Stupid alpha

I went through this when both the fluff and furr were at the vet for the pre-op check. Magnum was very hostile afterwards, constantly growling and snarling at Adira. I did "Psst!" until my throat was sore, and after a few days he gave up on it.

Fluff and furr have recovered from their declaw. They still shake their front paws and lick a lot. But they don't act like they're in pain. They're back to using their old litterbox.

But Magnum again picked up the bad habit of growling and snarling at Adira whenever she came in sight. No wonder the poor thing keeps to the bedroom for the most part.

Adira's now exhibiting "beta" behavior now to try and get the stupid Magnum from growling and snarling.

Stupid cat - you're alpha. Don't rub it in when she's accepting you being the boss.

Must be a characteristic of orange stripey cats.

Starbucks = bad

So I won a $10 Starbucks card from a vendor fair. I normally give my $5 cards to someone that frequents Starbucks, but I was going to hold onto this $10 one.

Figured I'd swing into the Starbucks on my way out of town Saturday morning and get a coffee and a breakfast item (if I could find something I could eat).

First of all, it was jam packed of people.

Then I had to stare at all the yummy muffin treats that I CAN'T have. So I kept my eyes on the menu. I was hoping to try the pumpkin latte. So I asked the girl what was in the pumpkin spice mix they use for that latte. There was carmel coloring, but she couldn't verify if it was from North America or not.

I said I'd rather be safe and ordered a hot mocha. I also found apple slices with carmel dipping. I checked the carmel ingredients, and it's okay to eat. Score - a hot caffeine drink and something to eat.

Sunday morning, I was in full gluten episode. New DH spot on my knee, and the stomach aches are terrible.

I've had several mocha espresso drinks at the Java City coffee stand at work with ZERO problems. I've also had a mocha drink at a coffee shop in Tucson. Bad assumption on my part that a mocha is a mocha is a mocha.

So I tried to get more info about what's in their drinks at their website. Can only get a description of the drink, but no ingredients.

But what made me almost spit coffee on my laptop screen was their "nutrition" information. A medium mocha with whipped cream is
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500 calories!

100 calories alone attributed to their whipped cream (which I never get anyway).

And their place was packed Saturday morning. I'm tempted to ask people if they have any idea how many calories are in the drink they're ordering.

Forget McDonalds as a reason why we're so fat. Try looking at Starbucks.

Find the gluten

*grrrr* This is the worst of food labels.

I was at Wild Oats Sunday. They're pretty good at labelling items with a big "gluten free" tag in front of them. But they miss some things (like their flourless chocolate raspberry torte). So I still read labels.

I've had bean and cheese taquitos from Trader Joe's. I figured it'd be gluten free if corn tortillas are used. I picked up a box of Nate's black bean and soy cheese taquitos. I read the ingredients and didn't see anything wrong.

Ate them, and the next morning I knew something was up. As the day progressed, I knew it was a gluten attack.

Got home and grabbed the empty box. I'm still not seeing anything. Then in a different location of the box from the ingredients it says "contains wheat and casein (a milk protein)"

F**kers. Where is the wheat source? I finally posted the ingredients to the celiac support listserv. To my "comfort", they couldn't figure out the wheat source either. I got a few suggestions of maltodextrin (have had that in the past), carmel coloring (made in CA, so that should be okay like other products).

The best suggestion was the "natural flavoring".




The moral of the story: avoid Nate's until they can clearly identify the ingredients so label readers can find the gluten.

Bad TJ's

After getting burned at Wild Oats, I resigned myself that if I wanted something for dinner, I needed to find it at Trader Joe's. I have their gluten-free guide on my PDA as a handy confirmation tool.

But it's all their treats that get me in trouble there. Sure, I walked out of there with their chicken taquitos. But the dark chocolate version pepermint treats, AND their mini peanut butter cups.

Darn you Trader Joe's why do you have to make some many yummy treats?