Charmed Monday Minute, March 26

Dear readers and friends –

My treasured assistant, Joya, is off visiting Kaua’i with her family this week (last week, too) and I miss her. It is wonderful how your life can change when someone enters it who is good at doing what you’re not good at.

I had a beautiful birthday. I went for training at the gym in the early morning, just like every Wednesday, and then treated myself and my daughter Adair to a “Day of Beauty” at the Dorit-Baxter Salon on 57th Street. (Adair’s birthday is on the 29th, and favor similar celebrating.) I love facials and massages and the like, so I left feeling like mush, but healthy, beautiful mush! That evening, we went to dinner at one of my favorite restaurants, Candle 79, with family and a few friends. It was restful and sweet, a time to sit and exhale.

I actually love birthdays (see below) since they’re the day we’re allowed to remember that we’re magnificent. Even the enlarging number of each year doesn’t bother me much. If I don’t feel it (which I don’t), it doesn’t seem to amount to much.

Happy buds and flowers and showers and spring stuff!

--Victoria

HELPFUL INFO OF THE WEEK: Juice yourself young! Begin with one glass of fresh juice daily. If you like it, work your up to two or even three glasses. Any more than that and juice may crowd out the whole vegetables with their necessary fiber. Dilute fruit juice half and half with spring water to cut its sweetness. Otherwise, use apple, citrus, or carrot juice as a mild base for mixed-juice cocktails. Be sure to include powerful green vegetables that are too potent to drink when juiced by themselves. Try carrot/celery (4 carrots, 1 stalk celery), carrot/apple/parsley (3 carrots, 1 apple, a small handful of parsley), or apple/cucumber/kale (3 apples, 2 cucumbers, 1 handful fresh kale). If it’s too bitter or overpowering, use fewer greens and more milder fruits and vegetables; if it’s very sweet, toss in a few more greens next time. I personally enjoy green juice with a hint of fresh ginger and a splash of lemon. In fact, my birthday “cocktail” at Candle 79 was a tart delight called the Green Goddess. No wonder I’m feeling younger by the day...

COUNTDOWN TO VICTORIA'S NEW, 10th, and (we're hearing!) BEST BOOK EVER, Fat, Broke & Lonely No More: Your Personal Solution to Overeating, Overspending, and Looking for Love in All the Wrong Places coming from HarperSanFrancisco on June 1, 2007 ...9 weeks and 4 days! If you’d like to pre-order online, here are links to the big guys: Amazon Barnes & Noble Or, call your favorite independent bookstore to reserve your copy! (To find an independent bookstore in your area, you can search on booksense.com here.)

Happy week, all!

My very best,

Victoria Moran