I’m Jennie Ruff, a 23 year old (girl) living in Philadelphia, PA. I moved here in the fall of 2009 to live with the Better Half, also known as Alex Melonas. I graduated with a B.A. in Psychology (Summa Cum Laude!) from American University. It is possibly the most useless degree known to man. I’m currently a freelance web designer who would like very much to be employed as a research assistant at a large university, or go back to school.
I’m a vegan, psychology
major graduate, coffee whore and a horse enthusiast.
Yes, you can be all of those at once.
I grew up in Salt Lake City, Utah. No, I’m not Mormon. Neither are my parents or extended family. Everything you’ve heard about Salt Lake is completely untrue, although I’m pretty sure there are some people like the family in Big Love camping out in Sandy somewhere. Still residing in Salt Lake is my best friend and interspecies life partner, Rivet, an Appendix super horse who turns 20 in April. He currently lives in a suburb of Salt Lake, and has a crush on his neighbor, Madame Ladybug. He’s smarter, faster, and nicer than most people and the way that little piece of hair flops over his eye? SO HOT. As of July 2009, I’ve added Charlie, a 30-ish gelding rescued from a therapeutic riding program, to the herd.
I have two rescued dogs (Sirius and Preston) and three cats (Tiger Lily, M.K. and Boo) who live at home with my mom, the saint, and two rabbits, Regan and Jax.
I started this site in 2008, after I couldn’t find a vegan blog that was up to my standards - I wanted something snarky, smart, something that provided resources for vegans and humanized my lifestyle for non-vegans, something enjoyable to read but with a little kick like when I spike my grape juice. I was thinking of a cross between Dooce and the Abolitionist Approach, with a pinch of the Vegan Lunchbox thrown in for good measure. Don’t get me wrong though, there are a lot of great vegan sites out there, just not one that combined everything I was looking for in one place. Plus I just like to hear myself talk.
My co-author, partner-in-crime and better half is Alex Melonas. He used to write for a blog called the Gun Toting Liberal, even though he has yet to tote a gun anywhere to the best of my knowledge. He was “fired” in the spring of 2007 for being ‘anti-christian’, despite bringing in more traffic than the other four writers combined. Because apparently you can compare George W. Bush to Hitler, but God help you if you criticize the Pope for his policies on birth control. During his time as a contributer he had an article published by Reuters and almost got himself shipped to Iraq as part of an experimental embedded blogger program. He’s currently in a Political Theory PhD program at Temple University. He’s brilliant and well spoken and underneath his grumpy hood-shrouded exterior he’s the nicest person alive. And he looks pretty good without a shirt on. I’m a lucky woman.
I went vegan in 2006, after being a vegetarian since age 7ish. Alex and I were driving home from Idaho (no, you the ho!) when he looked at me and said “I think we should go vegan.” I agreed, on the condition that vegan yogurt was edible. It is, and I’ve been a vegan ever since. As a vegetarian, I hated every vegan I knew. I believed they were self-righteous, egotistical hippies. Now I know better. Only about half of vegans are self-righteous ass-holes, and only 75% are of the hippy school. Yehaw.
One of the things I wanted to be able to do on this site is show people that I’m just an average, everyday girl. I bathe regularly, am a self-confessed shopping addict, am addicted to sugar, wear makeup and shave my legs. In short, I’m just like you but way more awesome.
This site chronicles life in a world where what many people find normal flies in the face of everything I consider to be ethical. Being a vegan isn’t the hard part. Getting people to pull their heads out of the ass of tradition is.
I like reality television, advanced vocabulary words, peanut butter, Ikea and designer denim.
I hate peas, the cold, those commercials for herpes medication and English professors.
