Flare Up

Last night, after I finished the blog post, I took the dogs outside for their final pee before bed and I found this!

It was a little disconcerting and difficult to go straight to bed until I'd checked the QFES updates a number of times to make sure we were not in immediate danger.

This morning, the sky was still very smoky, but the fire was much smaller and here we were, feeling safe and believing that the worst was over.

When BAM!!

The sky became dark with thick brown and black smoke, there were planes with sirens, helicopters and fire trucks all over the place!

The wind had changed direction and strengthened and here we were in the danger zone again.

The Motivator took these photos (she took the video that I put on yesterday's blog post too!)

That lasted for about three hours until the wind changed direction again, which didn't reduce the danger, but DID clear the sky. As of this afternoon, things appear to have calmed somewhat ...

For the third night in a row, we are still with bags packed, ready to evacuate if necessary and we are currently on the "STAY INFORMED" list, which is our best status so far. They are still concerned that conditions could change at any time, so we are not completely in the clear.

While I was waiting for the fire to make a decision about how bad it wanted to get, I decided to do some art. Adoring Husband had to go into town for some medical tests, so I had the house to myself.

I'm quite happy with the results of this one and in this case, the real thing looks better than the photo.

Tomorrow is Saturday and I'll be working at The Happy Abode, so I'd best get some sleep.

Nite all.

Not Quite Over

It was a restless night for me.

We packed a bag each and put them in the back of the car ready for a quick getaway and went to sleep hoping that the fire would turn on itself as predicted.

The skies were clear when we woke and there was no sign of the fire, which was a relief, but as the day wore on, it flared up again and now we are on alert for a second night, and the bags are waiting at the back door, just in case!

I spent a lot of today cleaning dry paint out of 34 plastic cups and their lids to return to the shop tomorrow. Not an easy job considering how small and fragile the cups are, but I got it done and then cleaned my own cups and tools ready for my next stint of painting.

Trouble is, after 2 hours of cleaning, I didn’t have the energy to paint! I wasn’t sure what to paint, so I spent 30 minutes going through my bucket list of “art to try” and by the time I decided, my energy was not high enough to spend another 2 hours at the studio table mixing paints and then concentrating on the art - because I didn’t pick something simple from my list.

I had to make an early dinner because Adoring Husband was off to SES training tonight. Did I mention that he has decided to go back in an Admin role? Needless to say that there was no training tonight because some of the crew were out in the flood boat monitoring the river banks for runaway flames, so he wasn’t gone for too long.

My photography crystal lens ball arrived in the mail today!

I think I’m off to bed now and hope for a less restless night!

Nite all.

One Extreme to the Next

My day has been both fabulous and scary.

It began with shopping and lunch with the girls at ‘Salt’ restaurant on the waterfront to celebrate a special birthday for Lady Lynn.

One of my favourite shops in The Bay is called Luxe. They sell the same brand of silk clothing as we do at The Happy Abode but their prices are MUCH higher, like 30% higher! They also have other beautiful clothes and I purchased a top and two Summery cardigans.

When we arrived at the restaurant, the original plan was to sit out on the deck, but the gale force winds soon blew us inside. We enjoyed delicious food and I selected freshly squeezed juice in place of an alcoholic beverage.

Much to Lady Lynn’s surprise, we presented a gift to her. She read the card and cried. She opened the gift and cried. She loved it and told us we were naughty. Our banter and cheekiness and laughter filled the room and we had such a good time together. I really enjoyed myself.

After lunch, I visited the gift shop nearby and introduced myself to the owner. When I told her about The Happy Abode, her eyes lit up and she told me that she had heard about us from a LOT of ladies and they always said amazing things about us. It was nice to hear.

We jumped in the car, drove to pick up my photos from the framer and then stopped at Eli Waters, initially for one of the girls to get something in Woollies, but while she was there the rest of us had to check out the dress shop.

More money was spent. We departed that shop feeling very happy ... still!

I checked my phone as we drove home to discover messages from Adoring Husband saying that he was hosing the grass roof of the Bali hut because there was ash floating across the river and that the town of Woodgate had been evacuated.

As we drove into town, we chose to go to the boat ramp to investigate the fire situation. This is what we saw.

The SES advised that they were concerned about the fire possibly crossing the river and we would have to evacuate, so that caused some concern.

