I wanted to go the Labor Day parade, but friend couldn't go, and I didn't feel like going by myself. However, here at home this morning, I could hear the sounds of the marching bands in the distance.
Since the parade ended, we've been having a series of thunderstorms and intermittent rain, sometimes heavy. It hasn't done too much to relieve the oppressive humidity, but at least the sun isn't out.
Today was an absolute do-nothing day. I had hoped to start a new freelance project, but the realtor never called me back.
As part of my widening regimen fighting the Lyme (I'm still getting headaches, after finishing 2 courses of antibiotics), I'm dosing myself with lots of fresh, raw garlic. I've been doing that for a week or so but after further reading determined that I wasn't consuming enough garlic to get a benefit from it, so I stepped it up day before yesterday to 5 sliced up cloves, 3 times a day, or 15 cloves daily, enough to do away with any vampires within a 100-mile range. That's a lot of garlic! Luckily, I don't mind the taste. If I know I'm going to be with people, I do the garlic later.
I felt kind of borderline at times today, but did not have actual headaches, which was not the case in recent days, so perhaps it really is working. Garlic is anti-bacterial and Lyme is a bacteria. Garlic can cross the blood brain barrier. I'm also trying to eliminate most of the sugar in my diet.
In addition to the garlic, I'm downing a huge assortment of herbal pills containing resveratrol, astagalus, cat's claw and sasparilla, among other things.
I did 2 loads of laundry yesterday and changed the bed sheets. Also began sorting through the remains of my garage sale. Tomorrow or Wednesday I'll drop some of it off at the dump, will recycle a few glass pieces and keep the rest to try to sell again in a month at friend's tag sale. The Teac stereo system I'd hoped to sell I couldn't when i discovered the CD player wasn't working, so that I can recycle at dump.
I have begun dipping my toe back into the online dating waters. Yesterday i met Bachelor #2. (Bachelor #1 was too ho-hum to write about.) It's hard for me to find someone who really interests and attracts me, so I was somewhat excited about Bachelor #2, and I think he's interested as well. However, I'm really not sure if we should proceed because I've observed we've made very different lifestyle choices in some ways that could make it hard to enjoy time together.
The biggest thing is that he has 2 Harleys. While I used to enjoy riding around with a boyfriend or two on a motorcycle when I was much younger, it's not something I want to do now. I think it's a high risk behavior. Even if you're a perfect driver, you can't control how other drivers react, and an accident on a bike is much more serious than an accident in a car. Plus, they are way too noisy. I don't think my neighbors would appreciate hearing it. However, B #2 really seems to enjoy riding them and taking them on trips, and if I'm unwilling to hop on with him, it would kind of put a crimp in any free time we might spend together. He does have a car, of course.
The other thing I've noticed is that alcohol seems to be a regular part of his dinner routine, and probably his social routine as well. I've always been a light drinker, and in fact recently decided to never drink again, based on new research that suggests that ANY amount of alcohol increases a woman's risk of breast cancer. Used to be they'd say 1 drink a day was ok. Now they say there is NO safe threshold. Here's the link if you're interested: http://www.care2.com/greenliving/breast-cancer-alcohol-how-much-is-safe.html
Normally I would just take it a step at a time, but I'm worried that if I came to develop feelings for him, it would be so much harder not to cave in on my beliefs to better enjoy time with him. I really do believe that "your body is a temple," and a good diet and a healthy lifestyle really is important to me. So I don't know.
On the plus side, he lives nearby, about 25 minutes away. He's also just a year older than me; so many of the men who are interested in me are like 90 years old. That's an exaggeration, of course, but I'm not interested in dating someone in their 60s. Sorry, grandpa. While he was married before, he has no kids, which to me is a plus becus it just means fewer complications.
He works as an engineer for the US government and drove to Ohio to adopt a rescue dog that had been a breeder in a puppy mill. The dog is terrified of all people now except him, and it's especially afraid of women. I don't know what they did to that poor thing.
He is also quite handsome, which let me to tell you, is increasingly hard to find when you're dating men of a certain age. It's true for women too, of course, but so many men just get old looking, gain too much weight and just don't look that appealing. I had very nearly given up on ever being in a committed relationship again.
So what to do about Bachelor #2? I've been feeling very tentative about the whole thing and have more or less indicated I want to take it slow.
Bachelor #2
September 2nd, 2013 at 09:53 pm
September 2nd, 2013 at 11:47 pm 1378162041
Again, sorry to be so negative.
September 3rd, 2013 at 12:22 am 1378164179
September 3rd, 2013 at 01:17 am 1378167444
We all have to make our own decisions about how to handle our health, and I do agree with you that taking good care of our bodies is incredibly important. But I just wanted to point out that some of the links in the article you reference do not support the statement that they are linked from. And I think that shows a little dishonesty from the author of the article, since most people will never follow-up and read the medical journal articles.
September 3rd, 2013 at 12:55 pm 1378209308
Also, when you get to the abstract that discusses risk of stroke/cardiovascular, if you type in "breast cancer, alcohol" in the search bar, it brings you to a series of articles, including this one (http://www.bmj.com/rapid-response/2011/11/01/alcohol-and-breast-cancer) that does indeed discuss the association between breast cancer risk and alcohol use. Which again strengthens my case that the author wasn't intentionally trying to hide anything.
September 6th, 2013 at 04:46 am 1378439169
September 12th, 2013 at 11:25 pm 1379024741