These are a few of my favorite things.

It's 12pm, and I haven't gotten out of bed yet. Well, I have, but only to rinse my sinus cavity (hold on, I'll explain), take a decongestant, and make a smoothie. I suppose I can no longer live in denial and admit to myself that I'm sick. No running, today or tomorrow. Under normal circumstances, if someone instructed me to go a day without spinning my wheels a little bit, it'd be a miracle if I listened to them. If I did by slim chance, I'd be surprised if it didn't drive me borderline nuts. Clearly I'm pretty sick, because there is not a single cell in my body that wants to run. Or shower. Or eat solid food. Or perform any task that requires functioning on a higher level than that of say, a toddler.

Sometimes I think of me as two different people: sick-Tayler and me-Tayler. Sick-Tayler refers to me before I gave up eating all the allergens that I go without now. I was sick, tired, miserable, and frankly, not nearly as good as me-Tayler, or present-day Tayler. Of course, I'm sick today, but Sick-Tayler being sick was a totally different story than the girl most of you know being sick. Before, being sick was much much more than a physical thing;  it had heavy emotional and mental effects. Before, I still had the brain, personality, and all the physiological traits that I have now, but it was like someone had taken a little gray veil and pulled it tightly overtop, dulling and restricting them. You could see through the gray haze what was inside, but it wasn't anywhere close to what it could be.

No one likes being sick, so to say "I admit that I hate being sick" would be a stupid statement. I still am slightly annoyed that I'm sick, but I'm not fixated on the work that I'm not getting done, the miles that aren't getting run, and all the other things on my to-do list that are going to go untouched. I'm in attack mode: be proactive as possible to help my immune system beat the shit out of this bug who has robbed me of a sunny afternoon 400m session. I got a decongestant. I've been taking echinacea and zinc. Instead of eating any junk that sounds appetizing, I'm slamming juices and smoothies with as much nutrition as I can cram into about 16oz.


Being sick is obviously not what the title of this entry references. Among the things I that I do like is Brother's Drake mead. If you don't know about mean, it's just wine made with fermented honey instead of grapes.  Isn't that a lovely little shot? That was taken at Bodega where they have a cocktail on the menu with the Drake elixir and a splash of ginger ale. Divine. I like to rep the local businesses. However, I advocate avoiding the sauce when you're sick (yes, even in that Hot Toddy.)

I love these temporary tattoos. I exercised a little retail therapy whilst licking my sick-wounds today and bought the awesome chubby baller-man.

I love this mango veggie smoothie from Naked Juice. Anything with sweet potato in it is fine by me.

I love this fresh juice of lemon, ginger, celery, grapefruit, and green apple. I can't say enough about lemon juice. It's antioxidant power is beastly; have you ever put lemon juice on sliced apple or avocado to keep it from turning brown? I want that awesomeness in my gut.


Another one of my favorite things: flavors for smoothies that involve non-drinkable foods desserts (cake, pie, cookie...). You might notice a pattern. Red velvet cake, snickerdoodle, German chocolate cake, key lime pie. You get the point. I could keep going. Another one of my favorite things: Amazon Subscribe and Save. Ironlady, another member of the Columbus Running Company family who is also gluten and dairy intolerant, told me about it and recommended it as a great place to get a huge selection of gluten free products with free shipping and and discount for subscribing. Choose your own shipping frequency. No contracts. Cancel anytime. Seriously. After going through 4 cans of pumpkin last week, I decided to add that to the list of things Amazon sends me on a monthly basis. Ridiculous?

Maybe. But it's wonderful for everything, including desserts in a glass. Cue electro dance mix and boogie to the blissful thoughts of cool, creamy pumpkin pie through a straw. I'm not a huge pumpkin pie fan, probably because compared to chocolate pecan or nonveggie-based pies it tastes a little...healthy. It's a different story if you throw some vanilla coconut milk ice cream on top. Then I'm sold. Before I gave up the cow, I would die a little bit inside when Edy's pumpkin ice cream was discontinued post-Thanksgiving season. This smoothie is basically like an Edy's pumpkin milkshake, but with Superman nutritional value. To kick it up even one notch further, I add Trader Joe's Very Green powder to all my smoothies. It looks like mold. It goes completely unnoticed in smoothies. I feel good when I know I'm drinking chlorophyll. And no, I'm not kidding. I'll hide as many good-for-you things in a smoothie as I can without it turning into a non-dessert, so I threw in 3 aspsaragus spears for a little extra zinc content. Spinach or any other green would work, and zucchini is pretty easily camoflaged as well. 

Pumpkin Pie in a Glass

 Ingredients


1 cup unsweetened almond milk
1 scoop vanilla protein powder
1tbsp chia seeds
1/2 cup canned pumpkin (not pumpkin pie filling)
tsp vanilla extract
3 asparagus spears (optional)
3 oz silken tofu
1 tsp ground cinnamon
1 tsp ground ginger
1/2 tsp ground cardamom
1 tsp lemon juice
1 tsp Very Green powder (optional)
3-4 ice cubes

Combine all ingredients in a high speed blender until well combined. Since you can't lick the inside of a glass, I suggest serving in a bowl.

