Actually, one of the small things that ended up being a pretty big issue in my last cohabitated relationship was showering. I’m all for showering with a friend on occasion, if I’m feeling it. Showering with your partner can be fun. It can be cute. It can also be sexy. How often do you get to be naked in the name of the environment? But sometimes you just want to shave your damn armpits without anyone breathing over your shoulder. I like to hog the water, and I like the water boiling hot.

Often when you live with someone, you aren’t on the same shower schedule so this really isn’t an issue. Or, if you spend all day apart, maybe a morning shower can be a sweet daily ritual. However, In my last relationship, we were both working from home, and we would hit the gym together and then hop in the shower together. Every day. I don’t care if it’s better for the environment, after months of this, I was missing my alone time. When I would request solo suds time, it would spark a fight.

While the shower situation is specific, this translates into all facets of cohabitation. How do you say you want some alone time without bruising any egos? Maybe you just want to run errands sans company, or go out with your friends without a sidekick.

It all comes down to communication. I think the healthiest relationships blossom because of an ability to understand and respect the need for alone time, and the ability to not take it personally when one of you is all “get out of me, I just want the apartment to myself for a few hours so I can watch my own stupid shit on Hulu/call my friends and talk about you/masturbate.” Yes, leave so I can masturbate. Now there’s a statement sure to spark an argument. Happy National Masturbation Month, everybody!

I have proven not to be so great at asking for my alone time, and I am worried it will become a problem in my new living situation, just as it was a problem in my last. I just let it go until I am so fed up I snap over something small, so all of a sudden my partner thinks I am angry because he forgot to pick up dish soap, but really I am angry because it’s been six weeks since I last saw myself naked without company. I don’t want the shack in shacking up to turn into shackle, know what I’m saying? So, how do you handle this, oh wise readers of SexyTofu?

Burned

On Tuesday I met up with the cast and crew of Courtesy Flush for a little bonding experience before we all fly out to set. By “bonding” I mean we went to a bar and relied on our favorite social lubricants until we were trading stories about exes and bad one night stands like we were old college friends.

We were at an outdoor bar and at one point I was standing in the smokers section right by the exit with several of the female actors. (I learned “Actresses” is out-dated and makes me look sexist.) As we were chatting, two guys from New Zealand busted up in our conversation. Literally, they just walked up and commented on our topic of choice, while we were mid-sentence. It was obnoxious. Then they asked which one of us wanted to come home with them and I vomited everywhere. Well not literally, but it was pretty awful.

One of our female leads bluntly called them out on their terrible pick-up tactics, and they scampered off into the night.

Okay, we were in the meat packing district, so an abundance of douche-nuggetry should have been expected, but really? You bust up into the convo of four girls–the last group of girls before the exit, mind you–in a last ditch effort to pick someone up before stumbling home? (Alone.)

With that in mind, here are a few tactics you can use to engage strangers when out in public.

Don’t interrupt. The best way to approach someone you want to get to know is just to go up and start an actual conversation with them. However, wait until they aren’t mid sentence, and be sure to have a genuine, non-creepy opener. And make sure your conversation is not riddled with weird, false-sounding compliments that may have them wondering if you’re Jeffrey Dahmer Jr.

Don’t blatantly solo them out. Okay so you are now in conversation with your target! Win! Instincts may tell you to focus your attention solely on them, but this can come off pushy and rude. Instead, talk to their friends, paying your target only moderately more attention. Don’t ignore their company or make them feel like they aren’t included. This will probably bother everyone, or at least piss off the friend enough to make them start tugging sleeves to go home.

Ask some f*cking questions. If they want to know how amazing your trip to Vegas was, they will ask YOU. It’s fine to put out little bits of info about yourself, but if they aren’t biting, don’t blunder forward. Ask them some things about themselves, and if interested, they will most likely return the queries.

My friend Alex Carabano, the hilarious comedian and partial owner of Park Slope’s latin kosher vegan heaven, V Spot, put out this video on hollering at women. It’s called “Yo Ma!” and it went viral on the YouTube. Take a look, have a giggle, and remember never to actually approach a woman this way…

This proactive procedure cut her cancer risk from 87 percent to under 5 percent. I am so beyond impressed with her bravery in not only making that hard decision, but in talking about it publicly, encouraging other women to evaluate all of their choices when it comes to cancer prevention.

