M. Suzanne Terry

I won’t tell you what’s in this cup.

Let’s just say that it’s not anything like the coffee I usually drink, and leave it at that.

I woke up this morning, and I went into the kitchen to make coffee.  My trusty coffee jar was empty.  Under normal circumstances, this would not be cause for alarm.  I keep extra coffee – as I buy in bulk – in larger, airtight containers in the cabinet.  I looked in my cabinet.  No coffee.  My pulse quickened as I opened the freezer, hoping beyond hope that I somehow lost my mind and stashed a bag in there.

Nothing.  There was nothing.  The skies darkened as the horrible realization began to seep in.

I’m still coming to terms with it.

I ran out of coffee.  Surely the apocalypse is nigh.

“It’s okay.  It’s okay,” I whispered, as I searched in vain for a paper bag into which to breathe.  “I can just drive through…OH, NO!”

Dilemma – to drive through for a sub par coffee-like substance in order to satisfy the caffeine craving, making myself late to work and almost certainly picking up a snack as well, or to make something that I did have work.

I chose the latter.  I am still undecided on whether it was the better choice.

Themes, observations, and lessons:

– Never, ever run out of coffee.  I thought I already knew this, but apparently…no.

– There is danger in reorganizing my schedule and priorities.  Hours-in-a-week are finite.  Part of the draw of fast food is that it’s convenient – that it’s on the way – a way I would already be going.  It’s not something extra I have to make a lot of extra time to do.  When I make extra time for things like cooking and cleaning up afterwards, that takes away time from something I was doing before.  This time, what got left out was ordering coffee.  I suppose this is better than forgetting to show up for work, but still.  I want to figure out how to make good changes without losing what I love.

I’m going 31 Days without eating fast food.  

One thing I really love about my parents’ visits is that we take time to sit down and eat breakfast.  Breakfast is my favorite meal of the day.  It’s usually pretty simple, but it’s always so good.

We usually have eggs, toast, some kind of meat (served on the side, for those who want to abstain), and fresh fruit.  We brew pot after pot of coffee while we cook and wake up for the day.

When I take time to cook breakfast for myself, it makes my whole day better.  I tend to vary what I make more often when I’m by myself, but whether it’s breakfast quinoa, waffles, a poached egg on rye toast, or a frittata, cooking is the best way to start the day.  It reminds me to do one thing at a time, because I only have two hands.  It reminds me not to get into too much of a rush, because the time it takes for something to cook doesn’t speed up just because I’m in a hurry.  It forces me to start my day off by managing my time well, and I end up handling the day better.

Themes, observations, and lessons:

– Breakfast could make me into a morning person.  Maybe.

– How I start the day matters.

– I like sharing breakfast, but I like it just as well in solitude.

I’m going 31 days without eating fast food.

My parents visited this weekend.  In celebration, we cooked, but we also hit the buffet.  We found an all-you-can-eat catfish place.  My mom loves catfish, so she didn’t even mind that it was a bit of a drive from Denton.

The food was good, and there was a lot of it.

Then we all waddled out to the car, and this is what that sounded like:

“I ate too much.”

“I’m so full – why did you let me go back for that last plate?”

“I’m never eating again.”

“I’m going to really feel this later.”

“I know better.”

We eat to excess, and we do it on purpose.  We knew that we would overdo it as soon as the restaurant was chosen, but we did it anyway.

This addiction to excess is not limited to event-by-event food consumption.  It also extends to food collection.

My grandparents grew up during the Depression.  They learned the art of conserving.  They also learned the art of stocking up for a rainy day.

Only the latter got passed down to their kids, except without any nuance.  There’s a fine line between stocking up and hoarding.

The family is a big fan of places like Costco and Sam’s.  I never go to Mom and Dad’s (or my sister and brother-in-law’s, for that matter) without being asked if I need a case or two of the ten thousand cans of whatever they bought.  The one good thing about having a small kitchen and apartment is that I can legitimately tell them that I don’t have the storage space without sounding like I’m just making excuses not to take it.

But I’m totally just making excuses not to take it.

I don’ t want my pantry and fridge to be full to excess.  I don’t want to have to choose between eating twice as much as I need and letting things go to waste.  I don’t want to have to stuff things in nooks and crannies and risk head injury every time I open the door to the cabinet.

I want the kitchen to be full of things that I need and use.

Themes, observations, and lessons:

– Mom cannot say “no” to catfish.

– I will not say “no” to peach cobbler.  I can, however, limit my intake to a few spoonfuls.

– New habits are hard to form.

– New habits are harder to form when they are based on values that are different from your family’s values.

I’m going 31 days without eating fast food.

Yesterday was the first annual National Kale Day.  It was also National Taco Day.  Obviously, I needed kale tacos.

I have made kale tacos in the past.  Roast some butternut squash or sweet potatoes, caramelize some onions, toss it together with steamed kale and goat cheese, wrap it in a corn tortilla, and you have a delicious treat.  This was the plan.

This is a great plan when you have any of those things in your house.

Alas, when grocery shopping on Tuesday, I did not anticipate this meal, so I did not buy for it.

I had leftover pasta with a butternut squash sauce and a sprinkle of parmesan.  That was acceptable.  In fact, it was good.  It was warm, homey, comfort food.

