Food cravings -- we all get them. Initially you experience the "a scoop of Rocky Road sure would taste good" phase. Since you have no Rocky Road in the house you try to put it out of your mind. Treat it as a mere passing thought.
Doing your taxes tonight is a passing thought. Cleaning the fridge is a passing thought. Wanting a scoop of Rocky Road is never a passing thought. It pitches camp in your brain. It WANTS Rocky Road and it wants it NOW. Only the frequent craver knows that the only way to dislodge the thought, free up millions of brain cells and get on with your life is to get the damn Rocky Road.
It doesn't matter what state of undress you're in or how dishevelled you look. PJs don't matter. State of hair and makeup? Secondary. You are on a mission. Throw on a trench, pull on a hat and power walk your Rocky Road deprived self to the nearest market for a pint. Only then will life be good again.
Most of us would go the distance to satisfy a Rocky Road attack, but what if it wasn't chocolate ice cream? What if it was something from another food group entirely? What if it was Brussels sprouts?
Are you still there?
It was the same process, the same intensity and I made my way to the market in search of the mini-cabbages with just as much determination.
A craving is a craving is a craving. And I picked up a pint of Rocky Road while I was there for later -- just in case.
Friday, December 7, 2007
Tuesday, December 4, 2007
Mystery Medicine
Billions of Chinese people have been doing this for thousands of years. That's what I told myself while the mixture boiled and bubbled steaming up my kitchen. As I stirred the brew, I fully expected an eye of newt to stare back at me. Maybe this is what inspired Shakespeare to write that famous witches -with -cauldron scene. Maybe Shakespeare too had a cough that just wouldn't go away.
After days on a diet of cherry Ricola, hot tea with honey and warm salt water, I gave up on all things Western. Chinese medicine here I come.
This was not completely unfamiliar territory. I lived in Korea for a while and had some success with herbal remedies. When I taught ESL, many Asian students offered to nurse me back to health with syrups -- usually dark brown and smelling like a clothes hamper -- they swore by.
At the herbalist's office there was the examining of the tongue, the taking of the pulse, the asking of the same questions as on a standard medical intake form. I left the shop with several small plastic bags of unfamiliar ingredients that would soon become tea. That and a box of small pills which read "Chinese Natural Herbal Concoction". Let's hear it for truth in advertising!
I recognized orange peels -- and that's where my intellectual skills ended leaving plenty of room for my imagination to take over. Several pieces looked like the ivory paint chips that fell from my bathroom ceiling last month. Others looked like used tongue depressors, mini-mothballs, tree bark and those little whirlybird seeds that fall from trees in the spring. I guessed that the brownish, raisin-like particles were reindeer testicles.
With sweeteners standing by ready to rescue sacrificed taste buds, I took a sip. Surprisingly, the tea was quite yummy. And -- now hear this Western medicine -- the next morning the cough was gone.
Yes, I'm concerned about Chinese imports like everyone else. Just don't mess with my miracle tea.
After days on a diet of cherry Ricola, hot tea with honey and warm salt water, I gave up on all things Western. Chinese medicine here I come.
This was not completely unfamiliar territory. I lived in Korea for a while and had some success with herbal remedies. When I taught ESL, many Asian students offered to nurse me back to health with syrups -- usually dark brown and smelling like a clothes hamper -- they swore by.
At the herbalist's office there was the examining of the tongue, the taking of the pulse, the asking of the same questions as on a standard medical intake form. I left the shop with several small plastic bags of unfamiliar ingredients that would soon become tea. That and a box of small pills which read "Chinese Natural Herbal Concoction". Let's hear it for truth in advertising!
I recognized orange peels -- and that's where my intellectual skills ended leaving plenty of room for my imagination to take over. Several pieces looked like the ivory paint chips that fell from my bathroom ceiling last month. Others looked like used tongue depressors, mini-mothballs, tree bark and those little whirlybird seeds that fall from trees in the spring. I guessed that the brownish, raisin-like particles were reindeer testicles.
With sweeteners standing by ready to rescue sacrificed taste buds, I took a sip. Surprisingly, the tea was quite yummy. And -- now hear this Western medicine -- the next morning the cough was gone.
Yes, I'm concerned about Chinese imports like everyone else. Just don't mess with my miracle tea.
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