urban herbs

Since it's new year's eve I decided to do some self maintenance so at noon I went to Urban Herbs for some acupuncture. I know what you're thinking and you're wrong. The place has real chinese herbs and has nothing to do with pot.

Anyway, Chloe gave me an assessment and then said I needed two acupuncture sessions. The first 15 minute session was to treat the "trauma" of fucking up my knee (that is actually typical of eastern medicine, they treat not just the physical injury but also the emotional injury). Trauma, in my case, was treated by having a bunch of needles stuck near my elbows and wrists, in my abdomen (I hate that) and above my knees.

While I was being punctured I was supposed to "breathe negativity out and inhale positivity". I was not sure exactly how to do that so every time I exhaled I said to myself "out with the old" and when I inhaled said "in with the new". Except that I kept saying "out with the old" when I was inhaling and vice versa. Even my thoughts are uncoordinated.

Also, Chloe threw a blanket over my feet to keep them warm and it was hitting the middle toe on my left foot which I broke last friday when I dropped my vacuum cleaner on my foot (don't ask, it was a freak accident). It's almost twice the size of my other toes and has an interesting grey black color to it. I would mention my Fashion Nails pedicure DID NOT chip. Thanks Vicki!!!!

Then came time for the energy enhancing treatment acupuncture thing. That was supposed to increase blood flow or some shit. I missed the explanation because as she started the explanation she was sticking 9 needles on the inside of my ear. That was pretty horrific. Also she put needles around my knee, in my face, in my ankles and feet, and in my wrists again.

After sitting there like a deranged pin cushion for another 15 minutes I was free to go. But not before being talked into buying some herbs. The concoction she made up has, among other things, peony tree bark, rehmannia root, alisma rhizome, sour jujube seed, zizyphus seeds, indian bread, and silktree bark. I've never heard of any of those things either. I'm guessing I'm allergic to all of them but we'll see.

The herbs come in a packet that you boil in water for a while. I think I boiled it wrong because there was supposed to be 8 cups of liquid and I had only 1 1/2. I added more water and am hoping for the best.

smells like a slow cooked shoe sole with some dog food thrown in - also, some items in the packet look suspiciously like toenails

I'm going to try it tomorrow, first thing in the morning, just in case it makes me puke.

getting rid of shit

This week I've been focusing on getting rid of things that I don't really need. I used craigslist to sell some things which kind of sucks because people are so fucking stupid and rude. I've yet to have someone turn up at the time they said they would come (if I was waiting 30 minutes, I understand - of 4 people who came by one was an hour late, two were over two hours late, and my fourth person is headed for the record at 3 hours late, if he shows up).

 I would add that as a person who isn't very big I feel much more comfortable with people coming by during the day than the evening. I am not too happy about strange guys wanting to come by my house at 830 or 9 o'clock at night. I've taken to carrying my mag flashlight into the garage (most of what I'm selling is in the garage) just in case.

And I get the dumbest questions. For skis listed as "women's volkl queen attiva blah blah skis" I received 5 emails (I'm not kidding) with the question "are these skis for women?" No, I just listed them as women's skis to fuck with you, and I guess "queen attiva" didn't clue you in that they are women's skis and apparently you've never heard of google so you could look them up and find out in case you doubted me.

I won't even mention the email from a person asking if my 22 foot ladder could be extended to 23 feet. Yeah I will, because that was the stupidest thing ever.

I will say though that once the people did show up they always had a good story about why they were buying something. Maybe made up, maybe not. The guy who bought my ladder needed it to fix a problem with his roof due to all the snow we've had and he just bought his house so he couldn't afford a new ladder (nod to that). The guy who bought my cruiser got it for his mom. He's worried she isn't exercising enough.

And the woman who bought a ski set I listed (it was my original skis, boots, and poles from when I first moved here - I listed the set for $20) got it because her daughter gets a  free ski pass through school and she wants to ski with her daughter. She works with the school system and her husband works with the homeless so they have no money (but 4 kids). She said my listing was a christmas miracle to her and she gave me a big hug after we closed the deal. I actually felt bad charging her so I told her she could have everything for free but she insisted on paying me. I am going to donate the money back to her school.

