A Box of Kiwis

Someone gave my husband a coupon for a box of kiwis, as a gift. This is a thing in China- giving a big box of fruit as a gift. If you got to someone's house, you should bring a gift, like a nice big box of fruit. Chinese people like fruit. My kids are Chinese and they eat fruit all the time.

Anyway, we had this coupon for a free box of kiwis, so we filled in our information on the fruit company's app and they sent it in the mail.

Here it is!

Behold, the kiwis!

When I first came to China and saw gift boxes like this, it struck me as really weird. I guess this particular kiwi box isn't super fancy, pretty much a regular grocery-store fruit box- but sometimes these boxes are really nice, red, for gifting. Fresh fruit- something that you have to eat fast because it will go bad- seemed to not really be the right thing to put in a many-layers-of-nice-packaging gift box. (Like, we immediately put all these kiwis in the fridge and threw away the box.) But somehow this is a really common thing.

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Related:

German Christmas Market (Shanghai, China)

Highway Rest Stop in China (photos)

Blogaround

Links not related to the antichrist:

1. Graham Platner is an Embarrassing Liar (November 13) "They don’t care. They don’t think they’ll ever face consequences–not for the imperialism, the violence, the racism, the misogyny, and no, not even the Nazi tattoo because they know there will always be another white man in those Reddit comments explaining that it’s not a big deal and we just don’t understand what it’s like to be in the military."

2. The developing world needs more roads (November 11) "This problem shows up most clearly in the differences in land allocated to road networks: 27 percent of Manhattan is dedicated to roads, as is 24 percent of London. These cities are typical for their income group. ... For the average city in Africa, Asia, or Latin America, only 16 percent is reserved for streets. Just 12 percent of Dhaka, 10 percent of Kolkata, 14 percent of Dakar, 13 percent of Addis Ababa, 12 percent of Nairobi, and 14 percent of Accra are dedicated to roads. Instead, lax building rules have allowed homes and workplaces to take over public spaces."

Also from Works in Progress: How market design can feed the poor (September 22) This is an article about a system that was set up to efficiently distribute food to food banks. Instead of just assigning them whatever, like the old system did, the food banks have a currency called "shares" and they can make their own choices and bid their shares on the available food, according to their own needs. 

3. Philosophical issues with transness are a symptom of dysphoria (November 15) "But in my experience, if your hormones are on point and you’re generally seen the way you want to be seen, then it’s not a big deal if you’re in some abstract philosophical sense your assigned sex at birth. You might prefer to be in some abstract philosophical sense the gender you identify as, but it doesn’t cause you persistent unhappiness."

4. The U.S. just produced its last penny after a more than 200-year run (November 12)

5. A 'breakthrough' drug to prevent HIV, an 'unprecedented' rollout (November 18) "Just two injections a year provide near-complete protection against an HIV infection."

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Links related to the antichrist:

1. Epstein survivors release MUST-WATCH new PSA as Congress prepares to vote on releasing the files (November 17)

2. Gregory Bovino is exactly who E.B. White — author of 'Charlotte's Web' — warned us about (November 17) "But, to use a book authored by E.B. White as your name is an offense to history. White was a leading voice for American democracy and freedom and against fascism and tyranny. Abusing his life’s work like this cannot stand without a response."

3. State Department Reverses Course, Says Trans Passports Will Be Valid Until They Expire (November 18) There has been a lot of back-and-forth about passports for trans people. The latest update is that, even though the Supreme Court says the government is allowed to stop trans people from getting passports with their correct gender marker, the good news is that passports which already have been issued will still be valid.

This whole thing is extremely stressful for trans people in the US (and it's still going on). Cis people should all be thinking about what we can do to support them.

4. Food stamps are back, but millions will soon lose benefits permanently (November 15) "The loss of SNAP 'was really stark during the shutdown,' said Dottie Rosenbaum, director of federal SNAP policy at the left-leaning Center on Budget and Policy Priorities. 'But [the One Big Beautiful Bill Act] is the largest cut in the program’s history. That is also going to be really deeply felt.'"

5. What Counts as Political Violence? (September 26, via) "Ezra Klein did not write a high profile essay about how Villegas Gonzalez was doing democracy the right way by working hard and taking care of his kids."

Also from Noah Berlatsky: First-of-its-kind LGBTQIA+ hotline in Illinois offers support amid sweeping attacks (November 3) "One caller to Illinois Pride Connect, according to the caller description, was “a parent of a trans adolescent seeking information on the risks and benefits of applying for a passport to reflect her child’s gender identity.” The family had updated birth certificates and state ID but had not changed their passport or Social Security record, and was worried about trying to get through customs with inconsistent gender information."

And: Republicans Want Poor People to Suffer (November 4) "This is the Newsmax logic; if anyone anywhere is misusing federal funds, that offsets the benefits of 3 million children a month being lifted out of poverty. Stopping one evil welfare queen is worth starving any number of children."

6. U.S. deports dozens of migrants to Ukraine amid war (November 18)

Blogaround

Links not related to the antichrist:

1. Reading Halloween (1978) Through the Lens of Labor (October 30, via) "Parents, historically, have been the most recurring threat to babysitters in their capacity to exploit and prey on them, and yet with Michael on set, the threat of the predatory employer-parent gets completely displaced."

2. Scientists thought this fossil was a teen T. rex. Turns out it's a new tyrannosaur (October 30) 

3. Hundreds killed in Darfur hospital massacre, 'hero' doctors abducted (October 30)

4. Israel still blocking most Gaza aid as military carries out more attacks (November 1, via) "This is an average of 145 aid trucks per day, or just 24 percent of the 600 trucks that are meant to be entering Gaza daily as part of the deal, it added."

5. Too many rats? Birth control is one city's answer (November 1) "For all these reasons, Somerville is trying something else — an anti-fertility chemical that targets the mature eggs in female rats."

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Links related to the antichrist:

1. America's immigration crackdown is disrupting the global remittance market (October 28) "What leads Yang to argue this is that immigrants in the United States send a jaw-dropping amount of money back home to their families. These remittances, as they're known, have dwarfed the size of official foreign aid that the U.S. spends on things like economic development, health, and humanitarian assistance."

2. America’s Assault On Real History Comes For The Staff Of The Charles Lindbergh House And Museum (September 3, via) "As of the end of August, it’s all gone."

3. Trump administration sets lowest-ever cap on refugee admissions to U.S. (October 30) "'It is egregious to exclude refugees who completed years of rigorous security checks and are currently stuck in dangerous and precarious situations,' said Sharif Aly, president of the International Refugee Assistance Project. He said that the number of those with confirmed travel plans to the U.S. is greater than the new refugee cap."

