stress eating

Sweet Options – Day 803

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Bark + Bee Honey – Photo: L. Weikel

Sweet Options

I’ve written about it before, and I’ll admit, the challenge continues. It’s real. I’m cautiously optimistic that this week’s inauguration will provide at least some respite to the nearly insatiable desire to self-soothe through comfort food. That said, we are still in the midst of a pandemic, and from the sound of things, everything could be on the brink of getting dramatically worse. All of which is to say: The stress of daily living appears in no hurry to diminish. Therefore, I need options. Preferably sweet options.

Why? Because the last kiffel disappeared today – as stealthily as DT did on Wednesday morning. And while I’m paying the price for the stress of the election and its aftermath (and feeling it when I put on my clothes), I must admit: I need to distract myself from ingesting the last remaining vestiges of holiday mischief still lurking about. These evil tempters are especially insidious at night, waiting to taunt and cajole me when I’m up late at night writing my 1111 Devotion.

Andy to the Rescue!

Yesterday, our postman, Andy, brought us an exciting delivery: a jar of Bark + Bee honey. Talk about sweet options! The prospect of this golden gift of the bees drizzled over a smattering of walnuts and topping a cup of plain Icelandic yogurt is even more tantalizing than an ice cream sundae. That’s because it satisfies my as-yet-unsated (if that’s not a word, it should be) urge for the dopamine effects of comfort and knowledge that all is well. And it’s good for me!

The cool thing is, beyond the universally known benefits of honey and plain, low fat yogurt, the addition of Bark + Bee honey, in particular, benefits both – you guessed it – dogs and bees!

Just…yum – Photo: L. Weikel

Bark + Bee Honey Company

The brainchild of two young women entrepreneurs in Princeton, NJ, cousins Laila Palmer and Gabby Issa, Bark + Bee Honey Company was created to both support their neighboring bee populations and provide much-needed funds (100% of their profits) to local dog shelters.

Sweet options abound! From choosing honey from local beekeepers whose bees work to pollinate the myriad crops of the Garden State to supporting facilities that foster pups for adoption rather than those offered by breeders for profit, what’s not to love?

Read More About It

Check out this article about the creation of Bark + Bee and bee inspired (wink wink). And if you’re trying to wean yourself off your own cycle of less than ideal self-soothing, consider this sweet option. You’ll be supporting yourself, Mother Earth, her bees, and her pups. It doesn’t get much better than that.

(T-308)

Cherry Lie – Day 745

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Cherry Pie from Crossroads Bakery – Photo: L. Weikel

Cherry Lie

Ha ha – nope. That’s not a typo. It’s actually an ‘autocorrect’ that struck me as just a bit too cheeky to pretend it didn’t happen. My Cherry Pie’s evolution into “Cherry Lie” was way too synchronous for my taste.

But see? I’ll own it.

I’ve been bemoaning my sudden seemingly uncontrollable appetite lately. And while I’m eating lots of everything it seems (including salad), I’m especially indulging in more comfort foods, including bakery treats such as the cherry pie, above, and occasionally the delectable locally-sourced artisanal ice cream as well.

From Afar

Watching myself from afar, it’s sort of interesting. I’ve been relatively disciplined throughout the entire past year. Indeed, I paid particular attention to making an effort to remain reasonably cognizant of over-indulging as we watched this year of 2020 unfold. I tried, at least.

It seems I lost all self-control just before the election and most definitely since then. The past month has been a dietary train wreck. And for the most part, I just. don’t. care.

So I guess that’s why I chose to post a photo of my little pre-Thanksgiving transgression. The raiding of the cherry pie.

Because, like that honey badger video I posted the other day (and re-link again here because I do find it hilarious), I just don’t give a s*&t.

Hope you have a marvelously decadent Thanksgiving and allow yourselves an extra scoop of everything – for each relative you are celebrating the holiday with from afar.

Stay well my friends.

