honestly i wouldn't mind the crowds so much, seeing as how i'm only getting 3 presents total, but the fact that i have to wait another 3 days at least for any kind of $ for (1st) groceries, (2nd) evan's parents, (3) bills, (4) savings, and lastly presents, is putting me on pins and needles. The knowledge that i have to do all my shopping 4 days and less from Christmas makes me want to get a rusted needle and pierce my own... well, you can use your imagination.

From the palm trees swaying gently in the bright midday sun, you'd never know it was christmas time here in California. Oh gee, it reminds me of every single other sunny xmas i had back home in Hawaii, - about 90% humidity. Nothing takes me back to my childhood than the feeling of sweat running down my face as i ran down the stairs those chrismas mornings long ago. I'll be sure to provide evan with a spray bottle so he can mist me down as soon as i wake up.

Naturally with the holidays comes the greatly encouraged and much detested "personal reflection period", the time where we collectively list all our shortcomings and guilt trip ourselves into being "better people", which we conveniently abandon a few weeks into January when we realize that all the new year bullsh*t is just that, bullsh*t, and that we're just as shallow, overweight, depressed, self-serving, gluttonous, and carnal as we always were. Then comes the February hump where we think no, i can change my life, i can be a better person, mother, father, friend, i can be happier, skinnier, less materialistic... we throw out all our candy, go to whole foods, take a walk around the block in a new jogging suit, buy a self-help book, bake a pie from scratch, and watch some dr phil.

Valentines Day rolls around, and we down our own bodyweight in chocolate (cause our wonderful significant others bought so much, or cause we are alone and stood in line at Sees pretending that the 4 boxes of peanut brittle are NOT for us). Sadly, we return to our panty-hose-n-pump jobs crying baaa-baaa-sad-sheep all the way, snuggle ouselves in a 401k, and try to remember that there are people dying in Africa so our lives must not be SO bad (but we still feel meaningless).

The prozac-orgie refills run out around Halloween, and we realize that lo and behold the "holidays" are coming up and we'll have yet another chance to change our lives and truly be happy. We eagerly clamp on to the somatic nipple of consumerism, comforted through another personal reflection, and suckle on happily to new years... waking up in a daze a few weeks later not knowing how we got 3 gym membership cards, a golden retriever, $3000 credit card bills, and is that a (positive!?) precnancy test on the counter!?

...

Holy crap, i just depressed myself.

...

Toast count: 2 (but the day is still young)

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Martha, cutters, baby oil, OH MY!

What a lovely, lazy day of slicing apart cardstock coupons with a box cutter at my desk, one by one by one by one by one by one... What can i say, it's not my fault that KMART is sold-out of the highly anticipated "Martha-derm", the latest suppository which has some of the following effects: the appearance of having suffered mild stroke, an irreversible desire to only wear pastels, a new ignorance of the outside world (husbands, kids, jobs) coupled with a surprising adeption to create complicated useless pieces of crap that you like to call "crafts", ending in your need to give them away because you believe the world needs more gaud and by GOD you're going to daintily cram it down their throats as you would a lady-finger-crust orange-meringue lemon petit four assortment. Homemade of course.

I vehemently apologize to the world for the lack of hand-huge-industrial-guillotine-slicing-thing coordination, it's not my fault the usual hand-eye coordination, hard won from years of copious video game training, doesn't seem to be finessed enough for me to wield our office scythe. However, with the latest controls and systems, *cough* Wii, even the most seasoned nose-picker will be able to hone is skills into a zombie-fighting sword-swinging girlfriend-boxing racecar-driving tennisball-smashing grapplinghook-shooting demi-god.

I am now of the opinion that certain games and systems should come with a free case of baby oil. You know, for your girlfriend to rub over your enlarged, uh, pectoral muscles as she screams "Swing that nunchaku baby!". There's nothing manlier than my guy running around as a scrawny elf-thing (that we all know is totally gay cause in all the time he's been doing things for that princess of his she's not once given it up) hurling his boomerang of the winds to move the drawbridge so that he can ass-sway his way over to save the shrieking deamon-monkies in order to battle a purple and green (obviously phallic) venus fly trap with enlarged red lips and a tounge that's just longing for a taste of.... well, if you've played Zelda:Twilight Princess, then you know what happens next.