4. Trump Admin Attempts To Ban Trans Youth Care Nationwide With New Federal Rules (October 30) "Now the administration is escalating with a blitz of three new rules that could effectively end most transgender youth care nationwide if enacted—pressuring many medical institutions to drop trans patients from receiving the care they need out of fear of federal reprisal, and punishing those who do not comply."

5.  The Myth of the Woke Right: A Response to the New York Times (October 24) 36-minute video from Big Joel about how that felon never actually understood "free speech" to mean "free speech"; how the New York Times wrote an article about "The Woke Right" but that's not really a thing, and the people who use the term use it to mean all sorts of different things; and the difference between cancel culture and government censorship.

6. Food Stamps are Good, Actually (Here Comes the Science) (October 30) "In the meanwhile, I urge you all to reach out to your local community to help out, or to find help if you need it."

And: Trump administration faces Monday deadline on use of contingency funds for SNAP (November 3) "The situation leaves millions with uncertainty about how they will feed themselves. Benefits will be delayed in November regardless of the outcome of the court cases because many beneficiaries have their cards recharged early in the month and the process of loading cards can take a week or more in many states."

7. US carries out new strike in Caribbean, killing 3 alleged drug smugglers (November 2) "The U.S. military has now killed at least 64 people in the strikes."

8. They were promised a lifeline to 'graduate' from poverty. Then it was taken away (November 2) "But just as you are about to receive that support, it gets canceled."

Blogaround

Links not related to the antichrist:

1. Air Bud Pt. II: Last Week Tonight with John Oliver (Web Exclusive) (October 20, 20-minute video) I love when people take the details of a fictional universe way too seriously.

2. From definitions to motivations (October 21) "Educators must be on guard against the shitty imaginations of skeptical audiences."

3. An explainer about kiwi farms. (October 21) "Kiwi farms has always existed as a community designed to foster, celebrate and encourage online harassment of vulnerable people."

4. Iceland reports the presence of mosquitoes for the first time, as climate warms (October 22) [content note: article has a close-up photo of a mosquito]

5. Reversing peanut advice prevented tens of thousands of allergy cases, researchers say (October 21) I'm kinda surprised to read this- I have little kids and so I've been through the whole process of how to introduce new foods to a baby, and the concerns about allergens, and the impression I got was basically "Don't give foods that are possible allergens to your baby until they are 1 year old! Oh, but wait, there's this other scientific evidence that giving potential allergens to the baby earlier can actually prevent allergies, and that also makes a certain kind of sense. Hmm, both sides have good points here, hard to say which one is right." But this article is saying yeah that standard advice has changed, now we are telling parents they should introduce potential allergens to their babies earlier, and this is a real thing with scientific evidence to back it up, and wow look how many allergies it has prevented. I'm really surprised to hear that "U.S. health guidance changed in 2015 and 2017"- that was before my kids were born, but when I was doing this for my kids, I very much did not get the impression that this advice was well-supported by evidence. I have always seen it talked about in parenting social media groups like "well, there's a certain logic to the idea that introducing these foods earlier can avoid allergies, but who's to say?" 

Could be that different countries have different standard advice? The groups I'm in are moms from all different countries, currently living in China. Or it could be that parents are overly-cautious, and view delaying introducing these foods as the "safer" move- even though that's not what the research says- but I can understand how intuitively it "feels" safer.

6. ‘Huge Lesson’: A Beijing Farmer Learns to Live in Climate Extremes (October 22) "It was 4 a.m. on July 28, when record-breaking downpours struck the mountains in Miyun District, northern Beijing, part of a storm system that swamped valleys overnight. By dawn, the flood had erased his 30-hectare farm."

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Links related to the antichrist:

A lot of bad stuff going on... don't get discouraged by all of it; instead, find ways to take action. Protest, donate money, connect with people near you to see how you can help.

1. Trump’s college compact is a trap (October 17) "The only reasonable response for now is for colleges to show solidarity and refuse."

2. We Found That More Than 170 U.S. Citizens Have Been Held by Immigration Agents. They’ve Been Kicked, Dragged and Detained for Days. (October 16) "'If the officers learn that the individual they stopped is a U.S. citizen or otherwise lawfully in the United States,' Kavanaugh wrote, 'they promptly let the individual go.' But that is far from the reality many citizens have experienced."

3. Millions Show Up AGAIN To Tell Trump They Hate Him (October 20) Photos and videos from No Kings protests across the US. [content note: one of the photos shows a giant penis costume]

4. Trump posts AI video showing him dumping on No Kings protesters (October 20) "President Donald Trump on Saturday posted an AI-generated video depicting him in a fighter jet dropping what appears to be feces on U.S. protesters." What on earth.

5. Why the State Department handed U.S. informants over to El Salvador (October 21) "So a core part of an informant relationship is that the United States says, you know, if you give us some information, we're not going to turn around and send you to the very government that you are giving us information about. That just doesn't happen."

6. White House begins demolishing part of East Wing for Trump ballroom (October 21, via) 

7. Legal experts question Rep. Goldman’s call for NYPD to arrest ICE agents if they act unlawfully (October 21) "'It is abundantly clear that the Trump administration is unwilling to police its own officers or hold them accountable for gross misconduct,' the letter states. 'Accordingly, NYPD — pursuant to the department’s own mission, values and oath of office — has an obligation to intervene and take appropriate action, including arrest, when federal immigration officers engage in conduct that is unlawful under state law and beyond the scope of their federal enforcement authority.'"

Also from Gothamist: Federal judge in NYC rules ICE can keep detaining people at immigration court — for now (September 13)

8. Arizona Attorney General’s Office confirms lawsuit against House Speaker Johnson (October 21) "Representative-elect Adelita Grijalva has still not been sworn in four weeks after her win. Arizona Attorney General Kris Mayes is suing House Speaker Mike Johnson, citing 'taxation without representation.'"

9. Home missions (October 21) "For 21st-century white evangelicals, Hudson Taylor and Lottie Moon are too 'woke.'"

Also from the Slacktivist: Get angry. Stay angry. Do better. (October 22) "That anger is the thing missing from all of the recent stories of more than merely 'problematic youthful indiscretions.' These stories involve plenty of defensiveness and dismissal and diminishment, but no self-reproach. No anger."

Blogaround

Links not related to the antichrist:

1. Why Frozen Food Gets an Icy Reception in China (September 26) "Chinese consumers are wary of, and even resistant toward, pre-made food. Western consumers don’t mind the convenience of a frozen pizza, and Japanese convenience stores sell countless pre-made meals. So why China’s reticence?"

