I Miss This Badly

Rocking out at the karee-okee :)

Don't Let Summer Be A Bummer

It's getting overly hot and humid here in Kyle. Every day seems hotter than the last. It's crazy! The piercing heat just makes me want to do a "take the plunge" Nestea commercial where people dive into the water dramatically by doing a sort of a back flop splish-sploosh.  



Our community pool just recently opened and I could not be happier. So we go there often to cool off our overly heated bodies and minds. 

Me and my sister lounging by the poolside. 

And those, those are my weird looking pasty feet. I try to get enough sun but obviously, not enough. 


Having sensitive skin can be a total bummer since I can't enjoy a lot of things like other people can. But that won't stop me from having a little fun, right?






Here are some tips I've learned to help our skin while having fun in the sun: 
1. Don't forget your sunscreen! Very important. Make sure the label says UVA and UVB protection to help prevent sun damage. Smear on thy skin generously and reapply as needed. Don't forget your feet!
2. Have a little sunshine. Early morning sunshine = Vitamin D. Yummers (that's the skin and bones talking right there hehe).  
3. The weird, strong smell in swimming pools is chlorine. Chlorine is used in swimming pools to help keep it clean. That is a good thing. We don't want to swim in water that is bacteria-ridden, which, is also used by other people. Only Big Billy Bob From Up In The Sky knows where they've been. 
4. But, but, but! There's a big but here! (Still cracks me up!) Too much chlorine can be irritating to our skin. It has a strong drying effect. And again, dry is not good. And of you're acne prone like me, chlorine is not something we want to be exposed in too often. 
5. After swimming, make sure to rinse well to help wash away the chlorine. Moisturize your skin. 
6. I found that it also helps to exfoliate once in a while. A mild and cheap way is to use baking soda! Baking soda not only helps in sloughing off the dead skin to keep it smooth and soft, it also helps get rid of the bleach-y smell out of hair and skin. But remember, exfoliating too frequently can cause more harm than good so don’t overdo it. I repeat. Do not overdo it. 
7. Drink plenty of water to rehydrate.
8. Most importantly, enjoy.  

I Love Ghibli!

Studio Ghibli has got to be my favorite animation company of all time. From the first time I've laid my eyes on Spirited Away, I was hooked. Beautiful animation and great stories, what more could one ask for.

I am a Hayao Miyazaki fan and I think everyone in Studio Ghibli is pure genius. Their stories are just so heart warming, fun, creative and  I also like how they address environmental issues.

The Borrower Arrietty, their upcoming movie is almost showing, and hopefully a dubbed or subbed version won't take too long. I am really looking forward to watching it. To commemorate, I will be having a Ghibli Marathon!

F Is For Fiber, Figs, and First!

I'm on my way to a healthier lifestyle. At least I think I am. Well, I've decided to become healthier, and deciding on something is the first step to success. Right? Right! 

Eating healthier is one of my goals, but I lack talent in cooking. I admit, I am not a good cook. I can be considered dangerous when left alone in the kitchen. 

So I am having a bit of a struggle right now, but I am learning. The good news is, the kitchen is still safe, no house fire yet :)  

I was craving for figs the other day. Fig Fi Fo Fum! ^_^ My sister is on her way to becoming a chef and  she was nice enough to teach me how to bake fig bars! This is my first time so please no making fun hehe :) I saw the recipe for vegan fig bars on the internet, I forgot the site where I got it from though...

And so we used the food processor and mixed all the ingredients into a bowl. And also, the ingredients are kind of approximated because we used a larger pan. I've learned to make adjustments as we went along:

about 20 figs (boiled for 10 minutes)

2 cups wheat flour

2 cups oats

1/2 cup of almonds

1 tablespoon baking soda

1/2 tablespoon salt

1/4 cup canola oil

maple syrup

1/2 cup almond milk

Next we put some more canola oil on the pan and started laying the ingredients, making it look like a fig newton bar with the figs in the middle. My sister put some maple syrup on top to add some extra sweetness. We also added some of the fig juice from when we boiled it earlier to add some moisture and figgy-ness. A cool fact about figs is that not only are they tasty, but they are also full of fibery goodness! Our colon will thank us for eating this healthy treat. Bake for about 22 minutes and viola! Fig bars ready to be munched.

Can I Has Lion Burger?

A few days ago I was watching the news and saw people serving unusual burgers. It was not just any meat. It was lion meat. As in Lion-Simba-King-of-the-jungle meat. Whoa. Now that is exotic.  

I have  had my fair share of "exotic" food, but I'm nothing compared to Andrew Zimmern of Bizarre Foods. I've tried eating frog, snake, and without knowing it, I also tried eating dog meat when I was younger. I almost tried to eat bat meat too. Although I am a little curious on what lion meat actually tastes like (they even showed people eating and commenting on how the burgers were "yummy"), still, these majestic creatures are not farm bred like pigs and cows. They're wild, and numbered! I don't think McDonalds will start serving lion burgers anytime soon (who knows?) but this kind of hype is encouraging people to hunt vulnerable animals. Pretty soon, they become endangered. Or worse, extinct. It just makes me wish that we didn't have to eat or destroy anything to survive. We have all this wisdom and capacity for a reason. Why not use it to help protect? 

