Bums and drunks

I think that growing up in a city very close to the Big Apple was quite the opportunity in many ways. Being so close to New York City, it afforded me many other opportunities that I would have never had elsewhere. Like encountering a bum up close and personal for the first time. I went into the city with my dad who was playing the organ at a church one Sunday. We walked to Central Park afterwards and I decided to go on the playground. I was playing around and having fun like any normal kid. Then I spotted a slide with a playhouse at the top. Now this seemed like the coolest thing to me and I was eager to go explore it. I climbed to the top and went into the house and was quite frightened to find a drunken bum passed out inside. As fast as I could possibly manage, I was out of there and running for my father. I can remember going to the Museum of Natural History at a very young age and seeing a bunch of people lying there on the street and I thought they were fake dolls. The drunkard in the playhouse incident brought home the fact to me that bums were actually real people.

Water, weddings, woefully long road trip!

Wow. I kind of forgot I had this thing for awhile, as should be obvious by the fact that nothing has been posted for so long! I've had an eventful end of June to mid July and now that I'm back home and the busy parts have passed, I'm feeling quite bored. I took a long car ride to visit my family. Someone who was driving to the same area as I was going offered me a ride for next to nothing. Couldn't really refuse that, especially with the price of gas! I'd had a ticket back in April on Skybus Airlines, but it went bankrupt literally 2 weeks before my trip. So it was nice to finally be able to go. The highlight of my trip was going kayaking with my brothers and father on the Delaware River in PA. I was gone for 10 days, then as soon as I got back, I was a bridesmaid in my friends wedding. Now I'm not a girl who has to do her hair and makeup and look "perfect" at all times, so this was certainly a new experience for me. At almost 28, I had never even worn makeup before! Just never had the desire to and I've been blessed with good skin, so I feel there's nothing to cover up anyway. Needless to say, getting all dressed up like that was a bit overwhelming at first. But here's my little secret to the online world. I actually liked it. Maybe I'm more of a "girly-girl" that I though. Not that I'd want to do it often, but it's kind of nice to have occasion to do that once in a while.

Virgil's Micro Brewed Diet Root Beer

Continuing along the lines of my last blog, here is another drink review. A bit of a background first. I'm always on the search for good tasting, low to no calorie drinks that are healthy for you and don't contain artificial chemical sweeteners like most diet sodas do. Personally, I'd much rather eat my calories than drink them! It's proved to be quite a task to actually find drinks like this with very low to no calories. In the past, I'd found plenty of drinks with calories in the 60 to 100 range, but if you drink 4 of these a day, that would be 240 to 400 calories in drinks alone. While better than drinking tons of juice, that's still too much for me!

I usually shop for groceries at places along the lines of Whole Foods. Up until quite recently, I hadn't found any diet sodas that were super low in calories. Until I discovered Virgil's Micro Brewed Diet Root Beer. This stuff only has 6 calories per 12 oz bottle. And it tastes really great too. It contains no artificial sweeteners at all and instead relies on the plant based stevia and xylitol for sweetness. For those who are unfamiliar, xylitol is a naturally occurring substance that is found in some fruits, vegetables, and other plants. It has the benefits of being good for your teeth and some studies have shown that it aids in the prevention of cavities. Stevia is an herb that has been used in certain parts of the world for hundreds of years. It is completely calorie free.

Because of the use of these two products in the Diet Root Beer, the drink is considered to be a dietary supplement. On the label, it has "supplement facts" instead of "nutrition info". The label also has an illustration of a guy who looks quite a bit like Jesus in a plaid shirt, serving up the root beer to some kids sitting at a table. I guess that must be Virgil though. But he sure does look like Jesus to me.

This diet root beer has a really great flavor to it and has just the right amount of carbonation. Not too much and not too little. It leaves a bit of an aftertaste of xylitol, which doesn't bother me, as I enjoy the flavor. However, some people may not like this. Overall, I think this is a wonderful product and I hope this starts a trend of more super low calorie natural diet sodas being created. Virgil's brand also has diet cream soda and diet black cherry soda available as well, although I have not tried them.

Inko's White Tea

I came across Inko's White Tea about two years ago and have been hooked ever since. It needs to be pointed out that this is an iced tea that has already been brewed. The tea comes in 16 oz. glass bottles. It comes in a wide variety of flavors, but my personal favorites are Honeydew, Blueberry, and Peach. Each flavor that I've tried has a crisp, light flavor that is very refreshing. With only 56 calories per bottle and 14 grams of sugar, this is a healthy alternative to sodas or fruit juices, some of which contain over 50 grams of sugar and 300 calories for a comparable serving size! Plus, tea contains quite a bit of good anti-oxidants which have numerous health benefits.

The only potential downside for some people may be the price. At close to $2.00 a bottle, some might not want to pay that much. However, I personally feel that to get better quality products, we often have to pay more. So it's worth it! If you can't find it in your local grocery store, they'll deliver it right to your door. Check it out!
http://www.healthywhitetea.com/

Life is short.

I haven't blogged in almost a month. Some friends of mine have been dealing with an awful tragedy. They lost a good friend in a bad motorcycle wreck. He was engaged to be married in November and was only 29. I had only met him a few times. (They all live in a different state.) But he seemed like a great guy and I know my friends adored him. This really hits hard. I've never known a person my own age who has died before. When someone young dies, it really makes you stop and think about your own life and the fact you could one day be gone in an instant. May you rest peacefully, Jeff.

On to happier things. I'm planning to write some reviews of several things in the next few days... So, you can look forward to a review of a really good, flavorful iced white tea; diet root beer that's actually good for you and doesn't contain any chemical sweeteners; and another diet soda made with green tea and doesn't contain chemical sweeteners.
Stay tuned...

Yum

So, there's this food product I've become very addicted to. It's freeze dried fruit made by a company called Crispy Green. Five different fruits are available: apples, pears, pinapples, apricots, and peaches. I came across this while grocery shopping at Earth Fare and it looked rather interesting, so I figured I'd give it a try. Now I can't get enough of the stuff. With only one ingredient listed on the package, being whatever fruit you happen to choose, you can't go wrong. Each package contains one serving of fruit, with only 35 calories per package and about 7 grams of natural sugar. The texture of the fruit is light and crunchy. I've only tried apples, peaches, and pears so far and peaches have become my absolute favorite.

As a single person, living alone, I've always found it very hard to shop for food. I'll buy something and then it'll end up going bad because I haven't finished it. It's almost pathetic how much fruit I've ended up throwing away, just because I've let it sit around for too long. Crispy Green fruit solves that problem! The packages I have now say "Best Before: 09.10". It's also great, because now, if I'm craving something sweet, I'll eat a pack of the stuff and the craving for bad stuff like ice cream or chocolate almost always goes away.

For anyone who wants to check Crispy Green fruit out, their website is http://www.crispygreen.com/.

So here I am...

Well, this is it. My first post on a blog. Not quite sure why I've even started this, but I'm sure it will be filled with a wide variety of very random things. Maybe I'll post about stupid stuff I see or encounter. Maybe I'll post my ramblings on about certain topics. We shall see.