Yeah, this is definitely a thing. Chinese people going to the market every morning to get fresh vegetables. I mean, not everyone- if you have a full-time job, obviously you're not doing that. I didn't know that some people took it to the extremes that this article says... in contrast, it's also normal in China to have a bunch of meat in your freezer... frozen dumplings, etc... but maybe the point is that people expect restaurant food to be higher quality than what you would make at home, and frozen food is NOT seen as good enough for that.

This was a real issue during the 2022 Shanghai lockdown. People didn't have, like, a stash of canned/frozen food. The government was, on the fly, coming up with systems to distribute food to everyone locked down in their homes- and it was fresh food, so there were some cases where delays in the delivery meant all the food went bad.

2. Huntington's disease successfully treated for first time (September 24, via) "An emotional research team became tearful as they described how data shows the disease was slowed by 75% in patients."

3. Voddie Baucham, Jr., Preacher and Educator Who Courted Controversy, Dies at 56 (September 26)

4. Wyoming town erects new monument to violent, anti-immigrant history (September 28) I think the wording of this headline is very strange; it should say something more like "monument for the victims of its violent, anti-immigrant history." Anyway, it's about this: "After burning several blocks once made up of homes and shops, the mob killed 28 Chinese people and injured another 14, in what is one of the deadliest incidents of anti-Chinese violence in U.S. history."

5. “War Criminal”: Thousands Call to Arrest Netanyahu, March at U.N. Against Gaza Genocide (September 29) "Despite the fact that Netanyahu is wanted by the International Criminal Court for war crimes he has presided over in Gaza, he was able to travel to the U.N. without incident, as the United States says it does not recognize the jurisdiction of the ICC. We spoke to protesters demanding Netanyahu’s arrest and an end to Israel’s genocide in Gaza."

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Links related to the antichrist:

1. Jimmy Kimmel’s reinstatement shows the power of noncooperation (September 23, via) "No business can handle a large-scale consumer withdrawal, and no government agency can handle widespread worker withdrawal. So even though the Trump administration has been moving methodically to consolidate power, the people of this country have the power to make it an exercise in futility."

2. Trump Posts an Absolutely Bonkers AI Video in Which He Promotes a Magic ‘Med Bed’ That Can Cure Any Disease (September 28)

And more on that from CNN: Trump shares apparent AI video promoting ‘medbed’ conspiracy theory (September 29)

3. Hegseth says Wounded Knee massacre soldiers will keep Medals of Honor (September 26) "'Only an administration intent on committing war crimes in the present and future would stoop to calling Wounded Knee a ‘battle’ rather than what it truly was,' Columbia University history professor Karl Jacoby posted on Bluesky."

I saw a comment about this, where someone said they just couldn't understand why on earth Hegseth would do this. Here's why: It's because acknowledging the atrocities that the US committed against Native Americans is "woke." Everything was fine with the history that Hegseth learned in school, and now these Native American activists are saying something is wrong and the US should apologize, ugh how annoying, can they just stop? Hegseth's decision here has nothing to do with "did US soldiers massacre innocent people" and everything to do with "why would we bother talking about things that don't affect us regular [white] people?"

4. Lower Than Cowards (September 25) "Now we know most titans of industry won’t be fighting right-wing authoritarianism as fiercely as they would a tax hike on private equity."

5. 'I want his name to be known': Wife of immigrant injured at ICE facility shooting speaks out (September 27) "He's on life support after being critically injured on Wednesday in the shooting at an Immigration and Customs Enforcement facility in Dallas. He was being detained there after being arrested on Aug. 8 for driving under the influence. He is in the U.S. without legal status."

6. Hundreds protest at ICE building after Trump’s announcement of troop deployment to Portland (September 29) 

7. YouTube agrees to pay Trump $24 million to settle lawsuit over Jan. 6 suspension (September 29) "Law professor Goldman said but for 'an attempt to curry favor with the president,' there is 'absolutely no reason to believe Trump would have gotten anywhere with these suits.'"

8. Trump's new $100,000 visa fee sets off panic and confusion (September 21) "Tech companies and banks sent urgent memos advising employees not to leave the country. Bags were packed, tickets bought and families left behind as visa holders scrambled to beat what they believed was a looming deadline."

9. U.S. Revokes Visa for Colombian President Petro After He Joined Palestine Protest at U.N. (September 29, via) "After the U.S. revoked his visa, Petro wrote online, 'Revoking it for denouncing genocide shows the U.S. no longer respects international law.'"

Blogaround

Links not related to the antichrist:

1. These evangelical men saved sex for marriage – they weren’t well prepared (June 17) "The experience has shaped how the couple are raising their six-year-old daughter and ten-year-old son. 'I want my daughter to have full information about her body – I don’t want her to go through what I did,' said Katy. As for their son, 'I just want him to understand that women are people,' said Nate."

2. This abortion method doesn't involve doctors — and many of them consider it safe (June 22) "Since the Supreme Court overturned Roe, the hotline has only grown. It now has dozens of volunteers, including clinicians as well as people who provide logistical support. The hotline gets thousands of calls and texts every month."

3. A cancer center in Jordan treats kids from Gaza, but only a few dozen have arrived (June 20) "All of Gaza's hospitals have been either damaged or destroyed in Israeli airstrikes."

4. Do You Want to Build a Snowman - 10 YEARS, SAME ANNA! (2024) OH MY GOODNESS this is amazing.

5. What’s the Right Way to Translate Chinese Dish Names? (June 20) "Semantic translation, on the other hand, conveys meaning rather than form. Traditionally, it prioritizes fluency and naturalness in the target language, even if that means departing from the original wording — rendering the Chinese shizitou as 'meatball,' for example. However, semantic translation can also mean literal translation, even if the result seems foreign or puzzling — such as translating shizitou as 'lion’s head.'"

Hmm. Yeah I would describe shizitou [狮子头] as a meatball, but 丸子 are also meatballs, but they are different. I guess then you have no choice but to translate 狮子头 as a lion head meatball? It's pork, though, okay.

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Protest sign that says "No kings / Yas queens!" Image source.

Links related to the antichrist:

1. Relief and a raised fist as Mahmoud Khalil goes free – but release ‘very long overdue’ (June 20, via) I'm glad to hear this. But it's not over- his immigration case is still ongoing.

Mahmoud Khalil emerges from airport security with his wife Noor and newborn, legal team and Rep. AOC.

[image or embed]

— Gwynne Hogan (@gwynnefitz.bsky.social) June 22, 2025 at 1:37 AM

'They wanted to separate me from my family': Mahmoud Khalil speaks after ICE release (June 23) "They absolutely showed me nothing. They had over 100 days to do that, and I dare Trump, [Marco] Rubio, and their administration to substantiate these claims with anything, because they did not refer to anything."

