Challenge #02684-G127: Winner Winner?
I don’t know if this even a thing in other parts of Earth, but in my country very popular thing is eating cartilage from chicken legs just like every other part of meat. Foreigners are saying that this sound is the most disturbing one they ever heard. It’s like very loud cracking bone.
What if herbivore heard this sound and automatically just started to look for predator in absolute terror? – Anon Guest
[AN: Oh holy freaking Powers That Be, my daughter does this. She even chews on the bones. We got some extreme carnivores out my way.]
Adjusting to a new Ships’ Human is always an interesting process. Interesting as in “interesting times” type interesting. Humans have an astonishing variety of personality types and an astonishing variety of personal quirks. Some will throw three random things into a pot and call it food, but will shun the idea of pineapple on pizza. That’s just one example of the things Humans get randomly touchy about.
There only seem to be rules about this. Things like Don’t mess with a Humans’ loved-to-death soft toy might as well be written in stone, but there are also some Humans who don’t take their beloved soft toys with them, and thus the trinkets they do take with them are therefore sacrosanct.
Food preferences are one of the things that cannot be predicted. Nonhuman members of the Alliance have learned to just leave Humans to do their thing. At least, this technique works most of the time. There’s always an unexpected surprise with Humans, as Companion Thorq was busily discovering.
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Challenge #02414-F224: Livin’ in the Fridge
I remember when my roommate raided the fridge, it was horrifying. – Anon Guest
Let me get one thing straight - when you’re riding the poverty line as a student, you will accept anything. Books cost a shit-ton of money. So does rent. So does the internet you need in order to do research. Food is always the biggest thing that gets cost-cut when you’re a student. Dumpster diving is big amongst the student crowd. Or it was before the corporations throwing out otherwise sorta-okay food started hosing it down with literal poison.
Capitalism - it won’t share with others. Not even when it makes sense to do so.
This is why the running fridge under the house was such a bonus. On discovery, we thought it would be cool to have extra storage for more bulk supplies. You know. Bulk supplies that aren’t huge crates of instant noodles. They happen. You just gotta be quick. But anyway, this fridge was old. I’m talking just past the invention of electricity old, and the whole thing was a block of ice inside. Couldn’t be anything decent in there, right? Wrong. You haven’t met Deano.
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I’m losing weight at last!
I started this year at 95.4kg, just a few small kilos away from 100kg. I made a resolution to lose weight and get fitter, so immediately I went out and stuffed myself for the annual new years’ rello visit.
Hubby didn’t help, either. Next night, he took me out to Sizzler’s.
Today [the 5th of Jan] is the day where I finally dipped below my starting weight. I’m now 95.2kg. You might not think this is a big whoop, but my peak weight was almost 97kg.
There’s lots of things people do when they want to lose weight, and the first thing most do is spend a ton of money on useless shit. Diet meals, diet meal replacements, thin shakes, that powdered stuff that allegedly turns into jelly in your stomach [creepy…], and the exercise machines… My good gravy, the exercise machines.
Listen.
You don’t need any of that shit to get fit.
You have feet. You have a place of residence. You can walk. Hell, if you live in a block of flats, quit taking the lift. Exercise, right there. Who needs to buy a stair master?
And you don’t need diet food [or food replacements].
If you’re going to buy anything, buy some chia seeds.
All you need to do is change your habits.
Avoid what I call “the white foods” - all the processed, bleached, chemically-enhanced whatever that’s ever-so-tasty and also ever-so-bad-for-you. Buy bread with bits in [seeds are great for you if you really can’t stand wholemeal]. Skip the potatoes and rice and definitely, definitely steer clear of pastry products.
Swap sugar for honey, wherever possible.
I ration my sweet foods. As someone who loves the sweet things, I have to have some little treat or I will go simply bonkers. So now my chocolate stash is strictly regulated. It should remain so. Last time I went off track, I started eating an entire block of chocolate for lunch, resulting in where I am today.
One of my new little tricks is honey toast. When I’m feeling peckish, but it’s not mealtime, I make a slice or two of toast and spread some honey on it. Very simple. BUT - it also gives me an extra serving of grains and cereals [bread with bits in, remember?] and staves off the cravings and desire to -say- eat an entire bowl of popcorn with butter in one sitting.
My other tip is also deceptively simple: Walk everywhere.
The easiest method of exercise is walking. You walk inside your house, so why not outside as well? The trick that I still employ is look for parking in the middle of buttfuck nowhere and walk to my ultimate destination instead of getting ulcers looking for a place to park near the doors.
Back when I knew where my pedometer was, I walked up to 10 kilometres just fartarsing around. This is based on a rough estimate of steps taken divided by a thousand, assuming that each step is a metre.
It’s amazing what you can do when you’re busy doing other things.
And my diet breakfast of choice? Oatmeal porridge.
It’s naturally low GI and stops you feeling hungry all morning. This with a side of chia could probably work miracles.
Oh yeah. The chia. I nearly forgot.
Chia seeds are available in health shops everywhere. If yours doesn’t stock it, ask. I like the white chia, but you don’t have to get it. Now let me tell you, this stuff is VERSATILE. If you soak it until it becomes a thick goo, you can use it as an egg white replacement. They pre-process sugar for you and turn it into low GI energy. Mix it with your favourite beverage to get an energy drink. Add it to cakes/bread/food of any kind to keep your energy up all day.
And, as a bonus, it’s gluten free. You can make gluten-free bread out of it. My mum-in-law sprinkles a teaspoon into her morning cereal.
I have yet to get my mum to try it, but I think that’s more her being a big scaredy-cat than anything else [yes, I know you read this, Mum. Try half a teaspoon in your coffee sometime. It will not kill you] and I really should get back to pestering her about it.
It looks like frog spawn when it’s been soaking up the liquid. It hardly tastes of anything at all [some report a slight bitter taste, but it’s easy to get accustomed to] and the only big worry is getting used to slightly lumpy beverages.
I take some chia and let it soak in a litre of water until I have a thick goo that I can mix with any beverage of my choosing. This is one of those rare few things that the more of it you take, the better it is for you.
I’m going to have some with my porridge. See what happens next.
Further bulletins as progress [and boredom] dictates.