SODA, HONEY AND SOME ISSUES

In the spirit of being as healthy as I can be with this whole “ I’ve got to lose weight because I am OBESE ( I MAY BE FAT BUT IM GOODLOOKING! ) thing, I've made a few dietary changes that I'm hoping to stick with. Here's a quick run-down of the main ones:

The Big Switch to Decaf: My daily mocha lattes for breakfast and after work have been an immense source of pleasure, they're such a nice jolt to my day. The nice thing, though, about getting decaf is that they're decaffeinated using the natural "Swiss water process" as opposed to chemical decaffeination, the way cheaper coffee companies do it. I really-really-really miss the nice latte wake-up. I've been trying to pretend that nothing's changed, but I catch myself regularly yawning around 10am and after lunch, and this never happened when I had my caffeine hit in the morning. And, though I'm enjoying the lattes, the missing payoff has me wondering whether they're still worth it. Without the caffeine, aren't they just additional calories that I really don't need?

The Big Switch to Natural Sweetener: For years, since my college days, I've been a fan of Equal. I'm a double-packet-in-my-coffee kind of guy, and sometimes use it on unsweetened cereals. I've never cooked with it, but otherwise, it (or its generic counterpart) has had a daily presence in my life. When I started investigating more natural/organic approaches to food, I briefly questioned Equal, but shied away from thinking too much about it. I figured I had made enough changes for awhile, and could circle back to analyze Equal again some other time. I tossed all the Equal in my cabinet into the trash. It was instinctual---suddenly that yummy sweet chemical felt as evil as the pro-natural publications claimed it was. Instead, I have made the switch to an all-natural sweetener called honey and is naturally non-caloric. It has no chemical compounds used to simulate the sweetness of sugar, and is proclaimed to be 40 times as sweet. It has become a part of my lattes along with the decaf, but it's taking some getting used to. Sadly, it tastes absolutely nothing like Equal, but I'm determined to get myself accustomed to it. It's also on the pricey side, and is only available in health food stores, but I really feel a bit more proactive having taken the honey plunge.

The Big Switch to Water: I've always been a pretty good water-drinker, but I'm also a Pepsi One drinker. It's the only diet soda that actually tastes GOOD to me, and it's become a rare day that I drink anything else when I'm in a soda mood.

I'm also trying to convince myself that water ( definitely without ice) with dinner at restaurants is perfectly okay. I mean, I know it goes well with the food and all, but I've been cuckoo about missing my red wines. I've been growling in remembrance of the that restaurant I went to in few months back on the last Saturday night before I the new year. I ordered pinot noir, but the server brought me pinot grigio. In the spirit of not being a jerky customer, I didn't send it back, but chugged it down like koolaid (which, honestly, all white wines taste like to me.) I grumble now because, if I'd known that night that that was to be my last glass of wine for 9 months, I sure as hell would have sent that tralala back. Being Obese has also really fueled my organic tendencies. I find that it's now a lot easier to punch it up and pay the extra cash for organic meats, which had previously been a hesitation point for me due to the steep cost. On the one hand, I'm dismayed that my own better health wasn't motivation enough to make some of these changes, but then I realize it doesn't matter that I hesitated before. I'm glad I've made the changes now, and though honey may be the weight that pushed these decisions to their full realization, I certainly got the train moving on my own and that's nothing to be ashamed of.