Getting to the Meat of the Problem

I have to say I love me a good piece of meat. I've always been a steak girl. And, yes, I know it's sinfully bad for me, but I don't think I can help myself.

Three-quarters of our family, in fact, not only favors red meat, but likes it done up rare. An old expression comes to mind: "I'll have mine rare~Just wipe its but & run it by the fire."

Last year, the Veggie Family tried to be good. The Wild One read Skinny Bitch over Winter Break, and all of the sudden the Veggies were going Quasi-Vegetarian.

The mantra of SB's authors?

"If you can't take one more day of self-loathing, you're ready to hear the truth: You cannot keep shoveling the same crap into your mouth every day and expect to lose weight."

They pinpoint red meat as the culprit in many of our diet disasters. So, at the first of the year we vamoosed cow from our diet.

I had a whole new repertoire in the kitchen. Quiche Lorraine replaced Ribeye. Curry stood in for flank steak. We still did kabobs, but they featured chicken instead of sirloin.

Moker started to make cracks at the dinner table. Things like, "I just wish I could eat a meal that required a knife every so often." But even the Big Guy got with the program, eventually.

Have to say I'm pretty proud of the Veggie Family. We lasted close to four months. Then TWO, who had orchestrated the whole charade, decided that she, too had had enough.

She broke her fast one sunny late-April afternoon, with a post-school steak burrito. And then we celebrated with burgers on the grill that night.

It was a challenge while it lasted. And, no, I didn't lose weight. Not an ounce!