For the past three years I’ve been vegan. A junk food vegan. Processed foods have always been my friend. They’re cheap, full of energy and bad for you? Meatloaf had it right when he said two out of three ain’t bad.

I’ve dusted off my old cognitive dissonance from storage. I guess once your eyes are opened to the ethical “problems” of a modern society it becomes difficult to close them again. Suffering does seem to be a keystone of our society.

A major issue I face is lack of funds. I continue to bleed money being well into month four with no income outside of government welfare. Every week that passes a chunk of my savings disappears forever because our welfare doesn’t even cover rent. Won’t someone think of the landlords?

Failure to stem this bleeding will likely result in homelessness. This is the cost of living and it’s too damn high. So for now, I return to being a carnivore. I’ll still buy vegetarian or vegan when I can justify the cost, and I’ll cut down on meals and make smaller portions. That was also my plan for getting my own weight back into the range I was aiming for, maybe.

But unfortunately for salmon, salmon is a nutrient-dense meal and I was still willing to make that exception. Farmed Atlantic salmon feed has reduced its reliance on wild-caught fish over time, but that does not make salmon farming environmentally benign. The average farmed salmon is harvested at around 5kg. Using my rough 60% edible-yield estimate, that’s about 3kg of flesh, or roughly 26 meals at 115g each. So that’s still one entire salmon slaughtered every 26 meals.

Onward to the decline. 🫠