That it should come to this.
I’m eating so much fish my wife is worried I’m going to come down with Mercury poisoning.
I’m so full of grains and pulses and assorted greenery that my digestive system appears to have gone into temporary shutdown.
Apart from that, it’s all going swimmingly.
Friday lunchtime was spent at 9th Street vegetarian institution, Main Squeeze, and very good it was, too. I had a Catalpa Tree Burrito, described thus: “organic brown rice, seasoned organic beans, monterey jack, organic red onion, tomato wrapped in an organic whole wheat tortilla, topped with spicy organic enchillada sauce, organic sour cream, sunflower seeds, sprouts.”
That’s six organics in one menu item. Six. Count ’em. And man, it was good. As I ate the thought occurred to me that maybe this wouldn’t be so bad, after all. That night Christina cooked delicious fish with a mango salsa, also excellent. Saturday lunch was one of my favorite things, Christina’s tuna melts. So far so good.
And then last night we went out to a fundraising gala for Rainbow House. Food was served buffet style, which mean I was able to pass by the chicken sate and went instead for the little baked brie thingies and California sushi rolls. (Long-suffering martyrdom index: off the charts.) It was only as we were driving home that I thought about the delicious little baked rolls that I had enjoyed at our friends Mark and Holly’s house before the party, which another guest had brought. I had eaten a couple of them without thinking – they were delicious – and now a horror crept over me. I realized that there had been little slivers of prosciutto in them.
The irony was delicious, if you’ll pardon the pun. After all this effort, I’d accidentally eaten some meat – but I hadn’t even realized until several hours later. I’d always thought that my next taste of flesh after my days of deprivation would be met with a chorus of saliva-drenched Hallelujahs, but it slipped by unnoticed. Is this a sign?
Anyway, it was an unintentional mistake, so on I go. Three days left. Tilapia, ahoy.