How I'm doing #HealthyatHome

So I'm about two-thirds of the way through my third 'week off' due to Coronavirus, as I alternate being at work for a week and a week off. The first couple of weeks off I used personal time off, but I was rapidly using that to try to deal with it, but this time I broke down and applied for unemployment benefits since my hours were reduced by half. Since that could take awhile, I'm not sure how financially that will work out. It seemed a better idea since I'm not sure how long we'll be operating on this plan. The governor is opening things up very slowly, starting with healthcare, but it could take some time to get back up to normal levels, and even so, we need to do it gradually to protect patients and staff.

I'm actually getting ready to listen to Governor Beshear in just a couple of minutes. His 5 o'clock briefings have become part of the routine for many Kentuckians, as it is carried on TV, radio, and online in many media settings. He actually took off yesterday for the first time since this began with Kentucky's first case.

I've been home except for going to the grocery, pharmacy, or pet food store. Yesterday I did some re-potting of plants. Two friends, Brenda and Feliz, dropped off plants for me in a socially distanced way, where I didn't get out of the house. Brenda gave us a hyssop plant and a dill plant. Feliz had some really tiny cherry tomato and jalapeño plants, just sprouted, and I put them in pots, which I'll have to re-pot as they're going to get bigger, I just got them out of the cups they were in. I also potted up two African violets I got at the grocery during a run for essentials.







I also have a new orchid blooming:



So my bedroom is full of plants:

Best bread I've ever made

Very creamy and aromatic, with a nice blend of flavours.

I am so glad tomorrow is Friday

It has been a very long, busy week at work. I've had a little time in the evenings to recuperate, but I'm ready for the weekend. Today I went on over to Meijer after work and got the stuff for my friend, along with some plastic plants for the little aquarium (I don't care for them, but I don't want live plants taking over the betta tank). I just put them in and he seems to like them. I did get some cilantro and German thyme plants to replace the dill and basil in the window boxes, which were pretty much spent. Everything's doing well so long as I water them. The strawberries have several berries on them right now, and hopefully they'll ripen soon. I also got a bread knife, as I didn't have one, and now that I'm making my own bread occasionally, I need a knife that will cut cleanly.

After I came home (the first time) today I planted the herbs in the window box, and then headed over to my friends' house to drop off the stuff from Meijer. I wound up watching a few episodes of 'H2O: Just Add Water'. Now I'm home and I'd better go ahead and pay my cell phone bill--I waited till the due date because today was payday. Then I think I'll listen to some music (I'm listening to Ed Sheeran right now') and head on to bed. Tomorrow I'm helping my friend with some cooking in the evening, and Saturday I hope to go to the farmer's market, we'll go to the grocery, and I have an appointment to have the car looked at. I think a belt is going bad--it's making that distinctive high-pitched noise, especially on rainy days, and I'm hoping to get it changed before it actually breaks.

Hope you have a nice evening and an even better weekend. Good night.

Happy Plants

I did get the herbs planted. Each box has a strawberry on each end. One has sage and oregano (pictured), one has thyme and rosemary, and one has dill and basil.

I've been up since 3:30 this morning, have done four loads of laundry, have worked a full day, had physical therapy, and my ankle is swollen to the size of a grapefruit because I've been on it much of the day, a lot of getting up and down. I am very tired. The danger, of course, is that I will fall asleep rather than work on the house. I'm going to take my contacts out and put my foot up for awhile, but I'm going to try not to fall asleep, maybe listen to peppy music or something. Wish me luck!

Today I have:

1. Eaten breakfast.
   
2. Planned my itinerary.
   
3. Discarded the idea of getting printer ink and checking with the optometrist about my contacts.
   
4. Taken the bus to Lowe's, picked up some things for my friends' house, and three cheap but nice plastic terracotta-coloured pots, one big, two small, for my herbs. That took my large tote bag and a Kroger reusable tote.
   
5. Gone into a Speedway for the first time since Thanksgiving and gotten a frozen drink, the first time I've done that in a good couple of years. It's so weird to go into one when I used to work in one.
   
6. Walked over to Liquor Barn. I picked up some pinot grigio for a friend and two pinot noir bottles for me. The pinot noir is for libations, one tonight in thanksgiving for prayers answered, and one for my monthly libations at menstruation. Those went into my backpack.
   
7. Gotten just a few things at Kroger; I'll do more shopping tomorrow morning. As it was, I could barely carry everything, as I added a second Kroger reusable tote and there was a box to carry as well. Fortunately everything except the backpack and box were light.
   
8. Taken off a home screen shell program from my phone that was freezing the whole thing up (and has been on and off, especially when time was of the essence), because it prevented me from returning a call when someone was waiting for me and there was a short timeframe involved. At least it was a free application. And it made the phone screens look really nice and allowed me to put things into folders nicely. A shame it wouldn't work when I needed it to.
   
