Timelies all!

The check engine light went on in my car on my drive home. I'm going to drop it off at the dealer early tomorrow and hope it isn't anything major. Feh.

I think I need a reality check. There's this post on consumerist [link] about a vegan blog that put together a recipe for a vegan version of the KFC Double Down. I thought the post was funny. But a lot of the comments are things like "Vegans: You have the right to eat whatever you want, just don't try to get me to go vegan or act all morally superior about it" or "Why do vegans have to be so self-righteous? Different strokes for different folks, live and let live." And I'm puzzled. The one thing in that post that I can see as insulting anybody is a swipe at KFC.

But now I'm worried that, if people are seeing self-righteousness and moral superiority in a post where I see having fun with food and chemistry, do people hear that when I talk about my food? Is there something in that post that I'm not seeing that's provoking that reaction, something that I should try to avoid but don't know to avoid because I don't know it's there?

It's not you; it's them. Hell, if someone can't tell that the vegans are even poking fun at themselves in that post, they certainly can't tell the difference between self-righteousness and, uh, whatever is not self-righteous.

Some people hear vegetarian or vegan and instantly assume they are being judged for not eating that way.

The brother of an former boyfriend tried to get me to argue with him because he ordered a steak at dinner. He was all "Aren't you a vegetarian?" He was really perplexed that I didn't care what he ate.

Hil, I don't ever see anything self-righteousness or morally superior in your posts about food (or anyone else's here). I'm pretty sensitive to that, being as I once dated a vegan who really WAS insufferably righteous about it.

I'm convinced I need a denim pencil skirt for work and socializing. I keep hunting but have yet to purchase.

Hil, I think it's a combo of people mistakenly feeling judged any time a vegan pipes up and having been so judged in the past. Not you and not the post.

Thanks.

The brother of an former boyfriend tried to get me to argue with him because he ordered a steak at dinner. He was all "Aren't you a vegetarian?" He was really perplexed that I didn't care what he ate.

I've had that happen a few times. Someone offers me a bite of something, I say "No thanks," they offer again, I say, "I'm vegan," and they respond, "Oh, you think I'm a murderer for eating this, don't you?" (Or, in the case of my officemate, responds by asking about the Jewish law concerning hunting, and whether there is any Jewish holiday on which one is required to eat something non-vegan.)

That kind of reminds me now of a Rosh Hashanah dinner when I was a teenager. There was some dish where we'd made a vegetarian version and a meat version, and my mom's cousin kept asking me about why I wasn't eating the meat version. I tried every polite answer that I could think of -- "I'm vegetarian," "I don't eat meat," "That dish has beef in it, which is meat, and I don't eat meat, so I'm not eating that dish," -- but she just KEPT asking, like, nonstop, "But what's wrong with meat? Why don't you eat it?" My mother had a very firm rule that there was to be no mention of dead animals at the dinner table, so I tried, "I'm vegetarian for animal rights reasons." And she responded, "But what do animals have to do with meat?" At which point I just blinked at her for a while.

We made it home. The kids did well on the flights to and from Florida. We had perfect beach weather while we were there. We are all pink and sandy and I have a metric ton of laundry to do.

I have skimmed but I am sorry for your car woes, Zmayhem. I hope you guys can catch a decent break soon.

Allyson, I'm sorry Sam isn't getting the love.

msbelle, glad the house is progressing.

P-C, you are a mensch, truly.

I'm forgetting other stuff, I'm pretty sure.

Welcome safely home, Cashmere! Glad the weather gods were kind.

And she responded, "But what do animals have to do with meat?"

Oh dear.