Crick in your neck? Satisfy a craving?

Here is food for thought:

I recently had a kink below my neck.  It sort of 'came on' over a period of about 2 hours late one morning.  I made a point to hydrate, etc.  It seemed that this kink was just getting worse no matter what I did, including massage, moving, everything.  It was worse after another night's sleep.

I noticed the second day that I was craving mayonnaise.  (I know, you hate mayonnaise.)  I got a spoon and indulged that craving.  I didn't quite eat enough that I felt satisfied.  But, lo and behold, over the next couple of hours, I noticed that the neck pain was easing!  I wasn't doing anything at all for it.  So I had a little more, thinking I would eat it until I felt I'd had enough.  (About 1 tablespoon in, I was done.)  The pain eased a little more.  So now I had about 20% of the pain, which I could live with.

Now this had my attention.  I noticed that I was also craving black tea.  I made a cup of tea (though it usually keeps me awake) and just continued to feel better in other ways.  The next day, the pain was almost completely gone.

Am I recommending mayonnaise for your neck kink?  Of course not.  But I am recommending a little check-in.  Just ask yourself:  Is there anything I'm craving?  Then give it a try.

(Disclaimer: if you're an alcoholic and craving bourbon, don't blame me if you opt to fall off the wagon...)

HOW TO CATCH MICE FAST!

OK, I have a mouse problem. I am now at the point where I have stopped them from getting in, but have to deal with those that are already here - and have multiplied.

POISON
I won't use poison.  Why?  Because
1) I do not want them to die in the walls where they are living - and stink!!!
2) I do not want them to eat it, die, and then have a predator like a hawk eat them and die.  When you poison a population, you also poison its predators, which is cement-headed, or bad business, if you like.
3) It's cruel.  Poor things.

SPRING TRAPS, MINT, TABASCO, CAT, DOG
The spring traps work OK, but slowly, and it seems that once I catch one mouse in one of those, the rest won't go near them.  They probably hear the mouse screaming and agony, or they see the horrific result.  I do have a cat and a dog who used to catch them, but who have lost interest.  I also tried mint oil, which I put on cotton and put in the walls.  It doesn't seem to have made a bit of difference.  I tried tabasco, too, which smelled up my house and also made no difference in the mouse population.

WELL, I FOUND A MAGICAL SOLUTION!

First of all, it helps that there is one place where they come out of hiding and are accessible to me: in the trash area under my kitchen sink.

We had pizza in a box, and after we had finished it, we wedged the box in next to the trash can, like so (see pic).  

*KEY: there was unfinished pizza in the box.

*RESULT: the mice gnawed their way into the box (see pic), and now I can CLEARLY HEAR them in the box, gnawing away at the pizza!

*KEY: the pizza box is, of course, largish and hollow, and therefore, sound resonates through it!

*KEY: the pizza pieces are too big for them to drag through the holes they gnawed.

*KEY: if they gnaw more than one hole, seal up the rest so they only have one escape route when you seize the box.  Or, just cut a hole for them in the box, so they can get right to work getting trapped.

I have now caught 6 mice in 2 days in the pizza box!  The mice wander around in the dark trash cabinet and go happily into the box to stuff their little cheeks.  I hear the feverish gnawing and just sneak up to the cabinet and open the doors.  Now the mouse is scared and hides silently in the box.  I use a rag to quickly cover the hole, life the box out, and go set it outside.  (Where they will not come back in, because I have already sealed the house.)  (There is good info online about how to do this.  For me, it was a matter of sealing the one place they could get inside the walls - not too difficult to find in a townhome.)

*NOTE: don't leave the box outside too long - you don't want a dog or the wind to come up and blow it away.  I lost my bait (the old, dried-up pizza slice) that way.  *HINT: I made more bait by melting cheese onto bread and it seems to be working just as well!

The weather is getting cooler and the mice I put outside are probably getting eaten by predators, but that's nature's way.  I still feel I'm giving them a decent end to their little mouse lives.

AND SIX MICE IN TWO DAYS?
THOSE, my friends, ARE RESULTS!!!

Cinnamon, coffee, and blood sugar.

With very little snooping around, you will find out that cinnamon helps control blood sugar.  If diabetes runs in your family, you might have noticed giant blood sugar swings from coffee.


So stop drinking coffee.


Not an option?  Me, neither.  Try this.


1) Switch to dark roast.  Dark roasts are usually made from Arabica beans, which have much less caffeine than Colombian.  I don't know the numbers on this and I don't need to know.  What I do know is that a cup of coffee I get out of someone else's carafe is just about enough to send me to the hospital.  A couple of cups of Arabica are okay, though.


2) Have protein with your coffee.  A latte works well here!  Or some milk, or maybe breakfast itself!!


3) Brew your coffee with cinnamon in the grounds.  Just a pinch!  Too much makes it bitter.  Start with a couple of pinches (more if you make a whole pot at a time) and work up to the right flavor.  You really should notice a big difference.  It should prevent the blood-sugar dip almost entirely.


