The driver on a road trip asks, “Do you need to use the restroom? This is the last one for about 60 miles.” “Nope,” you reply. “I’m good.” Ten minutes later you are a human Twizzler and you’re thinking that the side of the road is looking pretty good.

Isn’t that how it always happens? You’re just fine until someone makes a suggestion, then a few minutes later, you’re miserable.

Yesterday, I shared a couple of changes I’ve noticed even before I get hip deep into this Reboot. One of the changes was a decrease in hunger pangs. Seriously, I haven’t heard my stomach growl in two weeks…until last night. I committed to really starting this Reboot and the imps in my brain are telling the terrorists in my tummy to send off panicky feelings of starvation. My stomach rumbling sounded like the start of an MGM movie! I powered through it, though. I drank my bottled juices and had some herbal tea. The lion sleeps tonight.

As I also mentioned yesterday, I had planned to start making juices/smoothies right away since my wonderful juicer wasn’t scheduled to arrive until next week. However, before I broke out the blender, I got a message from Amazon saying that my juicer actually shipped yesterday and will be here by tonight! I. AM. PSYCHED. Because I’m so close to being able to do it exactly as prescribed, I’m just going to keep with the bottled juices until tomorrow when I can make my own.

I’ll tell you what, this whole juicing thing has been and continues to be such an education for me! I had planned to continue drinking my little Bolthouse Farms juices thinking that they would be okay. Then I started looking into their pasteurization methods to see how many nutrients were destroyed in the process. I found this article: Don’t Fall Victim To These Tricky Juice Labels and am now annoyed that the bottled juices I’ve been getting from the grocery store aren’t nearly as good for me as I thought they were. Oh, sure, they’re better than a pint of ice cream; but, they are not as nutritionally sound as the labels led me to believe. Silver lining: I then went in search of a juice bar near me where I can stock up before work and score! I found one – Pa Bunk’s. I’ll stop by there this afternoon to get me through until tomorrow when I can really start this thing.

Have you noticed how many times I’ve said “I had planned?” As I move through this process, learning more about the world of natural and bottled juices, my plans change almost as quickly as I make them. It reminds me a great deal of when I first started this journey three years ago. I had a basic framework for how I needed to eat and what I needed to do; but, I made mistakes and tweaked my program as I went along. As I learned, I altered my course. I hadn’t thought that I would be doing the same thing with this juicing experiment; but, I’m glad I was wrong. It will be a bigger adventure this way and it will be much more fun to share with you.

I thought I had it all figured out; but, it turns out there is so much more to learn. Isn’t that how it always happens?

After a week’s worth of prep, I’m ready to start my juice fast today. Although I did eat a salad with balsamic vinaigrette on Wednesday, and a spoonful each of baked beans, potato salad and banana pudding at a cookout on Saturday, the rest of the days this week have seen me eating only granola bars and bananas, and drinking a variety of fruit and vegetable juices along with coconut water.

You couldn’t see me; but, I totally shivered when I typed that – coconut water. So, Joe Cross says that I need to be drinking a ton of this stuff every day because of the potassium it contains. Basically, coconut water is like natural Gatorade. He recommends that I drink the unsweetened, unflavored kind. Um…no. I tried it, y’all, really I did. I even tried it at that super-cold temperature you use when you serve crappy wine so that no one can really taste it. Nope. Coconut water tastes like sweaty grass. Plus, it’s not exactly in my budget – a liter ran me about four bucks. At that price, I’ll mix what I have left with fruit juices that mask its taste enough that I can drink it; but, I’ll not be buying any more. Sorry, Joe. I’m just going to have to throw a few bananas in with my juices every day. For me, that’s noconut water.

I did drink a lot of plain water over the week, though, and not one single soda. As I told you last week, I drank my last Diet Coke on Friday night. By Sunday, a universe was being born in my head. I could barely lift it off the pillow. To be honest, my head didn’t completely stop hurting until Tuesday. Even until Friday I would have sold a kidney for a cold Diet Coke; but, the cravings have decreased since then. When I go into a convenience store, I find myself heading for the cooler more out of habit than anything else.

In addition to plain water, I’ve enjoyed Vitamin Water Zero with no artificial sweeteners. The lemonade flavor is my favorite. I also like those flavored waters by Dasani; but, I worry about the sweeteners they use since I can’t find them listed. I’ve also followed Joe’s advice and replace my morning cup of coffee with a cup of hot water with lemon. It’s not nearly the same as my personal CDM/French vanilla brew; but, it’s a warm drink that has some flavor and my body seems to like that.