(T-366)

Tropical Storm Isaias – Day 632

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Photo: L. Weikel

Wow. Well, I mentioned in last night’s post that here in Pennsylvania we’re not used to tropical storms maintaining their ferocity as they march into our area from the south or tornado warnings beeping out on our phones and warning us to ‘take appropriate cover.’ Enter Tropical Storm Isaias – yet another reason to wonder just what we did to so profoundly piss off 2020.

Who’d have imagined a tornado would touch down at  the hospital in our county seat of Doylestown? The storm ripped off part of the roof of the on-site daycare center, damaged another pavilion, and tossed about and upended six cars in the parking lot. And that’s just one instance among many reports of a devastating number of trees uprooted and creeks and other bodies of water blowing past their flood stages and inundating everything in their path.

And it does sound as if the full moon did indeed exacerbate the impact this storm had when it slammed into the North Carolina coast as a Category 1 hurricane last night. Storm surges have been devastating and well over 3.5 million households are without electricity. It’s all a bit hard to fathom – a tropical storm at the beginning of August.

Stress Eaters

Just after the height of the storm hit, I walked out onto our porch to take some photos of the storm water cascading across our property. As I stood there in the pouring rain, I was joined by Spartacus. Instead of acting fearful of the storm, he quite adorably seemed more concerned than anything else.

Spartacus – Storm Watcher – Photo: L. Weikel

Then I noticed something even odder. There were a bunch of birds at our feeders! That was pretty much the last thing I expected to see in the midst of the storm. Granted, the absolute worst had probably just peaked – but the rain was still pounding down and strong gusts of wind were whipping the willow behind our barn and making the rest of the trees dance very hard to keep up.

Yet there were these birds, crowding several of my feeders. My heart went out to them as I sort of chuckled to myself. I could relate. Clearly they were stress-eating; stuffing in as much as they could while the getting was good. Living for the moment.

Stress eaters – Photo: L. Weikel

Rampaging Tohickon

After the storm passed and bright sunshine made everything look and feel as though it’d just been power-washed, the after-effects were startling. The Tohickon overflowed its banks and was rapaciously engaged in transporting logs and all sorts of other bobbing doo-dads and detritus to the Delaware River.

Many roads were impassable, either as a result of flooded creeks and streams or massive trees giving up the ghost and dragging electrical wires down with them.

The Delaware practically had enough trees floating down it to qualify as a forest itself.

Tohickon Creek – Photo: L. Weikel

It’s Only August

While I’m profoundly grateful we were spared the worst of it, I have to admit, this does give me paust. It’s only August. That seems pretty darn early to me to be dealing with a storm of this magnitude. Given the attitude of 2020 so far, I don’t think I want to challenge worse – that’s for sure.

It’s kind of amazing to contemplate just how devastatingly effective Mother Earth is at putting us in our place. It doesn’t take much. We really are a vulnerable species when you get right down to it, which makes me wonder. Is that why we’re often such bullies when it comes to Nature?

I hope everyone is safe and dry. I’d say I hope you’re warm, too – but if you have no electricity, warm may not exactly be the state you prefer. I hope you’re safe, dry, and comfortable. Take good care of yourselves – and don’t forget to feed your birds.

Casualty of Tropical Storm Isaias – Photo: L. Weikel

(T-479)

Peanut Gallery – Day 592

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Peanuts with an olive oil chaser – yum! Photo: L. Weikel

Peanut Gallery

I’m definitely getting trained. While I can’t say that I’ve totally got this down yet, since I pretty much need to get harangued every morning before I spring into action, I feel I’m at least becoming a bit more responsive to the demands of my peanut gallery.

And I actually think they take turns. Some mornings it’s the blue jays who glare at me, issuing forth an ear piercing shriek is I manage to ignore their dirty looks as they hop from one branch to another.

Other days it’s my grackles. They snag my attention by visiting in groups of five or six at a time. They swoop in and land on the empty peanut coil causing it to clatter against the wrought iron post that also proffers two conventional feeders filled with sunflower seeds. Black oil, no less. Only the best for my buds.

