Juice-ly 27th: Weekend Wrap-Up.

Day 27. What a weekend! Sorry for the lack of posts over the weekend, but I figured that most people spend their time catching up with family and friends when they’re not forced by economic and/or career necessities to sit in front of a computer for hours a day. And I was pretty busy attending to family matters of my own. My daughter celebrated her 5^th birthday on Saturday! Such a little blessing to everyone she touches, and I spent my day Saturday completely devoted to doing whatever in the wide world she wanted to do.

These things are HARD to resist...

An exercise which, believe it or not, involved some rather significant challenges to my juice fast. First, my darling daughter requested hot dogs cooked on our gas grill for lunch. We bought the grill last summer and gave it a pretty extensive workout, between brats, burgers, dogs, and the occasional vegetable. Then, of course, I completely changed the way I eat, and pretty much abandoned the grill for the beginning of this grilling season. My daughter remembered how great stuff tastes on the grill, and she has always loved hot dogs.

(I know, I know. I’m working on it, okay?)

Anyway, my wife’s parents were in town for the day as well, and my father-in-law is pretty handy around the grill, but in my mind, to cede even temporary control of my grill, even for one single, solitary meal, would have represented a colossal blow to my man-dom. (Man-ness?) And believe me, I have a long and storied history with hot dogs. Something about the combination of salt, processed mystery animal parts, and mustard kept me eating until I absolutely couldn't anymore, at one time. I remember very vividly, shortly after moving north from Florida in summer 2012, being at a party hosted by two of my oldest friends. I had been doing pretty well as a vegan from about August to April, but I had clearly abandoned veganism by the time we reached Ohio. I don't remember how many hot dogs I ate that day, but I do remember eating them pretty much non-stop. I had learned on the Travel Channel a technique that allowed me to eat two hot dogs in one bun, and I did that for about six or eight dogs, plus a few more singles. At one point, my friend looked at me and said, "So, JB - how's the vegan thing going for you?" I was in the middle of a binge, and the shame I felt when called out on my obviously poor eating habits was the only thing that stopped me from going much farther over the edge than I already was.

All's well that ends well, though. Hot dogs have not been synonymous with “food” for quite a while, in my mind. Not a big challenge to fire up the grill and scorch a few dogs for the fam, ya know? Amazingly enough, and true to her form, my daughter – the one who requested this meal, months in advance – didn’t even touch her hot dogs! Reminded me of her first birthday, when she didn’t even touch her smash cake. Anyway, I’ve known her long enough to know her physical cues with regards to eating, and I knew pretty early that she wasn’t going to touch the things. She may be a budding vegan, yet!

After lunch, we went out to get her ears pierced. She tried to handle it like a little trouper, but after holding herself together for the initial shock of the piercing, she broke down in tears for a little while. Just a couple of minutes, and probably nothing they haven’t seen a bazillion times at that piercing station. Still, though. When it’s your daughter who’s in that chair, trying to be brave and failing miserably (but looking oh, so cute while doing it), your heart breaks a little bit. No worries, though. She got over the ordeal fairly quickly – in fact, shortly after the nice young lady working the booth applied some of the cleaning solution to her tender lobes.

Scarlett Overkill, the new face of evil in the movie Minions.

We had done a pretty good job of keeping the rest of the day a secret from her to this point. Slowly but surely, she found out what we were doing. She had requested a Minion-themed party this year, which is pretty cool, actually. So my wife went out and picked up a whole bunch of Minion-related stuff, which took her all of twelve seconds because every store has five aisles dedicated to all things Minion these days. We capped that off by seeing the Minions movie, which I thought was enjoyable enough (though I’m no movie critic). My daughters loved it, which is all I cared about. The music was pretty amazing as well, owing to the movie’s main setting (London, 1968). Some more discerning Christians found some aspects of it a little more objectionable, but I will leave it to them to try to shield their kids from things their kids are going to seek out on their own anyway (especially if they have any friends at all).

But I digress! I brought three juices along to stay on track, and I cracked open my first one right as the movie started. I planned on having the last two at around 4 and dinnertime, but as it turns out, I only ended up having one of the remaining two, at dinner. The second one went back into the fridge when we got home, but I threw it out early Sunday morning when I discovered that the green goodness that normally separates and floats to the top of the jar had sunk to the bottom like a reverse goldfish. I could only assume that the life-giving nutrients had hung on as long as they could before dying. RIP, Third Juice!!

