Tea-time

Delivery from the US of A! Once upon a time in 2004, I was staying with a friend in Charlotte, NC, before flying home for Christmas. They showered me with gifts, including this sample box of teas which were just, heavenly. When I realized I had the possibility to order these from ex-flatmate I spent 2 hours online trying to find the name of the brand (I only remembered the name of one tea kind, honeybush, and vaguely what the packaging looked like).

Success! Am now drinking copious amount of tea from my new tea pot set I got from the bargain section of Bolagret. Screw the fluoride, it's sooo... comforting, and tasty, and the feeling of pouring the tea... I so get the whole 'tea ceremony' thing. All that's missing now is the dim sum. Have located recipes for gluten-free dim sum so I suspect it's only a matter of time!

Flu stilleben

Day 5 of the flu, succeeded in walking to ICA. A collection of things I could possibly consider eating despite pervasive nausea. The 'cheese cake' is particularly interesting, normally I wouldn't eat this even if someone gave it to me for free, because it's, um. Disgusting?

(also, just realized it probably has gluten, which I didn't ever consider. Huh! Fever-fail)

LA here I come! (I would make an excellent failed script-writer/waitress)

I've heard they haven't even finished the script for the next instalment of the re-boot franchise, so here are some ideas for Abrams and his team:


Lost in Translation -> Lost in Klingon translation


The alternate universe where Kirk is, uh, a forest ranger!



The crew goes back in time and accidentally cause the extinction of dinosaurs, possibly involving dilithium. Thereby, obviously, saving mankind cause, you know, if the dinosarus were still around THEY WOULD HAVE EATEN US ALL.

Here I got confused with the Stargate universe. I was all, like, dude, we accidentally flew through New York and people saw us and now we have to reveal the - oh, right. People know. They probably don't fly this close to ground though. I'm sure there's some spin on the Hudson river incident possible here.

You're welcome, J.J. Just get Quinto back onto the big screen, 'kay?

My new best friend

So apparently a twitching 26-year old with an enlarged thyroid is nothing to worry about. I got about 5 mins talking time with the doctor and a prescription for beta blockers I can renew three more times. Drugs!
So obviously right now I don't even need the drugs, as my biggest problem are my threatening-to-cramp, ice-cold-despite-three-pairs-of-socks feet, but lo! behold my new best friend:


I call it Ernie. It's a horrible name, I know, but I just looked at it and thought: Ernie! so. Ernie it is.
(note, also, the multiple evidence of studying in the background which is in fact a true representation of how I spent the last 5 hours or so)

Oh, btw.

I did too drink. But other people drank more. So nothing too terrible happened, in the end. Also I just read that alcohol usually has the short-term effect of reducing spasms. I thought it was just if I got drunk enough I didn't notice them. Alcohol is however not usually recommended as a treatment, because of well. I guess you can guess.

My ER15s have finally arrived and listening to music with them is so much better than with the ER25s. This is a nice revelation. Also the case is cuter, and these babies don't need lubrication, cleaning tools, and alcohol wipes: you just pop the filters out and rinse them with water. Genius.

Also, my up-down relationship to my thesis is currently up. ERP systems and customization peeps, it's fascinating.

Just some things that aren't completely shit. For blog karma.

Something about a creek and shit and a paddle

So. Euthyrox takes 6 weeks to reach peak efficiency. It's half-life is 6-10 days. Which means it cannot be the reason I am currently shaking and even having some foot cramps. Trying not to panic: failing. Ironically, panicking has always made this kind of symptoms worse so now I'm shaking on upper body half as well.

Trying to reason myself out of this. This happened last time I was on synthroid, and eventually it went away. I was perfectly non-tremoring those months until I started taking Euthyrox again.

Another explanation is that I have somehow at the same time as taking the Euthyrox developed a tremor condition. Most of these are chronic and untreatable. I don't really believe in coincidences, and tremors and muscle problems are associated mostly with hyperthyroidism but also with your thyroid dying, which is when you can exhibit symptoms from both the hyper and the hypo subset of symptoms. I'm certainly not losing any weight at the moment (so not hyper) but I could still exhibit another hyper symptom.

A third explanation is that there is a God, and he is vengeful. I've had some thoughts recently about people with chronic illnesses and how they are usually happier, because of a host of reasons involving psychology and absence of pain and other things I don't know much about and won't get into. I never said I wanted a chronic illness, but perhaps the vengeful God can read minds and somewhere read a stupid, ill-conceived notion that this would be a great way to stop being unhappy and has now decided to punish me for such thoughts. Or these wishes are stronger than I thought and I am being rewarded? In any case. I do not wish for a chronic illness. I want to be healthy and unhappy. Please?

Well. Hypothroidism is a chronic illness. Let's hope it's just my thyroid dying. Hoping hoping.

Tremulous times

I'm so tired of this fucking shit. I was feeling decidedly normal for a few days, but fat, so yesterday I went for a run and felt fine for like, 6 hours, and now I'm a trembling, muscle-jumping... thing. Gonna beg a doctor for some more beta-blockers tomorrow, I've run out. I'm still fairly sure it's just the lingering effect of the Euthyrox but just the idea that this could be something cronic is enough to freak me out. Also, the constant trembling is freaky just on its own.

Along with diss topic stress and feeling very very fat, these are not good days.

The only good thing is that I possibly won't be able to drink tomorrow (alcohol these days always make me a bit shaky even when I'm not shaking all the time, so I can only imagine what the knock-on effect will be). Big corridor party with all the classmates, including the Chinese gang. They're a lovely bunch of girls, but they stay sober and love to take pictures. This is not a good combination with my party persona and behaviour of late.

Duh.

So. I've been freaking out, because it's been ages since I stopped with the euthyrox and I'm still having mild tremors and spasms in my legs. Then I started counting and realized it's actually only been 35 days, and the half-life is 6 weeks. Then I realized what the word half-life implies: half. Half the euthyrox is gone after 6 weeks, so it's not completely gone until after 12. DUH.

Consequently, am probably not coming down with Parkinson's. Now: why doesn't this country have diet tonic? I need me some low carb kinine to calm down my annoying muscles. Fact: kinine is the only help for restless-legs syndrome, which is basically what I temporarily have.

Otherwise, extremely busy and procrastinating. Thesis topics, statistics, seminars, I still love being back at uni but holy cow there's a lot to do and angst about. Also having many lofty thoughts about future. Melbourne is looking good at the moment. Completely ignoring the fact that before any eventual relocation to down under I need to write this thesis.

IF

Is the way to start the year off properly, after yesterday's (not really) hangover-induced goodbye carbs pigout session. As in Intermittent Fasting, that is. Mind you, I'm not sure it actually qualifies as a fast, but where I've seen it reviewed they say you are allowed to have as much coconut fat and cream as you wanted in coffee during the day. I lasted on that until 6pm, when I got not exactly hungry but bored, I guess. I should maybe do the fasting on a day when time is actually scarce - when you just lounge around all day cooking is such a vital part to mark the passing of the day, that all you do is think about food (at least when you're not supposed to have any).
Anyway, I made a broth on 2 onions, 1 carrot, butter and as much olive oil as I could bring myself to add before it started looking disturbing. And broth cubes, yes yes evil I know, I still use them. And then I added cream when serving :) And probably ate about half.

So although this day probably doesn't count like a fast in any way shape or form, I think I at least came very close to having less than 20g of carbs. Which makes me realize how many carbs I probably normally eat. I think maybe I need to start hunting carbs more. I do like calculations and lists and projects and the such. Shouldn't be a hardship...