MoFo Day 29 Post 24 Cheerful Little Earful

I will definitely meet the MoFo Iron Chef deadline this week. Yay. Will post it later today. We interrupt this chatty happy go, (oh lucky doesn't fit), happy go mucky MoFo blog to bring you GiGi's sad face blog. Yep once every other full moon I switch up the apron for a protest sign and use this space as a tiny platform.

You see, Crazy boy and I were invited to this big Halloween bash that our friends were giving. They've been planning it for three weeks. Invites, decorations, dance floor, tons of food. Yep tons of food except nothing for the vegans. I received a stressed out call today while I was working.
Hostess: I'm totally stressed. Just realized that I made four sauces and all of them have yogurt, and I said to myself, GiGi and Larry won't eat that. Should I just keep some of the beets out for you?" 
GiGi: Well did you get any vegan ice cream?
Hostess: Um no.
GiGi: So should we bring our own food?
Hostess: Yup.
GiGi: Well we better win best effing costume at least! Hahaha.

Needless to say said friends were going out to run errands and still didn't ask, "Hey what can we get you guys?"

Considering that Crazy boy and I have an open house policy and friends are always here chowing down, and that we will accommodate special dietary concerns like gluten free, sugar free, and we always ask everybody if there is any food that they won't eat or are allergic too, this lack of hospitality knocked the wind out of me. I asked three times in the last few weeks if I could bring anything. The answer was, just bring yourselves. (Subtext: and freaking starve to death you annoying vegans.) The hostesses were even invited over to our house this past Friday evening but declined since they were whipping up a storm, uh not for any vegans though.

Now to the bullet points:

• Veganism is not an anathema. Vegans don't make these food choices to stress you out.
• These vegans have chosen to live this way because we respect all animals and don't believe animals were put on this earth for our consumption. Isn't there enough violence in the world?
• With the exception of my few in person vegan friends, none of my friends have ever asked why we have chosen to live our lives this way.
• With all honesty, most of my friends have made a concerted effort to accommodate us and have made beautiful meals, or even tacos and hummus, but none of them really know why we are vegans. We appreciate the meals so much, but wish you knew more about us and the why's of veganism. Perhaps you would be able to make more informed choices.
• Oh and the next time you ask a vegan over, we don't expect you to make something fancy shmancy for us from one of our fancy cooking blogs, but we'll happily make that for you. 
• Why not visit your local Whole Foods and pick some already prepared grains from the salad bar, serve with premade baba ganoush and chips and we're good to go.
• Or just ask. Yep just ask your pain in the ass vegan friends, something like, "Would you like anything special?"

I'll probably give you the standard answer I've been giving for forty years. (Vegan for 7, the remainder veggie). "I'll be fine with just a baked potato, some sea salt, and a tossed salad with vinegar. Yep don't wanna cause any trouble, ma'am. One carrot is fine."

As Colleen Patrick Goudreau says, I obviously need to raise the bar.
If you've got a couple of minutes, check out this amazing video from Colleen called "From Excusitarian to Vegan."


I'll be back in a couple with some cookies and rice milk, I promise.
Thanks for listening.