Cookbook Blues (or how I haven't learned to stop eating and prepare a meal)

Although I have been fairly good this month and not had any intentional slipups. And yet so far, this month's challenge has been a bit of a failure.

The reason I am attempting to do these monthly challenges (besides curiosity and general interest) is to eliminate those things in my life, albeit temporarily, that I feel I am addicted to or on which I am overly reliant. I definitely consumed too many sugary foods, and drank too much coffee. Yes, I probably ate a lot of animal product in my day to day life, but what I have really eliminated was fast food. The grab and go options that I would consume almost daily are almost all gone. I mean, I could still order up some fries if I really wanted them, but that option seems particularly dull to me just now.

Yet there is another side to these challenges. Eliminating something is one aspect, but adding something to my every day life is also a part of it. Instead of sugar, I consumed more fruit and sugary vegetables to get my fix. Instead of coffee, I drank more liquids to maintain the habit, even if it wasn't quite the same. This month, the plan was to force myself to prepare my own food more often. There are vegan restaurants out there but they are all rather limited. For sheer variety's sake, I would need to cook and prepare my own food. Perhaps even every day. This hasn't come to pass.

So what happened? Work. Unlike most of y'all out there, I work three separate jobs, all requiring different time, physical, and mental commitments. I am and have been almost constantly on the go, leaving me little time for petty things like sleep or even eating. Today, for example, I went from one job directly to another and ate a pre-prepared lunch (consisting of dinner leftovers) while I worked at job 2. During my rare time off (such as now), I feel utterly incapable of preparing a meal, and lack the ingredients to do so anyway.
Hopefully, things will settle down soon and I will be able to fulfill the other half of my entirely self-imposed contract. Time will tell.