Latest At-Home Remedy: Ginger

Last week was reading week and my husband and I went around visiting family and only just got back yesterday (hence the lack of posting). As a wonderful welcome-home gift, my stomach decided it wasn't going to have a good day. It may have been food poisoning, it may have been the week of eating junk food, but whatever the cause, I was feeling pretty awful when I woke up this morning and it only escalated from there.

Because my husband is awesome, he immediately went searching on the internet for something that would help indigestion. He discovered a ginger concoction and went to work right away. I thanked him and guzzled back the ginger water. Anything to get myself feeling better, even spicy ginger water.

After a minute or two, my stomach began to gurgle. Then things started moving around. Then....disaster.

Turns out ginger is a "powerful laxative".

It was at this point that I realized I hadn't thought of how ginger was supposed to calm your stomach. I guess it just makes sure that whatever is causing a problem gets flushed out immediately. Better than writhing around in agony, I guess.

So there you have it. If your stomach is bothering you, some heavily gingered water will quicken the pace and ultimately lead to a faster recovery.

TV Is My Life

So, my husband went out with the guys tonight. I was invited but opted to "work on my thesis" instead. I have been home alone for an hour and not once until this moment did I even consider working on my thesis. I mean, inititally I fully intended on working on my thesis, and I still might at some point...but it's sooo boring and time-consuming.

Instead, I opted for blogging.

Recently my husband and I have been watching Being Erica on Netflix. We tend to cling to certain shows and watch them obsessively. Like, we watch House every Monday night...except this one because we don't have TV anymore...but that;s another story. We also watched Mad Men in the course of a couple weeks. Several episodes a day. Or Wonderfalls which we've watched several times.

Anyways. Being Erica. We've been obsessively watching an episode or two or three a day. We're in season 2, just after the "do over day" and I've gotten so caught up in this fictional life that I'm fretting over her relationship with Ethan (Who is the hot bartender in Wonderfalls and who plays essentially the same character so husband and I have been imagining that Wonderfalls preceded Being Erica and that poor Ethan/Eric has gone through two divorces and is a hopelessly good guy with incredibly bad luck).

This always happens. We get swept up in the drama and excitement of vicariously living through TV and we feel so personally tied to the characters and their well-being.

This time around, there's a motif. Every episode or two, Erica actively screws things up. It's like there are so many ways that things could work out if she just didn't screw them up, but she invariably does. Typically because she's a whorebag. And a little stupid at times. So now, almost every time we watch an episode, at some point I'm going to start yelling at the TV, "Noooo!! WHY is she such a WHOREBAG!? UGH, what is WRONG with her?" Like that cute, very smart, well-adjusted guy from the high school reunion. She was starting to really connect with him back in time there, but she had to go and sex him up right there on the boat after only having like one conversation with the guy ever. Shockingly, this didn't become a problem. But after being turned down by him at the reunion, she goes and turns it on for Ethan. I mean, there are a ton of times where she just makes out with people, or sexes them up or does something really whoreish and if she just resisted a wee bit, things would turn out better.

However, this show is highly unrealistic in its consequences. There are many times where she tells people stuff that normally would go very badly for her, but they seem to work out in the end. Told her sister she was marrying the wrong guy? Only an issue for a week or two. Yelled at Ethan for being a coward? He came back and professed his love. Told her best friend she was a bad mother? Her friend agrees with her! This is totally unrealistic.These things would not get resolved so quickly or so well in real life.

But now, there's this new guy that's fun and exciting and cool who really hits it off with Erica and they have this special bond, but I can't bear to see Ethan heartbroken. I'm torn. It upsets me that there is a seeming plethora of nice, attractive, available men on this show! You can't just be like "clearly that one's the best looking plus he's the only truly nice guy". It's trickier than that. How are you suppposed to choose who to root for when you feel bad about not rooting for the other handful of decent guys? You can't just hope that they all get her. That would likely be highly dissatisfying for all the guys, though not for Erica...she'd probably love it, the whorebag. Kidding. A little.

Anyways, all this is to say I hope my husband doesn't stay out too late because, damnit, I want to find out what happens with Erica, Ethan and Kai!

Taps

I live in a cheap apartment. It's very inexpensive, utilities included, on a bus route, so I let a bunch of things slide. Like the fact that it's in the scariest neighbourhood in the city, or that the whole place is shoddily built. The biggest current concern, however is our leaky tap. It's the one in the kitchen and it's been leaking since day one. We complained to the landlord when we first moved in but nothing was done about it so we've just been trying to deal with it. The leak now has gotten so bad that it's a constant stream of scalding hot water that we have to place 'just so' so the stream of water hits the side of the sink which minimizes the sound of it. But that is nothing compared to its worst feature.

Every so often, it will be nice and quiet in the apartment and then all of a sudden, I'll hear a sound...

I don't know what exactly it's all about, but the tap makes a super high pitched 'ee' sound that is similar in quality to an old TV. Sometimes merely moving the faucet slightly makes it stop. Sometimes you have to turn it on and then off again. But it always happens when the people in the apartment next to us use their tap.

This is just one of many reasons why I've been cultivating a strong hatred of the neighbours. But I'll save that list for another post.

