So why the journey?

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Well, let's start at the very beginning. In 1992 my best friend was 16 and his brother accidentally shot him. Don't get on your soap box about hunting safety, everyone is young and dumb and he thought the rifle was empty. So buck shot entered the abdominal region, tore up intestines and a few surgeries were needed to repair the intestines, and remove intestines that couldn't be fixed. Well, if you don't know: removing intestines to fix them isn't the easiest of surgeries, nor is it possible for the surgeon to get them back in as they originally were. So they took the appendix as it never would have been found if it ruptured/went bad and 8 1/2 feet of his intestines went into the incinerator.

Now that 8 1/2 feet includes some of the large intestine (colon). That means the buck shot went "up". I must admit that the xrays are fun to play connect the dots with, I digress. Scar tissue will form anywhere they fixed the intestines. Scar tissue will form on the inside as well as the outside (adhesions). This means that your intestines won't move properly. Blockages will happen. A colonoscopy is the best way to see the scar tissue on the inside.

Now we move to some time about 25 or so years ago, about 2000. Said bestie got bit by a tick. It started small. Upset tummy. That was all. No biggie, maybe the "meat" just didn't agree with the already picky tummy. When you're missing intestines and were told that scar tissue would form...

But it continued to happen. Beef, pork, eventually turkey (we didn't attempt any other fowl) and then fish. All things he loved to eat, out the window. So vegetarinism was becoming a bigger must as the years went by, In 2023 he went completely vegan. This was for a multitude of reasons. The biggest reason was that the vegan cheeses, sour cream, butter and a few other things actually taste good now. The other reason is that American milk is crap. Mainly because of how cows are raised in America. But I won't get into that right here.

When you grew up with mom stirring the pot, taking a taste, adding something, stirring, taste, then using same spoon (still) to stir something else, it takes a bit to learn to not cross contaminate the food.

We have 2 instant pots. 1 is Bestie friendly only and the other is for the 2 carnivores (me and my spouse-oh and the dog gets home made food) in the house. We have 2 "meat mashers", red is bad! The green one is for veggies only. We have 1 brush that gets used for "meaty" things. Meaty things get washed 4 (four) times! Yes, 4, because then I can guarantee that it is clean! If I'm cooking meaty things on the stove I put aluminum foil over the stuff on the counters to keep them non-meaty. We have 2 fridges. Yep 1 vegetarian\vegan, 1 meaty. If we even think we may have cross contaminated something it goes in our fridge. If it's the stick butter I put it in a paper bowl, put another paper bowl over it and write NO CJ! Some things I write it on the lid, like sour cream, but he knows to stay out of our fridge for "condiments". If we even think we may have touched meat, we wash our hands! Can't tell you how often I have to wash off the Power Wash (I'll put the recipe in the recipe page) bottle, the faucet and the faucet handle. Then I have to clean the sink to ensure that he doesn't touch it and then lick a finger off when he makes coffee, tea, or whatever.

Which reminds me of the hospital visit the 1 Easter weekend. He was putting the ham away and 1 drop, and I mean 1 drop, of ham juice hit his lip, he licked his lip... Oh the screaming!

Eating out can be a hospital trip as well!

If we happen to have the Phenergan or Zofram on hand for the nausea, then just waiting is the best bet but if it's an actual blockage, it's a hospital trip.

So this has been the journey