Eat Local Challenge Eve

It's Eat Local Challenge Eve and I'd be lieing if I didn't say my courage was waning. Last night was spent looking for an internal compromise to going the whole way. The banana devil sat on my shoulder whispering, "Just stick to local carrots. You can't live without mayonnaise for a month. What difference are you going to make anyway?"

And the devil is likely right, my eating completely local for 30 days will not reverse global warming, reduce the amount of run off pesticides or fertilizers that pollute our waterways. It will not lessen the number of shopping carts with plastic boxes of produce packaged for easy shipping and retail display. It will not raise the national number of farmers that produce food instead of subsidy commodities and I'll probably still never meet Michael Pollan or Barbara Kingsolver.

The only effect of my eating local will likely be to my pocket book, waist line and a reason for the cute guy to do a lot more sailing. And I can't not do it.

So this morning as a last hurrah of sorts I had a croissant from the Acme Bread Company at the Ferry Building and bid a silent farewell to my friends at Starbucks's. Tomorrow will be a new day.

Here are my guidelines for the Eat Local Challenge per the questions on the Locavores website:

Goal: I'm not sure. To save the world? Yeah, right. To be part of the solution as Anne Lamott would say, but a solution for specifically what I'm not sure. A better world? The one we have is pretty darn beautiful this morning and the fruits she produces are damn delicious already. Okay, here it is -- My goal is to reduce my carbon bite by eating food grown within a 100 mile radius of my home and to enjoy the perfection of it all. And to blog every day of the challenge.

Exemptions: Coffee. Period. I will however brew my own coffee instead of going to Starbucks and I'll use beans that are some combination, if not all, of fairtrade, organic and roasted locally.

And I get one wild card exemption one time each week if I need it so I don't throw myself into a pit of dirty varmin if I have a starving, near death moment in the urban desert of life and make an unlocal choice.

Challenge: To not be too serious.

Tip Offered: Breathe.

Help Needed Finding: Local mayonnaise, yeast, sugar, caffeinated tea.

Writing this I realized I should have solicited sponsors for each day I succeeded and donated the money to farm tours for kids, a women's shelter or cleaning up the dead zones off the coasts of Oregon or Louisiana. That's an idea for next year though. This year, I'll be my own sponsor - $5 for each day I succeed, donated somewhere yet to be determined.

Eat well.