Complex Numbers

Have Your Kale and Eat It Too

I'm not on good terms with food.

I have almost no self-control, so left to my own devices, I'd be eating pizza and cheeseburgers every day.

It wasn't always that way. In a complete reversal of the way I've always heard things are supposed to be, I had more self-control when I was younger. I think I ran out, or maybe I just realized that having discipline never got me anywhere, while indulging myself got me immediate gratification. I figured I could force myself to eat kale, quinoa, and strawberries, hate life, and maybe get hit by a truck; or eat foods I actually enjoy like pepperoni pizza, and still maybe get hit by a truck after at least enjoying my meals.

Incidentally, I actually kinda like kale, quinoa, and strawberries - they're actually not bad mixed together, with maybe a bit of balsamic vinegar or lemon juice and olive oil - but if I had to eat that every day, I'd go looking for the truck.

It occurred to me that if I eat more healthy food, I might actually be fast enough to get out of the way of an oncoming truck, so I make the attempt. But I have to make it as automatic as I can, and ensure there's variety with, yes, the occasional indulgence that would give my cardiologist a heart attack, such as bacon or a grilled cheese sandwich. Or a grilled cheese sandwich with bacon. Dammit, now I'm hungry.

The key, I decided, was to take advantage of my innate laziness, and not get too complex with the food preparation. The less work I have to do, the less likely I am to say "Fuck it; I'm ordering pizza delivery." So I found a website that generates random meals based on calorie count targets, and it strives to balance macronutrients (carbs, protein, lipids) while providing a variety of fruits and vegetables.

The downside? It's not cheap, especially since I can't be arsed to drag my lazy self to the grocery store twice a week (if I only go once a week, everything spoils by day 7). Thus, I get delivery, as I mentioned a few entries ago. And there's a lot of wasted food. I haven't figured out how to use everything I buy before it spoils, since the food industry is hell-bent on making things difficult for singles unless they want to buy single-serving microwave meals. Like, say, one meal calls for celery and almond butter. The almond butter will last a long time, but I might use one stalk of celery out of the entire bunch, and the rest gets thrown away or fed to my housemate's guinea pigs. So my choice is: eat high-sodium prepackaged foods, no waste, and die of another heart attack; or buy fresh foods and be unable to use them all before they go bad.

Which reminds me of a story. One time when I was in a non-shit-giving phase, I went to the grocery store and loaded up on microwave meals, frozen pizzas, snack foods, beer, breakfast cereal, and other easy food. Went through the line and the cute cashier looked at my selection and asked, "So, you're single, huh?"

I chuckled. "How could you tell?"

"Because you're ugly."

Anyway, I could probably find a way to use the foods a little more efficiently, but that would take work to get the meal plans just right, and I'm allergic to work. It cuts into my game-playing time. Consequently, I usually just go with the random food it generates, and only change out meals if they involve food I can't stand.

So that's how I discovered that kale, quinoa, and strawberries makes for a pretty good salad. But I'd still rather have pizza.