In my daughter's mind, there was no contest between this and Build-A-Bear.

Before we get to dinner, though, we have to mention the next step in my daughter’s birthday celebration. At this particular mall, the movie theater isn’t that far away from a couple of pretty popular doll stores: Build-A-Bear and American Girl. We had originally talked about taking her to Build-A-Bear but when we saw how close the two stores were (literally, across the street from each other) we decided at the last minute to give the birthday girl the final say over where we would go. I walked her towards the intersection, with American Girl looming on my right and Build-A-Bear hearkening in the distance on my left. I gave her the options, and before I could even finish my sentence she was pointing to the American Girl store. Didn’t give some stinky old bear a second thought – just made a beeline to the door. Ooooooo-kay then! Glad we gave her that option!

It took her all of 90 seconds to find a doll that looks enough like her, and she was done shopping. (Yup, shops like her dad. Nodding in approval over here.) I’m actually a big fan of the way they do their dolls there now. It’s kinda like Build-A-Bear for little girl dolls! She picked one out with just the right skin tone and hair texture, and that was a wrap. She hasn’t yet named her new doll, but I’m sure it will be a pretty good one.

The scene of many a food crime, and one major victory (so far).

Finally, though, dinner. She wanted to go to the Cheesecake Factory, mainly because they were in the mall at some point before this and she thought the sign and décor was cool. In other words, the scene of some of my most infamous food crimes. They don’t call it a “factory” for nothing, as it seems like they have food for months. I have, at times, eaten like it was my job to eat all the food they have before it spoiled in the next half hour. I mean, whole platters of food AND whole slices of decadent cheesecake, and wanted more. Their menu has, basically, every type of cuisine. It was pretty much impossible to get away with that mind trick I like to play on myself whenever I see big plates of meat now. The “it’s not food” trick, which shuts down the hunger and the cravings before they even get started. The bread they bring out? Most certainly looks, smells, and probably tastes like really yummy food. The fries? Soup and salad? Sushi? Tofu burgers? (Actually, they don’t have tofu burgers, yet. But I wouldn’t put it past them to get with the vegan craze and add them in!)

I honestly can’t remember now, but I think I was breathing through my mouth most of the time we were there (another great defense mechanism). When it came time to order our food, I looked at our very friendly waitress (who had the same name as our 2-year-old daughter) and told her that I’m on a juice fast, and if she would bring me out a couple of extra lemon wedges for my water, that would be great! She didn’t even bat an eye, so it wasn’t nearly as awkward as I thought it would be. Later, when her helpers brought our food out, the last guy looked a little puzzled when I told him that we were okay, even though I didn’t have a gigantic platter in front of me. “Are they going to feed you today?” he said, half-jokingly. Once again, I looked him in the eye and said that I’m on a juice fast, so I’ve got what I need right here (and tapped my Mason jar brimming with delectable green juice). He just walked away, no doubt shaking his head.

The rest of the table ate, and I drank, and it was all good. We enjoyed the fellowship and I felt absolutely no pressure or desire to eat anything but what I brought along. I couldn’t help thinking about a conversation thread from one of the weight loss support groups I’m a part of on Facebook. A woman was going out to Olive Garden for a birthday celebration and asked the group for some advice. A few people encouraged her to have just a small something or other, though it seemed to her that OG didn’t have many vegan options, if any.

(But isn’t that the case with most restaurants whose main source of commerce is based on the Standard American Diet (SAD)? Everything has to be slathered in something in order to be palatable. Or, not palatable – so the customer continues to order more food, until s/he is stuffed.)

I tried to shift the whole discussion by asking “Why do you have to eat anything?”

And was basically laughed off the thread.

One woman said, “Where’s the fun in not eating? Have a little something, it won’t hurt.” At that point, I knew that such a radical point of view was out of place in this particular discussion, so I refrained from commenting any further. But I did feel slightly vindicated later, after posting news of my victory over that sprawling food megalopolis known as the Cheesecake Factory, when quite a few people chimed in with similar experiences and similar victories. It *is* possible not to make every social event about food, even if you’re in a restaurant that specializes in, well, everything. It’s even possible not to eat at all! Maybe next time I find myself in such a setting, I won’t even bring a juice. Hmmmmm…