Hippyshoppingchick.com is online!

Check out the beginnings of my new web site, HippyShoppingChick.com!

To continue that earlier thought...

Reigniting my passion for starting the website is that conversation I had about vegetarian food in the checkout line at Sunflower.

The lady wanted to know what to cook because her father just had major surgery and ever since, he's become a vegetarian. Problem is, she has no idea what to cook for him. He's grossed out by all his old favorite foods like gravy and bacon. She thinks you just feed a vegetarian broccoli...

Yikes!

Most meat eaters think you feed vegetarians vegetables and salad. People forget that everyone needs a balanced diet including protein, whether they are vegetarian or not. There are lots of malnourished people out there, vegetarians and meat eaters alike. It's not that hard to properly feed a vegetarian or a vegan, or someone just interested in altering their diet with veg type foods.

That's the whole idea behind starting this site. People are more interested in alternative foods than ever. I saw a lady in a doctor's office the other day talking about how hard it was to deal with a son who she had just found out was allergic to eggs. She was saying she couldn't believe how many foods eggs are in as an ingredient.

She could go to Sunflower, Sprouts, and Whole Foods and look for packaged foods marked "vegan."

The woman with a father who is now vegetarian in his 80s? She can go for vegetarian and vegan foods, learn to make some tofu, seitan, and many more veg-friendly dishes.

Lactose intolerant? That's me. It doesn't keep me away from those 3 Musketeer candy bars though! But I do know with some time and effort I can obtain good, lactose-free, vegan chocolate. It tastes so much better and is easier on my digestive tract!

So that's the idea behind HippyShoppingChick.com.

More to come soon!

I really need to launch this website.

I am pretty busy as a freelance/part-time worker and college student, so my little projects like Hippyshoppingchick.com are on the back burner.

I really have to get this thing going, however!

The inspiration came to me the other day at the grocery store. I was shopping at Sunflower market for birthday dinner preparations for my boyfriend's 29th. This included two boxes of vegan spare "ribs," and I can't remember the brand of the top of my head. Those two boxes were sitting on the end of the conveyor belt as I was waiting to check out. The lady behind me in line asked if they were any good. Of course! I told her how my boyfriend and I love them. We never would eat real animal ribs as I'm a vegetarian (leaning vegan) and he just isn't into the whole red meat thing. He has come out of the closet finally as a non-vegetarian. So this is a good thing for us to buy, prepare and eat.

More on this idea later, as I have to run...

HippyShoppingChick.com on the way!

I am entirely too busy to launch the site the way I want to do it. So I just may launch it anyway because that thing called "free time" may just never come. You know how you always procrastinate to do something until that perfect day when all that "free time" you think you need comes along? That's a surefire way to get nothing done, I have found!

So keep checking back to the HSC blog often to check the progress of both this blog and the under construction main site.

--Heather

$40 later...

I am the proud owner of a new electric Remington razor. It works great, in fact too great. It's leaving my armpits with some razor burn! So I'm going to attempt a laser hair removal tomorrow. I am curious as to how many sessions it will take to kill my armpit hair off permanently.

I ended up buying the razor at Target because I was there to get a bunch of other household items. So I picked out the $40 Remington shaver. It came with some type of trimmer thing I still need to buy a AAA battery for. It has a charging stand and I have no idea how long it takes to charge the thing, but the directions do say it can't be overcharged. So there you go.

I just thought I'd point out that the labeling on the outside of the box said nothing about charging times or that it couldn't be overcharged. None of this information could be found on the packaging for any electric razors so it was hard to make an informed decision.

Which is the bigger environmental evil; Electric razors or disposable?

I just can't figure it out. I hate the smell of chemical-filled shaving creams and blow through the cruelty-free Kiss My Face lavender shave balm too fast for the price it costs. (I’m cheap). I do highly recommend it though. I decided I waste more water shaving my legs with disposable razors -- or in the shower period -- so I switched to an electric razor around Christmas.

All was well and good but I bought a cheap, $17 one at Target and it has already conked out on me. So what to do? Do I go splurge on something more expensive that will last longer? Or go back to the dependable old disposables and waste water again?

Well, Google is my friend and I found this article that says the rechargeables are actually the lesser evil. It takes less power to charge one up than it does to pump water to the sink so you can shave. I’m a girl. I don’t want to use water to shave at all. I want to do it standing up in the bathroom without stinky shaving cream and razors I gotta throw away after a week. I don’t think it’s worth filling the landfills just so I can have a close shave.

So I think I will look for an electric razor that will work well, last a long time, and hopefully not suck a lot of power. I think I’ll set my kitchen timer when I charge it so I don’t leave it plugged in forever. Shame on my nasty habit of overcharging electric things!

Del Monte Energy Bloom

I can only affectionately refer to Coke Black as "Coke Crack." Red Bull tastes like shit and, according to my personal trainer, can even give you a heart attack. Never drink that crap pre-workout. It's amazing how many people don't know that.

Do you have any idea how much coffee I have subsisted on this past week? Weak and exhausted from last weekend's car accident and stressed out from school, I sucked down cups of black coffee and even a Starbuck's mocha (soymilk, natch). I may be a Hippy Shopping Chick/health nut/vegan/fitness freak, but I am not immune to the power of caffiene. I need it right now. Life is too demanding and I haven't been working out (beacuse of my chiropractor's orders post-accident) so I feel a definite energy drain.

But I think I'm sick of coffee today.

I stopped at Aj's Fine Foods this morning on my way to my airshift at 98-7 The Peak. I selected a couple Kern's Nectar drinks to pop in the nasty station fridge, but then sought out something already cold and full of energy I could guzzle. I found something new. It's called Del Monte Energy Bloom and I bought the mango passionfruit flavor.

The Details:

Disclaimer: I have no idea how this stacks up nutritionally. Just passing on what's on the label!

"One full serving of fruit"
"Calcium"
"B vitamins"
"Antioxidant rich"
"White tea extract"
"Lightly carbonated"

The stuff is tasty. It's like mixing juice with some lightly carbonated water. So it doesn't have that nasty chemical taste of other energy drinks like that Red Bull stuff. The cashier at AJ's told me they just got it in Friday.

The paragraph still lists a littany of ingredients like any frankenfood would...carbonated water, chemicals, fruit juice concentrates, etc.

It boasts 100 cal; 115mg sodium; 24g carbs; 20g sugars; 10% vitamin A and Calcium; 100% niacin, riboflvain, B12, & B6; 10% vitamin D, 20% vitamin E, and 100% pantothenic acid. What is that? Vitamin B5, of course.

The can also says, "One 8 oz. serving of Bloom Energy Drink provids 1/2 cup of fruit. The USDA My Pyramid recommends a daily intake of 2 cups of fruit a day for a 2,000-calorie diet." The can also reads it's 50% juice.

You get 10.5 oz of beverage, which I paid $1.99 for. Red Bull costs much more and tastes shittier. I think I'll be buying a lot of Bloom.