feed me seymour, feed me now

As you have probably noticed, I've been away from the blog for a bit. My apologies to all my loyal readers. All both of you.

I just finished up teaching a three-week course on Classical Literature for *gifted* high school students and right after that was the online high school "faculty" "retreat" (both words deserve scare quotes - I learned that I am not, in fact, faculty but simply an instructor, and the retreat was about as far from a retreat as a boardroom in Palo Alto is from a cabin in Tahoe). After the retreat was the big graduation for all the online seniors (real graduation - not virtual). And then I promptly got a cold. And then I had to sit on the couch playing MarioKart for an entire day. Cold cured.

The weekend was nothing but catered meals (including a wedding up in Berkeley on Friday night) and it was definitely tough to be a vegan. At the wedding on Friday I ate dairy because it would have been starve city otherwise (and it kinda still was - the woman dishing the gnocchi only gave me two little dumplings and then another two after I begged...but the wedding was LOVELY). At the faculty retreat I took the hunk of mozzarella off my sandwich, but the pesto spread wasn't going anywhere. And the graduation party at a student's house on Saturday featured a wonderful salad covered in crumbled blue cheese. Blast.

I was pretty good about packing snacks over the past few days to ward off any fainting spells, but I think if I really am going to commit to being vegan I'm also going to have to be more vocal about it. Case in point, when it did come out that I was vegan at the retreat a soy cheese pizza magically showed up for lunch the next day. I think the trick for me is finding that balance between speaking up and just keeping my mouth shut. If the bride wants to serve vegetables soaked in butter, I will eat it with a big smile on my face. But if the admin brings nothing but butter-soaked pastries as breakfast for a retreat, I might give a grumble or too.