2. One daughter's search for a father detained by ICE (June 21) "Urizar had no idea where her father was being held or how to reach him."

3. The Antisemites In and Around the Trump Administration (June 17) "I mean the kind who proudly performs a Roman salute or two on a national stage, like Elon Musk and Steve Bannon, sure, but you already knew about those. There are many, many more."

4. U.S. Supreme Court allows — for now — third-country deportations (June 23) "In a searing dissent, the court's three liberals accused the conservative majority of 'rewarding lawlessness.' Writing for the three, Justice Sonia Sotomayor said 'The government has made clear in word and deed that it feels itself unconstrained by law, free to deport anyone, anywhere without notice or an opportunity be heard.'"

Blogaround

Links not related to that felon:

1. Machine-Generated Garbage Hall of Shame (via) Oh cool, a roundup of posts about LLMs being used to create garbage.

And: I'm a Spotless Giraffe. (2023) "It's not just that the training sets simply don't have examples of people who look like me. It's that the system is now explicitly engineered to resist imagining me. …Hey, is now a good a time to mention that in an effort to create a welcoming and inclusive community for all users, the Midjourney Community Guidelines consider deformed bodies a form of gore, and thus forbidden?"

2. ‘I was scared to even eat the vegetables in my fridge’: the eating disorder that focuses on food purity (May 2, via) "'I remember asking myself why everything was so hard,' she says. 'Why aren’t other people following the same food rules? Why don’t they care about their health as much as I do?'"

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Links related to that felon:

1. 'We Don't Do Kings': Mass Protests Planned to Counter Trump's Birthday Military Parade (May 6)

2. With ICE Out of Control, How Can the US Cohost the 2026 World Cup? (March 31) "Given that ICE is being used as a masked abduction force, and given “border czar” Tom Homan’s contempt for the courts, it is unconscionable to encourage people to visit this country."

3. USDA chief says agency is trying to fill key jobs after paying 15,000 to leave (May 7) 

4. Judge orders release of Columbia student protest leader Mohsen Mahdawi (April 30) "'I'm saying it clear and loud to President [Donald] Trump and his cabinet: I am not afraid of you,' Mahdawi said after he was freed, local public radio station Vermont Public reported."

5. Many Afghans living in the U.S. fear being tortured or killed if they get deported (May 7) "'I have … a threatening letter,' Qattali said. 'If I go back, like, 100% they're going to kill me and my family as well.'"

I just... why? Why would these MAGAs want to deport Afghan people, who helped the US and are now just living their lives and not making any trouble? It reads like they just want to deport as big of a number of people as possible, so they're casting about for any way they can make the number bigger.

6. Tufts student Rümeysa Öztürk freed from immigration detention (May 9) "And that was three weeks ago, and there has been no evidence introduced by the government other than the op-ed. That literally is the case. There is no evidence here."

This is good news- but she is still in the process of fighting against the government revoking her visa- she is still at risk of being deported. But the good news is she doesn't have to be in jail during this process.

7. Trump & Deportations: Last Week Tonight with John Oliver (HBO) (May 5)

8. Roundup: Experts Condemn Trump Pseudoscientific Anti-Trans "Report" (May 9) "'AAP was not consulted in the development of this report, yet our policy and intentions behind our recommendations were cited throughout in inaccurate and misleading ways,' she said."

"Color Taste Texture" (a cookbook for autistics/ anyone with food aversions)

Book cover for "Color Taste Texture."

I very much enjoyed reading Color Taste Texture: Recipes for Picky Eaters, Those with Food Aversion, and Anyone Who's Ever Cringed at Food [affiliate link], by Matthew Broberg-Moffitt. The author is autistic, and according to their twitter, uses he/she/they pronouns. I'm also autistic, and I think this book is great from an autistic perspective, but it can benefit lots of people even beyond that. Anyone who is "picky" or has food aversions. (For example, the book mentions that it's common to have food aversions during pregnancy. TRUE FACTS.)

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I love the overall idea of this book

In the beginning pages of this book, Broberg-Moffitt says that there is lots of advice out there about how to "trick" picky eaters into eating things, but this is NOT their approach. No. Instead, their approach relies on thinking carefully about what specific aspects of the food you are averse to. For example, do you not like the taste of onions, or the texture? And then finding ways to work with those aversions/preferences so that you have food that you do like. 

It's fine to eat the same thing all the time, as long as you're getting enough nutrition and calories! Don't force people to try things they don't like!

I love this. I feel like I don't need the recipes in this book, but I'm really glad I read this because of its overall philosophy. Instead of feeling like you're supposed to "get over" your food aversions, or feeling like they're just silly things that you shouldn't expect other people to take seriously, this book advises that we should treat them as serious things and work with them. If you don't like to eat xyz, then let's find a way for you to eat a healthy diet which doesn't include xyz. This is great!

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Discussing individual tastes/colors/textures and how to cook food to attain these tastes/colors/textures

There is a chapter on tastes, which goes through the different tastes (sweet, bitter, etc) and gives tips for small ways you can modify your cooking process in order to give the food more of that kind of taste. 

Similarly, there is a chapter on color, which lists different colors and gives tips for how to change the food into that color without affecting the overall taste. (You could use food coloring if you want, but this book gives ideas which don't use food coloring.) For example, if your kid really wants to eat yellow food, you can add a little bit of turmeric.

Maybe it seems a little strange to care about the food's color- if the taste is the same, what does it matter? But, yeah, it matters. If the food tastes fine but it looks disgusting, then it totally makes sense that people would be too grossed out to enjoy it. Slight changes to the color can make a difference.

And there's a chapter on texture, and how to achieve certain textures when cooking. In particular, autistic people often prefer soft or smooth textures, because every bite is basically the same. You're not suddenly going to bite into something weird. *shudder*

Temperature is also important! Maybe you don't like cold food, maybe it just feels gross to you to eat cold food. That matters! Don't eat cold food then!

And the book discusses what to do if you can't stand the sound of people chewing. The book gives various suggestions- and one of the suggestions is to let the food-averse person eat alone. You might think that's not acceptable because the "ideal" is to have a nice family meal together- but if the food-averse person really really can't stand the sound of people chewing, so family meals are unpleasant for them, then you should consider the option of letting them eat alone.

In practical terms, in my own life, I don't feel I need to implement any of these suggestions. But I think the author's way of thinking is very valuable here. Instead of expecting autistic people and picky eaters to "get over it", they should think about what could make it better for them, and do that. Are there certain tastes/colors/textures you prefer? Well let's cook food that incorporates those, then.

