Meat??? Or Fake Meat???

I've been getting a kick out of this whole meat-substitute thing. The other night, I made an AWESOME beef stroganoff using meat substitute crumbles and you could not tell the difference...I've always been a fan of ground beef as it's so versatile and quick to cook up --we're talking tacos, Mexican lasagna, spaghetti, manicotti, jumbalaya etc as weeknight favorites.

When I made the stroganoff, Justin found the wrapper before the food was even ready and threw a FIT. He actually went to the store and picked himself up a steak just to be 180 degrees opposite of the stroganoff. If only he knew what he was missing!

Funny part is--he has eaten the crumbles MANY more times than he would even care to realize. I'm telling ya, you cannot tell the difference. Granted, I wouldn't make a hamburger out of the stuff (my texture taste buds aren't that brave yet) but it's a great alternative for ground beef. However, I will admit--there's times I've used ground beef because I was too lazy to walk all the way back to the organic section to get my crumbles. I tried telling him that we've been eating about 50% crumbles and him eating about 50% real meat but now he doesn't trust anything I tell him!

So tell me--by looking at this picture, would you say MEAT or FAKE MEAT? When I look at the picture, it reminds me to add the onions in the very beginning so that they brown up with everything else...ooops!

The Past Few Months...

The past few months I've been having super weird things going on with my chest...on a few occassions I've ended up either at the ER or the local urgent care center (it just depended on which one was closer!) with a racing heart, throbbing chest pains, piercing head pains, difficulty breathing, extreme dizziness, unable to stand up and feeling like I was going to pass out at any minute. After the episodes, I would find myself absolutely drained for at least the next day, if not two days after. My body seriously felt like I had just run a marathon and all I wanted to do was sleep to regain some energy. Each time I sought urgent/emergent care, the attending physicians or PA told me "it was just a panic attack" and to go home and take care of myself. One PA even told me to go to a happy place whenever I started feeling bad. Really??? The girl who is always chill is having a panic attack??? I've never had one before and why would I start now?! I will admit I like to rant & rave, but that's totally different than worrying about stuff and letting it consume me--consciously or subconsciously. I tend to think my primary care physician is pretty awesome and will do whatever she can to make me comfortable...she knows I'm not one to complain unless I'm at my wits end with feeling crappy. We tried several different anti-anxiety drugs while we did a battery of other tests and guess what--the anxiety meds didn't make any difference. Dr. Morin was pretty sure they wouldn't but she figured it was worth a shot. Well, the stupid episodes continued and I would just let it run its course while curled up on the couch in a fetal position. I figured the hospital/stat care didn't do anything other than send me a large bill afterwards and yeah, maybe that would cause a panic attack! Anyhow, the first part of February I decided to cut out meat and see if that made a difference. I'd just had another attack so I figured it was worth it. About 3 weeks later, I was at my dr's for a follow up and she told me I was getting put on a heart monitor for 21 days. I was a bit frustrated about being hooked up to a black box when I hadn't had any episodes since cutting out meat and we were in the process of moving. It wasn't the most convenient time to be put on one but I was ready for some answers...I have no idea how many times I accidentally set off the heart monitor--it made this awful squaking sound so needless to say, it was a bit embarassing to be around other people and have this hideous sound start coming out of me! I wore the heart monitor for the 21 days and nothing happened. I was SO excited! I called my dr's office to let them know but then they told me I had to wear it an additional 2 weeks--so 5 weeks of wearing the stupid thing?! I decided to bite the bullet and low and behold, I started having episodes again during Easter Weekend. Ah, maybe they do know what they're doing after all! Finally, I was able to turn in the monitor and schedule my appointment with the cardiologist to review the results. Yesterday was the big appointment day! Turns out--I wasn't crazy! The symptoms were not in my head and they were NOT panic attacks. For whatever reason, the electricity in my heart exits out just like it should...but then it decides it's not ready to leave and re-enters my heart, causing my heart to short-circuit and go into tachycardic episodes. That's why my heart would hit at least 160 beats per minute for hours at a time! I kinda giggled at the thought and wanted to ask if it was maybe my brain and not my heart because ummm, yeah, sometimes things don't always connect in my head! Thankfully, a daily med treats the condition and if I still have episodes while taking the medication, they'll go in and burn some of the tissue that causes the short circuiting. He also gave me some tips on what to do at home during the episodes so that I can re-set my heart and not have to seek medical care. All in all, I was so relieved to find out that I wasn't going crazy after all! Part of me wants to write a letter to the doctors who told me it was all in my head and be like, "Hey--I wasn't freaking out, turned out my heart just needed reset. PS You suck. Love, Bria." But then I realized--it is a small town and maybe someday I will need them to reset me so it might be best to be a nice girl about it!

Going Green!