Magical Hallway of Wonders

I live in an apartment building. I'm not sure if this is a common phenomena or not, but every time I walk down the hall, I'm bombarded by interesting smells from behind every door.

They're very rarely pleasant smells and only the weed is recurring. Every time I pass by my neighbours, it's like a fun little guessing game, "Name That Smell'.

Fortunately, I've been given the gift of scent and within a short while I can usually pinpoint exactly what something smells like. And it's usually gross. And often announced when everyone is mid-bite. I remember once I went to an Indian restaurant and I wasn't very familiar with anything beyond the usual chicken, potatoes and vegetables. I was with my whole family and I was probably about 12 years old. We were seated and everyone but me was excited to be sampling from a foreign culture.

I tried to be a good sport at first. I sniffed the food, trying to enjoy the aroma. I may have gagged. Then I started tasting the odd thing. And then it hit me. I knew exactly what this tasted like! I was so excited to discover this that I loudly announced it to everyone:

No one else shared my enthusiasm. They just slowly chewed their food and stared somewhat shocked. But they knew I was right. And because I was right, I'd ruined the meal for everyone. I didn't eat much of the food and no one else did either. That may have been the last time we went to eat somewhere exotic as a family.

So now, when I walk down that hallway, I can put this talent that no one but me appreciates to use.

Ch-ch-ch-CHANGES

I already knew I had body image issues between ages 7-16 or so, but I didn't think I still had those issues. But the reason I'm becoming aware of it, is that I've started making healthy changes and realizing the big differences. By healthy, I mean mentally. I've always tried to be healthy food/exercise-wise. And every time I go to the doctor, I always turn out to be the right height/weight combo and everything.

But there are bad habits that was making me think I was fatter than I am. For instance, I stand WAY too close to my mirrors:

I also stand all weird in front of the mirror that eccentuates flaws...and even makes ones that don't exist!

I've discovered that if I just stand a normal distance from the mirror, and stand normally, I look fine. I was just being silly and making things look aweful and unflattering. No wonder my perceptions differ so radically from everyone else's. The last habit that I'm trying to break is wearing ill-fitting clothes. I always thought that when clothes fit properly, they should be stretching a wee bit at all times. This is not accurate.

So, if you suffer from body image issues, ask yourself these questions three: Am I standing so close to the mirror that my face is one inch from it? Do I stand in akward poses to "get a better look" at fictitious flaws? Do my clothes fit me?



Why I've Become a Hermit

Like most young women, my perceptions of myself are radically different from others' perceptions of myself. This realization isn't because I see what others see. This is coming purely from what people tell me is so, which means I'm note entirely sure I believe them. They could be lying to make me feel better. It happens.

Unfortunately, this realization doesn't change how I see myself. But from what I've gathered, this is how others see me:

Not perfect, but nothing glaringly wrong with me. BUT, here is what I see when I look in the mirror:

As you can see, it's quite a leap of the imagination to make myself believe that I look fine when that's what I see. My solution? Just don't leave the the house! It's perfect except, ya know, when I need groceries or have to do laundry or have class or meetings....

So...my realistic solution is to chew on my sweater (which covers my lower face) and lean on my hands (which covers the sides of my face) and maybe wear a hat (which covers my hair, though I don't always opt for this one because without big hair, my big nose becomes REALLY noticeable). And ultimately, that makes it worse because then I get more acne all over my face.

FML.

Half-assed

This happens every time I get inspired by things I see other people doing. I think to myself, 'I can do that only BETTER!' and in my mind, I concoct incredibly wonderful ideas and imagine how it's going to play out, but it NEVER works out that way. When I first saw friends making websites, I thought 'I'll make the best website EVER!' and I learned html, made gifs and whatnot for the layouts but ultimately, no matter how much I learned, and how much I tried, it always sucked. Or at least, was far worse than what I'd imagined.

Then, I knew friends who blogged. So I started blogging. It always turned out like a very uninteresting journal. It didn't start that way, no, it started with grand ideas and one or two really good posts and then it quickly declined.

Same thing happened with photography and music and basically anything that requires talent. Talent that I'm always so sure I have, but apparently don't. So recently, I started reading Hyperbole and a Half. If you haven't been exposed to her fantasticalness, please go there and laugh till it hurts. This webcomic/blog always makes me laugh and once again, I was overcome with the idea of creating a blog like hers, only mine and with MY hilarious stories. But then I tried to make one drawing, just one, and it sucked something awful. So I made a separate drawing to express how I felt:

That is all.

February yaaay!

It is now February which means we're almost past the worst of winter. Almost. Which is VERY exciting to me.

Dermatillomania update: apparently it's hard to quit doing things that have become habitual. I am in fact wearing gloves as I type this so as to prevent myself from picking at my skin. Without the gloves, I just do it without thinking, so this way I at least can't do any harm. And really, now that I think of it, it's best that I'm doing this during the winter when it's not THAT weird to wear gloves and mittens all the time.

I'll update again about this later to let anyone out there who may be suffering from the same thing know about the progresses I've made and what has and hasn't worked. Keeping your hands busy so far is the best advice I can give. And wearing mittens. And try not to obsess in the mirror. I have to learn to just let go and allow my skin to get gross in order for it to get better.