As for juices, I drank a few Spicy V-8s. And I’ve bought some of the Naked brand – Green Machine, Berry Veggie, and Orange Mango: but, their juices contain more sugar than I really want in each serving. I prefer the juices from Bolthouse Farms. Their Mango Ginger + Carrot is my favorite! They also make a Daily Greens juice that is just stupid nutritious! The flavor takes a little getting used to, though, so I like to mix a quart-sized bottle of it with a 15.2 ounce bottle of their Green Goodness. It makes the Daily Greens a little sweeter, but doesn’t wreck the nutritional value with all that sugar – natural or not.

This week, I’ll start with the 5-Day Reboot, then go from there. I thought I had a line on a great used juicer, but the seller flaked out on me; so, I’m going shopping today before I hit up the local grocery stores for my veggies. More tomorrow on what I find in both categories.

So, even after an astrophysical headache and Diet Coke DTs, I’m still resolved and ready to get this underway! Let’s get juicing!

Okay, so I bought Reboot with Joe on Thursday and had planned to start my juice fast on Saturday. Then I read the book, and as if often the case, the thing isn’t as simple as one-two-three-go. There is preparation to be done.

Before I go on the full-on juice fast, I need to:

1. remove refined sugars from my diet
2. get off the caffeine – no more coffee or diet cokes during the fast
3. get caught up on sleep
4. buy a juicer

I took the weekend to do some of this:

1. I haven’t been eating many refined sugars in the past few weeks; so, this one is no biggie. My digestive system has been upset for a full week and has tolerated only granola bars, of all things. They do have some refined sugar, but not as much as if I were having a candy bar or a regular soda every day. My tummy is still ticked off for some reason; so, I continued to eat them over the weekend.

2. Oh. My. God. I don’t know when I last tried to get off caffeine; but, clearly, it was long enough ago that I have forgotten the Big Bang Headache that goes with it! My head feels like a universe is being born in it! The matter inside my head is expanding at far greater rate than my skull can accomodate. My ears are bleeding, my eyes just popped out onto the table, it’s mayhem, I tell you! I exaggerate. A little. But if headaches were jewelry, this one would make Cartier’s collection look like gumball machine loot.

3. As a result of my vicious headache, however, I did get a lot of sleep. (When it hurts to keep your eyes open, you tend to drift off, no?) As you know, the past month has been full of more grief, more anxiety, more work, more excitement and less sleep than my normal months. As a result, I was a little sleep deprived to begin with. Joe says in his book that the first five days of a reboot can be really difficult. To make those days easier, he recommends resting before the reboot. Since he does this every quarter or so, I’d say he knows of what he speaks. To be honest, I was unconscious for most of the weekend. As the single mother of a young man, I remember well the days when that kind of uninterrupted rest was impossible and I am grateful to have the luxury now.

4. Last week, I said that I planned to go the smoothie route rather than just juicing. I also said that I planned a 30-day fast. After having read the book, I have changed my mind about both of those things. Joe says that only the insoluble fiber is removed during the juicing process, not all fiber, as I believed. I was concerned about losing all that fiber; however, the pulp that is left behind is mostly insoluble stuff that my body can’t break down anyway. I can still use it to make broths and other things; so, even that is not a total waste. I am concerned about the nutrients that are lost in the juicing process. It seems that smoothies keep all of those nutrients. However, the reboot program works for so many, I think that I need to at least try it the way it is constructed to see if it works for me. If I start making changes to it right out of the gate, I’ll never know. As for the 30-day fast, that’s just too long for me. I don’t need to lose that much weight; so, a 15-day fast should be plenty.

Hey, if you’re game, there is still time to get the book, do the prep and join me! Those who have done it report increased energy and mental clarity which both sound really good to me. So, I am still excited about my upcoming fast – or, I will be as soon as this intracranial Big Bang is finished.

Whenever anyone I knew talked about becoming a vegetarian or about a vegetarian they knew, I would always screw up my face, uttering an oh-so-mature “Ewww!” I’ve always been WAAAY too carnivorous to be a vegetarian. I love me some steak, hamburger, bacon, pork chops, swordfish, shrimp, chi…well, you get the picture. I’ve always been all about the animal protein, eating it at all three meals and sometimes even having meals that consisted only of animal protein. But that was Before.

