I Am a Thieving Thief

I copied this entry idea from my delightful friend A Lover and a Fighter over at Hobocamp, because A) I adore her and everything she does and B) because I have nothing to write about and I feel like a big ol' lazy lazyass and need to write something soon before you all go away and find BETTER boring people to read about.


Things You'll Never Hear Me Say:

• Pie is not suitable for dinner.
• I can't wait to dust!
• Please get me LOTS of ketchup packets and make SURE they put extra mustard on it!
• Hyperbole is stupid.
• I plan to be the first in line for this new technology.
• I beat Meg at a game of Scrabble. 
• $10 is not too much to spend on lip balm.
• There's nothing worth watching on tv, so I'm just going to do something productive instead.
• Being in "The Friend Zone" is just as good.  
• I am very graceful and have superior balance.
• No, I don't have to pee.
• I don't need anything from Sephora.
• My job is fulfilling and makes me feel good about my life choices.
• Oh, happy day, these pants fit perfectly & I won't need to wear heels with them or have them hemmed!
• I'm too thin and tan.

 Things I Never Thought I Would Say & Yet Have Said:

• My mp3 player needs more memory.
• Quitting smoking was actually pretty easy.
• I like my freckles.
• Coke Zero is delicious!
• Pine nuts are of THE DEVIL.
• The problem with kids today...
• I've met some of my closest friends and favorite people over the internet.
• I'm going to be FORTY in a month.
• Brussel sprouts are tasty.
• I don't know if I could live without Facebook.
• I kind of like living in Ohio. (mostly)
• According to Google Reader, 45 people read this nonsense.

What about you?  What's something you'll never say and something you never thought you'd say?

Pine FuckNuttery Part 2

Dammit.  Remember this?  So, I decided to try pine nuts again, thinking that maybe my reaction last time was because of a bad batch or specific to a particular type of pine nut.  This time I bought the teeny, tiny, wee pine nuts, as opposed to the big, torpedo-shaped ones like last time.  I thought they would be good with brussel sprouts.  I THOUGHT they'd be a nummy treat after not having had them for a year.  Why did I think this?  Because I am teh dumb.

Yuck.  Food is gross again.  And you wanna' know the REALLY sucky part?  I just bought the tastiest, sweetest, most flavorful blueberries (Chilean, natch) I've ever eaten and now they taste like battery acid.  (Ok, well, I'm guessing on that.  I've never actually had battery acid, so who knows, maybe it tastes delightful?)  Just like before, sweets and bread taste the blechiest, so maybe that's a good thing.  Maybe I'll lose a few ounces. 

Luckily, this time I only ate a few, because I wanted to see if I'd tolerate them.  I'm hoping maybe that means I won't have this nasty bitter taste for as long as last time.

Oh and not related to anything above - I taught Willow to come when I call her by using a hand command.  How cool is that?  She still ignores me about 50% of the time, because she IS a cat and they are hateful, little things, but the rest of the time, she actually responds.  She also sits for treats.  If I can just get her to stop whining at me from across the room, she'll be my favorite cat EVER.  (Shhh, don't tell her, but she already is my favorite cat ever.  Shhhhh, she'll get all cocky and shit if she knows this.)

So, I haven't talked to you kids for a while.  What's going on with you?  Any news?  OH and don't freak out or anything, but I'm probably going to post another entry tomorrow - TWO days in a row!  Can you even stand the excitement?

Decisions, Decisions...

I have nothing going on. Nothing to post about. BUT, I know that you guys are probably just dying to know what’s going on with me. I’m sure you’re furiously emailing each other going, “where’s Lainey? What’s she doing? What’s going on in her life? I NEED TO KNOW! I NEEEEEEEED TO KNOW, DAMMIT!”

Settle down, lovelies, it’s ok. Shhh, *stroking your hair* it’s ok. I’m here now.

I finally got my taste buds back. YAY. But now, because I simply cannot live without conflict and self-created drama, I can’t decide what to eat. This happens almost every day. I have too many choices. I will probably end up eating a handful of peanuts and microwave popcorn because I simply cannot choose between all of the wonderful food in my kitchen. Here are my choices:

Homemade chili and naan
Freakin’ AWESOME pasta salad with chicken
Chicken with mashed potatoes, cauliflower, asparagus and edemame
Chicken with sweet potatoes, cauliflower, and cranberry orange sauce
Turkey sausage & pierogies and applesauce
Spaghetti, garlic bread and salad
Eggs, turkey sausage, toast and half an orange and some blueberries
Leftover pizza
Grilled cheese, sweet potato fries and an apple
Shrimp, wild rice and asparagus
Crab legs, baked potato, cauliflower and edemame
Black bean soup and naan
Hard-boiled egg, string cheese, crackers, hummus, and an orange
Special K Blueberry cereal (which is good, but doesn’t taste like blueberries. Tastes like purple.)