4) If you opt for breakfast with coffee (and of course you should be eating breakfast daily!), you can put a little cinnamon in the milk.  Or get cereal or granola with cinnamon.  Or make hot cereal and put in cinnamon.  (Subtext: cinnamon is good for you any time of day if you have blood-sugar issues.  Try to have it one way or another every day.  Unless your doctor says not to.  I don't know anything about diabetes maintenance.)


Do I need to say the disclaimers?  This is not a substitute for medical care.  Just a handy tip for not putting your system through the wringer with every cup of coffee.  Also, if you do notice a big blood-sugar reaction to coffee, you probably should get your blood sugar tested as you may be prone to diabetic-type-of imbalances.  This kind of information is much better to know PREVENTIVEly.  Then it is power.  After the fact, it's not so much power.

Fog your windows

I like light.  But on some windows, you really don't want total transparency.  You want frosted glass or glass brick.  But you might not be able to do that, for whatever reason.  I do hear that there is now a film you can buy that 'frosts' your windows, similar to tinting your windows.  (And I've seen the tinting film at K-Mart.  I can only imagine the many clever uses for that.  Wouldn't you love to have a square of it that you could reposition wherever you needed to as you drove, when the sun is at an impossible angle? Like a giant, tinted post-it.)

Anyway, I have tried a couple of things here.

1) Waxed paper.  If you hang this well and cut it neatly, it's not bad.  It is narrow, though.  I have a strip hanging down the center of one of my tall, narrow windows.  It looks decent, but as I've given it no special treatment, you could easily say, "Hey, isn't that waxed paper?"  But the beauty is, it's not actually that noticeable so no one says anything.  It just quietly does its job, taped in place.  It does kind of blister where moisture gets it, so if the window gets condensation on it, it will be the worse for wear.  If you did this well and it hung a couple of inches away from the window, it could look really very nice.  It's smooth and kind of sleek, with its verticality.  If you put some trim at the top and/or bottom (presumably through the artful use of tape), it would hang well and look quite nice.  BUT: wouldn't tolerate much breeze, I fear.

2)  Parchment paper.  This is better looking, as it's thicker.  It's also wider so it covers a bigger window.  Problem: nothing sticks to it.  I have taped a big piece of it over the window in our front door because I want light, but not transparency, and can't stand the miniblinds up there.  (Tacky, dusty, noisy.)  I had to use packaging tape and literally run it all the way up the sides with a very heavy hand, taped to the glass.  (Yes, this does mean there is some transparency at the sides. I didn't want to tape it to the sill as that would look bad and catch lots of dirt and dust...)  Bottom line: I really like it.  It catches the light beautifully and looks a little Japanese.  In fact, I think that's one thing that this has over actual frosted glass: it's a little more opaque and so it does actually catch the light and so the big white rectangle of light hangs there when the sun is striking it.  I really enjoy that.  It lights up that corner rather than the far wall where the light would hit.

3)  Starch.  I have used starch to stick tissue paper to my windows.  I liked it.  I wouldn't want to go too crazy with the colored tissue paper, as condensation really works on this and I picture dripping dyes tinting the painted sills.  But for white, it worked okay.  It would work especially well with good, double-pained windows.  You can cut out all kinds of designs and embed them into the larger layer, or you can just starch shapes onto the window.  WARNING:  I did this once with snowflakes I had cut out of that silverized, space-tapey tissue paper.  I believe I used canned spray starch on this.  When we left that house, no one and nothing could seem to remove all of the silvery starch that remained after the paper came off.  I partly suspect the spray starch.  I didn't have that problem with starch that I mixed up from powder.  (Available in the laundry section of the grocery store.)

You might try the starch on the parchment paper.  However, I suppose starch is one of the main things parchment paper is made not to stick to.  But it might be a case of, If you use enough, it can't get away.

You can also starch fabrics onto your windows!  This has endless possibilities.  I learned about this from my aunt, who starched a fun Noah's-Ark bedsheet to her son's bedroom wall and ran stained wood strips up the sides (and probably stapled them in?).  So you can starch things onto walls too.  Just really be careful that there are no dyes that will run.

4)  Vinyl adhesives.  I suppose that the first thing I mentioned is one of these.  There are such beautiful vinyl wall adhesives now, that the starch trick is a bit old.  BUT still much much cheaper - and at the moment, much more available, at least for windows.

6)  Bubble wrap!  I love this.  You can just stick that self-adhesive bubble wrap to your windows!  It does look a little weird BUT it provides SOME opacity AND -- drumroll -- a little insulation!  How brilliant is that?

7)  Wet-erase or dry-erase markers.  Color your windows stained.  Just be ready for stained sills.  Wet-erase really drip and break apart with condensation.  I haven't tried dry-erase for this.  I believe they would be less intense in color.  Why don't you try it and post your results?

