POTASSIUM!

So, everybody knows that it's important for you to get your vitamins and minerals and all those other healthy things that human beings are supposed to ingest. What I never realized was exactly how crucial these things are.

First, I need to point out that my mental health situation is seriously lacking. If you can name it, I've got it. Since I was a child I've had such dramatic and impressive sounding disorders as Obsessive Compulsive Disorder, Sensory Defensiveness, and Trichotillomania. Maybe I'll write some posts about them some day, but for now you're going to have to deal with Googling them if you don't know what they are. As you can imagine, these unwanted intruders in my mind caused a lot of anxiety, mostly when my life started to get more stressful. High school, for example, was particularly stressing, and that was when I developed Irritable Bowel Syndrome. More fun for me. Also, I dislocated the cartilage disks in my jaw while chewing on a Twizzler, which has nothing to do with my mental health, it was just stupid. And then there was college. A pretty good college, if I do say so myself, which may be the reason I got that much more stressed out. By the time I realized I wasn't actually a straight A student anymore, I was on academic probation. Oops. And then I thought, Gee, maybe something's wrong. Good thing my school has free psychological counseling! It was there that I learned I almost definitely had Clinical Depression, and probably also had adult Attention Deficit Disorder. It's like I'm a collector of horrible things. (If you're wondering why I'm capitalizing all my disorders, it's because I'm telling you that they're legit. I don't think you're actually supposed to capitalize all of them.) Now, all this personal information I just threw at you, whether you wanted it or not, is all intended to lead up to the moment that I decided it was time to end at least some of my discomfort. This particular discomfort came from what I had assumed for years was a potassium deficiency. That's what everyone assumes when you say you have terrible muscle cramps for no apparent reason.

So, one day I was at the pharmacy getting probiotics (for the Irritable Bowel Syndrome) and I saw some potassium! Buy one get one free! So I did! Now, apparently you're supposed to ingest about 4g of potassium every day. I believe this is specific to Americans because we need to balance out the massive amounts of sodium in our food. The legal limit for potassium in a pill is 99mg (about 3% of your ideal daily value, so not a lot). I started taking one pill a day like it said to on the bottle. That was a couple of weeks ago. In the meantime, I started to feel content. Every day, I just felt more and more calm. The sky became more beautiful. The wind felt better. I managed to stop going to bed at sunrise. My nightmares went away. So did my muscle cramps. I'm not sure what exactly ignited my suspicion, but all of the sudden I decided to look up the side effects of potassium deficiency. I found a bunch of lists, some more helpful than others. Muscle cramps, check. Restlessness, check. Fatigue, check (could be caused by college). Depression ... check? Wait, potassium deficiency can cause depression? What?! If I've been depressed all year just because I haven't been eating enough bananas, I will seriously be upset with life! Of course, that might just mean that I'm on the road to recovery from at least one disorder. But still! How frustrating is that!

Boys and girls, especially Americans (because we like our salty foods), consider this a plea from me to you to watch your diet. Not to watch your weight or your figure, or even to try to live longer, but because if not eating bananas can make you hate yourself, what else could you be enjoying that you're not? Seriously, think about it. Also, read my blog more. It's good for your health and mine, even if this is only my third post. ;D
Please note: bananas are not the only source of potassium; they're just the funniest to talk about as a life-saving food.

Short and Barefoot

I am short. Not too short. Not midget-sized short or anything like that. Just 5'2", which is not short enough to justify the behavior of the postmaster of my local post office. There are actually no characteristics that justify his behavior, but it is possible that he disagrees. This is how it went:

I was walking home at around 4:30 and thought I would drop by the post office because it closes at 5:00. The weather was lovely, thanks to the early spring that climate change decided to give us in order to placate us, so I wasn't wearing shoes. It's possible that shoes might have given me the half-inch necessary to earn some respect from the postmaster, but probably not. So I went in ... and I had a package! I love packages. And this package was special. It was ceramic teabowls shipped from Japan. Some were antiques! And despite the fact that the box quite clearly had "FRAGILE" written all over it, the postmaster was handling it in the rough sort of way that would get you arrested, but only if the package were actually a baby. I decided not to confront him about it, but only because it wasn't a baby. I'm also sure that the half-squished state of the box happened somewhere between here and Japan, so I didn't push that either. What did bother me was that the package had been shipped to a destination approximately four hundred miles away from where it was supposed to go. Alas, they were my dad's teabowls. Not sure how they got to my post office.

So I told the postmaster in my most assertive (not at all assertive) voice, "Um, this package was shipped to the wrong address. Is there any way to forward it or something?"

He looked at me in a way that suggested that he was either high or sleepwalking. "Um ... "

"You know, because it's not supposed to be here."

"You'll have to take it with you," he told me, blinking slowly. "Write a new address."

"Can't I do that here?" I asked.

"Sign here," he said, giving me a pen. Before I could argue he called, "Next!" and started speaking to the woman behind me over my head, because I'm apparently that short.

Don't let this happen to you, folks. Wear shoes in your post office.

(Not wearing shoes is also not an excuse for rude behavior. Remember kids, don't discriminate against short or barefoot people. They're human too.)

Update: always wear shoes in restaurants, though. I'm pretty sure that's a law.

Why I Wear My Hair in a Braid, and Other Important Tidbits

There are two things you need to know about me. First, I always wear my hair in a braid. Second, I'm always late. The first is intentional, and the second is not, unless of course I really feel like standing someone up, because then it is. People have asked me before why I don't wear my hair down more often, so let me inform you that three feet of hair is rather hard to manage. If you had three feet of hair, which you were convinced had a mind of its own, you would also try to control it before it became too powerful and tried to control you. It can do that, you know. Just the other day I decided to be adventurous and went out with my hair unsecured. I should have known better. My hair was plotting against me the whole time, obviously, because it decided to grab onto the front door of the very first building I tried to enter. While it might have looked at that time like I was making a respectful, sweeping bow to the door, or perhaps just whipping my hair back and forth at it in an inexplicable rage, I was actually stuck, which seemed to escape the notice of the many people shoving past me in a desperate attempt to fill their stomachs with breakfast foods. However, after a bit of making loud gibberish sounds at confused and upset passerby, and even a bit of embarrassing head thrashing, I was able to let myself loose. The hair was temporarily defeated, but its next attack could come at any time. I took the precaution of tying it in a knot, but it has a habit of escaping, and when it does, I have to watch my back. I would use the eyes in the back of my head, but my hair seems to have conspired to hang in front of them so I can't see what's behind me. It thinks it's so clever. I have often been asked after situations like this why I don't just cut it all off. No one understands. That's what the hair wants. It wants to be free of me so I can't keep it in line. If it escapes, there's no telling what it will do. Beware the braid, my friends. Beware.