When Justin and I lived in our duplex on Shirley Lane, we tried curbside recycling for a while...however, we didn't have much luck as the students didn't always pick up on the correct day and the billing was so screwed up.

The other day, I was cruising the Peoples' Grocery Co-Op website and they had a listing for a new curbside provider.

The company, Carnahan Curbside, is located out of Olsburg and the owner came with great references from my sister's mother-in-law. While checking out other providers in the area, I was very disappointed in the lack of information or broken web links. In my opinion, if you can't have a website in today's world, I'm automatically skipping over ya!

Last Saturday, I sat down at the computer and signed up for Carnahan and by Monday afternoon the bins were on our front porch! My anal retentive tendencies kicked in and I decided to place the bins next to the trash can so we have NO excuse for throwing out something that could live another life!

But the best part of Carnahan??? The payment is taken via PayPal so no need to keep track of paper bills, you can check all your account info online AND new referrals get free service and so do we!!!

Justin was convinced that recycling is going to be a waste of money and being the penny pincher he is, that's a sore spot! I'm convinced that we will break even--if not drastically reduce our trash fequency by recycling.

Per the photo, after 4 days of recycling we've collected a lot of stuff! Three days later and we've only used 1 trash bag in an entire week! I didn't take a picture of the bins after 7 days because it's a bit embarrassing to see all our rubbish! Oh, and please let me point out--the beer bottles and pizza box are NOT mine! lol

Just to prove Justin wrong, I'm becoming very conscious of the packaging that our groceries, take out, etc comes in. If we're paying for the service, we're going to use it as much as we can :-) After my root canal last week, I've had more than my fair share of milkshakes...as much as I love Sonic, we have to break up because their drinks come in styrofoam cups. I can't recycle that! At least I can break down my paper cups from McDonald's and smoosh it into the recycling bin :-) Simple changes such as your drinking cups, grocery bags, etc will make a huge difference in the long run

If you want to check out Carnahan yourself, go to http://www.carnahancurbside.com/; and if you decide to sign up, our reference number is "4y6y"

The Reason I Love Margarine...

Growing up, margarine was like the forbidden fruit in our household. Mom was a strict butter-only cook and refused to ever replace it with the "good stuff." She tried convincing us that it didn't cook the same, had a different flavor and was bad for a person. And butter's not?! Lol

When my brother got engaged, I started working on a cookbook for his new wife. Shawn is notorious for being a picky eater so I thought it would help if Nikki had some recipes he liked, but also some of our family recipes.

I knew off the top of my head what recipes my brother would want from Grandma Marcene--her mashed potato recipe, her frozen peas recipe and the strawberry-jello-with-banana-slices recipe. Such recipes are extremely easy and require no secret ingredient, other than MARGARINE!!!

We used to get so excited to eat with Grandma & Grandpa because we could slather everything in the yummy Country Crock margarine...and thus, the start of my love affair with margarine :-)

Almost one year ago, I received the dreaded call at work saying that Grandma wasn't going to make it. She'd been in the hospital after yet another fall and during a stroke that morning, she aspirated causing her lungs to fill with fluid and her organs were failing.

Our family was no stranger to such calls asking the family to gather by her bedside. But this time it was the real deal--the "Energizer Bunny" was no longer and even her doctor said he didn't expect her to come back kicking harder than before. Deep down, I wished it was just another false alarm but this time was different--she was at peace and I knew it was finally her time.

We managed to get through the holidays without her or Grandpa and it'll be weird not having them at our wedding in September. But at least I can think of her and smile everytime I get to eat margarine :-)

They say the memories will always live on so here are my Top 10 Memories of Grandma:

10. Every Christmas when we were little, Grandma & Grandpa would take us to Concordia to pick out a toy at Wal-Mart and then eat at Burger King...oh what fun!!! Especially the year one of us kids caught diarrhea half way between Clifton and Concordia!

9. One time when we were at the Yellow House, I was spinning Shawn around on the office chair & Grandma said to stop before he threw up. I didn't believe her since it didn't happen right then, but it did later that night and I think Shawn made sure to throw in a little extra just to prove me wrong!

8. After they moved to Clay Center, I was picking on Shawn and Grandma threatened to bend me over her red checkered apron. But, I knew she didn't have a red checkered apron so I kept at it--I quickly learned that it was a reference to not an actual apron, but a spanking!!!

7. In grade school, we were told by our parents that we were no longer allowed to ride with Grandma Marcene. In fact, if they wanted to take us anywhere, Grandpa had to be the driver. NO EXCEPTIONS!!! And we couldn't tell Grandma why--that was the tricky part!

