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Tuesday, February 7, 2012

Lab Rattery and Tea


Last night I went to get my results from the sleep lab a couple weeks ago. After a lengthy monologue featuring many numbers and a variety of graphs, the surprisingly young doctor (who I trusted more because he was balding) summarized that my sleep is utterly normal.

Just for comparison though, they had me go take an EKG, three letters that I remember from TV shows but wasn’t sure what they actually meant. This time at least, they meant getting a hairnet made of rubber tubing with a slew of wires and electrometer thingies attached to monitor my brain waves.

The even younger technician kid (I don’t mind celebrities being younger than I am, but it kinda bothers me when medical professionals are) had me close my eyes for a few minutes then open my eyes for a few seconds, repeating this several times. It quickly grew boring, so I began my own experiment, thinking about the taste of peanut butter & jelly sandwiches, the color green, the feel of an unsanded wooden door, the sound of Carol of the Bells, and as many other sensory thoughts as I could come up with. I’m pretty sure I heard Tech Junior mutter “wat is dat?” and the process took longer than anticipated.

Then he went a little Clockwork Orange on me, using a robo-demonic box to flash strobe lights in my eyes at various speeds. It was peculiar enough to be interesting, but I’m glad that part didn’t last very long.

It’s still colder than a witch’s teat out there (admit it, you’re jealous you don’t get to use that expression more often) so I made us up a big ol’batch of potato, leek, and cauliflower soup. And after dinner the last bag of masala tea we brought back from Nepal. It’s sad to see it go, but exciting as a preparation for departure. Do you know what’s in (some) masala tea? (“Masala” just means “spice” so I assume it differs.) This one was: (all spelling copied exactly from the packaging)

  1. Organic Black Tea
  2. Greater Cardamomum
  3. Cinnamom
  4. Cardamom
  5. Long Pepper
  6. Hot Pepper
  7. Clove
  8. Ginger

I am tempted to try making my own…with someone else to taste test it…

1 comment:

  1. I remember having this test done, among others, because I had this problem where my eyes would uncontrollably wobble around every time I tried to go to sleep. This caused vertigo and insomnia. Turns out it was all due to stress!! I wasn't even consciously stressing about stuff. But lo and behold, after my father in law moved out, my symptoms went away. Just goes to show how internalizing things can really F a body up.

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