Meme thingy

We now interrupt 31 days of energy to bring you this MEME thing. MsDarkstar sent it to me after I read her blog and requested it. I guess it's not really a meme unless you are passing it on SO, feel free to leave me a comment asking for five questions of your own to answer in your blog if you have one and I will send you some.

1. If you could go back in time and tell your 16-year-old self something, what would you tell her?
Oh hmmm...going back in time could be dangerous because you could really mess things up for the future (your present.) I was thinking maybe I'd tell her some lottery numbers, but y'know she probably would have spent all the money by now and made a mess of her life and I'd never exist as I know me today so screw that. I think I'd just tell her not to get in cars with strangers EVER, not even if they are someone she just met at a job, and I'd tell her not to cheat on her bf when she's 19.

2. What's the best thing about being vegan? What's the hardest part of being vegan?
For 20 years I was vegetarian and I was always a very guilty vegetarian. I used to agonize over the egg section at Whole Foods, trying to figure out which eggs came from the chickens that had the best lives, never mind the fact that laying hens never get to live out their natural lives no matter whether they're treated a little better than the worst treated hens or not. Plus of course all the male chicks that are born from laying hens are just thrown in a dumpster to die or otherwise inhumanely killed. I'd also agonize over plenty of other choices as well, like which butter or cheese came from "happier" cows (never mind that dairy cows are where veal calves come from, or the way the cows have their calves taken away from them over and over again so we can drink their milk instead, etc...). So becoming vegan relieved me of a great burden of guilt that I felt.
The hardest part is finding out something that seems like it SHOULD be vegan isn't for some dumb reason. Like my favorite brand of pot stickers has some egg white in it and I'm pretty sure it's not really necessary. I guess just reading food labels in general is hard, because you never know what awful ingredients you'll find in your food and sometimes I'm just not in the mood. I wish I could just say "I don't want to know" sometimes, but I don't because I've already spent too many years not wanting to know.

3. If you could live anywhere in the world (and money were not an issue), where would you live and why?
Hmmm...first I would need to travel to a bunch of places to see if I'd really like them as much as I think I would. I used to think I'd want to live in Santa Cruz, until I actually went there. If I'm not allowed to travel to a bunch of places before I choose, then I think I'd just like to live in a really cool warehouse loft/studio in the East Bay so I can be closer to my bf. I mean if money is no issue I've seen some pretty cool condo type lofts that even have space for a garden.

4. If you could have only one beverage for the rest of your life, what would you have? (This would be something you'd drink every day)
Is water a choice or do you get water too? I guess I'd have to say water because sometimes that's the only thing that satisfies my thirst. I would never pick wine because having only the finest wines on earth could be part of Dante's 3rd circle of Hell if what you really want is to have a nice cool glass of water.

5. What's your favorite non-vegan food and how do you resist the temptation to eat it?
Oh, I suppose cheese. I have always loved cheese and although it wasn't as hard to give up as I thought it would be, I do find myself thinking about it sometimes. To resist the temptation sometimes I might have a substitute, like Tings instead of Cheetos, or some Dr. Cow aged cashew "cheese", but mostly I just remind myself 1.) it's not healthy to eat it and 2.) that's not something I eat any more because of all the reasons I've gone vegan. It's simply not an option, plus it's pretty gross when you think about it.