Light and Momentary

Apples and fennel and walnuts, oh my

I mentioned recently that Elwood had made an apple-fennel salad I loved, and Alexandra asked for the recipe. It's a simple one from the NYT: combine thin-sliced apples with fennel and celery in a lemon-olive oil dressing; add toasted walnuts. They call for Parmesan cheese but I'm not convinced it's necessary.

There is another batch of apple-fennel salad in our fridge at the moment, and I decided that I would serve myself a pile of it on top of a pile of sliced cabbage, because A Cabbage A Day Keeps Your Microbiome Happy; It's Science. 

I added a comment to my post from yesterday with a few more details about the study I mentioned, and out of curiosity I weighed my cabbage before I added anything to it. Result: 45 grams. That is FIVE PERCENT of two pounds, you guys. I would have to eat TWENTY of those piles of cabbage. I cannot decide whether I find this more horrifying or hilarious.

Tonight I stopped at one pile of cabbage, served underneath one pile of apple-fennel salad, alongside Elwood's tomato soup and a grilled-cheese sandwich. Gotta say, I'd rather lead a life of pleasant cozy varied fall dinners than a life filled with radish sprouts and pureed broccoli, in which I was "instructed...not to consume any other foods or beverages, except water."

I guess my microbiome will have to adapt.

Too much of a good thing

I went looking for scholarly papers that described the impact of cruciferous vegetables on the microbiome, and I found a study that did indeed report changes. But you guys, they fed their participants TWO POUNDS of cruciferous vegetables EVERY DAY.

I have a fondness for cabbage that is, frankly, a little bizarre, but TWO POUNDS of cabbage is a lot of cabbage to eat in one day.

Now I can't find the paper to confirm that the participants were indeed human beings and not, say, cows or giant captive capybaras or what have you.

If I had been assigned to review that paper I would have said, "Please say more about your participants' degree of compliance with this TOTALLY BANANAPANTS diet." Generally when I am peer-reviewing a paper I avoid phrases like "totally bananapants," but what other descriptor could apply in this situation?

For the mansplainees

Last night I was scrolling through Facebook when I came across a group of men talking about mansplaining. Lately it has been working for me to keep social media in a small box, popping by on weekends and not giving it too much space in my head the rest of the time. But last night, as I say, one of my white male 60-something friends shared a post about mansplaining, and a whole swarm of his white male 60-something friends felt the need to assert that there is no such thing as mansplaining.

I can't think about that for too long before my head threatens to explode, so I won't. But I suspect, on a blog whose readership is at least 95% female, that there will be some wry nods and eye rolls and sighs of recognition.

For some reason I've had Carrie Underwood's song Before He Cheats in my head this weekend, and it occurred to me that it might lend itself to some updated lyrics.

Before He Speaks

Right now he's probably enlightening a doctoral student about her dissertation
Right now he's probably opining about how effectively he could run the nation
Right now he's probably suspended just above his barstool by his giant ego
But he don't know
what he don't know...

She dug her keys into the side
of his overinflated manly pride
Reported him for all his rabid tweets
She shone a beacon of logic on all his lies
Slashed his ego down to size
Maybe next time he'll think before he speaks

Non sbagliato per niente

I mostly have no idea what drinks are trending these days, but the negroni sbagliato conversation caught my eye.

I am a longtime fan of amari, and my usual wintertime cocktail order is a boulevardier: Campari, vermouth, rye. It's a better version of a negroni, with rye instead of gin. (Brown liquor >> clear liquor. I might not die on that hill, but I would for sure stand there and argue for a while.) I can really only ever have one, though, because I am not much of a drinker. The idea of a negroni sbagliato, where gin gets swapped out for prosecco, made me say immediately and emphatically, "Yes, I will take one of those. Maybe two." It sounded like a wintertime version of an Aperol spritz, my usual warm-weather cocktail. 

Today I came home from work to find negroni sbagliato fixings sitting on my kitchen countertop -- how's that for a fun surprise? Elwood and I went out for Korean food, just the two of us, and after we came home I mixed up a cocktail. Verdict: it ticks pretty much every box for me. Maybe...I will go make myself another. And maybe, even if you are usually skeptical about trendy drinks, you might enjoy trying one too.