In her op-ed, she writes that she is stepping forward to talk about her procedure because she hopes that other women can benefit from her experience.

“I choose not to keep my story private because there are many women who do not know that they might be living under the shadow of cancer,” Jolie writes.

It is miraculous that Jolie was able to hide this from the public since her procedure in April. The media attacks celebrities for stepping outside wearing the wrong footwear, let alone the removal of both breasts. So kudos to her on keeping it private, and triple kudos to her on then coming forward and talking about the experience for the benefit of others. Well done, Angelina.

In the last decade, Jolie has done her best to stay out of the spotlight, focusing on humanitarian work and building her brood of 6 children with fiance, super stud Brad Pitt. I think a lot of what she does goes unacknowledged. Jolie is one of the handfuls of celebrities using their success to push forward and do good, instead of snorting it or avoiding their taxes.

Jolie is only 36, which is young for a procedure like this. However, her mother, Marcheline Bertrand, passed away from cancer at the age of 56. In her NYT piece, Jolie writes touching sentiments about her children not getting to know “mommy’s mommy.”

This spoke directly to me, as a preventative mastectomy is something that has crossed my mind before. I have breast and ovarian cancer on both sides of my family. My mother and aunt are breast cancer survivors, my aunt having undergone a mastectomy. I lost another aunt nearly two decades ago to ovarian cancer. As a woman at a high risk for cancer, it’s empowering and reassuring to see a celebrity taking it on.

I especially love Jolie for openly addressing the idea of a “loss of femininity,” which many women feel after having a mastectomy or hysterectomy. The breasts are one of the largest (or for others with ballerina boobs like me, the smallest ) symbols of the feminine, developing at the beginning of that painfully awkward time that signifies the entrance to “womanhood.” I have heard that many women feel to lose their breasts is to lose their feminine identity, and they can suffer emotionally after procedures similar to Jolie’s.

“On a personal note, I do not feel any less of a woman,” she says. “I feel empowered that I made a strong choice that in no way diminishes my femininity.”

Jolie openly discusses some of the details of the surgery, and what the procedure entails. She also addresses more holistic measures, writing that her own regimen will be posted on the website of her treatment center, the Pink Lotus Breast Center.

“Life comes with many challenges,” she concludes. “The ones that should not scare us are the ones we can take on and take control of.”

My friends in high school could tell you that my bedroom was adorned with every image of Angelina Jolie I could find. I was attracted to her raw sexuality, her individuality, and her take-no-shit attitude.

As she moved from sex symbol to serious humanitarian, my admiration for her only intensified. Ten years later, I am still crushing hard, even if some of the reasons have changed. Thanks Jolie. Good to know you’ve got my back.

The film, Courtesy Flush, is a character-driven dark comedy that focuses on love and sexuality and asks us to take a look at what we consider “normal” in our sex lives and our relationships, both platonic and romantic. The story follows a couple, James and Lexi, who have created an erotic fitness parody called F*ck Fitness that accidentally went viral. After spending a few years cashing in on their Internet fame, they move to Hawaii and befriend the polyamorous trio living next door. The group gets into some mischief on the island, and are forced to solve a mystery that will cause each of them to reexamine what they think they know about themselves, and each other.

In the screenplay, I also examine the concept of loneliness, and further investigate my obsession with “difficult” women. Also polyamory. I am infatuated with polyamory. One of our film’s awesome producers and I actually first came into contact several years ago when I wrote about polyamory on Sexy Tofu. Talk about full circle…

This is one of our Kickstarter rewards! Made by our costume designer out of Hawaiian shells.

It’s been really fun, and now it’s on its way to being funded. If you like SexyTofu, then you will like Courtesy Flush. I promise. Triple promise. The movie is being directed by my boyfriend Phillips, who I write about on here all the time, because he is terrific and makes my insides flippity flop. He is extremely talented, and looks amazing naked, although you can only enjoy one of those assets. (I get to enjoy both. Win!)

