Vegan Vixen Ventures

My Love Affair With Opera

I love walking into an opera house for the first time. I can equate it to seeing a new ballpark for baseball fans. Perhaps they see the green of the field and they are filled with excitement. For me, the colors of the seats, the decorations on the balcony and the anticipation of the performance causes my heart to race. I try to take it all in until my little seat feels like home.

Just some of the opera tickets I have accumulated over the years

I enjoy arriving early to listen to the musicians warm up. I love to hear bits and pieces of the opera I am about to experience. People usher themselves in and take their seats. Some are dressed for a special occasion and others dressed for comfort. One of my favorite moments before the opera begins is the applause that welcomes the conductor. First, you can hear those in the balcony clapping because the conductor is seen from above first. I can’t help but smile when I hear the roar of those below joining the appreciation. I like thinking of myself as a single drop in a sea of pure joy.

The Surprise English Road Trip

My road trip began when I got picked up at the Lichfield Trent Valley train station by a friend of mine. All I knew at that point was that I was staying with my friend and her wife. It turned out that due to an issue with their shower in their new home, we were to take a road trip from town to town enjoying the countryside along the way. I was completely onboard, wondering what sights I might see, what I might learn and what vegan food I might discover in each town.

Three Days in Soho, London

Having traveled to over 50 countries, it was hard to believe that it took me so long to travel to merry ole’ England. After all, how could I really say that I was a well-seasoned traveler when I hadn’t even been to London?! I figured it was time to remedy this embarrassing reality. As a start to my England venture, I naturally spent a few days in England’s capital city. Having found a great accommodation on AirBnb, I focused my time in and around the Soho area. It turns out this was a very smart thing to do as the majority of the aspects to this cosmopolitan city was located quite near the flat I had rented.

Vegan Fine Dining and the Opera – Date Night in Sarasota

It just so happened that my favorite opera, Puccini’s Tosca, was playing at the Sarasota Opera House. Chrissy bought tickets for a few weeks out to ensure that they wouldn’t be sold out. Sarasota, Florida is anywhere from 1 hour and a half hours to two hours to drive from our home in Clearwater depending on traffic. This trek is a beautiful drive, however as it combines Highway 60 which includes a narrow drive from Clearwater to Tampa, with the Gulf of Mexico on either side. Coming from the north, the Sarasota journey also includes the beautiful Skyway Bridge, which is lit up with colorful lights at night.

I felt like a queen when Chrissy opened the door to her truck for me. We were both dressed up and she looked fabulous. And just in case her sexy butch self wasn’t enough, I caught a whiff of her Polo cologne as she closed the door. “This is going to be a great night”, I thought to myself. A fancy dinner at an upscale vegan restaurant and the opera? What’s not to like!

Florida Strawberry Festival – Plus Savory Vegan Strawberry Recipes

One of the many bonuses about living in Florida is that strawberry season is in February/March. Plant City is known throughout the Sunshine State as the place to get strawberries. I went to this small town with three goals: to buy fresh strawberries, find a cowboy hat and to try the vegan options they would have at the fair this year.

Vegan Strawberry Shortcake from Seasoned Greens

Visiting a Gun Show as a Vegan Lesbian

I grew up in a Quaker family, where I was taught that “guns are bad”. As a result, I never saw a gun growing up. None of my family members owned a gun and if my childhood friends’ parents owned any weapons, they kept them well hidden from us. Then, just out of college, I got a job at Southwest Airlines at the BWI airport. As a result, I was suddenly thrown into a world where I was expected to have a basic understanding of guns. While working at the ticket counter, it was part of my job to inspect all guns to ensure they were not loaded. I had no idea so many people carried guns in their checked luggage. It was at this job that I learned words like “magazine”, “chamber” and “dry shoot”.

I was also raised vegetarian (and have since become vegan), so I was completely unfamiliar with hunting or fishing. Frankly, I was happy to grow up without dead animals around me, in the kitchen or elsewhere.

When I moved to Berlin, Germany in my late 20s, I was surprisingly expected to own a gun, or at least be familiar with them. So, when I returned to the United States for a visit, I decided to ask a friend to take me to a gun range. After listening to my friend’s safety spiel, I learned some basics: 1) always assume a gun is loaded and 2) always point guns down range even when resting. The indoor range was fun. It was here that I learned what “kickback” was.

Since then I tried two more ranges and one included using “big guns”. Those were fun. It is at one of these ranges that I first heard of “conceal carry” and “open carry”. To be honest, I found the differences confusing, especially when you include the requirements for each and the fact that these change in every state. With my limited knowledge, I walked into the Tampa Gun Show with “GUN” stamped in blue on my hand.