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Recipes

About one third of this book is the discussion of practical tips to achieve certain tastes/textures/etc when cooking (as I described above), and the remaining two thirds is recipes. I just sorta skimmed the recipes; I personally don't feel that I need them. 

As I was reading this, I was thinking to myself "well, I don't really have food aversions" but actually I do. It's just that as an adult, being a "picky eater" is treated as less of a big deal, because *I* do the grocery shopping, and I just don't buy things that I don't like.

I really have "gotten over" a lot of my food aversions, though, compared to when I was a child. I don't really know how, I guess they just faded away. But, I don't like meat that has fat in it, and I don't like eating meat where you have to spit out the bones, or eating fruit where you have to spit out the seeds and skin. (Food that requires you to spit out bones/seeds is common in China. Blah. I avoid it as much as I can.)

I sometimes feel like I have to "protect" myself from food I'm eating, like kinda have to cringe away from it and not think about it as I eat it. Like there's an equilibrium between how hungry I am and how weirded out I am by the food. (Anybody else feel this way?) Eating just enough that hunger is not bothering me anymore, and then after that point I just can't. I mean, for foods I genuinely like, of course I don't have to do that, but sometimes I'm at some fast food place and there aren't any good options so I just eat a little, until I'm too repulsed to eat any more.

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Quotes

A few quotes I LOVED:

• "I'm a classically trained chef who has never worked in the food industry because some food is just gross." (p 1)
• "If your kid only eats chicken fingers and mashed potatoes and absolutely refuses anything else, make them the best chicken fingers and mashed potatoes. If they are getting adequate nutrition and calories, this cookbook isn't going to try to force anything else on them." (p 2)
• "Not wanting your food to touch is, frankly, logical." (p 45)

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Conclusion

This book is great because it's about how to actually work with food aversions and cook something that people will like, rather than forcing them to "get over it."

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Related:

“Easy” Jobs and “Hard” Jobs

Blogaround

1. Pennsylvania school boards up window openings that allowed views into its gender-neutral bathrooms (October 5) "Such openings weren’t installed in any of the school’s non-gender-neutral bathrooms." What on EARTH.

2. Where the moral obligation ends (October 7) "Daily Wire influencer and abuse-victim doxxer Megan Basham begrudgingly allows that Jesus calls us to love our neighbors, but then says, 'Ah, but who is my neighbor?'" This whole post is SPOT ON.

Also from the Slacktivist: Do you want plagues? Because that’s how you get plagues (October 10) "The Pharaoh in the biblical story of Exodus — the Pharaoh whose disobedient oppression of immigrants echoes throughout the entire canon of scripture — chose to “get tough on immigration” because he became obsessed with something very much like the racist “Great Replacement Theory” that has been actively supported by anti-immigrant white evangelicals for the past decade. “‘Look,’ he said to his people, ‘the Israelites have become far too numerous for us. Come, we must deal shrewdly with them or they will become even more numerous'” (Exodus 1:9-10, and also the Republican Party Platform and Project 2025)."

And: ‘Where you don’t want to look’ (October 15) "In anti-abortion politics, decisions are taken away from those closest and most affected by them. Those decisions, instead, are mandated by those farthest removed from the facts and the impacts, by people unaffected and unrelated to them, for whom such decisions are abstractions based on false witness and hostile, vicious false assumptions about those directly involved."

3. Rudy Giuliani’s Daughter: Trump Took My Dad From Me. Please Don’t Let Him Take Our Country Too (September 30, via) "But if you zoom out, Trump being the president was the worst thing that ever happened to my dad, to my family, and to our nation’s modern history. The consequences will only be more severe—and irreversible— a second time around."

4. Fast Crimes at Lambda School (June 18, via) "Austen thought he could fake it 'till he made it. He lied about students getting jobs, the success of the company, and he even lied about being homeless."

5. Duracell PowerCheck: A genius idea which didn't last that long (October 9. 16-minute video) Wow, I remember when batteries had these little white dots that you could press really hard to see if the battery was good or not.

6. Republican lawsuits target rules for overseas voters, but those ballots are already sent (October 14) BOOOOOO. "'It’s not the case that anyone in the world can apply for a ballot. They still have to demonstrate they are an eligible American citizen,' she said." Yes, OBVIOUSLY.

7. Remember When Russian Pop Duo t.A.T.u Pretended To Be Lesbians? (October 10) Well I don't think I ever heard their music, but I do remember Focus on the Family clutching their pearls about it.

8. CIDABM (October 9) From xkcd.

9. Is the food in the fridge still good? California wants to end the guessing game (October 2, via) "It will require the use of 'Best if Used By' label to signal peak quality and 'Use By' label for product safety, an approach recommended by federal agencies." This sounds like a great idea. My personal philosophy toward expiration dates is, food doesn't suddenly go bad right on that date, there must be some sort of range. And the expiration date is picked such that assuming a normal distribution, you can say with a high probability that the food is okay. So, not a big deal if you're past the expiration date and the food looks fine.

(My husband is totally the opposite!)

Interestingly, in China, packaged food is stamped with the production date, and then it will also say how long it is good for (12 months, 18 months, etc) and then you have to add them yourself. And for fresh things like bread or meat, usually they will have a sticker that says the production date and use-by date.

10. Buoyed by his party and the press, a raging Trump goes full Hitler (October 13) I'm really worried about this.

11. Europa Clipper - Cool! That was launched by NASA on October 14.

12. Nature Study Reveals the Deadly Danger of Anti-Trans Laws (October 15) "They found that in the first year after a state introduced anti-trans laws, the number of teens between 13 and 17 attempting suicide jumped significantly compared to other states."

Blogaround

1. Workplaces Without Borders And Sexual Harassment (August 8, via) "You might say 'well, if Harvey Weinstein asks out of nowhere whether your breasts are real, when you aren’t working on a Miramax film, he’s boorish and misogynist and a creep, but he’s not engaged in workplace sexual harassment—there’s no employment relationship between you and him.' But in a very real way that’s wrong, because even if Weinstein isn’t your employer right now, he might well have been your employer last year and be about to be your employer next year. Because the workplace is borderless, Weinstein’s behavior still creates a hostile work environment."

2. Phistomefel's Sequel (August 11) 1-hour-55-minute video. Normally Simon solves sudokus, but in this video it's a weird variation called "chequered arromino." "I think the big game in town here is to know whether yellow is orange or blue, and whether purple is orange or blue."

Wow, this one is also very good: Is There ANYTHING Cleverer On YouTube? (July 30) 1-hour-26-minute sudoku solve video.