On a completely different note: These rehearsals and concerts are killing me. Not to mention the immediate fantasies of red-hot branding irons near whatever deity is actually controlling the whole show when i remember that i don't have a car. My friends are so lovely and have been giving me rides right and left but, sometimes it's not where you're going, but how you get there, and it really feels good to do it on your own. Sigh. In other news my fingertips are molting, as is the winter tradition. Soon they'll break free of their cumbersome restraints and head south until Spring. For now they're meeting up with Monsieur Papier for the last hour of work. He's alright that Mr. Papier, but a little to far into bdsm. I always come out with cuts in the end...

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I'm in a WORLD PREMIERE!

No really, i am. In fact, it's the world premiere of WoW's new expansion "The Burning Crusade"!!!

Last week i sang in a taping of it for Spike TV's Video Games Award Show. It was way cool, got all access, dinner, put up in a suite to watch the show, sang a world premiere to the greatest multiplayer game of all time, and got paid to do it.

Here's the link for You Tube: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3qlHC9vFSfo You definitely can't see me as an individual and you'll see why when you watch the video. However, you can see more of my face near the end, but YT's resolution isn't the greatest. So if i was really obsessed i'd dl a non-pixelated version of the show, spend lots of cash-money on a new plasma high-def 72-inch everything-wrong-with-consumerism-in-America TV and pause it just to see my nose and chin. For those of you who are playing the home game, i am not that crazy.

Anyway, it was an amazing experience, i met a bunch of celebrities (inc. the Reno 911 cast, they rock!, Jack Black, Samuel L Jackson, the new superman guy, AFI, etc...) And the expansion looks incredible, so check it out! Oh no no, no applause please... just, send money.

~The Toast

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Idle hands spend time at the genitalia...

And we all know how much God hates that...

First order of business, who in the buttf*ck of hell thought that liquid zinc and freeze dried lemon concentrate would be the greatest cold fighter in the world? If i wanted to drink something that looked like anti-freeze and tasted like tin foil, i would go to Denny's.

It's almost sad, wait, no, it IS sad how far into Pretty Guardian Sailor Moon (the live action, yes, LIVE ACTION, sailor moon) I am. I'm only on episode 6 but i already have starry eyed visions of over-gesticulating whilst talking to purple stuffed cats. On an even sadder note, the drool bucket i had reserved for scenes of Tuxedo Kamen hasn't arrived yet so poor pippin and i have loaded all our earthy possessions into a dinky row boat in preparation of future episodes. On a side not, i am so not into those Asians, but he is de-licious!

On a better but dorkier side, our new DND campaign is going swimmingly. Actually, there's been no real "swimming" involved per se, but we were trudging in the swamp for a number of days on the what-a-f*cking-chance-in-hell-we'll-find-the-caves-and-make-it-out-of-here-alive hope. I present to you Exhibit A- One girl, desperately trying to escape the blindly-continued fear-induced regurgitated life-denying traditions of the corporate world, suddenly dumped into the rough-and-tumble compact body of a fighter gnome who's specialty is punching guys she likes in the face and is VERY touchy about her height, that you very much... Now you tell me that doesn't sound like a 15-year-old-targeted series of books!? I could make millions...

In my true fashion, i've begun to take notes, ahem COPIOUS notes (i'm talking verbatim required here) and turn it into short story form. It takes way too long, i'm never happy with how i describe certain scenes, and i can't decide on the tense of the speech, but i am now obsessed with writing my stories. So obsessed in fact, i've slighted my poor boyfriend, sleeping next to me, to ride the sugar wave all the way till 2 am (and still only get to the FIRST day we're in the swamp). I've already planned out hours and hours to be dedicated to this project. Especially since we are playing every sunday (warren, best DM ever!!!) and for 4+ hours each time. Sigh, so much story, so many lines, so many zombies, and so little time with which to document it. Do i hear the sweet siren song of caffeine calling my name?

Nay, work is slow goings today and i have a BUTTLOAD to do. I'm compromising though, i'm working through lunch but watching PGSM off youtube while doing it. After karate, Lappy, you are so mine and we will get to the part where i get laid again. I think Scarlett gets laid again. Sigh. Little boy blue has a stomach ache so i need to go bug him through Meebo.

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Posting

I am posting posting posting, i am posting in hopes that you will see...

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Recipes

Working on this... better check back later.

Raw Vegan Flourless Chocolate Caek

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