While the grackles and blue jays will reluctantly consume sunflower seeds, it is quite obvious that their preference is peanuts. And it goes without saying that all the woodpeckers that hang around near our home also do their best to deplete the resources, including their cousins, the nuthatches.

For a couple weeks, the fish crows had moved back into the avian neighborhood. Their distinctive grokking voices could be heard taunting each other high in the ash and maple trees that were just beginning to leaf out. They, too, knew of the legendary Weikel peanut dispensary and would visit frequently.

Inspecting the coil – Photo: L. Weikel

Feeding My Face – and Theirs

As I wrote about a couple of times in April and May, I simply had to confess my utter helplessness to stop binge-eating peanuts in response to the stress of this pandemic and its effect on my emotions. But I promise you: I would not be compulsively feeding my face with peanuts if I didn’t have bags of them set aside for my birds (and yes, even the squirrels).

It’s because of my dedication to my creatures that I have these stupid peanuts around my house, tempting me. But I’ve discovered something else. If I went by the demand in my yard, I could literally blow through a three pound bag of roasted peanuts every single day. And that’s without my help anymore!

But come to find out: one person’s loss is another critter’s bonanza. Check this out.

I just might be doing my fellow (peanut planting) Americans a service. Apparently there’s a glut of the prized Virginia peanuts on the market due to the suspension of major and minor league baseball. I didn’t realize bagged peanuts in the shell are a huge source of munching pleasure enjoyed by baseball aficionados.

As a result of discovering the plight of peanut farmers due to the Coronavirus, I now have a newfound appreciation for just what my patriotic duty could entail. Three pounds a day. I can do it.

And I know I have a lot of support for that strategy in the yard as well.

Grackles cracking open peanuts on the driveway – Photo: L. Weikel

(T-519)

Checking In – Day 523

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One of my many vices – Photo: L. Weikel

Checking In

Rain is pattering down outside and I’m sitting here listening to it. This Friday night is cold, wet, and can be pretty fairly characterized as miserable. So I’m checking in, wondering how you’re all managing to negotiate the temptations of too much…well, too much of anything.

You name it. If you’re like me, you can over-indulge in any number of vices. Netflix, chocolate, roasted peanuts. You name it.

Yeah, I just ticked off my latest ‘big three.’

Oh my goodness. What is it with these peanuts? All of a sudden, I am absolutely held hostage by the irresistible urge to eat them mindlessly, one after another, seemingly powerless to stop. Time after time, I promise myself that this is the last handful I’m going to take from the bag – the bag I bought to feed my blue jays and fish crows, if I’m honest.

As Bad As Sheila

I’m not the only one succumbing to temptation and indulgence in this household.

Sheila has been particularly egregious in her flaunting of the social norms established in our household over the past 15 years.

No eating cat poop. That’s a pretty hard and fast rule. Well, poop of any kind, but cat poop is usually the most frequently encountered fecal fast food in Sheila and Spartacus’s pantry.

I don’t know what has gotten into Sheila lately, but she’s been veritably defiant. Honestly, I think it’s her blindness. If she can’t see us, she thinks we can’t see her? Or is it her deafness. I screetched when I caught her foursquare in the cat box this morning – and she didn’t even flinch.

Ugh. I was so angry. She knows better.

And yet she just snuffled in my general direction when I picked her up and did not exude the least bit of remorse. And she used to feel bad about being a bad girl! (Then again, so did I.)

Exiting the snack bar, oblivious to being discovered – Photo: L. Weikel

Stress Eating

All of which brings me back round again to the topic of stress eating. Man, I am struggling with this. I think the key for me is not having it around. And I wouldn’t, but for the fact that, because of this coronavirus pandemic, I do not have the luxury of running out to the store to buy stuff only when I need it.

