A Garlicky Situation

Ugh, I am a little down just now, and I don't know why. This happens occasionally, after all it is hard being away from Chris and my family, but I'm seeing them on Sunday so it's really annoying to feel so sad. Normally I'd call Chris but he's working late and I'll need to go to bed before he'll get back. It's really stupid though, I've had a very nice week and can't complain, so my melancholy mood is inexplicable.

We had our Roman party on Saturday and even though my costume looked just like I'd tied a bedsheet around myself (possibly because I had in fact tied a bedsheet around myself) it was a nice night. The honey and rosemary toasts, rasberry cheesecake, apple tart, and muscat were all particular highlights. However I do recall being rather down over the weekend as well as I barely went out. S's friend A was here since last Thursday and so they were doing things together which I was also invited to, but which I had done before recently and didn't much feel like doing again. On Friday I went food shopping with Cl for the roman party and we spent 3, yes that's three hours in Auchan (a supermarket) which was a bit crazy, and I managed to spend an inordinate amount of money on food considering I'm only here for a few more days then I go home. On Saturday and Sunday during the day I did basically nothing, although Sunday night another friend from India came round and made us curry which was very nice. Then on Monday S and A went to the Calanques- the sea- which I would have really have liked to have done, but I was working, so when I got home from work I spent the night in alone. Yesterday was a good day- I didn't need to work, as the school had the previously mentioned Challenge Langues Vivantes so I spent the day playing Happy Families with the kids and met some English expats. After school I took the bus back to Avignon with S and A who were also in Cavaillon, and then I went yet again to the shops and impossibly bought even more (all I needed was chopped tomatoes and margarine but I ended up buying 23 euros worth of stuff). When I got back to the house, there stainding in the kitchen was a strange and very tall man, plus A, who immediately took a photo of my puzzled face.

The man turned out to be D, a guy S and A had spent time with at Villeneuve on Sunday and at the Calanques on Monday, and who they had met by surprise at the bus stop in Avignon and had invited back. He was a Canadian who was travelling around Europe for 9 months, and so he stayed for dinner- lentil soup (with groans from the boys who I think wanted something more substantial or meaty, although in the end they liked it) and pizza which was surprisingly given to S by our most mysterious housemate- Mr Sh, who lives downstairs next to the garage and who we almost never see. After dinner me and S and A went to a friend's house for a 'Nutella party' which comprised of biscuits and bread and breadsticks all of which were spreaded with or dipped in nutella- a fairly calorific but pleasant affair although by the end I was completely shattered and desperate to go home.

Today I went out with S and A as A wanted to look for presents to take back to friend's and family, and then we met D and a girl we're friends with N, at the Palais des Papes and went up to the Jardin Des Doms and passed an agreeable afternoon picnicking on the grass in the sunshine. We then went to the bus stop with A, to say goodbye as he went back to Germany. Then we came back here with D so he could give S his photos and we drank ginger tea.

The reason behind the ginger tea is a battle I've been having over the last couple of days with a cold which I am determined not to succumb to. Basically on Saturday night at the party Cl wasn't very well and she even had to go to bed early because of it. Then on Monday morning I awoke with a really sore throat and constant thirst which for me is usually the first sign of a cold. I can just about deal with the sore throat, but I hate what usually follows- a nose so blocked I can't sleep, losing my voice, a hacking cough and then eventually a nose so runny I either need to sniff or use a tissue every two seconds- and it just so happens that I had recently found out that garlic was good against colds.

The reason I knew this was that last Tuesday, just over a week ago, I had some bread that needed to be used up and decided to make garlic bread, the problem being that I wasn't so sure how to make it- in the end I chopped up about 3 cloves of garlic for about 12 very small pieces of bread (think a slice of a baguette) and mixed the garlic with margarine, spread it on the bread and toasted it. This I then offered to S, and apparently I'd used way too much garlic, which wasn't a problem of taste- it tasted pretty good, kind of spicy- but after we'd finished eating it S pointed out that eating garlic can often result in smelling like garlic. Which could be a problem, considering that this particular night S had a date. I thought it would be fine- just brush your teath and it'll go away, right? Wrong. I then did some research on garlic. Apparently it sticks to your lungs or something and the smell comes out when you exhale whether you brush your teeth a hundred times or not, plus the smell actually comes out through the pores in your skin. So, whoops! Nonetheless I tried researching contra-garlic measures, but the most effective seemed to be eating fresh parsley, which we didn't have, or not eating garlic. But while I was doing this research I discovered that garlic also had antibiotic properties, and was therefore good for colds. Which brings me back to....

My battle against the ever approaching cold. When I felt the sore throat coming on, I decided to see what natural anti cold remedies might be available, by doing my usual form of research- typing 'natural cold remedies' into google. Zinc, vitamin C, ginger, echinacea, and of course, garlic. Phase one was a fairly disgusting, but actually better than I thought, concotion of two crushed cloves of fresh garlic in a cupful of boiling water mixed with ten drops of lemon juice (for the vit C) which I drank on Monday night. Yesterday morning I awoke with a similarly sore throat, but no other symptoms. Yesterday evening after the nutella party I drank another garlic-soup concoction, plus a carrot-apple and strawberry drink I'd bought which contains half the RDA of vitamin C, plus in the morning I'd eating a vitamin and iron rich cereal, to which I added raisins, for the iron, the reason behind this being that as a vegetarian I am susceptible to anaemia which in turn lowers the immune system, which isn't good in the battle against a cold. Today I awoke with a sore throat again, but still no other symptoms, and the first thing I did was drink the vitamin C juice after which the sore throat got better throughout the day- phase three involved buying some ginger today and making ginger and lemon tea. Now my sore throat is almost gone, but who knows, it may be back tomorrow. Which is just about where I'd got to in my evening I think...

Anyway D left for Lyon, then he's going to Rome, so he has continued on his travels. After he was gone we made a quiche (phase four- eggs for the zinc!) then I prepared for school and tutoring tomorrow (though I am still rather unprepared for school, there may be some improvisation involved tomorrow), then Stefanie was tired so she went to bed, then I came on my computer, had a look at the roman party pics on facebook, felt rather down and decided to write in my blog...

...and that's about it! Who'da thunk it but I actually feel a lot better now, maybe I needed some spiritual cleansing in the form of spewing out my life and boring contra-cold eating habits! So now I'm going to sleep. If anyone actually got through this labyrinth of a blog post, well done, I'm a bit all over the place right now. Oh but if you have any other cold cures, let me know- I've still to try echinacea but I'm working my way through the list!


P.S.- If you're wondering what happened on the date after all the garlic, apparently he didn't seem to notice the smell but sadly S decided she didn't like the fellow any more, he just wasn't her type. So if you know any young, handsome, eligible bachelors in the Avignon area let me know and I'll pass the information on!