The Spiteful Chef

The loooove nest is a little ol' place where... we can get-to-FEATHERRR.

I think my attack pigeons are having a threesome.  Either that, or they’ve brought in a sister wife.  All I know is that there are now three attack pigeons sharing one nest, when there used to be two.  I have no problem with it– good for them– but they’ve got eggs and I don’t really feel like that’s the appropriate environment for raising armies of small feathered soldiers.  Oh…I should clarify…if you ask anyone who has visited my home in the last year, they will tell you that the approach to our home means an imminent swooping and dive-bombing from at least two pigeons who live in the eaves of our roof by the front door

They’re not afraid of anyone or anything.  They don’t attack me or Chris or Emmett, and recently when I make pigeon cooing noises, they look up and sometimes respond.  I think we’re communicating!  Which is ideal when living in a duplex-style living situation with members of the opposite species.  Look closely at the pic.  They’re all three in that nest together, raising their eggs.  True love.

I’ve been suggesting to Chris that we bring in brother husbands for a while now, and he’s completely unreasonable about it. Even when I explain it means less housework, more income, free babysitting, and someone to play video games with, he gets all like “I am not having a devil’s threesome” and I’m like “that’s not what I want at all.  I’d never do two guys at once.  I AM A LADY!” and then he says “fine! Can I bring in sister wives?” and I respond “YES! I fully support that.  As long as they’re not prettier than I am, they have their own income, they don’t have any children, and they don’t touch my stuff.”  I’ve even brought in some excellent options.  Women who are pretty and smart and willing to talk about either computers or baseball without throwing up on him, and really seem to get along well with Emmett, and have way more lucrative jobs than I do, and (most importantly) are fun for me to drink with and could probably be conned into making out with him.  The pretty blonde one, who has similar Scandy heritage to my own, even said she’d carry one of his little half-Scandy babies, and he wasn’t down with the idea.  Ridiculous.

I’m hoping that the beautiful, loving, alternative relationship that these pigeons are displaying will be an eye-opener for him, because I’m really tired of doing dishes and don’t feel like being pregnant again.  Ever.

I would settle for a live-in maid, nanny, and surrogate, if he’s going to be weird about calling them “wives.”  But that doesn’t solve the problem of him having unrealistic expectations about me not bringing in Chris Hemsworth as a brother husband.  He could teach my original Chris about Norse mythology and abs.  And he could teach me how to wield my inner mjolnir effectively, and sit at the kitchen table having cheekbones and being fierce.  Between him and the pigeons, this fortress would become essentially impenetrable.

Now, if you don’t mind, I’m going to briefly discuss fitness-related things.  If fitness and body fat percentages and goals and diets are not your thing, skip the next segment.

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On my own impenetrability front, I’ve been working my ass off to try and hit 15% body fat this summer, while maintaining strength and stamina.  I’d like to accomplish a couple of things.  A marathon within a slightly more reasonable time frame, for one.  The burpee broad jump mile, for another.  My brother, who has completed both, says the burpee mile is worse.  I would believe him except for that when he ran the marathon, he ended up gimping around for a year with plantars vaginitis and having to wear Das Boot, and when he did the burpee broad jump, he didn’t seem to have any kind of lasting injury except for PTSD.

Exercise-related PTSD is something I understand, given my experience with the 36 F underwater barrels of the Tough Mudder Colorado last year.  Because that sucked so hard that it created a vacuum in my existence and caused nightmares for 9 months.  It’s the first athletic event that I’ve done that I’ve said “I have no desire to ever do this again” after completion.  I have my orange headband and my title.  That’s all I need.  Victory is forever.  Like herpes.

Anyway, 15% is proving to be more elusive than I could have EVER imagined.  I’m sitting at 16-16.5% right now, and it’s the leanest I’ve ever been in my life, bar none.  I have had to do some BULL SHIT to get here.  At 5’9, empty stomach and bladder, I’m tipping the scales at 132 lbs.  At the same time, I’m lifting big girl weights, pulling many hundreds of pounds on sleds, thrusting 35 lb plates for an hour at a time, and running.  I’m doing things I said I’d never do.  Replacing meals with protein shakes.  Eating eggs for breakfast.  Making appetizing slurries of fruits and leafy greens to toss down the hatch like an Irish car bomb, only less delicious and with way more antioxidative powers.  And my caffeine levels?  I am so hopped up on stimulants that I’m essentially a human vibrator.

Keep your panties on, I’m not that kind of girl.

This photo was taken during mile 2, after a beer bong on someone's front lawn.

I am the kind of girl who totally just ran the BolderBoulder and finished in the top 30% of my division (there were 623 women ages 30-34).  I shaved 41 minutes off of my 6-months-pregnant BolderBoulder time, but in fairness a lot of that one was walking with a group of other pregnant women and assorted husbands.  And it was while we lived in TX, so I was killed by the altitude back then, and now I’m used to it.  I ran this year’s (6 days ago) wearing the shirt I got for my pregnant race, and as you can see it’s both too short by 3 inches AND too wide by 6 inches.  Thank you, women’s fashion, for giving me a shirt that looks like it was designed for (and potentially by) SpongeBob SquarePants.

The point is that the lowered body mass (I’m usually 10 lbs heavier as a static weight), has sped me up quite a bit, which bodes well for distance races.  The tricky part is trying to maintain a reduction in weight while retaining/gaining muscle.  What I’ve had to do to make this happen is dramatically increase my protein.  Now stop for a sec.

I am not doing a low carb diet.  I am not Paleo.  I am not restricting fats.  I am not restricting sugar.  What I’m doing is simply increasing my protein significantly, because I want to make sure that when I’m lifting, I’m always got enough amino acid floating around that my metabolic systems don’t decide that the easiest way to get fuel is to cannibalize my muscles.  This isn’t Miami.  It’s been tricky, because I’m unaccustomed to eating so much protein, and I’m not willing to change the quality of the meat and eggs we purchase.  I drink a lot of shakes and eat a lot of eggs.

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Now, fitness gains aside, here is a badass sandwich that combines great swaths of protein inside my famously amazing Dill Dough Rolls.

It's the loafiest!

The biggest problem with the meatloaf sandwich is that I am violently opposed to the term “meatloaf.”  It’s just unappetizing.  Ham loaf.  Loafers.  Pinch a…. you get the picture.  Loaf is just not a nice word unless you’re talking about fresh bread.  So when I say that this sandwich is filled with “meatloaf,” it is with great trepidation and sadness.  But worth it.

The only thing…and I do mean ONLY…that I am changing for this recipe is that in MY batch, I used about a tablespoon too much salt.  It was SALTY.  So I’m fixing it for the recipe below, because I don’t want your kidneys to hate me for assaulting them.  Otherwise, these were just fantastic sandwiches.  The dill dough rolls, with just a dash of horseradish added for spice, make sweet flavor babies with the beefy heartiness of the…filling.

I plan on bringing a couple of these to the happy…not couple…um…the Happy Few pigeon parents when their brood hatches.  I’m sure that all the small birds will be happy and healthy, and not immediately “turned gay” like the GOP would have you believe because they were raised by an alternative lifestyle.  Free love, everybody.  Especially Chris Hemsworth.

CAN YOU IMAGINE OUR BABIES?????