Don't Mince Words

2009 Thanksgiving

I had another one of those “oh fuck I do live in California” moments this week when I realized that 72 percent of my Thanksgiving guests were vegetarian or vegan. It really called into question if I had to buy a turkey or if I could get away with making turkey burgers.

I haven’t made the full switch yet, and I still enjoy fish, but I knew I’d have to cook and carve the turkey and get the carcass out of the house before the V’s arrived so as not to offend. They aren’t the wishbone snapping types. Dinner went off with out a problem, but the fun came afterwards.

The conversation reverted to vegetarian food: how to make a good tofu scramble, wheat-free breads, tempeh, and my soy chorizo. I watched my meat-eating Texan friend as we yammered on and I could tell he was ready to blow. This I knew because he arrived first and said something to the effect of, “there’s no reason to be a vegetarian except for religious purposes.” I mentioned cruelty in the food industry. He is in the “meat is tasty” camp. Needless to say, he was one of the first to finish up and leave, but not before he confirmed that vegan pumpkin pie was not as good without butter.

We enjoyed our vegetables and odd conversations without the presence of our own family members. That’s probably why we had a good time, just like the original settlers did minus the tofurky roast.

In my continuing effort to live a healthy, unemployed lifestyle, I decided now would be a good time to try one of those eight-week, Runner’s World couch-to-marathon training programs. I started week two today and I think I’m going to flunk myself and repeat week one.

I knew this was going to be a harder week, so this morning I suited up appropriately: super-plus tampon, Spanx to give my thighs more zing, and a waist-cincher to support my back. I successfully managed to run two minutes with a one minute break until I hit 15 minutes and realized my heart rate had soared to an unbelievable 175 BPM. WTF. I reverted back to the week one lesson of 1run/2walk.

What doesn’t make sense to me is I can go like a maniac on an eliptical machine at the gym on my off days, but that foot pounding into the pavement seems to freak my body out. Come to think of it, I can have hot monkey sex longer than I can run.

Everyone I know who has taken up running late-life loves it. I’m going to get through this eight-week program even if it takes me… four months. But for now, the only runner’s high I’m going to get is from the beer I have afterwards.