Confessions of a recovered vegetarian

Since giving up my 16 year streak of vegetarian ways (full disclosure - I've been eating fish since a few years after I moved to Maryland, so I was only full veg for like 11 of those years), I've had a lot of people express curiosity. Most of those people are real life friends who probably won't ever read this. Still, since I don't really have much to share running-wise other than an easy 6 after work tonight I'm devoting this post to a little Q&A. 

This is probably going to come off a bit anti-veggie, but I'm just calling it how I see it. 

1. Do you have more energy since beginning to eat meat again? Yes!

I didn't know how to answer this one at first. I didn't truly dive in to meat eating until Christmas break, and that week I had tons of energy. But it was also a week filled with sleeping a minimum of ten hours each night and having my parents take care of me (aka I had the responsibilities of a four year old). Now that I've returned to normal adult life, I can safely say thanks for donating your life to make me a delicious dinner, animals, because hearing the alarm in the morning only makes me curse two or three times instead of making me feel like I just got punched with a dump truck.

2. Is your husband thrilled? Yes!

Not only is my husband thrilled, it turns out everyone's husband is thrilled. Since the big burger announcement, all my male friends (aka the guys my girlfriends married and now we're all couple friends because that's what happens when you get old) have shown a surprising amount of excitement. I've gotten all sorts of congratulations through texts, twitter, Facebook, etc. If there's one thing I love, it's doing something that takes absolutely no effort, is enjoyable to me, and that millions of Americans do on a daily basis without giving it a second though and then being applauded as though I've actually achieved some sort of significant accomplishment. Keep it coming, guys.

3. Do you feel fuller after meals? Yes!

I'll openly admit I'm a big eater, but that's where that ends.. If anyone else draws attention to my voracious appetite, I'll immediately make some sort of angry comment poorly disguised as a joke which will result in one of those extremely tense, awkward silences while I mentally declare that person dead to me. Trust me, I have witnesses from the time it happened when an instructor called me out in class. 

So once again, I'll thank the animal kingdom for helping me fill up on less food and thus helping me attempt to blend into normal society just a tiny bit more.

Exhibit A: My dinner from Saturday night (after a 20 mile run).

Beef soft taco, enchilada, and tamale. 

Just based on pure volume, I normally would have easily devoured three quarters of that, if not more. Now, this meal was dinner Saturday, Sunday, AND Monday. I'm not saying that while at the restaurant I didn't also eat a gigantic amount of chips and a watermelon margarita the size of my head, but that's a constant, not a variable.

However, I ordered turkey on my sub on the drive down to North Carolina Friday night, and discovered that the addition of meat didn't change my sub mantra: "Six inches is not worth my time". 

Footlong is the only way to go

For what it's worth, I was satisfied with only my footlong sub, iced latte, and Cadbury cream egg (no chips).

So there you have it. Meat is the way to go, at least if you want to feel alert, have a happy marriage and enjoy life. No, seriously, being a vegetarian is fine, obviously I survived and managed to live a normal life for 16 years. But if I ever once again pledge myself to a life without bacon, I'm giving full permission to the entire internet to come slap me. 

Would you rather live without meat or without dessert? A forced choice like that would be the only way I'd ever go back!