Category: Veganism

A few months ago I read a blog post from a carnist that stuck in my mind. He was a fan of Michael Pollan who was a bit angry that his enthusiasm for better food was dashed by not being able to afford the prices.

Yesterday, while I was in a waiting room I was flipping through a magazine that had an article/advertisement for a local “farm” that raised chemical free, grass fed cows. The picture in the article showed that steak from this place was about $16 a pound.

When I got home I went on Amazon. Alaskan salmon, another favorite of the Pollan crowd, was about $32 a pound. A more humble person can buy grass fed organic hamburger for about $7 a pound.

I live in a metropolitan area. I can get organic whole grains and organic dried legumes for about $1.50 – $2.00 a pound depending on where I shop. I know how to cook these things conveniently and I know many delicious recipes. Recipes that are certainly more interesting than hamburger.

In other words, as a vegan, I can live the Pollanesque dream of Earth friendly, sustainable ( not to mention near cruelty free ) and wonderful food for about 1/3 of the cost.

Huzahhhhhhh!

It has been over 30 years since I went vegetarian. Aside from a deviant period of about a year and a half in college I have been one all of this time. I have been a vegan for about over 15 years.

During that time I have met some wonderful people who were carnists. I have also met plenty of people who, upon simply meeting me, have given me what they thought were original “witticisms” ,

I’m not the only person who has had this experience, as you can see from the internet classic “Defensive Omnivore Bingo” pictured below, followed up by the more modern sequel.

If you are using Firefox ( and you know you should be 🙂 ) you can make the text larger by holding down your Ctrl key and pressing your ‘+’ key. Doing the same but pressing the ‘-‘ will return the text to normal size.

Enjoy!

… and …

Mr. Rollino at a party in Brooklyn for his 103rd birthday. He was one of the last links to the old Coney Island strongmen.

This post is dedicated to my recent guest “Hammer”. Not all of the wisdom of the world can be found in a single book or in the Masai tribe….

Mr. Rollino stayed away from meat. And cigarettes. And alcohol. He said he walked five miles every morning, rain or shine

snip…

On Monday morning, Mr. Rollino went for a walk in his Brooklyn neighborhood, a daily routine. It was part of the Great Joe Rollino’s greatest feat, a display of physical dexterity and stamina so subtle that it revealed itself only if you happened to ask him his date of birth: March 19, 1905. He was 104 years old and counting.

A few minutes before 7 a.m., as Mr. Rollino was crossing Bay Ridge Parkway at 13th Avenue, a 1999 Ford Windstar minivan struck him. The police said he suffered fractures to his pelvis, chest, ribs and face, as well as head trauma. Unconscious, he was taken to Lutheran Medical Center, where he later died.

snip…

“Pound for pound, in the feats that he practiced, he was one of the greatest performing strongmen we’ve ever had, if the lifts he’s credited with are accurate,” said Terry Todd, a co-director of the Stark Center for Physical Culture and Sports at the University of Texas, who knew Mr. Rollino for more than four decades. “He certainly wasn’t one of the strongest all-time strongmen, because of his size.

snip…

Old photographs of Mr. Rollino are displayed in several neighborhood shops. People called him Puggy. “If he shook your hand, he’d break it,” said James Romeo, owner of Romeo Brothers Meats and Foods on 15th Avenue. “He wasn’t feeble.”

Charles Denson, a historian and the author of “Coney Island: Lost and Found,” first met Mr. Rollino at his 103rd birthday party at a neighborhood restaurant. “He was one of the last links to the old strongman days of Coney Island,” he said. “Coney Island was the training ground for strongmen. He was one of the best.”

The full New York Times article