But it was not kale tacos.

Themes, observations, and lessons:

– I am even more emotionally attached to food than I suspected.  If it weren’t for my decision to forego fast food altogether, I know that I would have hit up Taco Casa for tacos, and the pasta would have likely gone to waste, just so I could satisfy a whim.

– I need kale in my house, because as cravings go, this is a pretty healthy one.  ‘Tis the season.

I’m doing 31 days without fast food.

Yesterday was a weird day to begin this challenge.  I had my hair appointment, a million errands, and attended my first meeting at a new-to-me book club (where we were instructed to bring a snack to share).  My habit on such days is to take the afternoon off work so that I get to go to bed before 2:00 a.m., which I did.  I arranged coverage for my shift, however, long before I decided to challenge myself not to eat fast food for a month.

Driving through is a part of my afternoon-off routine. I drive through Sonic (chosen because I’ll want coffee, and they add a shot of espresso to the coffee, rendering it somewhat less terrible) and get some kind of sandwich to fuel my afternoon, which I eat on the way to Salon LaPage, where Meredith will work her magic.

But Sonic is a no-go this month.  Instead, I had to plan ahead.  I had to remember to bring my travel mug so that I could take coffee made from my stash at the office.  I brought a sandwich from home, which required getting up earlier to make it and pack it.

You know what?  I didn’t miss Sonic.  My sandwich was delicious and not greasy, and you know the coffee is better when I make it.

On the way home, though, I really wanted onion rings.  Again, it was my pattern.  I went grocery shopping, and on the way home from grocery shopping, I always drive through and get a snack.   I know, I know – it seems ridiculous, because I just bought all this food, and then I get fast food.  But that’s just what I do.

This time, I didn’t get a snack.  I let my reasonable side – the side that tells me that this habit is ridiculous – win.  This might have been my favorite moment of the day.  *pats self on back*

Third challenge – bring a snack to share.  Taco Cabana taquitos work beautifully in such situations, because the last thing I usually want to do when coming home for the day is find something to cook.  Instead of Taco Cabana, though, I decided to make beer bread, and people loved it.  It didn’t take a lot of my time (mix three cups of self-rising flour with a beer, put it in a loaf pan, pour butter over it, and bake for almost an hour at 350 degrees), and it made for a much prettier presentation than an oil-soaked box.

Themes, observations, and lessons:

– Shirking convenience requires planning ahead.

– Fast food is intricately woven into most of my days.  I’ll have to watch out for unraveling.

– Real food (and coffee) is so much better.

– I need to learn how to make onion rings.

I’m doing 31 days without fast food.

My eating habits are terrible.  TERRIBLE.

I could rattle off a lot of excuses.  I have two jobs.  It’s so much trouble just to cook for one person.  I don’t want to eat the same leftovers for a week.  The drive-through is so tempting and convenient – it’s on the way to everywhere I go.  And so on.

My excuses, however, are weighing me down.  More specifically, they are enabling me to continue with excessive behaviors that weigh me down.

I know how to eat well.  This month, I’m going to start making choices that reflect that knowledge. I know what my worst habits are, and this month, I’m going to break one of them.

For 31 Days, I am going to avoid fast food.  I’m going to avoid what’s convenient and replace it with something better.

I’m not going to count calories or obsess about the fat content of what I’m cooking.  Those steps can come later.

What I need to do first is to get back into the habit of planning meals and saving my out-on-the-town meals for special occasions.

I want to be healthier.  I want to have more energy, and I want to take care of myself better.

I also just want to be excited about food again.  I want to feast, and I want to feed people.

None of those scenarios has a Taco Bueno bag in it.

These posts will focus on what I’m making and the people with whom I’m sharing it.  I hope there will be lots of stories and pictures and minimal whining.

I’ll be linking up with The Nester and hundreds of other people posting what their next 31 days are going to be about.  Will you join us?

Day One – Welcome to the Club

Day Two – National Kale Day!

Days Three and Four – Roots

Day Five – Everything in Excess

Day Six – Breakfast Love

Day Seven – Jesus Feminist, Body Image, and Related Ramblings

Day Eight – Running out of Coffee

Day Nine – “Let me ‘splain…no, there is too much.  Let me sum up.”

Day Ten – Irritability

Days Eleven, Twelve, and Thirteen – The Myth of My Poverty

Day Fourteen – Pretty, Pretty Food

Day Fifteen – Olivia Pope is (not) always right.

Day Sixteen – Southern

Day Seventeen – Small Talk about Big Food

Day Eighteen – The Fridge of Shame

Day Nineteen – The Visiting Cottrells

Day Twenty – Supper Club, Phase One

Day Twenty-one – Not Eating is Not an Option

Day Twenty-two – Taco Tuesday

Day Twenty-three – NaNoPrep, Meal-Planning To-Do List

Day Twenty-four – NaNoPrep Meal-Planning, Steps 1 & 2

Day Twenty-five – Waste

Day Twenty-six – Grocery Shopping (aka, I can never spend money again)

Day Twenty-seven – Easy Like Sunday

Day Twenty-eight – Supper Club

Day Twenty-nine – Well-Stocked Pantry

Day Thirty – Sugar High

Day Thirty-one – Grace