3. Google will start deleting inactive accounts in December under new security policy (August 10) I find this very concerning, because they don't say how it will affect blogspot blogs. (Blogspot is a google product. My blog is hosted by google.) So, doesn't affect me because they're only going to delete stuff after 2 years of inactivity, but will people's blogspot blogs be deleted just because the blogger hasn't logged in to their blog or used their google account for a long time? The policy says that accounts with youtube channels won't be deleted, but what about blogs?

Also, another very concerning thing is what if you have a gmail account that you never log into because you've set it up to forward the emails to a different account? So you still use it, you still read the emails from it, but you don't log in. Would google see that as "inactivity"? (This answer on reddit says yes...) 

Google posted their policy here, Inactive Google Account Policy, and here About Inactive Account Manager. And also you can see what the recent activity was on your account here: My Google Activity.

4. Ooooh look at this, there's a new book called Color Taste Texture: Recipes for Picky Eaters, Those with Food Aversion, and Anyone Who's Ever Cringed at Food. A cookbook for autistic people! (And anyone else who has food aversions.) I am very interested in this.

5. US, China agree to double weekly flights between countries (August 12) Yessssss. "The 24 weekly flights are still a fraction of the more than 150 round-trip flights allowed by each side before restrictions were imposed in early 2020 due to the COVID-pandemic." Also, a complicating factor is that US airlines aren't flying over Russia now.

6. 'Blind Side' subject Oher alleges Tuohys made millions off lie (August 14) "Oher eventually hired a lawyer who helped him uncover the details surrounding the movie deal and his legal connection to the people he believed were his adoptive parents. His lawyer unearthed the conservatorship document in February, and Oher came to the painful realization that the Tuohys had not adopted him."

7. Christlike or Pornlike? A Christian Woman’s Role in Marriage (2021) [content note: abuse] This is what happens when everyone takes it for granted that a husband is simply not capable of being a decent human being if his wife's not regularly having sex with him. He is mistreating her in so many ways, and everyone (husband, pastor, church culture) tells her that the first step to fix the relationship is she needs to have sex with him whenever he demands it, otherwise nothing will change.

8. We can't stop thinking about Barbie's deliciously cutting Matchbox Twenty moment (August 1) "First, it perfectly encapsulates the feeling of being made to listen to a man sing, unsolicited, when he clearly thinks he’s being so dreamy right now."

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Edit: Well I published this post, and I went to schedule it to tweet on tweetdeck, like I always do with my new blog posts, and now I have to add another link:

9. Twitter finally figured out how to kill TweetDeck, by putting it behind a paywall (August 17) Ah, well, I guess it's just a matter of time till I'd end up leaving twitter, it's just one thing after another. We'll see.

YK (Japanese BBQ Restaurant in Shanghai)

Hi everyone, I recently went out to eat at a Japanese BBQ restaurant here in Shanghai, and I'd like to share the photos. Also, this will sort of serve as an answer to the question "what's it like going to a mall in Shanghai, post-lockdown?"

First, we took a taxi to get to the restaurant. In the taxi there is a location code that you have to scan with your phone, related to COVID-19 contact tracing- I've written about these location codes in my many blog posts about the pandemic situation in Shanghai.

Location code inside the taxi. (Red lines added by me.)

Chopsticks for Babies

I live in China and I have a little toddler son. I thought you all might be interested to see the chopsticks they sell for little kids who are learning how to use them. Here are some photos I took at the baby store:

These are imported from Japan- see all the text on the packaging is Japanese. (Except the 右手用 which means "right-handed use" in Chinese; I guess the characters for it in Japanese are the same?)

Basically one chopstick has 2 loops for your fingers, and the other has 1 loop for your thumb. Some of the chopsticks sets (like the bear and My Little Pony, above) let you attach the 2 chopsticks together at the top. Also you may notice the pointy end which picks up the food is a little bit flattened or has a grippy texture, to help with that.

I have heard some moms complain that the design of the loops only works for right-handed people. (In China traditionally people think you should teach left-handed kids to be right-handed instead...) Apparently you can also get training chopsticks without the loops; some moms think those are better.

Little Square Root has a pair of chopsticks with the loops, but he hasn't used them yet. So far he mostly uses a spoon, or a fork for fruit. Even though forks aren't traditionally used by Chinese people, they are easily available to buy for babies. (And also he eats with his hands of course, being a baby and all.)

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Hey readers! My Patreon reached a goal of $20/month, which means I am writing some posts with photos of life in China for you all! The previous ones are: 

Sinopharm vaccine, 1st dose 

Taking the Subway in Shanghai, China 

Disney Store at Lujiazui (Shanghai, China) 

Next: "Jurassic World" Exhibition (Shanghai, China)

If you would like to sponsor me on Patreon, link is here! Thanks readers, you are all great!

Blogaround

"The Very Hungry Caterpillar" in Chinese. 好饿的毛毛虫。 My son has this book. Image source.

1. Noah’s Flood: Competing Visions of a Mesopotamian Tradition (posted April 7) "In this context, the biblical God becomes just an indecisive protagonist who creates a deluge without really knowing what good it will do."

2. Poor in Tech (posted May 19) "I knew I was the only poor person at my tech startup because they always ordered extra catered lunches, and at the end of the week someone would just throw them away if I didn’t take them home."

3. China's Yuan Longping Dies; Rice Research Helped Feed World (posted May 22) "Worldwide, a fifth of all rice now comes from species created by hybrid rice following Yuan’s breakthrough discoveries, according to the website of the World Food Prize, which he won in 2004."

4. omg:

Hello, my name is Kevin Max & I’m an #exvangelical

— kevin max (@kevinmax) May 15, 2021

There ain't no disguising the truth.

5. Eric Carle, Creator Of 'The Very Hungry Caterpillar,' Has Died (posted May 26) Love his books ~ they are great for little toddlers like my son <3

6. Dior chooses Chinese transgender star as an ambassador for its new fragrance campaign (posted May 28)

Blogaround

Baby Yoda cookie, from link #2.

1. Treating Food And Exercise Like A Zero-Sum Game Is Peak Eating Disorder Culture (posted December 12) "Putting the number of minutes required to ‘work off’ a food is peak eating disorder culture because food and movement are two different aspects of life that should not be presented as prerequisites for one another. You deserve to eat whether or not you exercise. You deserve to enjoy exercise without verging on the brink of collapse."

YES. 100% agree with this blogger. This whole "putting the amount of exercise to work off the food" on food labels is a TERRIBLE idea. Because what's the objective? Do you want people to literally go out and exercise for that exact amount of time after they eat the food? That's called having an eating disorder. Or do you expect people will go ahead and eat stuff just like they normally do, but feel a little more shame about it, like there's this mountain of exercise debt they're never going to work off?

