Yes, I can!

Since I registered to this other fitness club two weeks ago, I had not had the time to take an appointment with a coach to adapt the program that had been made for me by a coach of my fitness club (that closed for unpaid rents) to the muscle-building machines there.

Leaving work at 6pm, I arrived there at 6:45pm on time for whether Body Pump, Body Attack or Aqua Slim, what only left me the possibility to attend the Body Attack course that does not require any equipment preparation or swimsuit. This a 100% cardio course! It gives you a great energy! I was meeting Philippe, the coach, at 8pm at the end of the course. When I saw him arriving, I puzzled by his physical appearance, bold, all muscle-build on the upper part of his body, with big arms and everything, with muscled but thin shaved legs and big colored tatoo on his left arm... and a strong voice!

The appointment was really worth it, he talked a lot about food, where to find proteins - because you strongly need them when you are working on muscle building your body - what to avoid, etc. Advice that had never been given to me and then he showed me how to use all the machines I would need for my personal training. It lasted about 45 minutes!

The girl coach I had met at my former fitness club had just given me some advice about 3 machines. He explained me how to use between 10 to 15 machines (apart from the cardio ones)! He took my email address and later in the evening, sent me my personal training program with advice notes about muscle-building, diet, etc. and assured me that, if I follow this program, I will have the results expected and be ready for the big day. I hope so!

Finally, going to thisa new fitness club has some advantages, I will maybe be better prepared with this program, he sensed my motivation (good!) and that I was surely the kind of girl that could do it! That is a nice thing to hear.

The only incovenient of this special diet is that for the month to come I will have to eat again chicken, I do not like that but I will need that source of protein (I am absolutely not going to eat again any other kind of meat!), eat lots and lots of eggs, almost every day, prefer five meals to the regular three and be sure to have proteins in each one. Well, let's go!

Cooking Time!

It has been few years I started to really cook (not just open a box and put it in the microwave or cook eggs in a stove) and I love it. As a kid, my mom was a housewife most of my childhood so she was always home to cook for me lunch when I was back home school or High School and in the evning to cook us dinner with my dad. I never had to "learn" to cook for myself and she never encouraged me to do so.

I think it started when I was dating my University boyfriend back in 2003, as an orphan, he and his sister had had to learn to cook for themselves and when they were kids, they parents owned a Greek restaurant (they come from a French/Greek family). More and more I begin to like cooking for us, for me, and later for my Mom and I when my dad had left home and I was no longer dating that boyfriend.

My speciality? Sweet things! I'm a "sweet girl"!
I love to create and I love to create stuff in cooking too. I make fruit pies, stewed apples, last evening I had some - too ripe for me - bananas and did not want to throw me away so I made out a bananas gratin for the first time and it was yummy!! I made one again last weekend at my mom's and her partener and her just loved it, nice! Now I want to try to make a pinapple gratin.

I also like to cook salty pies and lots of vegetarian dishes (as I am a veggie but also because I love vegetables!), salty gratins. Yesterday, I try to make a new thing, some rice with zucchinis cooked in just some olive oil and coconut milk I used for the very first time, that was yummyyyyy!

Now that I work with weird working hours, I am home late and do not have time to cook and I only have 30min to eat lunch, most often in the afternoon, at work. So, now, I have to make a "cooking planning" lol and take advantage of my free mornings to cook. It is less fun to cook for one of course but you have food for at least two meals.

I am not much of an "all-made" dishes you buy at the supermarket, they are practical when you don't have time from time to time but I often make things myself after having looked at the prepared dishes that give me ideas, as so, you can controle the amount of grease and salt you put in and your healthier dishes are free from chemical stuff!

I am so in a cooking mood right now!

Meet Miss no Meat

Today, I went and celebrated three little girls' birthday, of my family.
As appetizers, there were some saucisson, chorizo, peanuts, little sausages and smoked salmon on toasts.

Then, the main course was some meat cooked in the oven with potatoes and mushrooms and fortunately, a zucchinis gratin.

