As I type this, there is a Crockpot burbling on low in the kitchen. In the Crockpot is a quartered yellow onion, three sweet potatoes, some chicken thighs, and three cans of El Pato tomato sauce. There are tortillas on the table. There is beer in my hand. I’m making this thing because Heather from Dooce told me to; also because I’ve had the kind of day where my hands crave to cook something but my brain just can’t cope with anything more complicated than “put stuff in here, then walk away for four hours.” I’m not even all that hungry now, but who knows how I’ll feel with 8pm rolls around and I can choose between food and sleep.
I guess Heather from Dooce is eating paleo, so probably this recipe she posted is at least halfway paleo-friendly. Not like I give a shit about eating paleo. While I am aware that the human race survived on what we now call the “paleo diet” (pretty sure Paleolithic humans just called it “food,” or perhaps “grthuuuffddgg”), I am also aware that we as a species have evolved since then, and while not all of our edible inventions are good for us, I’m not about to turn my nose up at bread because some slope-headed ancestor who couldn’t live past age 20 hadn’t worked that one out yet.
The only solid information to come from a paleo diet is that processed foods are generally not great for you, and that whenever possible, you should eat whole ingredients with the most nutritional value possible. Well…duh. No one’s arguing that a box of Fruity Pebbles is better for you than a root vegetable, Heather. Although I don’t think cavepeople had tomato-jalapeno sauce in cans (cans with cute little ducks on them!) or slow cooker devices that plugged into the wall, so why don’t I add an onion and some olive oil and the beer I used to rinse out the cans because hey, the ancient Egyptians invented beer and, slavery notwithstanding, they invented some other pretty cool shit, too.
I view the paleo diet like I view most diets – with skepticism, and the understanding that most of the people on them are miserable. For one, defining yourself by what you don’t allow yourself to consume is joyless and weird. Second, there is a difference between a diet and just eating sensibly. Shoving every kind of food down your gullet just because you can isn’t how we were meant to eat, although enough people are doing it that just getting rid of the crap food has become an industry of “how do we name this so people will buy books about it?”
If not the diets themselves, what grates me is that people talk about diets so much. And not even the actual diets, but just about why they should or shouldn’t eat something and the feelings that accompany their decisions. I mean, with one exception (the Cryptkeeper, but she has her own food issues), all of the women in my office are overweight. The percentage of overweightness depends on the person, but every single one of them has a weight issue and none of them ever shut up about it.
Please, ladies, stop picking up donuts or cake or frozen burritos or burgers or pizza or every fucking food item that comes into the office and saying “I really shouldn’t be eating this.” Because a) you’re just going to shove it down your throat anyway and b) I care about your food choices about as much as I care about your shame spiral, and the answer to both is not at fucking all.
Stop blabbering about your diet food one week and then taking three weeks “off,” meaning you literally cannot stop eating or talking about how hungry you are, which I can’t figure out because you’re sitting on your asses all day long. Where do your calories go? You do know that a calorie is a unit of energy, right, and not just another excuse to wrap your lips around something you’re admitting is bad for you.
Not that I’m into health food. My ratio of decent food to garbage is about 80/20, determined not by points or formulas but by the fact that I choose to enjoy and savor everything I put into myself (yep, terrible friends, that includes dick). And I don’t hate fat people. I don’t understand the fat haters, those trolls who think it’s acceptable to discriminate against an entire group of human beings because they’re not physically attracted to them, and like people who get fat are any more taxing on our medical system than morons who drink, smoke, or otherwise party their skinny little bodies into a doctor’s office. I just don’t see how either issue’s application to you is the entire office’s fucking business.
If any of the women in my office had any pop culture sense whatsoever, they’d remember their Yoda:
“Do or do not, there is no try.”
But, I mean, there is try, just not “try, but so half-assedly so that your “goals” are more like “things you think about sometimes when you’re sitting in the McDonald’s drive-thru again and your biggest regret is that you got in line behind some other fatass who ordered the whole goddamn menu”.”
