Fighting for a Seat on the Wagon

If living a sustainable lifestyle were easy, everyone would do it, right? New challenges continue to pop up, but that's why I'm blogging this - so you can see 'em coming if you're going through this too! There was some illness and injury, a little Internet overwhelm, and a touch of blonde. Allow me to elaborate.

As you may have guessed from my previous post, my kids have been sick. We're still not sure what's up with my son; more tests are needed. My daughter has a staph infection for the fourth time this year, and we can't seem to kill it. We've traced it back to a spider bite I had a while back, but we need more tests to figure out if it's become resistant and if I'm still carrying it. Personally, I feel just fine, but I'm not 3. In any case, they're both feeling much better, thank you, although our healthy, hippy house is now home to more antibiotics than you can shake a stick at. The extra hours at various doctors and hospitals and pharmacies definitely cut into my thoughtful food preparation time, and I haven't been shopping in a while (just ask my husband).

I did manage a quick trip to Ever'man's, the local whole foods co-op. I picked up a number of grains and a gorgeous wild rice and lentil mix. It's so lovely, I'd like to just stare at it. But I can't, because it's in a plastic bag. In fact, they're all in plastic bags. Suddenly I'm thinking of that island of trash in the ocean, the giant man-made landfill that's poisoning the ocean. Glass! I need glass containers to put my grains and beans in, then I can reuse the plastic bags and save the whales. You would think that finding air-tight, glass storage containers would be easy, right? Nope. I spent about 2 hours online, both "Googling" and "Binging" them, but with little success. I just wanted some of those Mason-jar things with the rubber gasket and flip-top lid I remember from my childhood. Apparently now they're called "French Hermetic Terrines", are pretty expensive, and are chronically out of stock anyway. I'm still not sure what I'm going to do about my pantry. Maybe I'll just pig out and eat everything and then I won't have to worry about storing anything.

With all the stress and distraction of the kids and containers, I haven't been eating well. Ok, I've been eating worse than a frat boy. Although I always strive to give my family balanced meals, I personally had Goldfish crackers and wine for dinner one night. Another time I tried to make nachos out of stale taco shells and processed cheese. There. My confessions are out in the open. Needless to say, I wasn't feeling too well myself by the end of the week so yesterday, I fasted. I love a good fast (I elaborate here). To break my fast, I chose oatmeal. Proper, steel-cut oatmeal that you cook, in a pot, with a wooden spurtle. I'm only second generation American of Scottish descent, so I know oatmeal. Apparently Homeland Security thought the IRA was hiding in my Irish oats, though, because I almost killed myself trying to get into the freaking tin. (See the picture for an idea what it took to open it!) By the time I got it open, the water had boiled down, so the oatmeal boiled over and trashed my stove. Mind you, by this time, I hadn't eaten in about 36 hours, and this is not the best time to test my emergency response skills. Eventually, I got my oatmeal. I was delicious, and almost worth the trouble.

3 weeks into the Momnivore Challenge, and I've learned a lot. I've learned I'll starve if I worry about every little thing, like the fact that none of the grains or beans I bought were locally produced. I'll settle for the fact that they're all organically grown, minimally packaged (bought from bulk bins), and purchased locally - and that they're real food, of course. I've learned that it's easy to fall off the wagon, but it's not a big deal to hop back on again. And I've learned that I'm barely 2% smarter than a tin of oatmeal.