9. Gone by bus with all this stuff and dropped off what belonged to my friends at their place and visited for a bit.
   
10. Managed to dodge the rainstorm by being on the bus for the majority on the way home, getting sprinkled just a bit.
    
11. Eaten dinner.
    
12. Vacuumed the apartment.
    
13. Transplanted the herbs--the lavender, thyme, and rosemary getting their own pots, and the sage, tarragon, and Italian oregano in one large one. I also rescued an amaryllis bulb and planted it. Then I put three avocado pits suspended in water in my bedroom window. Soon I may have an avocado plant or three. :)
    
14. Cleaned up the leavings from doing all that potting.
    

Pretty productive for a Saturday. Now it's time to do notes. (Yes, I waited till the last minute, again.)

I couldn't resist taking pictures of my indoor garden in the afternoon sun

Living area window in the afternoon sun

 

Umbrella plant, rosemary, and lavender

Hoya, wooly thyme, Italian oregano, French tarragon, and sage

A successful first day

Well, I started the regimen of horse pills and this is what happened:

My fasting blood sugar was 232 this morning, which is lower than it had been. Now that was before I took the supplements, but I've been eating well the last three days (although I did have a Pop-Tart this morning, as the only yoghurt was lemon), so I'm assuming that had a lot to do with it, plus I was up about half the night working on the house for the walk-through tomorrow.

Two hours after lunch, though, I checked and it was 197. Now you must understand, it has been running in the high 300s, almost 400 after lunch in the same time frame. So, I thought that was pretty good.

I checked my blood sugar before eating dinner, and it was 124. 124! That's four points over norm. At best I am about 140.

Okay, so it may just have been a good day. I'll continue to monitor my levels to see how it goes. I did open the cinnamon/chromium picolinate capsules into my milk. Tomorrow I'll try it with yoghurt instead. I noticed tasting the fenugreek several times in the morning, but it isn't unpleasant. Anyway, we're going to consider it a tentative success.

I just read a book by a man with scary hair

but who seems to know a lot about insulin resistance and diabetes. It's called Take Charge of Your Diabetes, by Sarfraz Zaidi, MD. I wouldn't really call it ground-breaking, like he does, but...he's right, many doctors don't really get insulin resistance syndrome, even though it's been described in the literature for some time. He puts it in easy to digest terms that I think would be useful to the average person, and his plan gels with what I've read about in the medical lit. I understand the role of diet, stress, exercise, medications, etc., in diabetes--at least in theory. I'm terrible at putting it into practice. But the part that I found particularly interesting was his recommendations for various vitamins and herbs that are useful at controlling blood glucose.

Now, my idea of taking a vitamin is Flintstones chewables. I hate horse pills. I don't even take the calcium I should. But I decided to give them a try. I checked to make sure none of them would react with my medications. I went to Kroger and found several 'buy one, get one free deals', which is good, because vitamins are expensive. So I got calcium citrate with vitamin D (not for the sugar issues, but on the recommendation of my gynaecologist), coenzyme Q10, cinnamon capsules with chromium picolinate, fenugreek, alpha lipoic acid, and some sublingual B12, all at the recommended doses. We'll see if they help at all. There was a 'diabetes mix' which had several, although not all of them, but not at the amounts recommended by Dr Zaidi to be clinically effective. I'll be sure to list them when I go to the doctor next. They are meant to be used in association with diet, exercise, medications, and stress reduction. Here's hoping.

Something to know if you're prone to seizures

Ginkgo biloba's epilepsy seizures warning

Ginkgo biloba is a common herbal remedy for memory and mental focus, among other things. It comes from the same tree that is very popular here in Lexington thanks to the great statesman Henry Clay, who had them imported from China.

I once had a woman tell a group I was in that herbal remedies were natural, and therefore safe. That is, of course, hogwash. A tincture of aconite would kill a person. Belladonna, too. Even beneficial herbs have contraindications, just like pharmaceutical medicines, because they have compounds in them, some of which can work very well, and some of which may have side effects. Apparently the evidence indicates that ginkgo may increase the risk for seizures in those with epilepsy or other seizure disorders.

You should always take care to research herbal medicines if you have health conditions. The Germans in particular have codified a lot of information on herbal remedies. There are guides in English as well. Please be careful about information you find on the Internet though, and learn to evaluate websites carefully. Finally, be sure to ask your doctor about them and list them as a medicine you take. Ginkgo, for example, can increase bleeding in surgery, according to what I've read. It's important they know that as much as whether you're taking aspirin.

I don't usually cook

But tonight I made a crock pot full of rice and lentils that should last several days, at least until I get paid again. I did forget to put salt in it, but that can be added later, of course. It's pretty tasty, actually. It has garlic, curry powder, cumin, lemon juice, celery seed, and ginger in it. I'd like to have had some peppers or onions in it, but oh, well. The celery seed is the primary herbal taste, but I really like celery seed. Someone I knew used to make a chicken and dumpling soup with celery seed that I really liked; I should try to figure out how to make a vegetarian version. It would really just mean using different bouillon and leaving out the chicken. I don't think tofu would work that well. Anyway, I'm fuelled up now for a few days. Crock pots are amazing things. You just put the ingredients in, turn them on, and walk away for a few hours. It's kind of like a bread machine. I miss having my bread machine (it died some time ago, and I finally pitched it in the Great Cleaning Purge). I'll have to add bread machine to my list of things to acquire.

PS YKWIA told me I should have gone easy on the celery seed and eliminated the lemon juice, since it just makes vegetable dishes acidic. I'll keep that in mind the next time.