May 29, 2016
Celebrate some baffling American-style food ideals this holiday weekend: Eating large quantities of poor quality, industrially processed food! All sarcasm aside, war was the catalyst for a shift and food manufacturing in the United States. One of our first processed foods was created in 1941 to help soldiers enjoy candy without Read more…
March 27, 2016
A lot of shoes are made from animals. With a trip to Yellowstone coming up, I needed some vegan hiking boots. Here is my research in case it helps. To note: I was searching for women’s mid-cut hiking boots, so my list does not include low-cut hiking shoes. Many of these Read more…
March 13, 2016
A long time ago, when the Earth was green, I swam with the manatees in Florida’s Crystal River, where hundreds of manatees flock to in the winter months when the waters of the Gulf of Mexico are not as warm. It was time to see the manatees again, though the Read more…
October 24, 2015
It annoys me how NYC food culture vultures and foodie scenesters so often snub vegan food… especially when they really have no experience with it. Well, wait. That’s not necessarily true. They have no experience with it as cuisine genre. Those who think that “vegan” is a curse word, well Read more…
July 27, 2015
The music used to be your own. Some songs you listened to on your record player. And you noticed the unique speed of your turntable when hearing it for the first time on another’s. Mine was just slightly faster. And the vinyl’s unique scuffs made it even more yours. You Read more…
February 1, 2015
Taking the LIRR’s Babylon line towards Atlantic Terminal on a weekday morning and you may end up in one of the train cars that platform at Boland’s Landing, an employees-only station for the men of the Morris Park maintenance facility in Queens. The cars who make this stop are filled Read more…
January 4, 2015
I’m thinking of the piano chords to Morning Has Broken by Cat Stevens. They’re kind of thundering, like a definitive decision, like a confident first step of something. I love how that song makes me feel. What is so delightful about music is that you get to pick and choose the emotion you Read more…
October 28, 2012
Happy 16th Vegan Birthday to me at Catskill Animal Sanctuary. I’ve been vegan so long. And while every year my passion for vegan food (and vegan food reporting) grows stronger, my reason for going and remaining vegan have nothing to do with food at all. It’s about animals. It was Read more…
August 19, 2012
I enjoy flipping through an old magazine looking at their advertisements. From my teenage years I was fascinated with exploring subliminal advertising in old liquor ads. I remember clearly seeing the “S E X” spelled out in a pile of ice cubes, the women–open-mouthed–holding many-a phallic object, and the far-fetched, Read more…
June 28, 2012
I have long been fascinated by men. Sure, as a woman, aren’t we all? They’re are from Mars, right? A whole other type of human being. Biologically speaking, of course we know there are those different parts but it’s more than that. The Y chromosome has its function. Make a Read more…
August 9, 2011
Like its name implies, Long Island is looong. Heading east from my starting point in Freeport, it’s almost 100 miles to Montauk Point (a.k.a. The End). With a year-round Hamptons local as my guide, I spent the day on this long stretch of road, searching for vegan eats but finding Read more…
July 17, 2011
…but, this time, I was a little scared to. The NY Time’s article on how it’s the new “anti-Hamptons”–the boardwalk being the “new Bedford Avenue”–seemed to promise a mob of hipsters… and local backlash of the influx threatened an old fashioned culture clash, ripe with all the associated generalizations. Diehipster.com‘s rant on Read more…
April 30, 2011
I wrote this ode in August of 2009. I’m “reprinting” it today as I am struck by the realization that I’ve grown to need Radiolab… for support, for inspiration, for a connection–in a world where the homogenized, trite and shrill voice of mainstream culture succeeds in alienating me. In my Read more…
February 26, 2011
I did most of my growing up in the 90’s. I did a zine. Worked in record stores. Went vegetarian. Fell in love with misfits.. often who listened to The Misfits. Had an amazing record collection. Listened to Riot Grrrl. [Balanced that with Lou Barlow. Balanced that with Unwound.] Music was my Read more…
October 15, 2010
I hate to bad-mouth an all-vegan establishment. Believe me when I say that I struggled with how to word this delicately, searched for the silver lining to the many clouds… but Ithaca’s Food For the Planet downright stunk. It pains me not to be supportive to a veg-friendly establishment, but I have Read more…
September 6, 2010
As the Industrial Revolution took hold of the nation, the average American in the late 1800s worked 12-hour days, seven days a week in order to make a basic living. Children were also working, as they provided cheap labor to employers and laws against child labor were not strongly enforced. Read more…
June 18, 2010
As a lover of food, I need to know it deeply. I want to. I’m reading Stuffed & Starved, The Hidden Battle for the World’s Food System. It’s moving me in many ways. Firstly, it has been awhile since I have had the opportunity to read at my leisure, to read Read more…
February 14, 2010
10 Reasons Why Love Stinks. 1.) You cannot will someone to action. 2.) We are, in the end, singular vessels of emotion. 3.) Outsides often don’t match the insides. 4.) Youth is wasted on the young. Love is wasted on the loved. 5.) The perceptive, sensitive and intelligent suffer easier Read more…
May 4, 2009
This posting has been brewing for years. (Alternate name: Smart Patty My Ass.) You probably know of LightLife‘s packaged veggie meats, maybe picked some up at some point given their widespread availability. They’re everywhere! Of course they’re everywhere. They get delivered with the Chef Boyardee, the Eggos, Orville Redenbacher’s, the Read more…
April 22, 2009
I haven’t had to do this in awhile (not since November 2008) but it’s time again… I have to get on the soapbox… As a vegan of many, many years, I am the backboard to occasional commentary and inquisition from omnivores, many well-intentioned but backed in myth and misinformation, many Read more…
July 9, 2007
New York City is making me hostile. Given the close quarters and large population, I am forced into knowing, in many cases intimately, 8 million people a bit more that I want to. I am within their conversations, their breath. The elbow pokes on my ribcage, graze of arm hair, Read more…