nyquil meets coffee

So... I am generally fairly anti- medicine, go for the natural alternative. And generally that works quite well. Yet I have my exceptions. And one of them is Nyquil on occasion when my nose won't stop running and I can't seem to sleep, which has been the case the last two nights. So, I've taken two little green pills and off to zzzz land.

It's not all that often that I'm sick, so somehow I conveniently forget that after one night of Nyquil the second night I wake up in the morning way out of it, in the Nyquil fog. That's what happened this morning. I woke up and thought, "I feel like I'm on something... Oh, yeah,... Nyquil..." And proceeded to forget every five seconds was doing in an effort to get ready and out the door. Fortunately, after about an hour of fogginess, it occurred to me that my friend mr. espresso might be exactly what I needed. Now, I've been fighting off this flu, now cold with OJ, an echinacea/ bee propolis/ thyme/ goldenseal tincture (3 dropfuls, 3x a day), and lots of rest, which has been working well. I haven't even needed to resort to the more costly "B complex" vials.

So, I made myself a yummy cafe con soja and went about my day, less foggy, a bit caffeinated. And yet later it occurred to me that many hours later I am still in the Nyquil fog. I no longer have any cold symptoms, my nose is no longer runny, but I am still in the Nyquil fog + coffee. It's not the worst of things, but I do wish there were a more natural, less side effect version. I'll have to work on that. And we'll see how tonight sans Nyquil goes. Or tomorrow may be another Nyquil meets coffee day until this cold completely goes away.

I might add, that YES I do know my body responds well to medicine, so I tend to take half the dosage. BUT that hasn't worked for Nyquil, at least not in the runny nose department, so I took both. There's got to be a better way. Forgetting what you're doing every five seconds and feeling out of it all day, just doesn't seem ideal. But then I guess I'd probably rather take this for a day or two instead of the nose like a hose and the red puffiness that results.

a quiet, lazy day

what i'm drinking right now... :-) a homemade iced café latte. and since it's a holiday here, corpus cristi, i'm enjoying some time to read, to relax, to listen to some sermons online, and to plan out the menu for my birthday party tomorrow night. :-) right now i'm listening to a sermon and enjoying my yummy coffee. :-)

café - part 2

"Días Descafeinados" - Papel Maché

Si nieve o llueve, tu eres el porche
Que me protege.

Y si fuera un lienzo,
Serías el pincel.
Y si fuera un cuadro,
El pintor, mi dueño, y mi creador.

El azúcar en mi taza de café, tú eres
La pieza que cumple tal puzzle de mi vida, ah, ah.

Días descafeinados, ... cortados
Lo que sería sin ti.
Una flor sin sol, una pagina blanco.
Días descafeinados, fotos sin color,
Es lo que sería de mi.
Sin tener te a mi lado,
Me faltaría algo.

Eres la piedra angular de todos mis puentes,
La mama que me coge cuando no puedo y me caigo,
La canción mas bella de mi guitarra,
Las escuelas, el viento que empuje al heroe,...

El azúcar en mi taza de café, tú eres
La pieza que cumple tal puzzle de mi vida, ah, ah.

Días descafeinados, ... cortados
Lo que sería sin ti.
Una flor sin sol, una pagina blanco.
Días descafeinados, fotos sin color,
Es lo que sería de mi.
Sin tener te a mi lado,
Me faltaría algo.

café

:-) yum! well it seems like the web domain panic is just about gone, although i'm still waiting for it to get fully resolved (i'm waiting for wordpress support to write me back). but it does look like all is well, no information lost, it looks like we still have our web domain, it just doesn't actually work yet.

in the meantime, i'm drinking some coffee - just pure espresso this morning (i need to go buy some soymilk), which is probably helpful since i'm running low on sleep, and it does taste mighty good.

here are two quick side notes before i get back to being productive...

here are two blogs that made me laugh (i found them looking for coffee pics):

"how to defend your coffee habit"

"coffee as a cure for the plague

and, secondly, contrary to these blogs and to my love of coffee, i actually do think that it's much more advisable to not be addicted to coffee, but to merely use it now and then when necessary for either emotional or mental conditions. :-) it's definitely true that coffee addiction makes more tired in the long-run, as it drains your adrenal glands and causes you to need stimulant to function (and actually to function at a lower level of energy). bottom line, it's not so good (although it is tasty) and better in small doses, or on occasion.

note: i think i am mindlessly writing whatever, so this is probably very much random ramblings...

Coffee or Tea?

Since I first came to Spain, in 1999, I have loved coffee, particularly espresso or a good cappichino. In fact I make myself a soy cappichino most mornings in Spain.

Well... from time to time, knowing that caffeine really isn't that great for your body, (specifically it drains your adrenal glands and makes you more tired overall and actually decreases you alertness and ability to concentrate (and obviously you become a bit addicted and dependent on it)) I take a break from caffeine all together. And somehow it is much easier to do so in Missouri suburbia than it is in Madrid, Spain, where life revolves around food and coffee. It's true.

So upon arriving home, I pulled out the Spanish cafetera, spanish coffee pot my dad bought when he was in Spain (but by the way has never actually used himself ;-)) and began making coffee & cappichinos. Well, after about a day or two, I just got tired of the hastle of making it and thought, "Now would be good time to detox my body from coffee and caffeine, at least now when things are a bit more tranquilo (calm)."