None of this is a healthy way to view food.

2. Baking hack: Chop off angel head for a homemade Baby Yoda cookie cutter.<**> (posted December 14) This is the way.

3. A Bethel Leader Is Asking the Church to Pray for Her Daughter’s Resurrection (posted December 17) [content note: child death] I have many many feelings and opinions about this. Not going to post them right now though.

4. sometimes I wonder / if Mary breastfed Jesus. / if she cried out when he bit her / or if she sobbed when he would not latch. (posted December 16)

I Didn't Know I Had a Culture Until I Lost It

PBJ sandwich. Image source.

"6 Years Later": A blog series reflecting on the fact that I, a white American, moved to China and have been living here for the past 6 years

Part 1: I Didn't Know I Had a Culture Until I Lost It
Part 2: On Immigration and Double Standards
Part 3: Because of an Idea
Part 4: Culture, Objectivity, God, and the Real Reason I Moved to China

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Living in China long-term has taught me so much about what culture is. I never could have learned this if I had stayed in the US. I've learned about Chinese culture, yes, but I've learned even more about my own culture. Specifically, the fact that I have one.

As a white American growing up in the suburbs in the northern US, I never thought about culture. Culture was when people in other countries ate weird food and celebrated weird holidays. That's all.

Culture? No, I don't have a culture, I just do normal things, things that everyone does. Eat a bowl of cereal and milk every morning, make a sandwich for lunch.

Just a regular dinner. With a cup of ice water. A fork, spoon, and knife- I don't know the technical correct way to make a place setting, but there are etiquette experts who do. And it's good manners to put your napkin in your lap. Pasta, meat, and a side of vegetables. Salt and pepper on the table. Dinner rolls with butter. Lunchmeat sliced right in front of you at the deli counter, so many varieties of sliced bread, so many different kinds of cheese. So many varieties of pasta. Buying a dozen eggs in a styrofoam carton, and a gallon of milk. Oh, and there's chocolate milk too. Pop-tarts. Raspberries. Bagels. Baking birthday cakes and decorating them myself. (And of course, licking the batter from the bottom of the bowl.) And you can eat cake and ice cream together. Granola bars. Chocolate chips. Pancakes with syrup.

Culture? No, I wouldn't call it culture. As kids we just watched normal kid movies, about believing in yourself, about following your dreams rather than being constrained by your parents' expectations. We played duck-duck-goose and HORSE. Let a slinky walk down the stairs. At birthday parties, we played pin-the-tail-on-the-donkey. Parents put kids' artwork up on the fridge. Swimming pool and swingset in the backyard. Fighting with your siblings. Planting sunflower seeds and pumpkin seeds outside and watching as the plants grow. And we were so excited when we stayed at a hotel that had a waffle maker.

School bus. Pledge of allegiance. Spelling bee. Kids getting their family to order chocolates or whatever as part of a school fundraiser. PBJ sandwiches. Middle school band concerts. Science fairs. Reading Shakespeare and Charles Dickens and Langston Hughes and Robert Frost and Mark Twain. Prom and homecoming king and queen. High school football and cheerleaders and marching band. AP classes and the SAT. You know, just all those normal things that every teenager thinks about. Yearbooks. Class rings. Senior pictures. College admissions essays. Going down to the DMV after school on your 16th birthday to get your learner's permit, then taking drivers' ed and getting your license around age 17. Some kids' parents even bought them a new car.

Culture? That's not culture. It's just Superbowl parties and people who are only watching for the commercials. Just snow days and sledding and owning a variety of gloves and mittens. Shoveling the driveway. Painting Easter eggs. Easter baskets and the Easter bunny. Filing income tax. Spring break. Going to the garden store and buying a whole bunch of flowers for the front yard. Just summer camp and s'mores and canoeing and scavenger hunts in the woods. Wearing flip flops everywhere you go. Picnics. Barbecues, grilling hamburgers and hot dogs and sausages. Corn on the cob with butter. Just Halloween costumes and trick-or-treating and haunted hayrides. Raking all the leaves into a pile and jumping in it. Just Thanksgiving dinner with turkey and cranberry sauce and mashed potatoes and pumpkin bread and pumpkin pie. Black Friday shopping and going to the Christmas tree farm. Candy canes and elementary school kids making their own ornaments. Stockings hung over the fireplace. Rolling out Christmas cookies, cutting with cookie cutters, baking them in the oven. Kids can meet Santa at the mall. Christmas lists, Secret Santa, white elephant. Drive around the neighborhood to look at everyone's Christmas lights. I don't have a culture, I just do all these normal things that everyone does. Things like Christmas shopping and wrapping gifts and putting them under the tree and waiting for Christmas morning. Leaving cookies for Santa. New Years resolutions. And just about every holiday has chocolates for it.

Drive thru. Pizza party. Road trip. Oven mitts and measuring spoons and meat thermometers. Swimming lessons. Ordering drinks first at a restaurant, and dessert last. Watch out for deer crossing the road. Public bathrooms have toilet paper and soap. Board games- pictionary, monopoly, scrabble, jenga. Ice cream truck. Dishwasher. Clothes dryer. Toaster. Petting zoo. Writing a check. Thank-you notes. Police have guns. Shoe sizing is different for men and women. Mowing the lawn. Joint bank accounts. Rolling the trash out to the curb for garbage day once a week. Jury duty. Fahrenheit. Debates about "is it called 'soda' or 'pop'?" Hunting. Pool noodles. Country music. Most families have 2 cars. Sending birthday cards. Tipping. Two political parties.

You should go to the dentist several times a year. You should tell your family "I love you." Eat chicken soup when you're sick. Say "bless you" when someone sneezes. You pay more than the number on the price tag because you have to add sales tax.

What if I told you EVERY SINGLE THING on this list is not part of Chinese culture? Or, rather, some of the ones related to cold weather and not living in a city might apply to some areas in China, but not areas where I have been. (I live in Shanghai now, which is in southern China.) Or perhaps Chinese people my age who watch American movies have seen some of them, but that doesn't necessarily mean they really *get* them. For every single one of these things, I expect that the average Chinese person I meet isn't familiar with the concept at all and I would have to explain the entire thing, and they still wouldn't *get* it because they don't have the lived experience of it.

When I moved to China in 2013, I knew it meant I would be experiencing a new culture and I would have to learn a lot of new things. But I didn't really understand what I would be losing- how I was leaving my own culture behind. I thought of my own experiences as "normal", like a neutral baseline that I would be adding new Chinese things on top of. My own culture felt so normal that I didn't even know it was there, and so I didn't realize that moving to China meant I'd be living among people who just didn't know any of this stuff.