A Year of Traveling During Covid

Traveling in 2021 involved staying up-to-date on the CDC guidelines, the government policy on arriving back to the USA and monitoring the Covid situation in other states and countries. This included staying informed about where I was allowed to visit, be it domestic or international. Despite these limitations my wanderlust took me on two Florida weekend excursions, Mexico a couple times, Africa, New England and a road trip to Baltimore.

Returning to the United States from Mexico

Recovering from a Lesbian Divorce

“I want to end the relationship”, she clearly spoke those words I dreaded to hear. It had been three days since I had seen her. I had picked her up from the hotel she stayed in for three days trying to decide if she wanted to leave or continue to work on our relationship. Covid hadn’t helped.

Ever since I could remember, people who knew me always told me how strong I was. Some had even told me that I was the strongest person they had ever met. I survived abuse, struggled with Borderline Personality Disorder, and was kicked out of my parents’ house at 19. But, this… this crushed me in a way that nothing ever had. I felt I was a fragile piece of glass that had been smashed to a million pieces. I was doubled over in pain so bad that I couldn’t even stand up straight. My best friend saw me crumple to the floor of his office at work. How was I going to be able to pick myself up after the most devastating blow of my life?

Picture was taken after hiking up a steep climb in 95 degree heat in Montenegro

My First Vegan Christmas Dinner

I celebrated my ninth veganniversary a few months ago. But, until this year I was never in charge of the Christmas meal. “Make whatever you want”, I was told. So, I began looking through various vegan recipes searching for recipes I thought I could manage, as well as recipes that would go well together. After a few days of contemplating, I decided on the meal:

An Unexpected Extra 24 Hours in Mexico!

As a seasoned traveler, I am honestly embarrassed to write this post. I have traveled to over 50 countries and have dealt with all kinds of travel woes and a variety of surprises. Having worked as a customer service agent at Southwest Airlines for over 5 years also gave me an inside understanding of air travel, in particular. I’ve always known how to handle delays and cancelations, I know my rights as a passenger and know what requests are reasonable and what are out of the question based on the contract of carriage and the FAA regulations. I thought my years of working at the airport (at the check-in counter, the gates and baggage service) as well as taking hundreds of flights all over the world, put me in the unique position of knowing how to be perfectly prepared for any eventuality in air travel. “People who have issues with air travel simply are inexperienced travelers”, I arrogantly said to myself, usually followed with an even more arrogant, “that would never happen to me.” Well, I was very humbled at Gate 61 of the Cancun airport! After my experience, I have changed my inner dialogue to “it could happen to anyone.”

Weekend Getaway to Melbourne Beach, Florida

I stood on the 16th floor balcony after setting my bag down. As if out of a Hollywood romance, two pelicans flew by close enough for me to see the details of their feathers. The various shades of blue sparkled just behind them, I could hear the powerful crashes of the waves and the familiar smell of salt filled the air. “This was going to be a fantastic weekend”, I thought.

Celebrating My 9th Veganniversary With Tapas

Nine years ago I decided to go vegan. I was living in Chiang Mai, Thailand at the time. While I had grown up vegetarian, going vegan had seemed to difficult. However, after taking the time to learn about the horrors of the dairy and egg industries, I simply could no longer eat eggs and cheese in good conscience. And so I took the plunge, which actually wasn’t as big of a deal as I had though it would be. Nine years later, the only thing I regret is not doing it sooner.

I pondered ideas of how to celebrate. I considered cooking dishes with 9 ingredients, thought about making a nine-course meal and then I came up with the perfect idea: tapas! I decided to make 9 tapas dishes. I read though recipe ideas online and even got out several of my vegan cookbooks. In the end, I came up with a menu highlighting variety.

Officiating a Lesbian Wedding Over Zoom

“I wanted to ask if you know anybody who officiates weddings. I would like to get married this year with Milena and, since same- sex marriage is not legal in Poland, we thought we might look for someone online who would like to do that for us.” This simple, yet profound, message I received from my Polish friend Kate through Facebook Messenger was the start of an amazing journey, that I will not soon forget.

I had met Kate while traveling in Jerusalem. Sensing a kindred spirit, I talked to her and an international friendship was born. Kate and I are both English teachers and we love adventure and traveling. I visited Kate in Poland and she very successfully showed off her beautiful country, introducing me to some great places, while also helping me with some family genealogy.

So, when I received the Facebook message above, I jumped at the opportunity to help out my amazingly generous friend. Little did I know that this would be an amazing experience for me too! Once they accepted my offer, I began by doing research on how to marry people. I was so excited!

Overnight at the Seminole Hard Rock in Tampa, Florida

We had just enjoyed the three-day weekend celebrating Independence Day, Tampa Bay Lightning was to play game four of the Stanley Cup finals and Tropical Storm Elsa, which kept threatening to become a Cat 1 hurricane, was on her way.

