Blessings Abound

In the last week or so, I have been able to reflect on some of the things that God has blessed me with. Milestones are always a good time to reflect. That's right- this blogger turns 21 today! I could drink whatever I want now, except for a milkshake.

This year, I embraced the fact that I am lactose intolerant, or at least lactose resistant. Allow me to quote a scene from Gilmore Girls that explains it:

PARIS: Logan, did you just polish off a carton of milk?

LOGAN: Oh, yeah, I guess I did. Sorry. There’s plenty more in there, though.

PARIS: Well, actually, no.

LOGAN: Really?

PARIS: Nope. There’s no milk in here for my cereal. It’s cool. I'll just skip breakfast and suffer the afternoon mood swings.

LOGAN: I’m sorry I could have sworn there were like four or five cartons in there.

PARIS: Each of these milks is here for a reason. I need the 2% for my cereal, whole milk for my tea, half-and-half for my coffee, skim milk for cooking or baking, plus, I like to keep lactaid on hand for Doyle.

DOYLE: Which I don't need. Because I'm not lactose intolerant.

PARIS: You're lactose resistant. You have a bias against lactose. You're sensitive.

DOYLE: I'm not sensitive. I have no problem with lactose.

PARIS: There’s nothing wrong with being sensitive. Jake Gyllenhaal is sensitive. Orlando Bloom is sensitive.

DOYLE: Me and lactose are cool. We're down.

I have switched to lactaid and I like it a lot better. I think there's fake sugar in there to keep it tasting legit but who cares because it makes my stomach hurt less. On to more things about this year! 

I started dating Andrew. That has been a lot of fun, a challenge, a new and exciting thing to figure out, and most of all, a blessing. He is great and I'm so grateful for the time we get to spend together.

I moved back home to continue my education. Commuter life is nothing to frown about. I enjoy it. Yesterday, I went through the Starbucks drivethru before my 7:45 class and come to find out, whoops, my window won't roll down because there's ice on it. Cue me opening my door to order, then pulling forward, putting my car in park and exiting the vehicle to pay for and receive my coffee. #drivethruDork

That day, I just got plain ol' coffee but a lot of times I drink lattes. Let me tell you, i feel really pretentious ordering a soy latte. I always want to explain that it's not due to any amount of snobbiness but that I really am dairy resistant. If you ever feel the urge to judge someone for ordering soy whatever, consider that they might be trying to avoid a nasty stomach ache and they are paying extra to avoid it. One barista was kind enough to tell me that when someone asks for soy, the employee is supposed to ask the customer whether or not they want whipped cream. I always forget to say no whip so I appreciate this policy.

Speaking of drinks, I started my own self imposed policy of only drinking pop on Fridays. I think that started this year, but I don't know. The policy isn't set in stone, like sometimes I trade Thursday for Friday or over Christmas I didn't follow it at all. It has been good for me to cut out some extra sugar and still feel like it's not forbidden. I'm learning to cook slowly but surely. I make a mean chicken piccata. By that I mean that I made it once with way too much garlic, and then the second time around it was a lot better. You gotta start somewhere! I'm already scheming for my next experiment. Also I want to make apple chips because those things are delicious. They're not hard to make according to the recipe I found, so I'm jazzed about that.

I started classes at Trinity and I'm really liking them. A lot of my profs have assigned weekly reflections. I like doing that a lot more than I like doing things like finding a relevant article and summarizing it. 

I secured a job this summer as a program host at Arrowhead Bible Camp. I am so excited for another summer on staff there. I can't say enough how the Lord has used that ministry to shape who I am as a person. In one of my courses, we are looking at the purpose of life and what are you doing to fulfill that purpose. One of my classmates broke it down as your purpose is your big picture and your assignments is what God has you doing right now or in the near future. I think this job is one of my assignments and I can already see some of the ways God is going to challenge me this summer.

In the last year, God has lead me on a great adventure. Never before in my life have I seen God's plan laid out before me so clearly. The plan looks pretty sweet from here- as it should. It came from Him, not me. So yeah. Life is really good right now. I'm excited to see this next year unfold one day at a time. 

Tastebuds

Something I've been wondering about lately is why some people like some foods and other people don't. I have done absolutely no research (not even a quick google search to see what yahoo answers thinks) but here are the ideas I have and I think it's a combo platter of these three:
1. That if everyone liked the same tastes, then we would like all of those tastes equally and everything would be bland. If you liked steak as much as you liked asparagus and I did too, then everything we ate would be at the same level. When you like the taste of a food more than the taste of another food, you're allowing for range in your palate. Even if there was just those two foods, one is more desirable than the other and you would likely choose one more often than you chose the other. That leaves more steak for the people who like steak more. That leads me to my next theory.

2. The basic supply and demand rule demands that people like different tastes. If absolutely no one likes bananas, then there wouldn't be a bunch of huge banana processing plants (that's probably a thing, right?) and there wouldn't be banana tree farms. The trees might exist somewhere in the wild for the sake of the monkeys. Anyway, if the only thing that everyone likes is lemons, then there would probably not be enough lemons to go around because they can't grow everywhere. With a bunch of people who have a bunch of different taste preferences, a variety of food must exist to satisfy them. Then you add in our nutritional needs and the lemon thing becomes a little silly, but you hopefully catch my drift.

3. It's more fun that way. It's interesting when you find a friend who eats the same weird stuff that you do. How crazy that someone can eat a thing and enjoy it and someone else could eat that same thing and want to spit it out.  That happens sometimes with art I guess, that someone finds an image beautiful and someone else thinks it's garbage but that's more about opinion than food is. If something offends your palate, I don't know that you have a bunch of control over that. I suppose you could talk yourself into eating it. There's a huge variety of food in this world and while not everyone likes everything, everything is liked by someone.

There's some pretty common things that other people like that I do not like at all. Cottage cheese, sour cream apple sauce, yogurt (see the theme of texture there? blegh), sweet potatoes, tomatoes, bananas, pork chops, and probably other stuff.

So yeah, that's pretty weird. Food is so tasty.