A broccoli a day keeps the Zoloft away

Back in the summer when I read Next Level, I posted about the authors' recommendation that women at midlife should eat cruciferous vegetables every day. Obviously, correlation is not causation, nobody should rely on cauliflower when she needs a psychiatrist, etc. BUT ALSO: I think that steady doses of cruciferous vegetables make a substantial difference for me. How much does my gut talk to my brain? Who can say? Not me! How much does my day-to-day diet modify my gut microbiome? Again, who can say? Not me! But I can tell you that my levels of motivation and happiness have been much higher since I put this idea into practice. I don't eat as many vegetables as I used to back in the Vegetable Project days, but every day I ensure that some kind of cruciform something makes its way into my mouth. I am a fan of this plan. Give it a whirl and check back in next month, okay?

Here is another slightly wacky tip for my middle-aged-lady friends in the computer, and it is about sleep. Have you noticed, my MALFITCs, that sleep is more uncertain than it used to be? Do you sometimes wake up in the night and ponder the ceiling for a frustrating two-hour stretch? I accidentally hit on a strategy that has been working surprisingly well for me. This sounds so much like I have gone over to the bro-science dark side that I am suddenly feeling shy about telling you, but here goes anyway: I have been drinking a protein shake before bed, and sleeping like a 20-something. It started because I was trying to up my daily protein intake in an effort to woo the Gains Fairy into swinging by our house and bestowing some larger muscles upon me. The recommended amount of daily protein for optimizing muscle growth is substantial, and I found myself squeezing the last bit of it in before bed. The internet says maybe the effect on sleep is related to tryptophan levels? Not all corners of the internet agree that this is a rock-solid strategy, but I tell you what: I'm sticking with it for now, because the correlation is persuasive. Last night I slept through so many hot flashes that this morning my pajamas smelled like PE clothes neglected in a teenager's locker all semester. But did you catch the key verb phrase in that sentence? I slept through them. Maybe get yourself some protein powder and tell me if it works for you. 

Still another Tuesday book release

I cannot remember the last time I bought this many books on release day in a one-month period, but I did it again today. This time the occasion was the publication of Laura Vanderkam's Tranquility by Tuesday. 

You might remember that I was one of her participants when she tested out the nine principles in the book. I wrote about it in March of 2021. That was one of the least tranquil periods of my adult life. HOOOOOO BOY, I started to explain briefly why it was such a stressful time and YOWZA, I do not especially want to dredge up the memories. (But here's the nutshell version: figuring out online teaching with a dreadful new prep on top of everything else, dealing with an administrative error that left me unable to hold any synchronous meetings for two of my classes, adjusting to post-sabbatical re-entry while also dealing with piles of lingering revisions necessitated by the COVID academic publishing slowdowns, all in the context of our first pandemic winter when hardly anyone was vaccinated yet.)

The scientist in me is very curious, actually: is it easier to boost tranquility in someone whose baseline level is "so far below normal that you'd need a hydraulic drilling rig to dig that far down," or in someone who is feeling more normal?

We shall see, I suppose. As I mentioned at the time, the rules about building productivity were easy for me to get on board with. I am good about maintaining a consistent bedtime; I agree at least in theory about weekly planning sessions even if I sometimes think longingly about skipping them. (OOOHH, MAN, I just got a figurative wallop in the face from another memory: I knew that I needed to be planning my weeks carefully in early 2021, that it was my only hope of staying on top of things. I would look at my massive to-do lists and I would just want to cry. So many tasks, hardly any of which I wanted to do. My current workload is SO MUCH more manageable and rewarding. I have so much fun in the classroom -- time flies, and people ask questions and laugh and stay engaged. It is slightly weird that people laughed as much as they did today when the subject was phonatory physiology, but life is full of surprises.)

As I said at the time, I am better at the work rules than the fun rules. Planning adventures, taking a night just for me-- I know those are good ideas in the abstract and yet I struggle with them. 

I'm not very far into the book, since it just came out today (I've already spotted a quote from 2021 Jamie, though). I'll keep reading and report back. If you undertake a tranquility project of your own, tell me how it goes.