Chrissy reminded me that she had received a free night stay at the Seminole Hard Rock Hotel and Casino in Tampa. I had only been there once before for about an hour, not nearly enough time to really give it a chance. We decided to do a little gambling, check out the vegan scene and (hopefully) watch Tampa Bay win the Stanley Cup.

Despite this picture sans people, Seminole Hard Rock Hotel and Casino was quite full.

Riding In a Pride Parade

I love Pride! I get invigorated hearing “Happy Pride” from complete strangers, I love watching the parades and reveling in the amazing loving energy! My absolute favorite part of the parade, whether seeing it for the first time in the 1990s in my home town of Baltimore or in the Tampa Bay area where I now call home, has always been the very beginning when the sexy women ride on the motorcycles. I would often dream about being one of them.

Riding in the Pride parade in Tampa, Florida!

Visiting Egypt as a Lesbian

“There’s no one around”, she whispered to me as we waited for the old-fashioned elevator to reach the floor of our AirBnB. As we stood in the hallway of this old apartment building on the Nile in the Dokka district of Cairo, Chrissy leaned in to kiss me. “No!” I said suddenly and pushed her back to her surprise. I pointed out the camera I had just seen in the corner behind her. That was a close one!

Lesbians in front of Hatshepsut’s Palace in the Valley of the Queens, Luxor, Egypt

Visiting Bok Towers in Lake Wales, Florida

Bok Towers was always one of those places that I meant to visit one day. Yet, every time I found myself traveling on I-4, I always came up with an excuse as to why I should skip this unusual, yet relatively local, destination.

One day, I finally ran out of excuses. The promise of botanical gardens, historical grounds and a live carrion concert seemed like the perfect date.

Vegan in Egypt

“Small, medium or large?”, the young waiter asked us from behind his mask. El Tahrir, an Egyptian chain restaurant, serves only one item: koshary, a traditional Egyptian dish that is a popular street food and that also happens to be vegan.

Within a short time, a medium bowl appeared with a bed of noodles, lentils, crispy onions, rice and chickpeas served with a bowl of tomato sauce and packets of garlic sauce and chili sauce. You are meant to use these to adjust to your own taste. I poured the entire bowl of tomato sauce on my koshary and squeezed some of the chili sauce from its packet.

I had posed the question “How do you enjoy your koshary?” to the Vegetarian/Vegan Egypt Facebook group and got back over 70 varied responses. The majority seemed to use a combination of garlic and chili sauce. A few liked theirs with more tomato sauce. I left El Tahrir wondering how I would prepare mine the next time I tried this delicious Egyptian vegan dish. I also knew that next time I would order a small as the carb and protein packed meal filled me up quickly.

Camping in the White Desert, Egypt

“Don’t flush”, Chrissy told me, “I have to go too”. I laughed from my squatting position over the sandy hole I had just dug with my hands. I quickly took stock as to how I got to this point – peeing while watching the sun rise over the White Desert in western Egypt.

The previous morning we walked out of the Steigenberger Hotel to find Mo standing there with a suitcase on rollers. We hadn’t seen him since our Giza excursion and so we spent some time catching him up on our time in Luxor while we waited for Sayed, our driver. I had loved learning about the various ancient eras of the Egyptians: marveled at the architecture; reveled in the linguistic scripts and enjoyed the stories of each pharaoh we came across. But, I was looking forward to this excursion most of all as it had the biggest potential of being the highlight of the trip for me.

Camping in Egypt’s White Desert under a super moon!

Spending My Birthday at Peacefield in Newberry, Florida

I had just survived Covid and 2021 was not even a week old. The thought of spending my 48th birthday at an animal sanctuary appealed to me even more than usual. My internet search landed me at Peacefield in Newberry, Florida, a place I hadn’t even heard of but was only a few hours drive away.

Valentine’s Day in Cancun, Mexico

It was just after midnight and so officially Valentine’s Day. Chrissy gave me a card she had thoughtfully written and brought with her to Cancun. Inside were wonderful words of love stating how happy she was to have met me. What a wonderful way to begin a holiday that I hadn’t celebrated in over a decade and a half.

The beautiful water at Delfines Public Beach in Cancun, Mexico

Skydiving in Zephyrhills, Florida

“Ok. It’s time”

“We’re first?” My heart jumped and the next thing I knew I was falling out of a plane into what everyone on the ground saw as a partly cloudy day.

Skydiving had been on my bucket list for quite awhile and was frankly one of the scariest activities on my ever-growing list. But, I felt it was time. My wife Mindy had decided to end our 16 year relationship a few weeks prior and so I began the process of rediscovering myself as I healed. I also liked the symbolism of diving into the next chapter of my life. And so, I pushed my fear aside and signed up for a jump with my friend Erick.