I say "fortunately" cause, I'm a vegetarian. Each time I confess my way of eating, people just look at me, full of surprise, like "what, so it really exists?" or sometime it can also be like if I had confessed something disgusting.

And so, just after that, people will always ask bunch of questions like "why? for how long? but what do you eat then? do you eat fish? do you eat bread? but carrots also have a soul, why do you eat them?"... yes, sometimes, reactions can be stupid! But, fortunately it doesn't occur too often.

I have a friend, whose husband is also a vegetarian but because he doesn't like the taste of the meat. My reason is more an ethical commitment and moral conviction, I don't eat meat because I don't see meat in my plate as food but as a dead animal that was murdered! What I mostly dislike is baby animals served as meat like lamb or veal. I've always been close to animals, I used to ride horses for few years, we had a dog for 16 years but, it took me 17 years to actually realized that the meat I was eating was in reality killed animals. It just happened. Since then, I stopped to eat red meat I had never been found of anyway, then paté and rillettes, ham and other by-products from meat, I didn't stop all of a sudden, cause after all, there was some food I liked.

So it was like "okay, next week, I stop eating this, next week I stop eating that". I, somehow, kept eating chicken and turkey (something some people couldn't understand), not that I wanted to but, for some health reasons, because your body can't stop eating some much type of food so quickly. And I kept doing that for 7 years, until one day, I couldn't bear eating it and also because I was kind of fed up with always eating this. So, since September 2006, no meat at all.

To answer some questions, some vegetarians eat fish, others don't, there are no rules! And why do we eat vegetables? Cause they don't reproduce, they're not living beings like even sea shells are. =)

Being a vegan/vegetarian can also be a matter of health concern and environment. You have the superior level, the veggies! For me, they're more or less aliens! lol Cause, I don't understand all their reasons even if I know them. I try not to wear leather, I certainly do not wear fur (!) but not wearing whool or eating eggs, dairy and honey... goes a little beyond my conviction. I understand these people want to fight against the animal conditions, I also do but... I find it a little extreme. Anyway, after all, they're not hurting anyone, that's the total contrary and that's what counts! Of course, as I respect this choice of way of living, I'd like people to respect mine... that's another story.

I always say, "you don't criticize Muslim people who don't eat pork or Jews who only eat Kosher, etc. so, take this as my religion (I'm atheist...) and give me a break".

When, I announced my relatives and friends my choice, some didn't seem bothered, but my dad or my grand-ma (dad's mom), thought it was gonna be a phase or that it was some kind of diet. Believe me, you can be a vegetarian and not be skinny!! lol My grandma used to say "it will pass, you'll see, you'll go back to eating meat one day". Well, that day still hasn't come yet and I don't think it will ever come as it got even worse as I stopped eating any meat more than a year ago! Sometimes, people say "in the Jungle, animals kill and eat each other". Sure, but I'm not an animal and we don't live in the jungle.

I never imposed my choice on the others, sometimes, when I'm invited for dinner for example, I will remind it to the person, if that's someone I know well, if not, I'll eat what I can eat, sometimes not much, but that's how it goes. Fortunetely, I have some relatives and friends who also think about me!

Another aspect of being a vegetarian is that, some people think you eat disgusting food like tofu and other soya-made food. Well, it now exists lots of good vegan food, tofu steaks that taste like chicken, I swear, I made some people tasted them and they were surprised! I'm also a little into the organic food and there are now a variety of meals you can have for lunch or dinner even if you don't eat meat. Vegetarians do not just eat vegetables! lol

And to end this (one way, so far) conversation, isn't it said that vegetarian people live longer and have less risk of having serious deseases?! ;o)

This speeach may sound a little vicious to you but I wanted to take the occasion of this blog to create this post and talk about being vegetarian.

Feel free to comment!! =)

Update: just saw this sentence on a blog about the vegetarianism "Animals are my friends, thus, I do not eat my friends". I like it, it sumps up everything.