Ummm...OJ rules. Just saying.

Farmer's market day, YES! But when we got there, my fave fruit stand was GONE! Where did you go, favorite fruit stand? Are you sick? Are you mad at me? I love buying your discounted, overripe fruit bags. Please come back next week.

Still, I took home plenty of produce, and introduced a new friend to my tummy: ORANGES! They are now insanely cheap. Here in Sacramento, I can get a 10lb bag of deliciously ripe, local Valencia oranges for 6$. A 25$ bag is only 12$. Next week, I'm upgrading.

This week, I spent 14.50$ at the farmer's market, and brought home:

10lbs of Valencia oranges
4lbs of persimmons
6 red/yellow bell peppers
1 giant head of cabbage
2 giant florets of broccoli

I think that's all of it. I also stopped in at WalMart to buy a crapton of bananas. I usually spend 20$ at the market, but I only had 15$. Sadface. But really, that extra 6$ always goes to discounted fruit bags, so I wouldn't have spent it, anyway.

Today, I've eaten:

Breakfast: Smoothie with 4 dates, 6 bananas, and lots of baby spinach

Lunch: One bunch of kale and 6 large oranges, juiced

Clearly I'm going to have a second lunch soon, but I've been really curious to try out some fresh squeezed orange juice as a meal. Holy crap, this stuff rocks. I busted out my trusty, yard sale derived Jack LaLanne juicer and peeled up a bunch of oranges, leaving on the white pith. I know that there are special citrus juicers that supposedly work really well, but I have to say that once again I'm really pleased with this juicer. When cleaning out the juicer after my meal, there was hardly any orange remains in the bag, and I squeezed them and found them to be pretty dry. I juiced an entire bowl of oranges and one small bundle of kale, and yet the pulp was almost entirely kale fiber. Plus, my glasses of juice were like, half fiber, and I had to keep stirring it together. I'm happy with these results, as I'm looking to keep a large amount of fiber in my juice.

Now, really you guys, I'm not being weird, but this orange juice is really...calming and strangely inspiring. I drank it slowly sitting in my kitchen, looking outside my window and watching the trees in my small apartment courtyard moving with the wind, and it was just so incredibly peaceful. Oranges are filled with bliss, jsyk. I haven't got jitters, no dry mouth or shaking, no mood swings or anything like blood sugar madness. Bliss, baby. I think orange/kale juice will be my go-to potion for my fiction writing sessions.

Who does heavy orange consumption? I may make them a mainstay since they are nicely ripe around now. There really is a lot of fruit to choose from throughout the winter months. I'm really surprised to hear people keep asking me what fruit there is to eat all winter. We've got apples, persimmons, oranges, pomegranates, and of course, bananas and dates are always available to fill in the gaps. Maybe it's a California thing, and I know I'm incredibly lucky to have been born here, since I can continue to eat fresh, local produce all year long, no matter what the season or the weather.