I Hate Flying Things (Natural Bug Repellant)

    'Tis the season for fun in the sun, playing by the pool, hikes, camping, long nights spent on patios with lemonade...and flying blood suckers, crawling blood suckers, itchy and irritated skin. Summer is like that ex girlfriend that your friends like, but she ended up cheating on you. When she's gone, you remember the good times, yearn for that warmth again, but when she's back, you remember how she betrays your trust. Well, no more. It's time to take back your summers without feeling icky, sticky, and itchy.

 

   
   An Ounce of Prevention:
There are so many mixes you can make at home to stave off the blood suckers. These mixes repel fleas, ticks, mosquitos, and flies, and can be used on humans and most domesticated animals with fur, however always do a test patch with a 24 hour wait before doing a full body spray on yourself or others, as everyone's different. Spray these mixes on directly before outside play or, if you sleep with the window wide open like I do, before bed. Reapply if you get all nasty sweaty or wet.

All of my mixes start with a base of 1 part apple cider vinegar (ACV) to 5 parts water, then I add any of the following essential oils, in any delicious combos. On average, in a 5oz bottle I total about 10-15 drops of essential oils, depending on how caustic the essential oil is. My list of bug repelling essential oils include:

• Lavender
• Tea Tree
• Citronella
• Peppermint
• Orange
• Lemon

 

 

   Right now I am using lavender and lemon in my spray, so it also doubles as an all around skin healing spray. I spray it onto sun burns, scrapes, and bug bites.
   Want to go a step further? Drink ACV daily! 2 tablespoons in your drinking water daily naturally repels bugs. Though, on a smellier note, eating a bunch of garlic and onions do the same, though you'll probably end up repelling more than just bugs.

   A Pound of Cure:
When bugs DO strike, acidity helps take the immediate sting down and relieves some of the skin irritation. Lemon juice and vinegar are extremely affected. If your skin is ridiculously sensitive, like mine, a baking soda pack helps to draw out some of the toxin that causes excessive inflammation, which will then help it to heal faster. Also, an Epsom soak will help to draw out the irritants, but the heat can be counter productive. Of course, a strong immune system is your strongest weapon to overcome bug bites.  


     To debug your home and outdoor spaces, the same scent apply. Simply add enough drops of any of the above listed oils to any of your household cleansers for the oil's scent to shine through, and clean as usual. I love Dr. Bronner's liquid soaps, generally in lavender, and I add tea tree oil to it when I use it to wash down my hard surfaces and add it to hot water to steam clean my floors (commercial floor cleaning liquids are full of so much junk!). For outside, light some candles, add some of the above essential oils to the burning wax, and BOOM, bug free zone.

What are your go tos for debugging your home? Debugging yourself? Any personal tips you have that you swear by?

The blind leading the...fuck that.

     So, I have been harboring pin hole glasses for over a year now and am still only recently using them. Pin hole glasses were originated by Doctor Bates, an old timey eye doc who wanted to find a solution to sight deterioration instead of a crutch for it. I believe he found the answer. Through  series of eye relaxing and strengthening exercises, and with the inclusion of pin hole glasses, many have seen measurable and long lasting results I just started using these glasses a couple of days ago, only using them to watch distance when I am not at work, and I am already noticing a huge difference. On average, I have been using them about an hour a day these past three days, at first it is difficult to focus, but after a few minute it is relatively easy.
     Pin hole glasses are opaque glasses with tiny holes in them, they are generally plastic and have no prescription to them. They narrow the focus of the eye and shield from excess light, which has dual purpose. The force to focus strengthens, while the reduction of light relaxes There are addition exercises that help to heal the eyes more efficiently, like palming which is when you literally cup your hands and put those cups over your eyes, it is supposed to be a relaxing break when your eyes are faced with harsh lights over long periods of time. There is also sunning, when you close your eyes, face the sun, and slowly turn your head from one side to the other, allowing your eyes to experience both full light and full shade, this should be done in a continuous, but slow, motion for several minutes, this forces your pupils to desensitize to light and aids in focus, leading to an enhanced 'crispness' to your vision. Then there are exercises like focusing on something close to you, then something far, and switching back and forth, allowing your eyes to focus on that object before changing distance, over time your eyes learn to focus more quickly. Many exercises I've found revolve around practicing focusing the eyes.
     DO NOT DRIVE IN PIN HOLE GLASSES. IF YOU DO, YOU DIE. DON'T DO IT.
   