We have packed the back of the car with all our important goods and chattels so if we get called out in the middle of the night, all we have to do is grab the psychotic dogs and go.

Right now, they’re hoping that the expected wind change will turn the fire back on itself and there are SES boats monitoring the river banks keeping an eye on everything. Fingers crossed that it pans out that way and everybody, along with their property, will be safe.

It’s quite scary!

We’ve had no dinner tonight.

Now it’s time for some trashy TV before bed.

Nite all.

Break Time

This post, I’ll give you a break from health education, except to say that today, I am feeling physically strong and pain free. I feel GREAT! Better than I have in a long time!

Strangely, I did not get to sleep until 2am on Tuesday morning and Psychotic dog Jack woke me at 5.05am. After I took him outside, I returned to bed and dozed on and off until 7.30am.

Even though I knew I was meeting the girls for coffee, I didn’t get out of bed until 8.45!

It took me 15 minutes to shower, wash my hair, put on my make-up, get dressed, gather my goods and climb in the car for Adoring Husband to drive me to my coffee date.

Everyone was already there waiting for Yours Truly. Two of the girls had to leave early so I didn’t get much time with them, but the rest of us yabbered on for another hour before visiting The Happy Abode for a little while.

After they left, The Motivator and I cleared the training room in preparation for meditation class on Wednesday. I chopped up some cardboard boxes, vacuumed the entire shop and emptied the bins ready for bin night before AH picked me up.

We planned on going into The Bay, but by the time we got ourselves organised, I remembered that I had to be back for hooping class and we didn’t want to rush the trip so we stayed at home.

I visited the new butcher in town and purchased some meat. We had marinated chicken wings for lunch, which were juicy and tender, then lamb cutlets for dinner with roasted cauliflower, sweet potato and Brussels sprouts. The lamb was divine. AH also cooked three of their “mongrel” sausages on the barbecue with the lamb.

Apparently they are a combination of meats and they too were very tasty. So at this point, we are very happy with the new butcher!

I started to clean some of the paint mixing cups in the studio so that I could return them to the shop, but I didn’t get very far because hoop time snuck up on me!

Again, I was the only one to turn up for hooping so lucky me got one on one attention and learned a few new tricks. I really must practice these tricks at home so that I can be more impressive in the next class!

I had a whole lot more energy and ease of movement today and I left the class with a bounce in my step instead of dragging one foot in front of the other like the last two weeks.

It was a great class.

This evening, I’ve enjoyed my Love Island trash TV and now I’m ready for bed.

Tomorrow we are having an early celebration of Lady Lynn’s birthday over lunch. I’m looking forward our day together!

Nite all.

Systems Of Us

Did you know that the human body has an Endocannabinoid system?

It goes on the list with the other 11 systems in the body eg circulatory, muscular, nervous and immune systems to name a few.

It is a newly discovered system and appears to be more important than the immune system when it comes to protection and healing.

To be strong and effective, this system requires the cannabis herb.

For thousands of years, humans used cannabis very effectively for pain, health and healing. Drs prescribed it for almost every condition from small cuts to chronic pain and diseases. It was given to children for childhood ailments.

Cannabis is non addictive and nontoxic. You can’t overdose, it has no negative side effects and it is a curative ie it helps the body mend itself.

It was legal right up until the end of prohibition.

Prohibition created a LOT of employment and new departments which were highly funded by the government, so when alcohol became legal, they needed to find something new for these government departments to police.

Cannabis became the new ‘something’.

They created scare campaigns and advertising through the media to frighten us into believing that cannabis was the new gateway drug to even worse addictive drugs.

THEN with cannabis out of the picture, they had to create new prescription drugs to take its place, which included opioids and any number of toxic synthetic poisons that we use today.

The trouble is that those drugs have earned pharmaceutical companies, hospitals and governments billions and billions and billions of dollars, so the last thing they want is for cannabis to become legal again.

In a nutshell, there are CB1 receptors in the central nervous system which deal with pain and there are CB2 receptors in the immune cells that deal with inflammation. When there is noxious stimuli (a potentially damaging event in the body), the endocannabinoid system naturally reduces pain and inflammation and attempts to heal the body.

This system needs cannabis to do this effectively.

Which explains why you hear so many stories about cannabis stopping or reducing seizures, reducing or stopping pain in the chronically ill, reducing the size of tumours, reduces and/or removes the symptoms of arthritis, heart disease, anxiety, depression etc etc.