6. I vividly remember riding downtown in Grandma's Buick Park Avenue when she blew through a red light and then asked us what color it was! Oh, we thought it was the funnest thing ever and were so excited to tell Mom & Dad...however, that led to Memory #7. In her last few years, she no longer could operate the foot pedals, so she used her cane to do so; her crippled hands couldn't turn over the ignition, but a pair of pliers did the trick! All her Assisted Living buddies bragged about how she was such a great driver while we cringed whenever we found out she was on the loose!

5. The summer Shawn got married, I stopped by Grandma's Hospital room to find her watching David Banner's "Get Like Me" music video. I asked her what she was watching and she said, "oh, I don't know--one of the girls just turned it to this channel." If you know much about my Grandma, you'd know why I about died seeing her watching rap music!

4. During basketball season, I'd call Grandma before the KU tip-offs and she'd tell me who all the starters were that night and who was on the Injury List. Even at 90 years young and loaded up on meds, she knew her KU ball players and their stats!

3. When I picked Mitzy up from the breeders, I took her to see Grandma & Grandpa...in all seriousness, Grandma was very concerned about how I'd keep the cockelburrs off of her! Once I reminded her that I live in town, her fears were eased and she cuddled up to Miss Mitzy

2. During High School, I would stay at the grandparents' the night before my tennis meets and debate/forensic tournaments. No matter how early my morning started, Grandma was in the kitchen heating me up a Tasty Pasty Nut Roll

1. During Grandma's last "fun" trip to Manhattan shortly before she died, she, Mom and I went to lunch at the Wareham and Grandma even managed the elevator to my apt in Aggie Village. In her crippled state, this was such a big occassion for her! Hearing her talk of her days working at the Wareham, studying at K-State and describing how Manhattan was during the 1940s was priceless :-)

Mitzy's New Bed!

We've found out that the animals LOVE running around on our hardwood floors, but they HATE laying on it! Mitzy never liked the dog beds I bought her in the past, but I figured it was worth a shot now that she has wood, wood, and more wood to lay around on.

I was in Walgreen's the other day with my mom & Aunt Sarah Jane....I figured I'd pick one up there but I had no idea I'd find the best dog bed EVER at a drugstore of all places!  Turns out, they had an animal bed of Maxx the Sock Monkey.  We've been trying to go with a modern-vintage theme for our house, so who woulda known their new bed would match our decor?!

Now Mitzy and Malcolm take turns laying in Max. It doesn't matter that there's another "generic" bed in the bedroom. When Mitzy's laying in Max, Malcolm will go creep through the windows for a while--then, when he's ready to hop in the bed for a while, Mitzy will go nosing around the house. I'm waiting for the day of when I come in the house and they're sharing the bed, cuddled in the Yin/Yang position!

I still can't post a pic of Mitz laying in the bed, but I will as soon as I can!

Do You Know What's in Your Food?

Unless you've been living under a rock, President Obama signed the controversial Healthcare Reform bill earlier this week.

Buried deep within the bill is a requirement that all fast-food places post their nutritional info on the menu by 2011. I remember a few years ago when businesses started printing brochures that contained the nutritional info--but how many people really look at that prior to making their order?

I think people will be shocked to see the caloric value and fat intake of their favorite fast-food items. Did you know that a Chipotle tortilla ALONE has over 400 calories??? I want to say it has roughly 12-13g of fat as well, but they no longer post their nutrition guide online ;-)

Just think what your Chipotle burrito contains by the time you do the tortilla (that's a meal in itself!), rice (plenty of carbs there), beans (nothing wrong there), meat (at least it's hormone free), cheese & sour cream (oh god, just let the cellulite spread further across your thighs ), guac (but that's a good fat!) and salsa (yay for more veggies!)...then add some chips & soda and you're screwed for the day. The average Chipotle burrito contains 1,000-1,500 calories and your entire daily intake shouldn't surpase 2,000! Don't get me wrong--I love Chipotle and get a sick, twisted kick out of eating an entire burrito bowl in one sitting, but it's just plain bad on the waistline.

I will be the first to admit that I'm not a lettuce salad-and-no-dressing-with-a-side-of-celery-sticks type of eater. Not even close...everything is fine in moderation....I love a great deep-fat-fried chimichanga covered with cheese sauce, but I'm only going to eat it about once a month.

When I was at my endocrinology appointment this past fall, he was telling me that the number of practicing endocrinologists is not growing, in fact it's falling--but yet diabetes is exploding like crazy (ps I don't have diabetes--that's not why I was there!). I realize that not everyone can control whether they end up with diabetes or not, but so much of the risk factor is influenced by diet and lifestyle. To me, it's an easy choice--eat healthy & feel good or eat crap and suffer for it later. And don't even get me started on what poor lifestyle choices will end up costing the healthcare industry...

