My Journey

Here it is again like a week before I start my period and I have all the classic junk food cravings... cookies mainly. If junk food was a drug cookies would be my drug of choice. :-p
I try not to do it much - but sometimes I eat out of boredom or stress related. When I was a teen I actually was overweight due to overeating because of depression. I have a character in my comic Promised memories I plan on writing about with a similar eating disorder. I also had a slight eating disorder when I was a late teen/early 20's where I just didn't eat because I wanted to be super skinny because I thought I looked better super skinny and it was a pretty dark time for me.

I've been trying to stay away from the ingredients of high fructose corn syrup and also corn syrup in general. It's hard - there are some foods I haven't found yet that don't have any - like Maple syrup syrup (once in awhile I like to have pancakes or waffles!). But I think I just need to look harder or just buy some all natural the next time I find it available. There are so many health risks associated to it! I know they make it, it's just a bit more expensive but well worth it.
But also sometimes I just crave some salty foods like chips. I don't eat chips much these days. The price just seems to be a bit high for how little you get in the bag.
And just crunchy is a craving I get, too. Like crackers or just good o' cheese crackers. That was a favorite of mine back from when I was a young child.
Bread is another one that I just find some comforting. Anything bread related - donuts, muffins, rolls, bagels... when I was younger and in my single days I would sometimes joke of wanting to marry a baker just so they could come home smelling like baked goods each day. ^^;
Gosh, what else... this is all making me so hungry and I need to go to bed soon. :-p
Cheese is another one that just is too delicious to pass up! And cheese with crackers and meat! sign me up! I recently made this cheder and potato soup that is super tasty. Once fall comes around I love having soup.
For awhile now I have gotten better about eating at fast food. But once in awhile I do have a fast food craving where I just go and get something little. Some places I just get sick after eating their food - like Taco bell.
At times I do like to have cake but not as much as I used to. My dad makes some of the best cake I've ever had. He usually makes homemade icing!
Brownie's are another guilty pleasure. I tend to enjoy the middle pieces more than the edge pieces. ;-)
And that reminds me of cupcakes. I love making cupcakes and have a nice collection of sprinkles for them. I have some pans for extra small ones (that are adorable) and regular size ones.
Last summer and this past summer I've had some wonderful ice cream from different places. And I've tried some new flavors which was fun. A new favorite of mine is this sea salt caramel flavor.

Okay, Okay - I think that should be it about guilty pleasure foods! I wanted to take a minute and write about something less serious than I have talked about recently. And this felt right. Do you guys have any favorite guilty pleasure foods that I have mentioned - or some completely different ones?

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Henri_de_Toulouse-Lautrec

https://www.wikiart.org/en/henri-de-toulouse-lautrec

So far after all the artists I have read - I think only 6 or something? - I think Henri de Toulouse-Lautrec has been my favorite. Not only do I like some of the posters he designed but I enjoy his paintings and I liked what I read about him and his interesting life. For those of you who don't know He broke both his legs early on in life and they did not heal correctly which left him with a stunted appearance. The book I was reading which was written in the 70's spoke of him as a dwarf - I'm not sure how accurate that is. He was born into an aristocracy family, if he would have outlived his father he would have inherited the family title - Comte de Toulouse-Lautrec. He came from a family of inbreeding sadly - his parents were first cousins. That may of had a-lot to do with his health problems.

He was born in 1864 and was considered a post impressionist. He spent a good amount of time in brothels and prostitutes and lesbians, showing up beautifully and naturally in his paintings. He preferred the woman in these places as opposed to plain models. Late 19 century in bohemian Paris seemed like it was quite a time and the fact that he created some works of art for us to view now makes it all the more interesting. Some of the copied prints in the book I read had women embracing and having a some form of intimacy. Others were of people in their natural environments. Henri did have an alcoholism problem and had spent some time in a sanatorium for three months and during that time he drew 39 circus portraits by memory, I find that impressive. He died at the young age of 36 of alcoholism and syphilis. His mother and art dealer kept promoting his artwork after his death.