Kakahead

Summer is gone, leaves are changing color, people are sneezing, hacking, and speaking with altered voices.  There are bugs going around.  Flu bugs.  And people are bringing them to work and spreading them around for all of us to enjoy.  Coughs and sneezes spread diseases ya know.  Are you suffering from a cold?  Do you hab a stubby doze?  Or maybe you feel achy all over and are trying to cough your head off?  Well, if you must come to work, please don’t sneeze on my phone or anything.  And while the flu is attacking, please stay home and fight back so the rest of us don’t get sick.

Now, if you are achy and have coughing and stubby doze, you probably  are getting attacked by a virus.  So that means that if you go to the doctor and ask them for an antibiotic, you will get better, right?  Wrong… antibiotics are for bacterial infection.  They just don’t work on the flu.  The onliest thing that will kill the flu is YOU… in other words, your immune system.

We just got our free flu shots at work so hopefully we’ll be able to head off some of the strains at the pass.  Thousands of people die from the flu every year, but these days we have that special H1N1 or “swine flu” to fret about.  Funny how all the other strains have maintained relative obscurity but when we get a disease named after pigs everybody freaks out.   OK, it’s a nasty one; but we’ll just have to do the best we can.

Since I’m old enough to remember when the Beatles first came to the U.S. on the Mayflower, I’ve learned a few tricks that have really helped our family fight the “cold wars” over the years.  We’ve also learned from grandmothers, friends, and yes, even those “weird alternative medicine magazines.” One of my favorite weapons against flu bugs is garlic.  Lots of it.  Sure… people say, “ya, kill the cold and those around you!”  Well, I’m married, and my wife has promised not to divorce me over garlic breath.  This is a very good thing:   we both love garlic but I’m probably Mr. Garlic Breath of the family. One thing many people aren’t aware of, though, is that if garlic is boiled, it loses a lot of its cold killing power. Also, fresh garlic works best.  “Ok,” you may ask… or not… “how can I use garlic and not boil it??  Anyhow?  You expect me to eat it raw or something you crazy person you??”

Expect?  No.  Suggest?  Yup:  cut a fresh clove in half and swallow both halves.  It actually knocks the snot out of a cold.  Too weird??  Well Grandma Bunny used to swear by raw onion sandwiches.  Two pieces of bread with mayo and lots of raw onion just before bed.  Onions and garlic are close cousins, but garlic is the more powerful cold killer of the two.

One of the best cold killing methods we’ve ever found is:

A) Mince 3 or 4 cloves of fresh garlic

5) Heat one can (or about 20 oz.) of your favorite soup (for this, ours is Campbell’s Cream of Mushroom) until it just begins to boil <well OK, don’t heat the can… take the soup OUT of the can, put it in a pot and heat it up according to the directions>.

L) Reduce heat and add one teaspoon of ground sage, and also one teaspoon of ground thyme (help you breathe better)

9) Simmer while stirring for a couple minutes, and finally

!!) Remove the soup from the heat, add the garlic, stir thoroughly and cover.  Let stand for 15 minutes.  Eat the soup all gone just before you go to bed and you will kick the germ bugs in the booty.

Then, after you wake up, make with the vitamin C, the zinc lozenges, and lots and lots of water and juice and stuff.  Oh, and not to forget the herbal tea!!  Blecch you say?  Well it isn’t that bad ya know…

On the other hand, you have an ounce of prevention.  You know, eat yogurt a few times a week.  Have generous portions of green vegetables and fruit. Get plenty of rest.  And then there’s that nasty “E” word (exercise).

And garlic falls into the prevention category for me.  I love the stuff.  As my Grandma used to say, “it’s good for what ails ya.  If nothing ails ya, it’s good for that too.”   I like yogurt, green vegetables and fruit.  I like… well, ok, sometimes I even…  once in awhile, um…. exercise is good.  I need to do more of that “E” word.  Right after I have my chocolate…

Come on over some time and we can have a garlic milkshake and some avocado flavored yogurt with a nice salad of lima beans and bananas.  Then we can take turns on our combination treadmill / electric generator and we’ll not only get fit, but you can help us keep the electric bill down.

We try to be hospitable, you know.