Yep, that's my life right now. Up, down, twisting around. There's so much going on I can barely keep it all straight.
First of all, you know that I'm moving to Florida, of course. There's not a lot to say there except that Durb and I are just looking for somewhere to live down there, and I'm hoping to find a part-time job to go with freelancing so that I don't get too bored. I'd be happy with a job at
Victoria's Secret or something else non-stressful, but then again, I may not end up bringing home a paycheck if I do that. I have an obsession with their Pink clothes and admittedly, some of their makeup products (I deserve swatted for that, I work for Lancome cosmetics).
That's been going on, plus my parents just moved out of the house they've had for 26 years and into a new one, so I've been trying my best to help them out with packing and moving things. Unfortunately, I haven't really been a lot of help because I kept finding boxes filled with things I haven't seen in years, like this
BADASS pair of earrings I honest-to-God wore to work today. When I remember to, I'm going to have to take a picture of myself with them on. They're bangin'. And the sales sticker on the back of them says they came from Hills and they were $1.97. Sweet. I hope you remember Hills just off the 29th St. exit back behind Taco Bell. I loved going there with my mom when I was a kid, they had popcorn and cotton candy up at the front and some arcade games there, too. I was fascinated by that place and now that I'm older, I'm sad to realize that it was really nothing more than a K-Mart-type of store. Anyway, I got some Little Mermaid earrings there and that's all that matters.
Let's see, what else is there? Oh yeah, last Sunday I drove up to Parkersburg for the night for my darling friend Laura's baby shower. Her little girl is scheduled to be delivered via C-section October 5th, and her other little girl, Reagan, will be two the same week. It was a great shower, and Laura and baby daddy TS got some pretty sweet stuff for their little bundle of joy and rottenness.
Aww, her eggo is preggo!
Laura, the pregnant bitch in the middle, with me and her other BFF Abby :)
Laura and the rotten little Reaganator - how cute is that kid?
Laura and the proud baby daddy, TS :)
Abby and I designed this special little treat. I thought up the martini glass, but Abby is the genius behind putting 'olive juice'. In case you don't get it, when you mouth 'olive juice' to someone, it looks like you're saying 'I love you'. Brilliant, right? And yes, those are little olives on the neckline with sparkly red pimentos.
While the shower was an all-around wonderful time had by all, there was one downfall, and it proved to be the most difficult situation for me since becoming a vegan. There was literally
nothing vegan to eat at the shower but fruit and tortilla chips, which are not necessarily a sustainable dinner. There was some alfredo-y dip that I tried (I wasn't a fan of, but I'm not an alfredo person anyway) that obviously had some cream and cheese in it. Uh-oh! There was a cheesy beef taco-y dip that I didn't try, of course, nor did I do the ham puffs or chicken nuggets.
I have come to the realization that
I can't expect anyone to conform to my eating habits and provide a vegan meal for me when they're making a non-vegan meal for 50 other people. Duh, I should have known that. My one question is:
Is it rude if I bring my own food with me to functions like this,
or eat before going to them or something? I feel like going to something like that and not eating comes across as snobbish, right? Because the hostess or host usually will ask, "How come you're not eating?" And then when you reply, "Oh, I'm vegan, no big deal," they probably freak out and worry that you're starving and that you think they're terrible people for not preparing something vegetarian or vegan just in case.
After the shower was over and everything was cleaned up and people had left, I just ran down to Wendy's and got myself a side salad and that was perfectly fulfilling, and it truly wasn't a big deal. I just didn't want the hostess (TS' mom) to feel bad for not making anything that a vegan or vegetarian could or would eat. She had worked so hard to make the shower perfect (and it truly was) and put all kinds of cutesy little baby touches on everything, and was such a lovely hostess, and I kind of tried to not let her hear that I'm vegan because I didn't want her to worry.
But I'm just kind of wondering what etiquette should be in a situation like that, so if you have any good answers or suggestions, let me know because I'm forever going to bridal and baby showers and whatnot.
I do have an confession to make. There were red velvet cupcakes that were
NOT VEGAN in any way, shape, or form, and I did eat like, 4 of them. I honestly didn't feel guilty like I thought I would, and maybe it was because they don't particularly appear to be related to animals in anyway, but in the back of my head the next day, I kept thinking about the eggs and butter that had to be in them and the icing. I had the guilt then, but not while I was licking the green icing off my fingers. So I'm probably going to have to find a recipe that sounds super outstanding from
this amazing website and eat some vegan cupcakes like a good little girl.
By the way, I made some cheesy rice tonight (non-dairy cheese, of course) and the recipe called for milk, so I used soy milk, obviously. Well, I shouldn't have even told my husband because he stood in the kitchen whining, and said to me: "Ugh, I wish you wouldn't have told me that, now I'm going to be tasting for it. It's going to give me diarrhea." It took everything in me to convince him that it's DAIRY-FREE and will not give him diarrhea like the regular milk I would normally put in it would. Ice cream would do more harm to his sensitive stomach than a cup of soy milk. He's very adamant about having no part in my veganism and sticking with his usual butter and milk and chicken, chicken, chicken. But I learned tonight that if I just sneak it in, he's never going to know the difference because he didn't seem to really notice any difference with the flavor of the rice. It'll just have to be my little secret from now on.
The amazing (albeit non-vegan) red velvet cupcakes at Laura's baby shower.
