So, your kid plays football?

I meet proud parents every single day that love to tell me about their children. I often hear about good grades, football, soccer, baseball, cheerleaders, gymnastics, ballet... Well, you get the point. These conversations usually involve how talented their children are, what team(s) they are on, where the next track meet is, and so forth and so on.

When this conversation shifts, and I am asked what my children do, I am sure I get that same proud look on my face that I've seen beaming from the other parent(s) involved in these polite conversations. I am proud to say the my children are in bands. My youngest son is in school band and my oldest son is in a metal band. You should see the looks that I sometimes get with the last part of that statement!

My son does not worship the devil. My son does not do drugs. My son, in many ways, is just as talented as your girl on top of the pyramid or your son that hit 11 homers for his team last year. The long hair and look is as much of a "requirement" for what he does as is the crew cut and jock strap for your son.

Metal, rock and roll, rap, and country is all the same. It's music. The people that make it in the music business may appear to party all the time, do all the drugs in the world, drink daily, and live life to the extreme. The reality is, they work very hard. Many of those appearances are just an act. The blue hair, the spikes and leather, and the outlandish beards are a way that these guys set themselves apart from others. Do you really want to see someone on stage that looks like every guy walking down the street? You wouldn't want someone to associate the rampant use of steroids in major league baseball with your 10th grade first baseman would you?

I have learned that many of the great local acts that I have seen recently in Atlanta work as hard as your football star. There is no rock and roll season. Music is an all year sport. These guys practice, create music, work on their sets, and orchestrate all of this without the help of a coach that went to college for 4 years. They go out and find their own shows and get their own fans. They do not have alumni that show up and support what they do. They do not have booster clubs that contribute equipment. If they are lucky, one or two of them may have a parent that understands.

The next time you are downtown and walk by a bar or club where you hear live music, stop in. Sit down and take a few minutes and listen. Drop a dollar in the tip jar and tell the people on stage that you enjoyed it. These local musicians deserve that much.

Get ready and start dying...a journey into food.

Get ready and start Dying

Hello all. My name is Mark. I am 39 years old. I live a simple life, with simple pleasures. I am not rich monetarily. Nor do I require a whole lot of it to live. I am a simple man, but not a simple minded man. But this isn’t my story per se. My story is about food.

Two months ago I began a journey that would change my life forever. I was overweight, on blood pressure medication, had Edema, sleep apnea, and no energy to call my own. My diet was in the tank. I was a huge “seefood” eater. I saw food and I ate it. Little did I know, what I was consuming wasn’t food. It was chemically engineered death! I had literally gotten ready and had started dying. But all of that would change.

A good friend of mine posted a link to a movie on Netflix that I should check out called, Fat, Sick, and Nearly Dead. It’s a simple film, straight forward and to the point. It’s about juice fasting, consuming raw fruits and vegetables and drinking the juice straight. It wasn’t preachy, which I liked, and it didn’t ask for a credit card number or donation at the end. It was merely there to inform. And inform it did! So much so in fact, I had to watch it twice. My brother watched the second viewing with me, and the wheels started churning for us both. We had no idea what was going to happen next. But that simple film sparked something in me (and him), and it’s been absolutely incredible! Thus the journey began.

I got myself a juicer and my brother and I began our juice fasts. At first we were only going to do it for 10 days. But the results I saw daily were absolutely astounding! The first 2 days I wanted to crawl under a rock and die as my body began detoxing. And let me interject something here, if you don’t believe caffeine is a drug, deprive your body of it for 24 hours straight!! In 4 days I had lost 18 pounds. At the end of day 5 I was completely off of blood pressure medication. At the end of day 10, the Edema had gone completely away. And also my sleep apnea went bye-bye as well. I couldn’t believe the results I was seeing, so we continued our journey for 20 more days, for a total of 30 days. At the end of the 30 days, I went from weighing 363 pounds, down to 315 pounds. A total of 48 pounds in 30 days, and that is with zero exercise. I was utterly floored. But it would become so much more.

During my juice fasting, what was happening to me on the outside was great and I loved it, but what was truly amazing was the transformation that was happening to me on the inside, not only from a physical perspective, but from a mental and emotional one as well. I began taking a hard long look at what I had been fueling my body with. I began to take the same foods that they alter in a lab and pump out to the masses, under my own microscope. I equate my studies I performed to how a research scientist goes about studying various bacteria and fungi for healing properties. I was totally consumed by my work. What had started out as a simple “Hey I think I am going to try this juice fast stuff and lose a few pounds” had turned into something so much more! And yes. Most of my friends thought I had gone completely nuts.

During my studies everything kept coming back to one source for all things holistic and true. A plant based diet. Now let me stop here and interject. A plant based diet? Are you kidding me!? Until this time in my life I referred to salads and anything green as “That’s not food, that’s what food eats.” So it wasn’t like this was going to be an easy transition for me. But after being on a juice fast for so long I could have eaten anything and it would have been good. So the juice fast was a preparation that allowed me to do the transition. I am a firm believer that anytime change takes place, there has to be a catalyst for that change or else there are going to be more hurdles to overcome than naught. So it was actually quite easy. So why tell us all of this stuff?

I felt I should start my food blog out by telling you guys my personal story and how I got started doing all of this. I don’t claim to know everything, and I am no Doctor, nor am I even a Nutritionist or Dietitian. But I do a lot of research on the products that I consume, MOST of which come from local farms right here in Georgia. And as you will discover, I am very passionate about this. So what now?

Well now it’s up to you guys coming to the Local A blog page and reading my blog about Organic Foods, Vegan, and Vegetarian cuisine. Although I personally don’t eat meat, I will post up articles on healthy meat choices. So stay tuned folks! This journey has merely begun.

wth is all this?

Hi & welcome! We're stoked you've stumbled across our humble little space!

We are Local A, and this blog functions solely to bring our friends & neighbors news about the coolest, trendiest & tastiest stuff in Atlanta.

The catch? It's gotta be REAL local. That means the stuff we pimp has to be designed, developed, created & sold right here in the good ol' state of GA. We do lots of researching & sampling of our local goodness (yum) & work hard to make sure what we're presenting to you guys is the best of the best.

Why? Because we believe that everyone can participate in supporting our creative entrepreneurs while strengthening the local economy, and most importantly, have a lot of fun doing it.

What's the best part? The money Local A raises goes into our local economy too! Our aim is to help people in the textile industry get back to work. I've personally watched mill after mill close down in the southeast over the past couple of years, displacing lots of really skilled employees. Funds from Local A will help those people start anew as independent contractors with their own businesses.

We hope this blog inspires you to get out & explore all the great things that are going on around town as well as all over the state. There are more than enough amazing people doing amazing things right here in our own community to satisfy all of your senses & give you an excuse to feel good about yourself too.

Enjoy ~
christy