Kickstarter is a bizarre beast. It’s hard to get your project funded, and it’s hard to predict where the money will come from. You might think that people are more excited to fund fledgling projects, but in actuality, they are more likely to fund projects that are already mostly funded. I suppose they seem more tangible. Oh irony, you bitch.

F*ck Fitness water bottle reward.

Take a look at our campaign here, watch the video of us talking about the project, look at our talented cast and crew, and read our rewards! You can get jewelry worn on set, a downloadable copy of F*ck Fitness, a DVD of the finished film, and way more. Please check it out and pass it forward!

Love love love love everywhere.

Z

Oh, here are some videos of three of our actors talking about their characters!

Courtesy Flush Cast: Caitlin Holcombe from Phillips Payson on Vimeo.

Courtesy Flush Cast: Mikaal Bates from Phillips Payson on Vimeo.

This week I was celebrating my boyfriend’s last day of work before we jet set to our island, and I made him a baked eggplant dish with spinach and pepper cashew ricotta. By spinach and pepper ricotta, I mean GREEN CHEESE!

Also, it is grain free. I did serve it over quinoa for my man friend who likes to be all grainy. I don’t, because grains make my skin real pissy.

Here it is, in all of it’s glory:

Baked Eggplant with Spinach and Pepper Cashew Ricotta
Serves 5/Time: 50 minutes

For Eggplant

1 large eggplant, sliced into thin rounds.
3 cups of your favorite tomato sauce (or one 24 oz. Can)
Nutritional yeast for sprinkling

For Ricotta

1 lb extra firm tofu
juice of 1 lemon
2 cloves garlic
1 tbsp EVOO
¾ cup raw unsalted cashews
1 tsp salt
½ tsp black pepper
¼ tsp oregano
big handful of fresh basil or 1 tsp dried
a few shakes of red pepper flakes
1 cup baby spinach
1 green pepper diced

Step one:
Preheat oven until 400. Throw all of the ricotta ingredients EXCEPT spinach and green pepper in your food processor and pulse pulse pulse til thick and creamy and ricotta-esque.

Step two: 
Add the spinach and pulse until everything is green. Then add diced pepper and pulse only until incorporated. Chunks are cool.

Step three:
In a large casserole dish, layer half of your eggplant rounds. Cover with a generous portion of ricotta (but not TOO generous. You want to have enough left for the top). Top with sauce. Add the rest of your eggplant. Smear on more cheese. Add remaining sauce. Sprinkle with nooch.

Bake for 40 minutes and enjoy!

Here it is over quinoa. It was really hard to make this look pretty.

In the summer, I plan to sub basil for the spinach and have a pesto party.

Okay tell me what you do to impress your omni friends. TELL ME!

Also, I know I have mentioned it on here before, but I wrote a screenplay and am currently raising funds for it to be turned into a movie! There are only a few days left in my Kickstarter campaign! So if you enjoy SexyTofu, you will seriously enjoy my dark comedy Courtesy Flush, set in Hawaii. Please support it (every dollar counts) or pass it to friends!

Recently, I sat on a bench with my darling omni boyfriend enjoying frozen yogurt (and frozen soy-yogurt for me). I was being silly and rambling on, per usual, about our looming cohabitation date. I said something along the lines of “when we move in together, I will be cooking, and so you will be eating vegan, and then you will feel so great you will want to go vegan, and then we can truly be soul mates.”

This was said in the jocular, babbling tone I take on when playing pretend. Similar statements have included “And then I will buy a barn, and go to the shelter, all of the shelters, and rescue the puppies, all of the puppies, and they will live in the barn. The end.”

Or my orgasms for breakfast regiment. It sounds great in theory but not so much in reality.

When it comes to vegans in search of romance, I am not of a “vegan-sexual” party. I am also not of the “veduction” party. You know: hook an omni, seduce them, demand they eat your seitan sammy, and BAM they are vegan. I am not for making people change when they don’t want to.

Say it with me: I can never change the person I am with. I should not expect my partner to change because I want them to. The only person I can change is myself.

Circling back to soul mates; I don’t even actually believe in soul mates in the one-for-one sense. However, I do believe in finding others with spirits and energies that mirror and match your own. This applies just as much in your friendships as it does in your romantic connections. And it is with this idea that I do harbor hope of having a vegan partner one day.