It didn't hurt that I found some Key Lime Rooibos Teavana tea (no caffeine or teina) in the kitchen, which by the way looks really pretty (with flowers and such) and tastes good and refreshing. So at least for a little while I will be decaffeinated and more of an Herbal Tea girl.

café y nieves (coffee & snow)

on the way home from campus (UCM) today, i decided to stop by starbucks to spend some time with the Lord, process life, and possibly study a bit for my driving test. i sat there awhile enjoying my cappichino con soja, a muffin, and studying the book of matthew (in the Bible). i processed some thoughts i've had from the past few days of spending time with the team who came from the states.

an older woman eventually wandered over to the corner i was in and sat down with her mug of coffee. sensing that the Lord wanted me to talk with her, i mentioned how cold it was in the coffeeshop. we then talked about the weather for awhile, i asked her if she lived around the area and she said no. she said that she comes everyday to this starbucks to get coffee, go to mass at the church right by, and then stop by el corte inglés (a department store) all within a block of each other.

i asked her about the church and why she went there versus one closer to where she lived. pretty quickly we began talking about Jesus and the gospel and what it means to really know him. she said that God is the one who has never failed her. that he is the one who understands our finiteness and is quick to forgive. she talked about how having a relationship with him has changed her life. she said she liked this church in particular because they realize that the gospel is for NOW and that God wants us to experience eternal life NOW, not just after we die.

she said that it also changes how she treats others because each person is precious to the Lord and of great value in his eyes, so she should treat them as such. anyway, it was really encouraging and fun. i can't say that it's a normal occurrence to meet someone like that here in madrid, particularly someone of her age. it was fun and an unexpected little surprise. :-)

oh, and her name is nieves (snow). i may just start dropping by that starbucks more often (i'd never been there before).

cafe con soja

okay, while i am blogging away about random and not so randomness... and while i am up entirely too late... i might as well blog about coffee and crazy randomness. i just came across this picture and love it. it makes me think of espresso, which i also love.

this is also on my mind because i met up with some students for lunch and then coffee today. ironically we went to foster's hollywood (an american restaurant) and then starbucks. they weren't my picks, but just a bit ironic and fun. first of all at lunch, miriam started to pick off the oats from the bread of her sandwich and said, "Alba (me in spanish), this looks like something you would like. It just looks so, um..." "healthy? (i said)" "yeah (her)"

then a bit later, as we sat drinking our coffees in the middle of this mall, one of the girls, irene, looked over at me and said, "Isn't Alba just so... um... sana (healthy) or um... natural. Yeah, you're just so natural. And you like everything healthy."

so, now that i'm writing about randomness and coffee, this whole conversation is coming back to mind... by the way, here is a little picture of miriam, yoana, irene, and ana. marta, natán, and i were there, but somehow they must have left before we started taking pictures and i am taking the picture.




it is kind of funny and a little out of the ordinary. i grew up in a very granola, health food family.

my mom made everything from scratch. we bought a lot of our food from a health food coop. we had a decent size garden most summers along with fruit trees. we lived in the suburbs, but had a compost pile and such before it was cool.

i didn't have refined sugar until i was three (only fruit juice & honey). i didn't have soda until i was in fifth grade and then thought it was gross. i remember in third grade designing the "ideal" cereal and was sure that mine would win. the big thing to catch people's attention was "NO SUGAR ADDED," "NO ARTIFICIAL COLORS OR FLAVORS," "ALL NATURAL." i had no clue why i didn't win, no clue. obviously mine was by far the best. what else, whenever the neighborhood kids would go to 7-11 to buy candy the once or twice i bought a chocolate bar (the only candy i actually like, strange, i know) i felt so guilty (thinking i had done something wrong) that i threw it away. truth be told, my mom wouldn't have cared, but in my mind junk food was bad, morally bad.

through high school and college i worked at health food stores, was planning to get an m.d. and some sort of natural healing degree to balance things out, and helped start "vegitarian action" at mizzou. truth be told, coming to spain, i was a bit overboard in terms of healthy eating. i still love healthy food, but don't think (or feel) it's morally wrong to add sugar to my coffee, to for that matter drink coffee, or to eat things that aren't necessarily good for you (within balance). i know this is odd, but it is in fact my life.

so, anyway, i came to spain wanting to serve others and willing to eat whatever was given to me (and assuming that probably meant eating meat). pretty quickly i figured out that there was virtually no vegitarian food in sevilla, at least not easily found at a café. everything labeled "vegetarian" came with tuna and a fried egg on top. so, i began to eat the way i normally would at home, but to eat fish, seafood, jamon serrano (spanish ham, like prosciutto), chorizo,... when i was out or at a friend's house. now truth be told i have begun to think about becoming a vegitarian again, not because i dislike meat (that actually never was the case), but that is another post for another time. as far as spain goes and as far as animal rights here, i really need to look into things more. it seems that animals are much more likely to actually run around and live a normal life. so, i feel better about eating meat here than i do in the US. but, as i said, i should probably look more into this.

also, in moving to sevilla, as i got used to the late nights, the sleepiness that comes after a big 2-course lunch, and the many appointments over coffee, i began to drink café sólo (or espresso). the most common thing would have been café con leche, but since i am lactose intolerant, i opted for pure espresso. and i must say it is awfully good. it didn't take long to enjoy it. and i haven't been the same since.

i mean i still love just about anything healthy, but also love a good soy cappichino.

and while i'm not much of a fan of american watered down coffee (i learned to drink espresso coffee in spain and that is what i like), i love the smell of an open bag of coffee (which by the way, if it's spanish, smells like chocolate - really - and just fyi, the best kind in my opinion is saimaza natural). and i love my regular café con soja.

the mornings i make coffee, i brew my delicious coffee in a nice cafetera on the stove. i put a bit of soymilk in an italian frother (which unlike the fully silver one to the right has a cool green handle and plunger). i have to say that it is one of the best cappichino con soja i've had. i don't have it every morning, but recently it's been more often than not. and then i generally have a café sólo (espresso) after lunch to help me wake up from the food induced sleep of lunch.

so, all that to say, i like coffee, particularly espresso or a good soy cappichino.