There was a woman in line behind me at the grocery store today buying a package of Hostess cupcakes, a big bag of beef jerky, and a Coke.

she forgot the squirty cheese

There's a restaurant here in DC that has weekend morning brunches with both vegan and omnivorous options. I usually go there with my parents when they visit -- I can get the awesome scrambled tofu rancheros, and my dad can get something he can pronounce. (My mom usually gets the scrambled tofu -- she tried some off my plate once and decided she liked it better than eggs.)

Oh! Bringing together the vegan and the junk food topics: the new Doritos flavor is vegan! Sweet Chili flavor, or something like that. I haven't tried it yet. And there's plenty of vegan junk food out there already, but mmm. Doritos.

I think that cooking a vegan meal would be an enjoyable challenge, i mean, it certainly wouldn't stop me from inviting a vegan to dinner.

first, certain kinds of meat cooking (like bacon) just smell disgusting,

Yeah, the last time I was in Vegas with my girls, some of us were in the process of cooking and eating a pound of bacon when one of the vegetarians came down begging us to open the door to dissipate the smell. We were like "????" but I guess I can see it being nasty.

Cooking meals with various restrictions seems limiting at first, but after a while, you barely think about it. (Just glancing in my kitchen now to come up with meals for the week, I've got noodles with seitan and peanut sauce, cauliflower-lentil curry, tofu-watercress stirfry, black bean chili with cornbread, and split pea soup. And that's just from a vague sort of "What can I see from my couch or remember I have in the fridge?" I think the noodles with seitan and the tofu-watercress stirfry will be the stuff I actually make -- the first because it uses up stuff I can't use on Passover, and the second because that watercress is going to get gooey if I don't use it in the next day or two.)

I know more than a couple vegans who are just fine with dating meat eaters.

And I've had plenty of delicious vegan food.

Yeah, I don't think the bacon smell thing is really related to me being vegetarian, actually -- I've always thought the smell was gross.

I wonder if people who deeply love music would break up with someone who listened to music they hated?

Hmmm, I don't think I'd even date someone that didn't mostly mesh with me musically. I love music and love to see bands. GF and I are as one on this issue, fortunately.

I really don't like the smell of raw chicken. However, I really like cooked chicken so I just suffer. I can tell when someone has just started to cook chicken in the over because of the disgusting smell.

I do like the smell of raw beef though. And I like my cuts rare, so it's good I do!