Tomorrow: V-Day

Tomorrow is the first day of the rest of my life (for a month). I'll be going vegan for one month to see how it affects my nitrogen isotopic signature.

The general principle in play: Plants "prefer" to munch on molecules of higher energy. The N2 molecules buzzing around in the air have different isotopes incorporated in them (it's all nitrogen, but different amounts of neutrons, thus some molecules are heavier and some are lighter even though it's the same element).

The lighter isotopes have a higher energy (because E = Mc^2), and are thus more likely to be sucked up by plant respirator pore things - yes this is the scientific language - no I am not a biologist (though I bet I had you fooled). Anyway, as plants have this tendency to suck up more and more of the light N isotope, they have compositions that are light in respect to N.

So when a bunny comes along and eats that light plant, he will eventually need to go to the potty. As the bunny goes wee wee his pee pee preferentially expels the light N, making Mr. Bunny enriched in heavy N with respect to the original plant he munched on. This process continues on up the trophic levels, until the biggest baddest carnivore in the neighborhood is extremely heavy in N with respect to the original plant - since every successive trophic level of animal which he or she eats is heavier and heavier.

This is the basic principle: vegans, people who eat no animal products, are chock full of light nitrogen isotopes from plants who love light nitrogen, where as people who were to eat only wolves and sharks would be very isotopically heavy compared to the vegan due to the natural distillation cycle in organisms who have nitrogen rich urine. Hopefully this change will be recorded in the growth of my hair so I can create a hair profile that shows my evolution. Maybe it will even show the protein binge I've been on all week in an effort to eat up all of my meats, cheese, and milk :)

So there it is. I'm going shopping this evening to Trader Joes so I can stock up on some good vegan products, grains, beans, and produce. I'm going to need to be cooking a lot to keep up with this and keep myself healthy, so please feel free to comment with any vegan recipes!

I'm also getting a physical and full blood work up done tomorrow which I will do again at the end of the month of veganism, mostly just for shits and giggles.

Wish me luck!