I realize that healthy food isn't cheap...we've all heard about those studies where someone has to live on food stamps for one week and they find they can't buy their organic head of lettuce as it costs too much. Then they end up stocking up on potato chips, processed cheese, soda, higher fat ground beef, etc b/c they can't afford the healthy alternatives.

I've been on a strict meat-free diet since the first of February and my body is loving it--I'm convinced that being vegetarian is for me. My chronic headaches no longer exist and my digestive system is finally normal after years of IBS. I originally intended to go vegan, but so far I'm happy with just cutting out meat.

Last week, I finally caved in a purchased a "lifetime" membership to People's Grocery, the local health/natural food store. It cost $50 but I get 15% off my purchases, I am entitled to member-only sales, I have access to overstock items and I also will be involved with their annual profit sharing. After shopping at Dillons & Hy-Vee for my vegetarian items, I realized that People's really doesn't cost much more. They also have a deli that has homemade naan, fresh hummus, soups, salads, etc and all the options are super healthy. It's SO much more enjoyable than trying to pick between fried chicken legs, pork friend rice or chicken strips!

All in all, I can't wait for 2011..there's times I end up hitting the drive-thru, but it will be nice to see what the nutritional value of my food is (or lack thereof) before I order. Now if we can only get them to eventually post all the additives and preservatives!

Collegiate Athletes & Inter-Personal Violence

I'm pretty sure we're all aware that UNI upset KU in the NCAA tournament this past Saturday...and I couldn't be happier!

It's not about a KU/K-State rivalry. It's about Sherron Collins not getting a second National Champs ring.

Some of you may be well aware of how absolutely disgusted I am by Sherron Collins. And for you of those who weren't aware, well, hold on because I don't hold back!

Sherron raped a girl IN AN ELEVATOR on campus and got away with it. KU pressured the DA's office to refrain from filing charges and guess what, no charges were filed. Eventually the victim filed a civil suit and Sherron decided not to cooperate.

What makes me sick is that the KU community acts like NOTHING happened and has the mentality that he's completely innocent of the accusations. Did any of you watch the K-State game played at Allen Fieldhouse on Senior Night? The fans might as well bow down and start washing Sherron's feet. Their support of him is absolutely sickening. He should be sitting his ass in Leavenworth but instead Bill Self and the KU program are standing behind him. And I want to know what's wrong with Bill Self to condone such violent behavior...But, I'm happy to say that karma finally hit Sherron on Saturday night and he will not be awarded with another Championship!

I realize that inter-personal violence perpetrated by athletes is not isolated to just KU. K-State has their share of it and I'm disappointed with how our Athlete Department has handled recent players. This fall, a football player was arrested for battering his pregnant EX-girlfriend. And the fact that she was his ex at the time highlights just how dangerous and violent this athlete is. At the time, he was the third string quarterback but during the season his position changed and he was given PLENTY of playing time.

As I was professionally involved with this incident, I was waiting for the local papers to jump all over it. Sure enough, they did. I was patiently waiting for Bill Snyder to make a statement and take his predicatable course of disciplining his player within the confines of the football program.

However, days went by and Snyder did NOTHING. As mentioned above, this athlete was given playing time. What happened to the Snyder who was known for keeping his players under control and laying a heavy hand?! Maybe he was more concerned with creating a winning record his first season back and didn't care that his players are assaulting pregnant women and ultimately harming the fetus. But yet, Snyder is involved with TONS of child-centered movements throughout the state. It's time Snyder truly walks his own talk.

*FYI--1 in 4 pregnant women are assaulted at least once during their pregnancy*

This isn't the first time such a thing has happened at K-State and it won't be the last.

However, these incidents make me proud to have been part of the Creighton community. Dana Altman, current Men's Basketball coach at Creighton and former K-State Head Coach, is touted for recruiting athletes who will do something with themselves after they leave college. Many people will say this is why he was fired from K-State. As the story goes, the big money people at K-State didn't care who he recruited as long as they were winning the games and Altman refused to play their games.

When I was at Creighton, the student-athletes were pretty decent people all around. Yes, we did have Terrell Taylor who was an incredible baller and he ended up with a criminal case after he left for the NBA...but this was a rare problem for former Creighton athletes. The Omaha community wouldn't pick up the World-Herald and frequently read about the Creighton athletes getting into legal problems. The past few basketball seasons haven't been the best for Creighton, but at least Altman realizes that character is more important than the way someone handles the ball.

Now that Collins will be gone, I can go back to enjoying my KU basketball. My Granddad Alcorn and Grandma Taddiken are responsible for getting me started on the team and I have to admit, they're hella fun to watch. But I cannot sit there and watch a team that has been built around someone who can't keep their penis in their pants. Hey, it's true of Sherron--he's fathered 3 children already so it's pretty obvious that he likes to do it regardless of if you're a willing participant!