She brought her daughter Katie with her, who I would guess is around 8. Katie walked into my house and said "I love this house! This is what my house would look like!" so of course I liked her immediately. She asked me questions about my pictures and shark teeth and nesting doll while her mom tried on the ski boots. Then she buried her nose in a book while her mom and I talked about boring adult stuff. Kind of reminded me of myself...

Then today I took some jewelry in to get rid of it (wedding ring, wedding earrings, etc) and the guy at the jeweler's took a shine to me because I am, to quote him, the first woman to come into his store and show more interest in his crystals and fossils than the jewelry.

After we completed the transaction he brought me into the back of the store and showed me, among other treasures he's found, a femur from a huge dinosaur, a vertebrae from a huge dinosaur (he dropped it a year ago and showed me the inside, it was crystallized and looked like gemstones, very cool), a dinosaur tooth (I said I would guess the tooth belonged to a meat eater based on my knowledge of shark teeth and he said I was right), and a very cool square rock with an entire fish fossil in it. BTW, he talked to a guy at the museum of natural science (who's also a client) and he said to store fossils in tupperware with a cup of water and a towel over the fossils to keep them from decaying.

Then he said I should stop by the store any time so he could show me the new things he's found (I walk by his store almost every day). He and his wife just bought 40 acres of land in southern colorado and they are finding all kinds of things. Also, his kids just got him a state of the art drone so he will find even more stuff (we talked about search grids, it was fun).

Planning a few little adventures for new year's eve tomorrow...

I cook drinking game

My chef friends has been hanging out in my kitchen while I cook, I would presume because I give them alcohol and food. They invented a drinking game on Friday to help with my cooking skills. They had to take a drink if I did any of the following:

• Turned on the wrong burner
• Washed something (e.g. a measuring spoon) and put it in the dish washer and then had to take it out of the dishwasher to use it again (two drinks if I rewashed it after taking it out of the dishwasher)
• Said "oops, fuck!" while in the vicinity of the food I was cooking
• Ran the garbage disposal (one of my friends said I run the garbage disposal "excessively" - is running the garbage disposal 3 times in the space of thirty minutes excessive???)
• Sprayed disinfectant in the sink, then wiped down the sink with dish soap while in the middle of prepping food (two drinks if I then ran the garbage disposal - my friend who owns a restaurant said I am welcome in his kitchen anytime to clean)
• Vacuumed the floor in the middle of food prep
• Asked my CIA trained chef friend "is it supposed to look like that?" or "is it supposed to smell like that?"

Anyway, my technique is getting a lot better and I hopefully won't end up going broke buying alcohol for my friends.

more cooking, and a cleaning disaster

Yesterday I made green chili chicken in my slow cooker, partly from a recipe, and partly from shit I decided to throw in. It was really good.

Today I took the left over green chili chicken and am making chicken soup. It tastes really good, though I'm going to let it simmer for a few more hours.

my neighbor has already brought over a bowl - I promised to share the soup with him

I think I've got cooking down. I made food in my slow cooker, on the stove, and in the stove. I have 10 recipes that I managed to make without fucking them up. And for the first time in my life I can make a recipe based on stuff I already have in my kitchen instead of having to go to the grocery for the ingredients.

Of course, with the good comes the bad. There was a spot of some ick stuff on the bottom of my oven. I was going to clean it manually but my secretary suggested I use the self clean function and save myself the work.

I don't know how self clean normally works, but with my oven it was a disaster. The oven automatically locked after I turned on self clean and I couldn't shut it off. Minutes after I turned on self clean my house filled with the worst smell ever. My eyes started to water from the fumes and I felt sick. I turned on my hood fan as high as it would go, and that kind of helped. Then I went for a walk to get some fresh air.

After self clean shut itself off I turned my heat down and opened the back door. Three days later the house smells like it normally does (except for the cooking food smells, which are not normal). I'm just going to clean my oven manually from now on. Fucking self clean feature...