                                  Me in front of a bomb painting my...uncle in law(?) painted,

   I'm bored of writing about the boring stuff, do they work? I don't know. I can't say definitively that they do anything yet. I know that today I had a meeting at my work and took off my glasses because the meeting didn't require me to see anything, just listen, so I popped off my glasses and tried to read the signs on the wall unaided. Success. I am already able to control focus of my eyes enough to read things I wasn't previously able to. And no, I don't squint, that leads to wrinkles, as a rule I will only get wrinkles by smiling Also, my eyes ache considerably less when my prescription glasses are off now. They used to ache so bad without the glasses that I would even wear them for reading, which is stupid because I am near sighted. I took off my glasses a few more times today and tried reading things that I knew I couldn't a week ago, and there were a few struggles, but I saw improvement. I would love for my eyes to focus out enough to only need glasses for driving. That would make me incredibly happy.

Take a Walk in my Shoes...If You Dare

     I just started wearing barefoot shoes. No, not the weird toe shoes, those won't happen for me, I can't even deal with toe socks. However, I was doing a hike in Boulder with my dog, and decided it was time to introduce her to cold, running river water, and had to take off my shoes, then struggle to dry my feet to put my shoes back on. This all was simply too much for me. I looked up amphibious shoes online and happened upon the Vivobarefoot Ultra, considered a barefoot shoes because of it's incredibly thin sole, zero heel drop, and flexibility. I was a little put off by it, I won't lie. My lady feet are very sensitive and I didn't know how I would do with them, also my hips and legs ache and twitch at night, so I didn't want to piss them off.
    But, I was still excited to try them out, especially with my lofty summer goal of a hike every Monday. IF this pair of shoes was as multifunctional as they said in the description, I would possibly never have to change my shoes for anything! They came, I tried them on, love. There is a inner sole that fits glove tight and makes my hikes feel so secure, and with the ability to grip my toes, I can climb up and down much steeper rock facings than I have ever been able to before. Without the inner sole, they are like full incasement sandals (which I adore), when I stomp around in puddles or rivers, I know my feet are safe and will dry in no time. I liked them so much, that I ended up getting their Freud II for my work shoes and everyday wear, considering the Ultras look a little too silly for my everyday wear.
     With exercising full function of my feet, I no longer have any foot pain, even when I am standing (or sprinting) on concrete all day for work. My hikes are more productive, I can go longer, I can explore more, I feel safer climbing now. But, the absolute best part of it, is how connected I feel to the Earth. Walking mindfully and with purpose has helped me feel grounded, even inside, even with shoes on, I feel the dips of the grass, the stones underfoot, the full incline and decline of hills, it's pretty amazing.
     Bonus perk: I haven't had leg twitches and hip pains at night since I fully transitioned to barefoot shoes. It could be coincidence, or it could be that I am learning my body better and treating it better.

     Now, this was not just a blind experiment, I did a ridiculous amount of research on how to transition correctly so that I wouldn't hurt myself. There are many sites suggesting splitting your day into sections, planning what sections are 'regular' shoe time and what sections are barefoot shoe times, gradually increasing the ratio of barefoot to 'regular' shoe time in order to build tolerance. I had intended to do that, but I had been spending so much time truly barefoot, that my feet loved the barefoot shoes and transitioned quickly. Being truly barefoot had intensified my sensitivity in my feet and made them a little tender already, so the barefoot shoes felt like a vacation! When I tried switching between regular shoes and barefoot one, the regular shoes made my feet hurt and calves tight, so I forewent even playing that game. It took about a week before my legs felt normal again, and my feet were a little tender, but it went smoothly because I listened to my body.

                                          These are my Freud IIs in pink.