Week 4

This week I became up close and personal with dairy not once, not twice, but THREE times.  The first time was purposeful. I wanted a celebratory cheese pizza.  I rationalized it by thinking it will help sway my maniacal cheese pizza cravings I've not been able to shake for the last three weeks, so we went to Felix and Oscars and had the thin crust cheese.  With a side of ranch.  I'm pretty sure they put crack in their ranch dressing because it was even better than the pizza.  Now I will have maniacal ranch dressing dreams.

The second time was equally as purposeful.  The cheese pizza and ranch did not sway the cravings, in fact it only made them worse.  So I chalked this week up to a "Let's see how the old body reacts to the re-introduction of dairy."  Bad idea.  I had J.Benjamin's famous artichoke dip - the whole freaking dish all to myself.  I got about half-way through it and wanted to barf.

The third time was today during lunch and just plain stupid.  Not funny ha-ha stupid, but "Rhea WTF is wrong with you" stupid.  I was in Iowa City presenting at a conference, and lunch consisted of a delicious pasta and salad buffet.  Still stupidly calling this my off-week I opted for the vodka penne.  I had problems all afternoon.  Maybe it was the vodka sauce, or the cream in the coffee, or the butter I put on my roll.  Or the two cupcakes.  Shit. I have no willpower during my week off, so this obviously needs to change.

At least I'm noticing a trend here.  Eating out = bad idea.  I am safe in my kitchen and turn into a drooling dairy-craving zombie everywhere else.  Rationalizing that it's okay to have a cheat week.  Okay maybe not such a bad idea.  I am of course trying to make this a manageable lifestyle change after all, so a little dairy here and there is not too bad.  I did NOT succumb to eating any delicious-looking prime rib slices that were on the buffet this afternoon.  But seriously, two cupcakes Rhea?

So to atone for my dairy sins, what do I do? Headed over to Fair Grounds Coffeehouse before my trip back home and picked up a half-dozen vegan cupcakes. And nine vegan cookies at New Pioneer Co-Op.  Don't judge.  At least they don't have dairy in them and I'm sharing with the fam.