5)  Easiest alternative.  In a pinch, if you're purely utilitarian, you can just buy a shower curtain and hang that.  I have a nurse friend who did that for some light in her exam room.  Also cleans well!

Post any other window tricks that you know of!  (Mainly sticking to the idea of providing a 'frosted' effect that lets light through.)

Heartburn

A nutritionist told us once:
THE BODY NEEDS PROTEIN AND B VITAMINS TO MAKE ENZYMES.

We are born with the capacity to make enzymes, but that can somehow be used up - by poor habits for years, for example.  Some people will never again be able to make their own enzymes (she said), in really extreme cases.  (Those people will always have to take enzyme supplements.)  The rest of us, after a certain age, might have to make an effort to get the protein and the B-vites we need.

So, my husband, who used to get a lot of heartburn, got into the habit of keeping a protein bar in his nightstand.

When he got heartburn at night, he would eat some of the protein bar.

Within a few minutes, the heartburn always went away.

Others may need to use B-vites instead or in addition.

I, too, have used this when I get that acid feeling.

As a friend pointed out, "The stomach is making acid because it's trying to digest food!  You kill the acid with antacids, and what have you got?"

What, indeed?

Pass the protein.

Scaling the Tea Kettle

This is an easy one.  We have very hard water where I live, but I went ahead and got one of those glass teapots anyway.  *Oops.*  Instead of sitting on the stovetop looking shiny and transparent, it *of course* gets all covered with scale on the inside every single time you use it.

But this gives me an opportunity to find out what works for getting sediment out of teakettles.  I'll tell you one easy thing that works really quite well: squirting the kettle out with the sprayer at my sink.

I just turn the kettle upside-down and squirt.  Now, our sprayer has a strong stream.  If your sprayer is all clogged up it's time for a vinegar soak or a Melaleuca's Tub'n'Tile squirt or two.  But if you have a strong stream, turn the kettle bottoms-up and squirt away at all angles to get as much of the inside as you can.  With our particular water minerals, at least, it really gets most of them out.

What works better than this is putting a small amount of salt into the kettle and swirling it around.  The scrubbing action gets the sediment off.

On the other hand, this kettle doesn't have months of buildup; just a few days.  You can do a few vinegar soaks or, better yet, vinegar boils, to get thick chunks of scale out.  Then just give it a squirt every few times you use it.

Another thing that works is boiling the kettle down and letting it sit on a hot burner, empty.  Of course, this is a major fire risk and you might end up with the kettle melted to your stove and your house burned down.  I've done this purposely, keeping the burner from getting red-hot.  It worked ... but then, the bottom of the kettle still kinda burned through and it wouldn't truly hold water anymore.  Well, it did hold water long enough to boil it, but pretty soon the burner got all covered with scale.  Still, that one I can't call a success.

Or you can just leave the scale in the kettle.  What can it hurt?

Better Bath mats (for the spiffy bathroom)

If you have a spiffy bathroom and want a tidy-looking and equally spiffy bathmat, use placemats.  The bigger, the better, of course.  These may seem too small for some, but for me, the bathmat is something my feet have to fit on.

I guess a WARNING is in order here.  This idea may not work for people who exit the shower with water still streaming off them.  This is more for those who mostly dry off in the tub before exiting.  But those who bound out with a splosh are likely not reading this, anyway.

Woven cotton placemats are absorbent and can be quite neat-looking, rather than frumpy.  When you hang them over the edge of the tub (or whatever), they require no folding and already look neat.

I'm looking for photos to post.  Meanwhile, Amazon has some basic, solid-color cotton placemats that work well, with photos that zoom really close.

One thing to watch for: mats that are too thick will take too long to dry.  (They still may dry faster than something you have to fold to hang, though.)  Too thin and, of course, they will leak onto your floor.  The ideal find would be cotton and oversized, and still machine washable.

If this is your taste, those quilted placemats might be just the thing for your tubside.  Just make sure they're all cotton; polyester might be a little too slippery.

ONE TIP
If you can, let mats air-dry after machine-washing; that way they don't shrink so much.  You can also re-stretch them before laying them out to dry, as the cotton can get contracted in the wash.  Re-stretching (by pulling the ends with your hands) helps re-flatten and re-spiff them.

ANOTHER TIP
Watch out for reds and other dark/bright colors; these dyes may bleed onto your floor when wet.

A TWIST OR TWO
One other idea is to place a (non-slippery) table runner at the side of your bathtub; it would stay there and dry in place. With multiple family members using the same tub, on the other hand, each could have his own mat - and thus no yucky sharing of wet mats!  And they would still look neat hanging in a row.

(It seems like bamboo really belongs here somewhere, but of course it's slippery and not absorbent.  Perhaps you could use bamboo placemats as some sort of window treatment, if you have small or narrow windows.  It would be easy to tie a couple of bamboo placemats together end-to-end.)

OUTCOME
Sorry I can't provide pics here - I don't have a spiffy bathroom at the moment.  But when I DID, this idea worked beautifully.  Your pics are welcome!