Bring on the crazies.

This whole hunt for enlightenment, "bigger picture" thing is getting me down, man. Needless to say, the first thing to go was the vegetarianism. I had a valiant four days but then it all went down the crapper with some free-range chicken and pasta salad. My plan was to be solidly vegetarian - plus fish. (Fish is a vegetable. As is bacon.) But then I got to talking with a chef who worked at Angelica Kitchen (uber-veg, for those out of the city). She was vegan for awhile but started to get woozy so she tried to introduce fish into her diet, but then she discovered that the mercury levels are getting so high that it's almost better to eat free-range, organic meat. (Free-range and organic are two different things. Just because they're fed organic feed doesn't mean the get to walk around, and vice-versa.) For women of childbearing years, they say ("they" that declare these things) that you should only eat fish - particularly canned tuna or salmon - once every two weeks. And if you're trying to get pregnant you're supposed to stop eating fish for six months because that's how long it takes for mercury to leave your system. Plus there's the significant problem of overfishing. At the rate we're going several species will be depleted, making life even tougher for fishermen and screwing up the ecosystem something fierce. So now I've settled on a mostly vegetarian diet supplemented with free-range, organic dairy and chicken. (I still can't eat cow. I'm sure it hurts chickens to kill them but cows bother me more. I'm convinced that because they have bigger brains they register more pain.) But then I read an article in Elle, of all places, written by their food writer. She was talking about the trend in restaurants toward exotic (read: icky) dishes. Call it the Mario Batali factor, but more and more restaurants are serving innerds. Beef cheek ravioli, coxcombs, liver and heart, brains... Sweetbreads creep me out the most. I always thought sweetbreads were the balls, but it's the thyroid. You're eating the stress hormone of the animal. The stress hormone of an animal that was undoubtedly incredibly stressed at the time of the kill. Now I don't eat these things - I doubt any of you do - but the interview with Mario Batali was very interesting. His point is that if you're going to kill an animal, you should use as much of it as possible. Why is the flank more appealing than the tongue? He pointed out that in the wild, animals always eat the brain and the tongue first because that's the tastiest and most nourishing part. While intellectually I agree, I can't get past the gross-out factor. But why can I justify not eating veal, duck, or rabbit because A: they're babies and B: they're cute, but I can scarf down the adult with only moderate pangs of guilt? I know that if everyone on the planet became vegetarian we'd have a serious animal overpopulation problem (see what happens to deer in the wild) but I can't, can't, can't eat another mouthful of tofu "egg" salad! I've also noticed that many of my female friends are contemplating vegetarianism, but I've never heard any men debating it. Curious.

And then there's God. Or more specifically, Jesus. Still mulling over those pesky issues. For some reason I have very little problem with the concept of God but Jesus is trickier for me. Probably because he was human and therefore fallable (which is a good thing) but I feel like I get yelled at a lot over him. (Him? WHEN DO YOU CAPITALIZE?!) The whole "JE-sus died for you!" stuff makes me so grumpy. If the idea is that we're all children of God, a part of God as it were, if God is inside each and every one of us, then why do we have to feel so damned guilty about everything? And church! While I'm really twitchy to go back - craving it, really - it almost makes me feel more separate, like it's a barrier between God and man. (Sorry for all the italics. I just got done reading Franny & Zooey.) Still, I'm going back. I'll be home for two weeks starting Saturday (clear your schedules, kids!) and am thinking of going to the Episcopalian church there. (The one across from the Lutheran church.) They used to put crosses out for every soldier that died in the war but there were so many that now they have one really big cross. That amount of ballsiness is encouraging.

Don't get me started on the ant killer I just bought. That's a post for another day.