Love, Jimmie

Oh, hey, yeah, I meant to tell you that I finished my “cleanse.” Remember, I was doing Whole 30 23, and I cut out all foods that had anything to do with grains, dairy, legumes, sugar and taste. I ate a lot of chicken and a lot of sweet potatoes. Remember that?

No, really, it wasn’t that bad. For 30 23 days I ate according to a certain plan in the hopes that I would kick some bad habits and finally get over sugar. Unfortunately that never happened. What I did do was endure to the end, the whole 30 23 days (the end being the day we had our professional headshots taken, and when I realized that my cheeks looked exactly the same as they did 23 days previous, I quit), and then jump right back into the foods I had always eaten, sugar included. Probably what spurred the quitting on day 30 23 were the dry heaves I got from a single bite of the same chicken and sweet potato I had eaten three days a week hence. I tried my best to choke it down but the moment I felt a revolt in my throat, I knew I was done with Whole 30 23.

Funnily enough, once I added back in all the foods, I never once felt like I was going to ralph. I guess I have a stomach of steel because by rights I should have felt miserable at the first bite of sugar but I didn’t. I do get sleepy when I eat sugar now, so I am diligent in trying to avoid it. Some other weird things happened to my palate, though. I can no longer eat regular mustard. It tastes like horseradish, and I’m about as fond of horseradish as I am raw onion. I can also no longer eat parmesan cheese. It tastes moldy and sour. Gross, quite frankly. These are two things I loved once so I’m slightly ticked off that Whole 30 23 gave me those aversions instead of the Beyonce booty I so richly deserved.

I have a few other updates and items of note.

This is my headshot, the professional one I had to have made and the same one I was so snarky about. Look at those cheeks, would ya? Also, do you see how pink I am? That’s even after the photographer did some editing with color and whatnot. Martie and I are doing some corrections there, and tomorrow you can read all about it on her blog. I’ll link to it in the morning. Once you lament over my pink cheeks, have a gander at my hair. Martie does such fabulous work. Someone told me today that big hair belongs to the 80s and to Texas but I call her full of poop. The bigger the better. I’m so sorry that the beehive is passé. I’d rock that in a heartbeat.

I’ll be out of town next week on my fancy tropical cruise. Lest any of you thieves and robbers decide to remove my home of its valuables, please note that I have a roommate, a neighbor and two vicious attack cats, all of which would risk their lives to defend my home. I mean, in theory anyway. I’ll take loads of pics, hopefully none of men in Speedos, for your viewing pleasure. I’d treat this trip much like the Ireland trip with a post for every day that I’m gone but being as how Woney and I plan to spend every day viewing the ocean over our toes in a hammock, I doubt those posts would be of much interest to you.

A final note – have any of you read The Moonstone? Four years ago, I joined a book club. I don’t know why I didn’t think of it sooner, honestly, the way I read. I’ve attended this club nearly every month for four years and read some books that I would never recommend. Seriously, we pick some of the strangest books but almost every month there is a lone person who loved the month’s selection. The rest of us have strong opinions of them, not many of which are good. Eighteen months ago we read The Grapes of Wrath. Rather, it was supposed to have been read eighteen months ago. While I enjoyed it, it did take me nineteen months to finish it. I’m currently doing that with The Moonstone. Tonight we are to have a deep and philosophical discussion about the book and I will be able to do that but only about the first 350 pages, of which there are 667. The whole point of this, though, is to ask for other book recommendations. Anyone got anything good they recommend? I can only promise that nine out of ten of us will hate it, but we still might like to give it a whirl.

Y’all miss me next week, would ya?