Cackleberry in California!

There is simply no excuse - good, bad or indifferent - for neglecting Cackleberry for so long. So here's one more attempt to get back on track and bring you the great recipes, vegan musings, updates on the animal rights movement and all the other good stuff I used to put out at least semi-regularly.

The news is that I moved, with My Beloved and our two rescue pups, from New England to California - finally fulfilling a dream that we'd shared for several years but never been able to act upon. However, when opportunity suddenly knocked, we leapt at the chance to make the transition from plucky New Englanders to carefree Californians. We quit our jobs, put the house on the market and high-tailed it west.

The road has been long and not a little challenging and you can read all about the actual journey at our travel blog, TheTeapotTourist.blogspot.com, which we updated each day as we drove coast to coast from Westfield, Massachusetts to Concord, California. We rented an RV - a singular experience in and of itself - and, having loaded all of our 'stuff' into a POD and shipped the cars via transporter, we spent 10 days living on the road. Why did we not just fly? Yes, I can hear you asking the obvious question! Well, the truth of it was that Darwin the Beagle, our senior pup, was undergoing a second course of chemo for lymphoma and he was too sick to fly. Besides which, neither My Beloved nor I were confident that either of the pups would be looked after by the airlines as well as we would want, so driving seemed like the only option to us. We gave him his chemo on the road and each state that we passed through offered a dog-friendly campsite that was happy to welcome a slightly shaky senior to its community. :)

And having settled in and felt the California sun on his Back, Darwin is now doing well, as are the rest of us. West coast living suits us and I am finding new interests and new meaning in my life. No, things have not worked out exactly as I had hoped, and there have been a number of disappointments and frustrations, but overall the change is refreshing and inspiring. I passionately want to get back to writing Cackleberry, to playing with new recipes, sharing new photos, and spotlighting issues within the vegan world. In terms of my commitment to veganism and to the animals, nothing has changed in the slightest.

I do not expect that the kind folks who used to follow this blog will flock back in droves, but I do hope the word might get out that Cackleberry is back: bigger, better, still uncompromising, and packed with news, updates, recipes, restaurant reviews, photos, gossip, and all things vegan and animal.

I hope to see you soon. In the meantime, stay vegan, friends!

- Posted using BlogPress from my iPad

Review: Little Things are Big

Sometimes it's the small things in life which make the difference. Courtesy on the road from a fellow motorist equally late to work, a warm smile from the tollbooth collector on a freezing winter night, or a random act of general kindness when least expected.

So that's one reason why I have come to love Maria-Rose's blog Little Things are Big. I stumbled across it accidentally and was drawn immediately to pictures of her beautiful little girl, Miss Bumblebee, and to Maria-Rose's wonderfully gentle writing style. By the time I learned she's also a vegan...well, I was hopeless addicted!

Maria-Rose is one of those unique folks who sees the good in the everyday, the beauty in the routine. Being somewhat of a pessemist myself, it is uplifting to read her posts - especially those of her undercover exploits as the Kindness Bandit. And it doesn't hurt that she's owned by the cutest bassett hound around!

So if you - like me - find yourself occasionally in need of a quick emotional pick-me-up, head on over to check out Little Things are Big. Because sometimes the 'little things' are all that count.....

Stay Vegan, Friends!

On Being 'A Good Vegan'...

A new job, for me, always heralds the arrival of a new coffee mug.

Some folks get a whole new wardrobe. Some a new computer. Me, I get a coffee mug. But hang the expense...sometimes I use it for tea too!

This is my latest acquisition in action:





It's from Compassionate Cooks and is easily the best mug I have bought in several jobs. Capacious with a large, palm-friendly handle, this mug is going to hold all the coffee or tea I can drink on the job and then some. And it spreads the message without me having to say a word: "Be kind to animals - Don't Eat Them". Nice and simple - a philosophy you can take to the bank!

Which brings me onto the topic I was mulling over this morning - practical veganism. I'm currently reading Joanne Stepaniak's book 'Being Vegan' in which she emphasises the difference between veganism and vegetarianism. One is a way of life, the other a way of eating. And I think this is the first time I have seen that distinction set out so clearly. Within the vegan community, I get the sense that vegetarians are considered 'pre-vegans' or maybe 'not-quite vegans', but Joanne draws a very firm line between the two and I think I'm tending towards agreeing with her.

The difference is fundamental and goes a long way to explaining how vegetarians can continue to eat animal products - eggs and dairy, specifically - wear leather and use products which are tested on animals, such as big label cosmetics and detergents. I had always been unable to reconcile this apparent incongruity, unable to understand 'selective compassion'.

But what I'm learning from Stepaniak's work is that vegetarianism really is about diet, whereas veganism is a whole lifestyle founded in compassion and active harmlessness. I particularly like this last part - active harmlessness - as it moves veganism out of the realm of passive avoidance (of animal bodies and secretions in 'food', of animal skins as clothing etc) and into an active realm of making life better - for animals and human animals alike.

I have always felt strongly that it is not sufficient to simply switch from a ground up cow burger to a veggie burger, but that I had to do more. I have to spread the message, to show folks how their actions - like mine - affect others around them. To be a good vegan and to make a difference.

And so, I came upon a post by Agnes, the high priestess of homemade vegan ice cream and was saddened to learn that she's received flak about a recent recipe. Apparently the Guinness in her Guinness ice cream is not vegan and some people have slammed her for being a 'bad vegan'. Since she's disabled comments on her blog, I hope she's able to get to this open letter.

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Dear Agnes,

I am a fan of your blog - I guess that goes without saying. And I was sad to read your latest post as it's obvious that you feel pretty bad right now. Your 'Mea Culpa' is wholly unnecessary and here's why...

Veganism, to me, is not about 100% purity - it's about minimizing suffering and exploitation. It's about making big choices every day to step outside of the meat-eating culture and refuse to support the institutionalised torture of the sentient beings whith whom we share this living experience. It's about doing the maximum we can to make life better for animals - human or non-human.

It is not about obsessing over minute ingredients.

It is not about alienating those who might otherwise be drawn to veganism by being the difficult diner, the scourge of waitstaff, the sotto voce grumbler or whiner.

And it's not about being holier-than-thou and judgemental.

It's about showing people that the vegan lifestyle is fun, expansive, fulfilling, easy and healthy. That what we put in our mouths very literally becomes part of us. And if that food is full of life and energy then we become different people than if we 'nourish' ourselves with the results of pain, torture, terror and death.

It looks like you've felt forced to hold up your hands and admit to being 'a bad vegan', but that's ridiculous. You obviously spend a great deal of time on your blog and who knows how many people that has inspired to **at least try** a cruelty-free option. You are 'walking the walk' and doing immeasurably more than all of the the critical label-readers and nit-pickers out there.

OK folks, so Guinness may not be vegan. Let's move on. Give everyone credit where it's due and don't let's slam each other for perceived infractions of a code. Because that kind of reaction is decidedly Not Vegan!

Take heart, Agnes, and keep up the good work!

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And Stay Vegan, Friends!