Just when I can drink beer again

Figures. Now that there are a couple gluten free beer options, people are predicting the demise of beer as the popular drink of choice.

Have these people ever gone to a bar? It's 90% beer, 8% mixed drinks, 2% wine (and 0.01% water).

This is coming from someone that drinks quite a bit of wine. Yes, I have other options for consuming alcohol, but wether it's vodka, amaretto (yes, I love those sours), beer, or wine, I drink more wine than anything. And with you getting drunk for fewer calories, I'm going to stay with wine for a while most of the time anyway. But here's why I think they're wrong:

Beer is more portable than wine. Yes, I brought three bottles of wine with me camping this last weekend with four wine glasses (real glass) and came back all glasses intact and three empty bottles of wine. But on the boat, I was drinking bottles of Redbridge (everyone else had cans of their beer). Yes, they offer the "glass sized" bottles of wine, but I don't expect many people to unscrew the cap and start chugging away. Plus, everyone knows whites are supposed to be chilled, which is a pain in the butt when you're in outside environments dealing with coolers.

The social pressure of bad vintage. I have had several occassions where someone swears by a bottle of wine that it's so great. And when I try it, I'm barely able to finish the glass. My first bad wine experience turned me off on wine for several years. I suppose that's interesting in that what's good for one person isn't floating the other person's boat (new compatability test?), but I don't see gatherings of people sitting around the game commenting about the flavor and tannins of the wine they're drinking. If anything will be said would be "great wine". I've been invited to some parties with pretty up and up guys and they're pushing a wine that I didn't like. Yet, I felt like having to say "great stuff". So it kinda eventually sours your entire preception of wine.

The limited nature of wine. While some consider that a plus, it's a real bummer when you develop a love for a vintage of wine. I used to never pay attention that much to the year of a bottle, but I remember once I fell in love with a 1999 vintage of a type of red. When I couldn't find that anymore, I tried the 2000 and haven't drank that label since.

The need to know. Kinda falls under the vintage thing. But if you have to more research and updating information than a Windows machines needs patches, wine will be a short term interest.

The trendy problem. My "crazy" aunt is rebuilding a perfectly good home with all these great things such as a beautiful kitchen, 3 walled shower massage experience, and a wine room. So I asked her what kind of wine she was planning on putting in her wine room. "We don't drink wine, so nothing. It's for the resale value." Every new home seems as if they're putting in a wine room or at least a wine fridge. And just like the backyard bomb shelter, I don't see how it'd be a lasting trend in housing.

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But if I'm wrong, beer will eventually make a comeback just because most of us don't want to do what everyone else is doing.

spring rolls - not just for Asians

I did a second round of spring rolls this week. Mostly because I had an empty fridge and freezer and needed some lunches for work this week. Also because I still had a ton of spring roll wraps from the package I bought. At least in the dry desert, they don't seem to go bad.

I was smarter this time and took a skillet and filled it with water to dunk the entire circle of paper in at once. And you can take the circle out of water even if part of it is still hard. Leave it on the work surface for a minute, and the water left on it will do its thing. If you leave it submerged too long, it's too thin and splits too easy. But I still don't have a great feel for it.

I took lettuce, cheese, corn, and diced ham from the fridge and went to work. I added some spicy mustard to the ingredients before wrapping them up. I made eight rolls before calling it quits.

The results: pretty darn good. Lots of meat (yum), and having the mustard in the wrap didn't make it seem as dry. And these were a lot more filliing because I only ate two yesterday with a Boomi Bar.

So I have lots of leftovers if anyone wants to try....

fat vent

I can't take this anymore. I was reading a forum thread about a new mail order service providing the reader everyday items for XL people over here. Both sides from "I'm fat, wah" to "I'm thin and don't want to pay for your problem" to "I lost over 100 pounds so STFU" is all in there.

Yes, ignoring the fact that many people are overweight will not make it go away. But personal responsibility has diminshed to nothing, so most are looking for a big brother fix for the problem.

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My personal take: I'm borderline overweight on the BMI scale. But my large Italian frame "carries it well." Last night I went from a nurse on the clinic ward calling me skinny to my mom asking if I was planning on losing weight before going to Hawaii in three weeks. I would be in worse shape from my Italian genes if it wasn't heavily mixed with the skinny Polish genes. For my mom's side of the family stuck with the "Italian curse", I got the good end of the deal because the Polish genes won out pretty well. Doesn't mean that I'm always going to have to watch what I eat because I will.

Since becoming a celiac, I don't eat fast food (that includes Pizza Hut and Domino's) except for maybe once every other month or so getting some fries and crossing my fingers that it won't make me sick. I eat healthier, and some weight has come off. When I screw up, it starts going the other way. But I take personal responsibility for it, and go on an Ensure diet for a few days to get my system back to it's normal routine.

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Boyfriend is overweight. He knows it. He's been talking about trying to lose it for the last two years (not that serious in execution). I still love him fiercely, but I get tired of hearing "starting ..(insert some calendar date).. I'm going to start trying to lose the weight". Then he was all upset about it last week in part of his meltdown (more details later), and I had to delicately get past the fact that this is nothing new to you, so either start doing something about it or shut up (in more delicate terms than that of course). I'm willing to help him in this adventure if he will at least start doing so by getting rid of the beer, and keeping only whole healthy foods in the kitchen.

My sister is even more overweight. When her gall bladder got infected, they admitted her to the bariatric ward. And the nurses never put her weight on her chart, so every time she asked for pain medicine she had to say what her weight was. She said the experience was a wake up call for her, and she's going to try and lose the weight. Again. What's helping this time is that now that she's minus a gall bladder and a better diet she's dropped 25 pounds already. I'm sure it's hard to stay away from the convience foods since she's got a toddler. But her toddler doesn't want happy meals. He rarely eats. We still haven't figured him out.

My mom has lost 75 pounds the last couple of years. She changed her diet, joined Curves, and has made her diet a new lifestyle. She looks great, and is going to fight to keep herself that way. She just has to look at her siblings to know what lies in store for her if she doesn't.

Ironically, when I get down to a size 6 (that's the smallest I've ever been), I hear from my loved ones that I don't look healthy. So I'm comfortable with being a size 10 jeans (or size 8 dress). But I guess I'm getting tired from hearing from strangers that I'm skinny, but my family saying that I'm fat.

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Yes, there are a lot of conspiring factors to drive most of us to be overweight. Then to be complete hippocrites, we post pictures of skinny people everywhere. I've already heard the mean comments that Jordin Sparks is going to have to lose weight. (Please don't give in Jordin.)

But take personal responsibility. Don't blame the fast food industry. If we all took the initative to bring our own healthy lunches to work, those places would close because we wouldn't be there anymore. Find the time to make good food for you. I'm a very lazy person when it comes to food, and I can still throw together a quick and healthy meal. I guess I'll have to post some ideas.