PLUS, I can’t decide what to drink. Should I have Diet Coke with Splenda? Diet Barq’s? Orange juice? Grape juice? Lemonade? Diet Pepsi? Plain water? Protein water? AAAAAAAAARRRRRRRGGH! I could have had a V8!

My wee brain cannot make a decision. All of these delicious foods are in my refrigerator or pantry right now. It’s not a matter of which would take longer to make or what one is healthier than the other. I simply can’t decide. This happens almost every day. Seriously. It’s really bad. Sometimes, I just go to bed without eating because I literally can’t choose. And then sometimes, I just say, “fuck it” and go to Chipotle.

I have little doubt that you’re thinking, “You’re a dick. If this is your biggest problem in life, you need to shut the hell up. People are starving in other parts of the world.” I know. I realize how unbelievably lucky I am and I’m truly grateful. I don’t mean for this to come off as whining or “oh woe is me, I can’t decide what to shove in my fat little face today. Wahhhhhhhh!” I’m just putting it out there as more of an example of what a freak I am.

Also, I believe careful readers will notice that motherfucking pine nuts are not included in any of the above menu options. Fucking pine nuts.

It Turns Out I'm NOT Dying After All...

Ok, you guys, seriously, I've been a bit worried the last few days. For about 3 days now (this is the 4th day), I've had this horribly bitter taste in the back of my mouth after I eat or drink something. It's not there all the time, just when I'm eating and after I eat. At first I thought it was the new vitamins I was taking and I blew it off. The next morning though, my coffee tasted terribly bitter and I hadn't taken the vitamins yet. So, I was all, "hmmm, what's up with that?" Later, at work, I ate a container of yogurt. Well, that's not entirely true. I TRIED to eat the yogurt, but it was so freakin' nasty tasting I threw it away after 3 bites. I ate some blueberries instead. You should know, I love blueberries above all foods, with the possible exception of sweet potatoes, (FINE and ice cream. Shut-up, I'm pretending I'm healthy!) and they were disgusting and gross. I couldn't eat them. This made me super frowny because I LOVE them, but also because it's not blueberry season and those fuckers are expensive!

I'm trying to figure out why I have this awful taste in my mouth/throat and I made a comment to one of my hypochondriac co-workers. His reply - "Dude, sounds like you're having some liver problems." WHAT? What the fuckingwhatwhat? You're so not helpful!

And then, of course, now I'm all worried that I'm having some sort of liver problem. I keep looking in the mirror to see if my eyes are turning yellow or if my skin looks jaundiced. I'm not a doctor, but I've watched 'House' a lot, so I think I'm pretty qualified to make a diagnosis. Obviously.

Last night, I'm just going crazy because now ice cream tastes bad, too. HOW CAN THIS BE? Ice cream is a gift from the Godtopus; there's no way in hell it should ever taste bad. Unless you're dying. Now I'm getting concerned. Because first of all, I did A LOT of drugs in the 90's. It's entirely possible that I damaged my liver. But secondly and more importantly, if I'm dying, but ice cream and blueberries are going to taste bad up until my death, then fuck it, bring it on now. I'm not gonna' put up with that kind of asshattery nonsense until my inevitable demise. That's just crazy talk and I'm not a big enough trooper to go through that. I know my limitations.

Of course, I turned to the internet because you pretty much always want to self-diagnose major organ failure via the internet. So, I typed in the search words, "bitter taste in mouth when eating". The first few links to pop up -

Liver failure.
Super.

Brain tumor.
AWE-some.

Kidney disease.
Neato Bandito.

But wait, there was something else.

Bitter taste - pine nuts?

Hmmmm, interesting. I clicky the linky and there are literally hundreds, if not thousands, of people all over the world describing what I'm experiencing and all of them have one thing in common - pine nuts. And guess what I've been eating on everything I can get my fat little hands on? Guess! Wow, you kids are super good at this game - you're right! Pine nuts. I've been eating them in my hummus, on pizza, in my pasta salad, mixed with other nuts, and a handful here and there on their own.

According to the other people who are also not dying of liver failure, a couple of days after eating pine nuts, they have a bitter/metallic taste in the back of their mouths, like a dissolving aspirin taste, which keeps appearing when they eat. Nothing seems to make it much better and sweet things seem to make it much worse. Some of them have reported it to their doctors and the doctors have never heard of it and there's only one published medical article about it. But, Wikipedia has something about it, so that's something, I guess. It doesn't happen to everyone and the only semi-common link is that a lot of the pine nuts are from China, but there's no definitive answer as to why. Why it only affects some people and why it only happens sometimes.

Anyway, evidently for another week or two I'll have this yummy taste, which is kind of similar to what it would taste like if you brushed your teeth and then followed it with a big ol' honkin' glass of cranberry juice. Mmm mmm, good, right?

I just thought you'd all be thrilled to know that I'm not actually dying and some pine nuts are evil.

I'm probably still going to keep trying ice cream. It's for SCIENCE, ok? Geez.