Arugula

My kind neighbor brought me a pound of fresh picked organic arugula on Sunday.  She belongs to a food coop and she takes what she is given.  The arugula was so fresh it still had rain drops on it.  I ate some fresh.  The peppery taste was very strong.  I don't think I've had straight arugula before.  It was delicious. I ate some raw.  I ate some on a veggie burger.  I'm not sure what to do with the rest of it but I'm grateful for such a healthy unusual treat.

The Hunger Angel

I read The Hunger Angel by Herta Muller.  I judged the book by it's cover. I saw the gold circle indicating a Nobel prize winner for literature and I wanted to read it.  So I read this book which is the English translation of a Romanian novel.  It was written by Herta Muller.  And although the book is about life in a prison camp in Russia, Herta herself has never been a political prisoner.  But her mother was sent to a prison camp and so was her good friend, a poet.  From reading her book a reader can tell she knew what it was like to be in a prison camp.  She describes the hard work shoveling coal, making cement blocks, and moving tons of sand.  She describes the hunger as an angel.  The hunger angel is around all the time making itself known.  The hunger angel can take life away but also make a person stronger.  And it isn't until the hunger angel i s gone that you realize how much it has taken from you.  If you are really and truly hungry, you don't care about your looks or your clothes or your hygiene or the lice that live in your hair, your clothes, and in your pubic hair.  The subject matter was difficult but I enjoyed this book very much.

Movie Review-Frogs

I was given the movie "Frogs" to watch.  Uncertain about it because I really don't enjoy horror films and wanting to avoid watching it close to frog survey season, I talked a friend and Offspring #2 into watching it with me. In the first couple minutes Offspring #2 says I hope this isn't a long public service announcement about pollution.  She called it early and exactly right.  I don't want to give the ending away but frogs don't really hurt people physically.  Frogs just drive people nuts with their croaking and peeking in the windows.  It's the other reptiles that are dangerous.  This movie has a couple things going for it though.  It's a classic poorly done horror film for one thing.  And it has a young Sam Elliott in it.  He's so young I don't recognize him until he talks.  As usual Sam is wearing jeans and sometimes he takes his shirt off to protect a pretty, young Joan Van Ark from those dangerous reptiles. So if you like Sam Elliott, poorly done horror films, or a walk down memory lane seeing the fashions of the 1960's, you might like watching "Frogs."

Only You

Turning a Corner

Today I swallowed the last pill of my eighth prescription for antibiotics.  I think I'm turning a corner; the corner to better health.  I first noticed a change on Sunday.  I felt better. I had less pain in my shin.  The hole in my leg was (gasp) shrinking side to side!!!!  Today my wound is 75% smaller than last Saturday.  And it's moved from a round hole to a triangular one.  And although I still have to pack it with wet gauze, hardly any gauze fits in there anymore.  Am I ready to transition from ill to healthy?  Medical patient to adventurer?  Couch potato to active person?  Am I ready to get ready for work without wrapping my leg in the flesh-toned, fashion forward Ace bandage?  Yes, yes I am.  Ready and raring to go; go back to taking a shower, back to swimming in the pool, back to exercising energetically.  I can see the corner now and I am every so ready for it.  Fingers are crossed.  Let's hope this corner doesn't move away from me again.

Ai Yi Yi

That is Just Wrong

I was okay with the decision of MNSure to use Paul and Babe as mascots for the new medical insurance program.  I even thought it was funny to see Paul water skiing across a lake and into a big pine.  But today I saw a newspaper add that was just wrong.  There stood Paul, in his jeans and red plaid shirt, standing next to Babe.  And he wore a hospital gown over his clothes and had an IV in his arms.  Between him and his beloved Babe was an IV pole.  Paul Bunyan as a patient?  In a gown that opens in the back?  You gotta be kidding me.  This is Paul Bunyan; an American folk hero.  Paul Bunyan was a lumberjack.  He ate pancakes so large that the cook had to tie pounds of butter to their feet and skate across the giant frying pan.  Paul Bunyan dug the Grand Canyon when he dragged his ax behind him when he walked.  He is a hero.  Paul Bunyan does not, I repeat - DOES NOT, wear hospital gowns and need IV's.