I can’t believe that it’s been three years since I changed my eating habits and lost enough weight to make a ninth-grader.

When I started the whole thing, I purposely ate a lot more fruits and vegetables. I made sure that at least 75% of my plate was made up of non-starchy plants. I ate no animal protein on one day of the week. I ate only fish one day and whatever lean meats I wanted on the other five. But that has slowly changed.

In a typical week, I may eat animal protein only once or twice – not one or two days, but one or two times. Okay, that number goes up if I figure butter in there, but since we’re such good friends and all, let’s not split hairs, shall we? Every now and then, I might eat a couple of meals of scrambled eggs, making my total much higher, but that doesn’t happen frequently. You may be surprised at this – I certainly was. (Or, you may not. You may not know me well enough to feel one way or the other, really. You’re just reading this while you have your morning coffee.) Once I assessed my food intake, I realized that I was becoming a (gasp!) vegan!

Okay, okay. Let’s not get ahead of ourselves here. I’m no vegan. I wear leather shoes, eat honey, shave, wash regularly, and can’t macrame to save my life. (That’s not fair. I shouldn’t perpetuate that stereotype. Vegans don’t all macrame.) Veganism is a philosophical stance. I’m not that philosophical about food, unless it’s banana pudding, then I’m practically Descartes. Vegetarianism is closer; but, they eat dairy which, with the exception of butter and ice cream, I don’t – or I rarely do. Although I didn’t plan the change, I’m beginning to think of myself more as an herbivore.

In line with that, yesterday, I bought Joe Cross’s book Reboot With Joe in anticipation of going on a 30-day juice fast. Actually, I plan to keep the fiber from the fruits and vegetables and drink smoothies; but, the spirit is the same. I have ten pounds I’d like to lose and since I don’t exercise nearly like I did two years ago, it’s a real struggle. I decided to do Joe’s reboot to A) lose those ten pounds, and B) see if the massive doses of macro and micronutrients would alleviate some of the pain in my hands and feet. I started reading the book immediately and plan to start the reboot on Saturday.

For the next month, the blog will be mostly about food again and I’ll give you updates on changes that I feel and see. Get ready! Here we go!

This morning I enjoyed a wonderful breakfast with my dad. He made Scotch oats with cinnamon, milled flaxseed and craisins, spicy V-8, Bing cherries and thick sliced bacon. (Hey, in reasonable quantities, bacon isn’t an enemy. Plus, we’re talking Wright’s bacon here. A slice or two in a month isn’t going to undo all of the good things I eat.) Daddy and I are both cherry fiends – we will eat them until we are literally sick. Cherries, prunes, dates and watermelon are traps for both of us.

Dad said that he had taken a bag of cherries to one of his work sites; but, the people there didn’t eat them. They eat apples, plums, peaches, and bananas. They might eat a pear every now and then, but the only cherries they eat are on top of a banana split. This restarted a conversation from several days ago about people with very limited vegetable menus. How many people do we all know who eat green beans, corn, white potatoes, maybe some yellow squash, and maybe some broccoli? They are missing out on the bounty of produce available! There is so much wonderful stuff out there to try!

Years ago, my son and I ate lunch at P.F Changs on our way to pick  up our Christmas tree. He ordered some kind of Singapore street noodle thing (I think) that neither of us liked. He apologized all over himself for ordering something he couldn’t eat since the meal was kind of a special occasion. I reminded him that if you never try new things, you never know how much you really like. As a result, his menu is broader even than mine! He will try anything once and, more often than not, likes it. (By the way, never share a bucket of mussels with him. He doesn’t really share.)

Some time ago, I challenged all of us to find and try something new. I think it’s about time for that challenge again. It is, after all, summer time and fresh produce is rolling in from all directions. If we can’t find an actual new item (like kohlrabi for me), let’s try preparing an old standard a new way. Grill it, roast it, steam it or serve it with simpler seasoning. Instead of boiling your yellow squash, dice it up, sauté it, and put it in  scrambled eggs. Bake a grapefruit half with a little brown sugar and serve it for dessert.

Let’s all shake up our menus and let the bounty of what’s available to us nourish our bodies and feed our spirits.