Case in point: the peanuts I give to my blue jays, fish crows, and – albeit begrudgingly – the squirrels. Because I find myself buying a couple bags of peanuts when I go to the store, I have access to them. I can’t just fill all the feeder/dispensers. No. There’s always some left over; a bag half empty. And if I make the mistake of cracking open just one beautiful nut perfectly along its seam, exposing the precious insides, encased in their natural tissue paper wrapping, I inevitably find I am helpless to resist. I pop the delicious morsels into my mouth and am compelled to reach for the next perfect crack-and-reveal. And then the next…

Even Though I Know I Shouldn’t

So I find myself feeling some compassion for Sheila. She’s old. She can still navigate her way to the cat box and snuffle out the occasional treat. She’s been sneaking them for years – and is simply less adept at snagging them undetected anymore. Given that we close the door to the bathroom (most of the way – not entirely; the cats can’t open the door on their own) in order to deter the old coot, the mere fact that she can blindly negotiate her way into the bathroom at all is a coup that merits the reward.

I don’t know that I exhibit talent even remotely on the same par as Sheila in tracking down my peanuts. But I do know they’re probably as (not) good for me as the crusted snacks she snags for herself.

Judging from her expression, though, I’d say she clearly feels they’re worth my displeasure. Or at the very least, she feels zero remorse. UGH.

Cat litter snout – Photo: L. Weikel

(T-588)

Stress Eating – Day 326

Posted on by Lisa Weikel Leave a comment
The pileated woodpecker who visited on my birthday – Photo: L. Weikel

Stress Eating

I’m sitting here on my couch once again trying to think of something even remotely interesting to write about and all I feel like doing is eating. Stress eating, since I can’t say I’m particularly hungry. But I crave endorphins. I want some comfort.

Seriously. I sit here noticing that my brain is saying, “Have some chocolate.”

“No.”

“No? Why not? It’s OK. Certainly better than ice cream.”

“Ooooh, yeah…ice cream would be so delicious. Thank goodness we don’t have any in the house. And anyway, no!”

I’m even contemplating excavating a beer from the bowels of my refrigerator (which of course is continuing its relentless on/off nonsense, but since the repairman essentially said he could attempt to repair it but it likely wouldn’t fix the problem and could easily cost close to half the price of a new refrigerator, we decided to just use it until it conks out). And anyway, the only reason I would drink a beer would be to get a buzz – and my pleasure in that would be short-lived, at best.

Think of Other Things

I don’t want to follow up on the disappearing birds post just yet. It’s too early; too soon. While I’m hearing from a number of people who live near me that they’re noticing the bird disappearance as well, I’m sort of feeling like I should give it a few more days. Maybe they’ll come back.

Although that seems unlikely.

Beyond the local corroboration, I’ve also heard from a few others as well. From places as far away as the southern Jersey coast, Baltimore, and even western North Carolina, when called to their attention, people are noticing that things are suddenly quiet. And the quiet is sudden: it’s been about two weeks or so.

The Elephant in the Room

Then there’s politics. I could write about that. But…no. I’d rather stress eat. In fact, what we’re all watching unfold (if we’re paying attention) is both riveting and revolting.

I feel like we’re going to have the limits of our republic tested over the coming days, weeks, and months. I am adamant that I do not want to gain weight over everything that’s going to come out and be revealed. And quite frankly, that’s why I’m not going to eat anything now – neither to soothe myself nor to quell my yearning for a ‘win’ – because I refuse to sabotage myself.

So this is where I am this evening. Up-to-date on breaking news. Falling asleep mid-sentence to the deeply resonant snoring of Sheila. Dealing with it all by contemplating snarfing up something sweet.

Fair warning? I may not be able to muzzle myself over politics much longer. I don’t know. I feel like something even bigger than has been unfolding this week and last may ‘drop’ tomorrow.

In the meantime? Stay strong, my friends. Big changes are coming. And while the change itself may be hard and painful as we move through it, I hold firm to a vision that we will come through this stronger, healthier as a nation, and more compassionate.

(T-785)