Sure, of course I knew there were lots of American traditions that Chinese people didn't share. Of course I knew I'd be telling them "we hang up stockings at Christmas!" and wouldn't it be so fun and interesting to teach them about it. But it's so much deeper than that. It's so many things, so many little things that run through every aspect of my life, and I constantly live with the weight of how much I miss my culture.

Sometimes it hurts more than others.

Sometimes I really want a donut.

And it's not just that I miss it. It's living among people who don't miss it and don't know what's wrong.

And some of these cultural things I don't even like, but all of them have affected me and made me the person I am. So it's not just that I miss them- it's that most of the people in my life don't understand. Can't understand. Sure, I can explain what some American concept is, but not what it means. That's something that can't be communicated with words; you only understand if you've experienced it. How can I explain the emptiness I feel when I don't have turkey on Thanksgiving, when I don't actually like turkey that much anyway? How can they understand that even if we search far and wide in Shanghai and cobble together some approximation of the thing I miss, it's Just Not The Same? How can I explain how I feel when I see some superficial commercialized attempt at copying some American tradition, and Chinese people treat it like it's the real thing and say "China is becoming so westernized" and I feel empty and I miss my home so much more? Why do I always have to do the work of explaining these deeply-felt cultural touchstones to people? It's exhausting. I wish they just *got* it.

I know that, compared with other immigrants, I'm privileged. I chose to leave my country. I wasn't forced to. I have the option to go back. So I'm lucky in that sense. I know that, compared with other immigrants, being American and English-speaking and white puts me in a relatively good position.

But this is hard. Living as an immigrant is hard. It's really good, but I lost so much, I gave up my own culture in ways I wasn't prepared for. It's what I want, I like living here, I don't want to go back yet, but wow it still hurts.

I know what culture is now, in ways I never did before. Because I never really I knew I had a culture. My white, American, suburban, northern-US life just felt "normal" to me- so normal that I thought everyone would automatically understand and I would never have to explain it. That's not true; it turns out I do have a culture, and I've lost it now. I've lost things I didn't even know I could lose.

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Next: On Immigration and Double Standards

Related:
I Didn't Count the Cost Before I Moved To China

Blogaround

Scar, from the 1994 Lion King cartoon. Image source.

1. Who Invented the Food Pyramid and Why You'd Be Crazy to Follow It (posted July 26) "Our recommendation of 3-4 daily servings of whole-grain breads and cereals was changed to a whopping 6-11 servings, forming the base of the Food Pyramid as a concession to the processed wheat and corn industries."

2. Making progress in Chinese in spite of praise (posted 2012) As a white person who can speak Chinese, I can confirm that this is very real.

3. James Dobson Visits the Border and Shows His Nativism (posted June 28) "We love you. God loves you. But you can’t come into our country. Sorry."

4. The Lion King: Was It Worth It? | SCB Review (posted July 23) [content note: spoilers for "The Lion King"] "Here's the thing about the animated Scar, is that he's just perfect." Yep, I agree with pretty much their whole review.

5. Jury: Katy Perry’s ‘Dark Horse’ copied Christian rap song (posted July 30) Wow, this takes me back to like, 2011 when I was super-into Christian rap. (Wow I could write a WHOLE POST about that- any readers interested? Here's a sneak peak: Lecrae is like the rap version of John Piper.) And yes, back then I totally did notice that the beat running through the entire background of "Dark Horse" sounded a lot like "Joyful Noise."

6. One-Time Purity Culture Advocate Joshua Harris Now Says “I Am Not a Christian” (posted July 26) Wow. As far as I know, no details have come out about this besides his instagram post, and I am all curious and want to know more. BUT ALSO, remember just last week I said, and I quote, "right now he still has a lot to learn and he should work on learning that instead of continuing to tell everyone his half-baked opinions" so, yeah, it's okay that he hasn't shared details.

Boundaries and Lunch

Sandwich. Image source.

So I'm an American in China, and almost everyone at my job is Chinese. Every day I eat a sandwich for lunch, and people notice and seem to think that's weird.

I get people constantly making comments like "you are having a sandwich again?" and "going to lunch- sandwich again today, right?" and so on and so on.

And I used to care. I used to feel like I had to explain myself and offer justifications that could satisfy them. Like I had to prove to them why it is okay and not weird for me to eat a sandwich every day.

I would tell them that Chinese people eat rice every day, and this is the same thing. Or tell them I have health reasons that I can't eat anything in the cafeteria because it's too oily, and then get annoyed feeling like I'm divulging this personal medical information that's not really any of their business. Or just tell them I like it, and that's why I eat it every day.

I tried all these things, and people wouldn't stop commenting on my lunch.

And then, sometime within the past few years, I learned about boundaries. See, "boundaries" means that I have the right to make my own choices about my own personal life. That it's not up for public debate. When it comes to things that belong to me and affect me and don't affect other people, I get to decide and nobody else gets a say.

This is so fantastic and freeing! Other people's opinions about my lunch have zero weight. ZERO. They can talk all they want, and I'm not obligated to take it into account, or debate them, or explain myself.

Like, oh my goodness, this is wonderful. People can come up to me every day and be like "you're eating a sandwich again" and I can just say "yes" and move on with my life. It really does not matter what they think. I don't have to care! I can continue to eat sandwiches every day solely because I want to. Nobody else gets a say in it.

I used to get annoyed, and angry, and stressed about this. Sometimes I even wanted to hide somewhere to eat lunch so nobody would come say anything to me about it. But now I know about boundaries, and that means I don't have to get angry at other people, because they can't do anything to me. My lunch is my lunch, and that's true regardless of how many comments people make or how well I'm able to debate them.

I just cannot get over how AMAZING this is. Boundaries! Random members of the public don't get a say in what I eat for lunch. I don't have to defend myself or debate them. I don't have to care what they think, because it's LITERALLY 100% my decision and LITERALLY 0% theirs.

I used to think that if I couldn't convince people and make them stop commenting on it, that meant I wasn't "allowed" to eat a sandwich every day. I didn't understand that some things belong to me, and that means I have the right to make choices about those things; even if my choices are illogical, it is still my right to make those choices. Boundaries.

And I just cannot even tell you how good it feels to know I don't have to get into debates about this every day at work. I don't have to defend myself. They can't do anything to me, because my lunch is my decision and nobody else gets a say.

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Related:
From "Virtues Morality" To "Boundaries Morality"
Captain Marvel, Boundaries, and Why I Don't Go To Church
A victim who's made mistakes is still a victim