Wicked Wednesday

The words are almost jumping out of my mouth and onto the keyboard; the Villain of the Week was an easy decision this week. I was in the middle of an easy run having a little thinky-think yesterday, and almost as soon as the words "Villain of the" were processed, a kid rode by me on his bike on a campus sidewalk. Cue ominous beats: this week's VoW is the crowded sidewalk cyclist.

Summery hipster

A few Sundays ago, Girl Tights and I were putting in some Sunday miles heading north on High Street. A the corner of 5th Ave. and High, a flannel-donned Hipster whizzes around the corner on her perfectly weathered 10-speed quick enough so we were about nose-to-nose before I even knew she was there. And  it wasn't my nose I was worried about. That front tire on her vintage Schwinn was pointed right toward my lady parts.

(As an aside, I realize that it might come off as if I'm making fun of hipsters. Maybe I am, a little bit, but merely for irony since I have been accused of being a liberal hipster and living in a liberal hipster neighborhood on a number of occasions. I'm okay with it. If you want to know more about being and living like a hipster, check out this blog entry over at Verbal Vomit. I laughed. )

I know I don't have all the goods down there that Girl Tights has, but let me tell you something: getting hit in the lady junk hurts like a motherf*#$er. I ran into the corner of a desk in the second grade. Life-changing pain. The experience was so life-changing, in fact, that I'm fairly sure it was the reason why I am hardwired so that upon first awareness of the wheeled Hipster, fight-or-flight instincts overtook my left arm which shot in front of me as fast and as hard as my neuromuscular system could permit. My hand, ninja-ed Bruce Lee-style directly into the middle of Hipster's chest, stopping her so that my hoohah was mere inches away from a black rubber death.

I've had several other incidents with sidewalk bikers, most of them on campus, and most of them on crowded sidewalks. I've never been able to figure this one out: why must we ride our bikes on such sidewalks, making it impossible to move two-wheeled vehicles any faster than a walk's pace anyway? I'm also that subscribes to the notion that if you're walking on the sidewalk, the same rules apply to you that apply to cars on the road. We walk on the right and pass on the left. And we certainly don't walk in the left lane when there is oncoming traffic. All these rules go to shit with pedestrians, and even more so when you throw a bike or two in there. It's not a good sign that my first instinct is to shoot my left elbow out anytime a sidewalk Contador goes flying by me. There have also been numerous times when I've seriously contemplated the Big Daddy stick-though-the-spokes trick. Let's get it together: bikes and all other "cars" belong IN! THE! STREET!

Whew. I feel better now. Okay, onto superfood: ginger. It's an ugly little root, but this knobby herb is a powerful anti-inflammatory which is something everyone can get pumped about. Me and my porcelain digestive system love it because it combats nausea and indigestion in about every sense of the word, including acid indigestion and gas. When I feel like someone's blown a balloon up in my gut, I juice some lemon and ginger root and throw it on some ice with some water and it does WURK. It is also suggested that this guy helps relieve motion sickness and promotes general digestion. Recent studies have shown that ginger root directly affects the muscle tissue in the digestive tract, preventing abnormally strong and fast abdominal cramping. Hello, ladies: have some ginger tea during your "special time" and see what it does for you. Aside from digestive inflammation, ginger has been shown to relieve symptoms of rheumatoid and osteoarthritis, and new developments in the study of diabetes in animals shows that ginger may help to lower blood sugar and cholesterol levels. Even studies of ginger root and the suppression of cancer cells are of recent interest, though these studies are very preliminary. Basically, the moral of the story is that this root is a baller.

How do I eat it? Frankly, I dump ground ginger into anything that makes sense. Juices, smoothies, stir-fry, oatmeal, and baked goods, but Snickerdoodle Alo Bites are a simple, easy favorite. (Also pictured are the blueberry pie variation.)

 
Snickerdoodle Alo Bites

Ingredients:
1/2 cup medjool dates
2/3 cup raw, unsalted cashews
1/2 cup unsweetened coconut
2 tbsp chia seeds (or ground flax)
1 tsp extra virgin coconut oil
1/4 tsp sea salt
1 tsp ground ginger
1 tsp ground cinnamon
1/4 tsp vanilla extract

Pit the pits from the dates and add them, along with the coconut, and coconut oil to food processor and process until dates and coconut are finely chopped. Be sure not to process too long; your mixture will turn to paste and wind up in one big ball of dough spinning along the inside of the processor bowl. The mixture should have a "meal-ly" consistency. Transfer the date-coconut meal to a bowl, add vanilla, and set aside. Process the cashews and chia seeds to the consistency of a fine meal. Again, avoid over-processing, as the cashews will turn to butter. Add the salt, ginger, and cinnamon to the cashew-chia meal and pulse a few times to combine.  Knead the cashew-chia meal into the date-coconut meal with ever-so-slightly dampened hands (this will prevent the mixture from sticking to your hands.) Add in chocolate (or white chocolate!) chips if desired. Roll into balls and store in the fridge.

Why does "fridge" have a "d" but "refrigerator" doesn't? Oh, and what's up with the goofy name? I'm currently slacking on some statistics, so we'll have to leave that for later.