Know Any Literary Animal Lovers?

Hi there PureJeevan readers! We wanted to let you know that Jim's new novel CHROO is available on Amazon. It's a crazy adventure involving a billionaire heiress, her Chihuahua BFF ("Chroo") and a host of human and animal characters. Find out more on Amazon! Here are some links:




All this week we're continuing to feature a variety of answers to the question "Are Raw Foodists Crazy " from various friends of Pure Jeevan. If you're just now tuning in, please read the back story and introduction to this, as posted on Monday.But, for now, let's continue with posting the rest of the excellent responses sent in! Enjoy!! :-)

We're taking a very short break from our Nadi Balance series to announce that once again it's a special time of the year for diabetes awareness. As you may recall, we spent Wendi's 25th birthday last year doing public outreach on this very topic, as it's an issue close to our hearts. Pure Jeevan even maintains a special page, here, for diabetes information. So, if you know of anyone suffering from diabetes, and feel that they may be receptive to some really eye-opening information on the topic, please direct them to:

http://purejeevan.com/diabetes/

Wow, so much happened in Chicago that it's taking literally weeks to show it all to you!? But, hey, it's also a lot of fun to share this stuff. Wasn't that a great talk yesterday with Kathy and Danny Living !? If you haven't seen it, definitely scroll down and watch!

Here's another one for you. Meet Hatice Yavuz, co-owner along with Chef Mehmet Ak of Cousin's Incredible Vitality, another great raw destination in the Windy City. "Hatice" is a Turkish name, in case you're wondering. The "c" is pronounced like a "j" -- so, her name sounds like "huh-TEE-jay." Our interview with her ran a little long, so I'm going to have to break it into two parts. Here's part one:

I was grocery shopping in Giant Eagle with a friend the other day; I was just there to keep her company. When we left the Nature's Basket area (where they sell organics and more natural items), I felt a strange feeling. I hadn't realized it, but over the past two years I stopped shopping in the other areas of the store! I told her that by the time we hit the packaged shelves of the Nature's Basket area, I'd already be done shopping and my cart would be filled. We had a good giggle and went on shopping.

Anyway, that has since brought my attention to the shopping carts of those around me. We do about 5% of our shopping in Giant Eagle (last minute things that we've run out of, that don't merit a trip to our Food Co Op), so lately I've found myself in Giant Eagle looking into the carts of those around me. I'm not judging anyone, I'm just curious. On average, just about everyone has a small bunch of bananas in their cart. There are the occasional carts with something like a cantaloupe, a bag of apples, and once I saw a single tomato and a bag of lettuce. The rest of the carts have been filled with packaged foods. There is next to no living food in the carts.

***** DISCLAIMER: As with all of our posts here at Pure Jeevan, and particularly those tagged with a new term, "Nadi Balance," please refer to the disclaimer that runs at the bottom of all Pure Jeevan pages. Wendi and Jim are health researchers, educators, and extreme self-experimenters, not doctors. ******

There are four parts to blood: red blood cells, white blood cells, platelets, and plasma. Using a specialized microscope, one can easily view these parts of the blood. Red blood cells deliver oxygen to, and carbon dioxide from, the body. White blood cells, also known as leukocytes, help defend the body against disease and anything that they see as unnatural or foreign. Platelets help form clots to prevent bleeding. Plasma, comprised of about 90% water, is the fluid that transports all of the above.

Here's some coconutty video footage from our Florida Keys excursion. First up is some footage of Randesh, from www.TheGuana.com, who obtains fresh coconuts for Charlie Wilson's Key West restaurant, Help Yourself (see yesterday's blog post).Notice that Randesh uses a proper piece of equipment -- a large machete (or cutlass) -- which makes short, easy work of opening these precious gifts of nature! In the video footage following that, you'll see how comically difficult it is to open a young coconut when you lack the proper equipment. We actually went out looking for a machete, but could only find a large chef's knife at a local K-Mart. Yep, they were sold out of machetes! (Ironically, the chef's knife -- the heaviest one the store had -- cost about $17, while plain old machetes run just $10 or so at most hardware stores. Next time we'll keep looking...)

We're going to be running the above banner for a few days as we bring you highlights of the raw food scene in the beautiful Florida Keys.

Hey everyone!? Just one long weekend left for Wendi and KDcat to (frantically) pack for their cross-country roadtrip. Yep, Monday night I'm dropping them on that midnight train to Portland. Wait until you see the spread of trip-snacks they're taking along. (We took some pictures of the raw foods smorgasbord sent by our generous snack sponsor, Natural Zing).

Today, since it's fun-filled Friday, I thought I'd share a little tale of frustration (although meant in kind of a funny way) relating to my own diet. You may have read my mini-manifesto a few weeks ago about my recent quest for simplicity. Well, Wendi and I have both largely maintained that kind of existence for a while now -- especially when it comes to the breakfast smoothies (pineapples galore!) and lunch salads. I have to admit that my energy seems to be trending upward very nicely!

Hey, where the heck is Pure Jeevan this week ??? Sorry for the silence on our end; we're actually in Portland, Oregon, closing on our new digs -- the new HOME of Pure Jeevan!!! Exciting stuff, but we're SO busy that we may not be able to blog again until the week of June 7. But, we'll definitely return by then, and maybe even post a thing or two from here. It all depends on our internet situation. In any case, it's SO wonderful to be taking direct action on the future on Pure Jeevan. It's a huge leap of faith on our part, but it seems right by all accounts. So, see you soon when we return! -Jim & Wendi

Original Comments

Below, we have included the original comments from this blog post. Additional comments may be made via Facebook, below.

On May 28, 2010, Gopika wrote:

Here's a fun story, with a fun, inspirational, and at least partially dietary conclusion. As I mentioned yesterday, Wendi is in Portland this week. Can you guess what she's doing there? ... She's attending a very important event -- something that merited getting on an airplane with almost no notice (and, wow, are those last-minute airfares pricey!). Still not sure? That's okay; I'll let the cat out of the bag: We found a new home!!

We've been talking about moving to the west coast for literally years now, so it's about time, right? ?In recent times, we've really begun taking action on things in a much more profound and immediate way than ever, and it's been working out amazingly well. This home purchase was just the latest instance of it. We basically saw an opportunity and immediately went for it, without hesitation, and before we knew it we were sending paperwork back and forth across the internet to our realtor.

We've spent some time on this blog talking about how much fun you can have via the meetup.com web site. If you search that site, you can probably find raw food meetups near you!? But, a few readers have asked us some follow-ups, such as What should I bring and What should I do if I'd like to host a raw foods meetup

*Attending* Raw Foods Meetups

Okay, so you signed up for a raw foods meetup group, waited patiently for the next event to come round, and now it's time!? But, wait... this is your first such outing. What should you bring