What I mean is that if someone truly matches your own sense of being, and your sense of being is compassionate through-and-through, then there is a better chance of them making an independent decision to live cruelty-free than if you lecture them for hours on end or make them watch Earthlings for the fourth time.

You can’t bully someone into thinking your way is the right way. And why would you want to? So you can have some vegan arm candy? They will probably only resent you.

Instead of focusing on finding a vegan partner (who could easily be wrong for you in many other ways), or changing the partner you’re with, focus on finding the person who is right for you in as many facets as possible. If their level of compassion truly reflects your own, then they may be curious about your lifestyle, excited to learn, and eager to adapt. But they have to want it themselves.

Maybe they will make the change. Maybe they won’t. Hopefully they will support and respect you regardless. And if they don’t end up embracing veganism on their own terms, well then you have a decision to make. You can show them another path, but you can’t force them to (happily) walk down it.

Last night I had dinner with my lovely friend Hannah (She is so inspiring! Check out one of her cookbooks or her award-winning blog!), and we stumbled onto this topic. Ever the well spoken one, she managed to boil down my entire ramble into two short, succinct sentences: “People can change. You can’t change them, but they can change.” Chew on that for a little.

Pretty stoked to wake up to this every morning

The countdown has begun: Exactly 29 days until I move to Hawaii with my boyfriend to work from our tiny studio apartment (iEG, island style!) and help him film a movie I wrote the script for. Exciting changes, if I do say so myself. But not only will the boyf and I be moving to a new state—scratch that…new ISLAND—where we will have no family or friends close by, but this is our first time living together.

I have written about cohabitation before; I tried it once in a past relationship, it didn’t work out, and the whole concept made me skittish. Where do you go when you’re having a bad day and want to be by yourself so you can cry for no reason without someone asking you what’s wrong? One can only sit in the bathroom for so long before they are randomly gifted Metamucil, “just because.”

Fear of cohabitation, I have owned you. I am not sweating you anymore. In fact, I am beyond stoked to be holed up in a single room with someone who happens to be my someone. This newfound excitement is brewing or a few reasons. The first is that we are making the move for the right reason: because we are ready to move our relationship forward. (Gulp.)

If you move in together for any other reason—financial, convenience, etc.–then it’s probably not going to work out. Living together, signing a lease together, pooling your things and trolling for street furniture together, those are HUGE steps down the commitment road, and anyone who thinks otherwise is in for a rude awakening. If your relationship is not ready, it will become blatantly obvious, and fast. So there’s that. I’m ready because we’re ready. (I know you wanted to know this, Internet.)

Mostly, however, I am ready because we have spent the last two months collaborating on a creative project and creating a business together. On the scale of Really Hard Shit, that trumps living together 10 to 1. You can argue with me on this, but “WTF do you MEAN you didn’t file that LLC last week?!” is hella more important than “WTF do you MEAN you didn’t scoop the kitty litter?” or “Did you pay the cable bill!?!”

The funny thing is that the problems that have risen in our professional relationship are the very same ones that arise in our romantic one, dressed up in a trench and sunglasses. I SEE you, communication issues. You can’t sneak up on me.

Collaborating together on this movie has been stressful. It has been difficult. It has kept me from sleeping well for the past 30 days. But it is so so worth it. There is nothing more ooey gooey than looking at our 110 page script, our team of amazing actors and crew, and saying “WE did that.” We made that creative baby, and it’s real freakin’ cute.

We’re still raising funds for the film via Kickstarter. You can check it out here. And get ready for some entertaining TLVs during the month of June, because I will be freshly cohabited and probably writing from the bathroom.

While putting together our Kickstarter, the boyf and I got a bit inappropriate, and a lot had to be cut. He compiled a nice little blooper reel for something I wrote for xoJane.com, but I am including it in here for you all, too. How Not to Make a Pitch.

The Art of a Pitch Video from Phillips Payson on Vimeo.