It’s not just masking the symptoms, but actually helping the body heal itself.

Cannabis comes in tinctures, balms and salves, capsules, oil and many other forms for various uses and treatments.

In the USA where in some states, cannabis is legal, prescription drug use has dropped considerably, so it’s proving to be very effective.

Anyway, that’s my medical information for the day and I still have four more hours of this Docu-series to watch, so you could hear more about this yet.

I swam a lot today. No art because there is no space left until the other 6 pieces dry. It was a very relaxing day which I thoroughly enjoyed.

Now it’s WAY AFTER midnight! I’d best get some sleep!

Nite all.

As Promised

Ok, so I have gathered most of my information about “lectins” through researching and living the Paleo lifestyle and more recently via Dr Steven Gundry who was a Cardiothoracic Surgeon and Heart Surgeon until he realised that the human body can prevent the damage that he was working so hard on repairing.

He now focuses on diet and lifestyle while performing all kinds of research and scientific tests to prove his health theories.

Most of you know that Adoring Husband and I decided to go Paleo in late 2013 just after he was diagnosed with PD, high blood pressure and GERD (Gastroesopageal Reflux Disease).

In the first 3 months AH lost 17kgs and I lost 13kgs. AH’s blood pressure returned to normal and the GERD disappeared.

Removing foods with lectins from our diet was part of the Paleo plan.

There is a long list of foods with high lectin content which includes tomatoes, capsicum, eggplant, potatoes, squash, zucchini, goji berries, beans, peanuts, wheat, dairy and eggs. Wholegrains are off the list - pumpkin seeds, chia seeds, peanuts, cashews, oats quinoa, rye, barley,buckwheat, corn, rice and spelt.

So ... what are lectins???

Lectins are microscopic proteins that plants evolved to defend themselves from predators, including insects and animals (that includes humans!). They are essentially indigestible and have the unique ability to increase the permeability of your intestines. That means that they can pass through the wall of your gut, and will be treated as foreign invaders by your immune system. This causes an inflammatory response, which can set the stage for a host of diseases, as well as weight gain.

The people who have followed Dr Gundry’s dietary guidelines have reversed diseases/conditions like heart disease, Type 2 Diabetes, all forms of arthritis, blood pressure problems, auto-immune diseases, digestive issues and more.

Just like Paleo, there are tens of thousands of people who will tell you their stories of going from chronic illness to good health.

There also many stories of people who tell you that it didn’t work for them, but they are the people who did not commit long term or only made a half hearted attempt.

With Paleo, it takes the body 10 weeks to release all the yuck from a life time of bad eating and drinking and reset itself ready to repair and thrive on the new lifestyle.

Since we opened The Happy Abode 2 years ago, our commitment to Paleo has swung and wavered wildly and our well-being has definitely suffered for it. We’ve recently talked about making a new commitment to our health because all those so-called symptoms of ‘old age’ are creeping back and we don’t like them!

We know how strong, vibrant and energised we felt while we were focused before and we want that feeling back. AH has gained 10kgs and I’ve gained 3.5kgs and we are feeling it in all the worst ways - even to the point of needing afternoon naps!

I’ve talked before about how the human body replaces itself. In a healthy human, the stomach lining replaces itself every 4 days, the skin every 35 days, the liver takes 6 weeks to replace itself and the skeleton every 3 months, just to mention a few.

That’s a healthy human. One that is fed lots of nutrients full of vitamins and minerals, NOT damaging processed foods, toxic chemicals, poisons like alcohol and synthetic drugs and I could give you a list a mile long of everything that damages your body and hinders the healing process.

The first thing I’m doing for myself is removing the lectins from my diet. There are really only 5 on that list that I need to remove and they are tomatoes, capsicum, potatoes, cashews and dairy (coffee). Those five have been almost my staples, especially tomatoes of which I was eating 2 or 3 every day.

The rest on the list haven’t been in our pantry for a very long time

It will be interesting to monitor the changes in how I’m feeling.

Just a quick mention that Google is now a Pharmaceutical Company, so any searches that you do related to health will be directed to mainstream medical information and it will be more difficult to find a wide variation of natural or alternative health treatments. Ugh!

So that’s just some basic and very summarised information on lectins and how relevant they are to our health, or lack there of.

I’m off to bed now.

Oh and I painted these today!

Nite all.