Canker Sours

Does anyone remember The Kanker Sisters from Ed, Edd and Eddy? They were annoying like heck, but their love hate relationship with Ed, Edd and Eddy can be pretty funny. As annoying as these girls are, the real life canker sores also get me worked up when I have them running amuck in my mouth. 

Ever since I was young I've always had a canker sore here and there. I've looked up the causes of mouth sores, and there are actually  a lot of them. Probably for me is having a lot of stress, having not so straight teeth (will be getting braces soon) which makes me bite my lips, inner cheeks or tongue a lot of times,  and probably hormonal changes. There are a many more causes that don't really pertain to me such as chewing tobacco, eating spicy food, having braces, etc. And also, toothpastes containing SLS have been researched to cause canker sores too!

They say gargling with warm water and salt helps. It does to a degree, but it doesn't really heal it faster. I've even tried slathering salt on it, which was insane, because it hurts like heck and it didn't really do much. Orajel just helps keep the pain to a minimum but does not  heal it. There are more products out there that claim to help heal mouth sores fast, but I have yet to try one that actually works.

Recently, I had a huge canker sore, it was so big that it hurt whenever I started opening my mouth to talk or eat. It was that bad. A coworker of mine helped me and gave me some advicce. She saved my mouth! She told me she had the same problem when she was younger. She advised me to take L-lysine. It was  an over the counter supplement so I did not need a prescription. It cost me less than 10 dollars. I tried it and on the second day, my sore was not completely gone but I was able to talk clearer, and had no pain when I ate. On  the fifth day, it was so tiny I don't even really remember it being there.

What is L Lysine? L Lysine is an amino acid that helps with our bodies' connective tissues, It helps build protein and helos in the production of hormones, enzymes, and antibodies. Lysine can also be found in soy, quinoa, eggs, cheese, milk, apples, apricots, papayas, carrots, celery, cucumber, etc. You can find out more about L Lysine through the links below.   

sources:

picture
wikianswers.com
causes
importance of lysine

Cancelled!

Happy Town is one of the shows I am really into right now. I love how this show keeps me at the edge of my seat, wanting to see more, and wanting to solve the mystery that is the Magic Man. And then, just when the show starts to unwind and the characters start to evolve nicely, the crazy broadcasting corporation  pulls the plug on it. Ergh. I guess it was not doing good as far as "ratings" go. There are 2 episodes left, and it just makes me sad to have to leave it to my imagination on who the magic man was, and how everything will go in Haplin. *Sigh* They never gave this show a chance, and I think it would have been a pretty good show.  

Independence Day

Today is the Philippine Independence day!
And to celebrate, I shall run around naked!!!
Freedom!!!
Ha-ha-ha-ha-ha, juuuust kidding ^_^'
Happy independence day again

Chemichalology Thingamajiggy 101: SLS

I've always noticed after brushing my teeth, my lips get dry faster, and I get thirstier. Normally I would just satisfy my thirst and drink water. Little did I know that there was a reason behind that. Yes kiddos, it was SLS. Not LSS, but SLS. Sodium Lauryl Sulfate.
What is that??? Well, sodium lauryl sulfate, or SLS is a chemical additive found in a lot of ordinary things we use everyday. It is in our shampoos, cleansers, toothpaste etc. This SLS makes a delightful lather that we enjoy to help clean things by removing oil and residues. 
And speaking of cleansers, whenever we clean our faces, you know that tight feeling you get after? I actually thought that was a good thing. Since my skin is pretty oily, well, the solution to that is keep it dry, right? Well, not exactly.


Let us put it this way. Pretend that this boy was our skin, and that the sebum are his clothes. His clothes keep him protected from germs and also prevent from overdrying the skin. The SLS is so good at stripping oils that it takes more than it should, so we feel dry. Naked.



The boy (skin) will try to compensate by adding more clothes (sebum) to feel less naked. And so more sebum, more clogging, more crap. I mean more zits. 

Talk about harsh. What makes it sadder is that SLS is cheap, so a lot of companies use it in their cleansing products without thinking about the consequences to their consumers.


SLS has been found to cause dermatitis and skin irritation to some people. There have also  been debates about this chemical causing cancer. I don't really have a say in that, it could be true, or it could be false, but I just try to avoid products that have SLS as much as possible. 

The next time we try to put something in our body, we have to be careful because we might be doing more harm than good.




sources:
wikipedia

Lazy Day

The last time I posted something was last January. Many things seem to have happened in between then and now, but I hope I get to become more consistent with posting blogs.
It is a gloomy-doomy-rainy day today. The thunder kept me awake cause it was like camera flashes coming from outside. It has been like this for a few weeks now. Well, it's better than being hot and humid I guess. Days like these put me into an introspective trance.... Or it just makes me sleepy. :)