Smokey Sweet Potato Chickpea Curry

Serves 3 / Time: 35 minutes

1 large yellow onion, rough chop
2 cloves garlic, minced
1 inch fresh ginger, minced
1 large organic sweet potato, cubed. (I scrub well and leave the skin on.)
1 cup cooked chickpeas
½ cup frozen peas
2 tbs creamed coconut ( I used Let’s Do Organic brand)
1 tsp hot curry powder
½ tsp cumin
¼ tsp smoked paprika
pinch of salt
1 tbs olive oil
1 cup water, plus more for optional adding

Step one

In a medium-sized pot, heat oil over medium heat. Add onion and saute until translucent (3-4 minutes). Add ginger and garlic, saute 1 more minute

Step two

Add sweet potato, chickpeas, water, creamed coconut (or coconut milk) and spices and let simmer, covered, for 10-15 minutes over medium heat. Stir occasionally.

Step three

Add peas and let simmer for an additional 15 minutes. If needed, add more liquid (water or coconut milk) in ¼ cup increments.

Remove from heat, let cool, and enjoy over a grain or on its own while you obsessively monitor your Kickstarter campaign for that film you wrote and must plug everywhere.

I want to share with you the mock informercial that made the two main characters in the film, Lexi and James, an internet sensation. Cheesy and terribly done, Fuck Fitness went viral on YouTube and ignited the plot that simmers behind Courtesy Flush! Below is a snippet of Fuck Fitness, done for our Kickstarter promotion. It doesn’t feature our lead actors, but instead the adorable Kristin from Will Travel for Vegan Food and the talented Curtis Gillen of Pig Pen Theatre Co. If you like it, please click over to our Kickstarter page and watch our other videos. The amazing thing about crowd funding is watching everyone come together, each adding a small amount to create something larger. Already in the three days it has been live, it has been beyond humbling.

Love love love and gratitude everywhere! Okay, enjoy!

F*ck Fitness Infomercial from Phillips Payson on Vimeo.

Hi all. SexyTofu was conceived over three years ago, when I was giggling with a friend of mine over something sexy (okay, probably something raunchy) and he said “You should really start one of those blog things.”

I love blogging, and writing in general, but my real passion has always been in fiction. I am just not as interesting as the stories I make up in my head. And so I have been working feverishly to write a screenplay that now, with the help of YOU, is being turned into a film. A dark comedy, called “Courtesy Flush.”

I am not doing this alone obviously. I have never produced a movie. So I am teamed up with an amazing production team that includes a director, cinematographer, assistant director, production manager, and a repulsively talented (and attractive) cast. One of them is my bossman over at iEatGrass, Ayinde Howell. Don’t worry, I made him audition just like everybody else. No special treatment here!

The film is set in Hawaii, which is not only an integral part of the plot (The island is actually a character in the film) but one of the reasons we need to raise money. We have to get our cast on set!

The story is about a young couple, James and Lexi, who move to a small jungle town after they accidentally become a fitness sensation when their informercial parody, Fuck Fitness, goes viral on the Internet. What started as a joke ends up launching them into the spotlight. They end up skanking their new brand around for several years, making a few workout dvd series, shooting a pilot for a reality show that never gets picked up, and working Fuck Fitness from every angle.

When we meet them at the start of Courtesy Flush, they have very much outgrown Fuck Fitness, and are trying to escape their embarrassing image–along with a few other problems in their relationship.

They befriend their polyamorous neighbors, who I lovingly dubbed “the throuple,” and a mysterious recluse who lives behind them (whaddup, Ayinde!). Murder, madness, and hallucinations ensue as the group embarks upon a mystery that ends up defining the virtues of each character. Dun dun dun!

Please, if you like what you read on SexyTofu, then you will love the story behind Courtesy Flush. It explores and redefines what we view as “normal,” takes a look at love and sexuality from all angles, and there is a murder!

Please switch on over to my Kickstarter to show your support. Even if you don’t plan on donating, watch the video of me talking about the project! And, there is a hilarious Fuck Fitness infomercial parody featuring me in compromising positions. And more importantly, our lovely fitness model Kristin Lajeunesse from Will travel for Vegan Food! 

Thanks for reading the past three (!!!!!) years. SO much love from me to you, every day.

Love and snuggles and all that good shit,
Z