Eating healthy. It evokes images of bran-filled ceral bowls and fiber laden dishes and the subsequent runs to the potty. Alas, whenever I get on one of these kicks, the Charmin is the first purchase. I know I will be needing it.
I once made a pact with one of my exes. I would go to the gym every day... and I did. I drove my car 12 miles up the road and across the bridge and parked in the overflowing lot. I would sit there, scarfing down Twinkies, proud that I kept my commitment to visit the gym daily. The pact didn't mention actually going inside.
Healthy food is something else. It taunts me from the cabinet, shouting, "I am not a devil dog!" Rice cakes and whole wheat pasta intermingle with the Snickers, which I have given up many times over. I don't allow them to mix for very long. It would be sacriligeous. The Snickers are promptly consumed. Sometimes I even go slow enough so I don't swallow a bit of wrapper with my binging.
I like my junk food unadulterated. Oatmeal raisin cookies, for instance, are just plain wrong. First of all, fiber and cookie are not words that belong in the same sentence for anyone below retirement age. Oatmeal is a prime source of fiber. Raisins are grapes on steroids. Hardly junk food. Then there is oatmeal chocolate chip cookie fare. The chips make it less healthful, sure, but the base product is still a heaping helping of roughage.
What really irritates me is that when I try to go all healthy, I buy a lot of fruit and vegetable matter. I proceed to place these perishables in the "Vegetable Crisper" drawer in the fridge. In truth, it is a "Vegetable Rotter" in my house. I bought a bag of apples this week, for instance. Five bucks for 2 pounds. Organic.
Organic is code word for crappy-looking fruit with lots of brown spots you have to like because it is how these things look without pesticides. It is the real deal, tootsie, and enjoy your unadulterated uber healthy fruit.
I didn't care about the uber healthy pure part as I peeled those apples, cored them and boiled them up to make baby food. I can buy that if I really wanted it - I wanted something for ME to eat. I wasn't going to lose the five bucks so I spent an hour making applesauce. An hour I could've spent working making ten times the value of the apples.
It is just hard to eat healthy when the produce quality varies so widely. It is a crapshoot whether or not I will be satisfied when I nosh on a Granny Smith. I know the Snickers satisfies. Even their ad campaign says so. The point is, we are so homogenized today that even fruits and veggies are affected. It makes me cringe to know the corn in my pot may be genetically modified. Then I realize I don't really know what it means so I can chow down with impunity.
Eating healthy was never so much fun!
