goodbye coffee

It's been three weeks since a drop of coffee has entered my mouth spilled over the back of my tongue passing by the valleculae with automatic epiglottal movement to cover the trachea and enter into my esophagus only to be emptied into my stomach.  Three weeks.

I'm entirely unsure at this moment if I miss it or not.  My adrenal glands certainly don't miss it and my sleep/wake patterns are looking better and better with each passing day.  Coffee has not always been my liquid of choice, in fact I was in my early thirties before I even drank it.  I remember the day specifically, I woke up exhausted but determined to make it through the day of work.  I succumbed to following in the footsteps of my roommates who are coffee connoisseurs, one who lovingly has a fun saying about looking for Mr. Right but found Mr Coffee instead; I poured myself half coffee half cream, and thus started my connoisseuring of coffee.  The trajectory path it followed was one of my original cup half coffee half cream, to coffee with fancy cream/sugar, to a little less sugary, to coffee with just a little bit of cream.  This trajectory also included coffee snobbery.  Starbucks was at the bottom of my list, passed up by Caribou and Dunn Brothers.  Starbucks only ranked higher than the Finnish Presidenti coffee- which in my opinion is pure stomach acid.

(side note: did I mention I grew up drinking tea and having tea parties)

How and Why did I give it up?
Three weeks ago, I caught a nasty virus which quickly left me on the brink of dehydration.  I was beside myself thinking that C-Diff had returned and I would be in for another long haul of medications.  Thankfully that was not the case.  The duration of the icky virus was on the longer side of about 6 days.  When you are sick, the last think you are drinking (or at least in my case) is coffee.  The third day of having no coffee, feeling drained and exhausted from trying to stay hydrated, and trying to stave of the pounding headache I had, the thought occurred to me- this headache is from no coffee!!  Further cognitive processes engaged and I made the decision to continue to go without.  While coffee apparently has some health benefits I know for myself it also had downfalls.  For example, waking up tired, and wanting to wear a sign that says, "Instant human, just add coffee" or "No coffee, no talkie". Actually it's sad to think that now that I woke up grumpy- well I usually do, ok beside the point.

Why-I just decided I didn't need it anymore.
How- By default and choice to continue to go without.  The headache!  I never want to experience again- withdrawl from coffee headache-terrible!

I'm back to the beginning- drinking tea.  I have my Grandma Anna to thank for that!  Well, tea and the tea parties.

So long coffee..

Humane...

Those who know me, know that I became "THAT" dog lady after I adopted Nadia.  The one I vowed I would never be.  When I moved to Duluth from the cities I by default had to stop volunteering as a domestic abuse advocate.  It is important to be involved in your community, and I found I really missed having a place to give of my time, other than work.  One day at the mall I saw a couple selling coupon books along side of them was a great dane; one they had adopted from the humane society.  I was easily drawn in and learned through discussion that photographers were needed.  Thus started my journey to train to volunteer my time for the local animal shelter.  This time however I am using my hobby of photography while volunteering and I couldn't be more pleased.

So, here I am, as "THAT'" dog lady, using photography to help helpless animals in need of loving homes.  Here are a few of the many many shots I took today at the shelter.

While my marshmellow hearted husband would take all animals home, it wouldn't be the humane thing to hoard them.  The humane thing is for me to make them look as beautiful as they are!  Best of luck to all of these little lovers.