The AH Coffee Shop and Reading Room #8

[Haulover]

Apparently, it has some effect on cramps. My oncologist initially prescribed a month's worth of Quinine pills but no more because excessive doses of quinine can have side effects.

Er - isn't it the gin that has side effects, rather than the tonic?



Weak lighthearted cracks aside - I wasn't aware of quinine having an effect on cramps. In the sports world, the latest fad for fixing cramps is pickle juice. (For the non-Americans, that means the brine from pickled cucumbers, which are similar to gherkins.)

 

[DarkRaven13]

Er - isn't it the gin that has side effects, rather than the tonic?



Weak lighthearted cracks aside - I wasn't aware of quinine having an effect on cramps. In the sports world, the latest fad for fixing cramps is pickle juice. (For the non-Americans, that means the brine from pickled cucumbers, which are similar to gherkins.)

Ahhh, we know about pickle juice over here....especially in the running community

 

[JGittes]

Is that common there for banks to shutter? I'm trying to remember if I've ever seen that. Hmmm ... I think the closest I recall around here was Wells Fargo saying they were closing, but I don't think they really did.

We live in a former Barclays Bank that closed in 1999 and was converted to two terrace cottages. I'm writing in the former manager's office.

The building is a 600-year-old Wealden Hall house. It was a Barclays Bank for almost a century.

Strangely in the UK, they are shutting down banks at the local level and eliminating the ceiling on banker's bonuses.

 

[TxRad]

I used to eat a lot of pickles and never got cramps. That explains a lot.

I love watermelon and cantaloupes but they have too much sugar I'm told. Too bad.

I'm just glad that sex has low sugar.

 

[oggbashan]

We live in a former Barclays Bank that closed in 1999 and was converted to two terrace cottages. I'm writing in the former manager's office.

The building is a 600-year-old Wealden Hall house. It was a Barclays Bank for almost a century.

Strangely in the UK, they are shutting down banks at the local level and eliminating the ceiling on banker's bonuses.

Back in the late 1970s we seriously considered buying a Barclays Bank Branch in a Kentish High Street. It was a large early Georgian House with significant land. We could have afforded it and the rent paid by Barclays for the lease would have paid far more than the mortgage.

But the part we would occupy needed work, and because it was a listed building in a conservation area, any work would have been expensive.

We thought long and hard because it was a beautiful building but Barclays' lease would expire in three years' time. It did, and Barclays closed that branch.

The people who eventually bought it had far more money than us. They bought it for cash, spent more than the purchase price on renovation, and more still when Barclays left. It now looks amazing and later sold for £2 million.

But it would have been a financial disaster for us.

 

[MillieDynamite]

Back in the late 1970s we seriously considered buying a Barclays Bank Branch in a Kentish High Street. It was a large early Georgian House with significant land. We could have afforded it and the rent paid by Barclays for the lease would have paid far more than the mortgage.

But the part we would occupy needed work, and because it was a listed building in a conservation area, any work would have been expensive.

We thought long and hard because it was a beautiful building but Barclays' lease would expire in three years' time. It did, and Barclays closed that branch.

The people who eventually bought it had far more money than us. They bought it for cash, spent more than the purchase price on renovation, and more still when Barclays left. It now looks amazing and later sold for £2 million.

But it would have been a financial disaster for us.

A fortuitous nonpurchase! That calls for an Irish Creme with a shot of fortification.

 

[Bubo_bubo]

I used to eat a lot of pickles and never got cramps. That explains a lot.

I love watermelon and cantaloupes but they have too much sugar I'm told. Too bad.

I'm just glad that sex has low sugar.

But a lot of honey.

 

[MillieDynamite]

But a lot of honey.

For me, it depends on what pot the honey comes from!

 

[MrPixel]

That is horrible that they won't accommodate you (and others who would have valid reasons why they might not be able to do online banking). I am sorry that it's so hard for you. Technology was supposed to be one of the great equalizers .... but for some, it's turned into yet another barrier.

Yep. Ask C. The setup for our experience: over the past 10 years ob/gyns have been leaving the area in droves. Even the local (big) health care conglomerate - that I otherwise think highly of - jettisoned their women's care operation to a non-responsive out-of-state health "management" firm.

Anyway, where C comes into this is her last, and I do mean last, contact with this provider drove her to tears. It would have been a disaster had I not been there with her, which I normally do not do for her "lady things" appointments. As mentioned a couple of days ago, C is hopeless with tech. She (we) went to check her in. The snotty little bitch at the front desk - and I'm being very kind - told her that she would not check her in, that C was required to use her smartphone to complete the check-in process on their website. C had never accessed a web page on her phone. Not ever. If I was not there with her it would not have happened, and at least according to the aforementioned snotty little bitch, she would not have been seen.

Only by my riding in on a white horse to save the day did the provider not get a formal complaint to the state physicians' board about denial of care.

By coincidence or whatever, in the meanwhile our trusted medical group added a certified physician's assistant (a doctor-lite) to their practice devoted to women's health. Great lady. We are so thankful.

 

[JGittes]

Back in the late 1970s we seriously considered buying a Barclays Bank Branch in a Kentish High Street. It was a large early Georgian House with significant land. We could have afforded it and the rent paid by Barclays for the lease would have paid far more than the mortgage.

But the part we would occupy needed work, and because it was a listed building in a conservation area, any work would have been expensive.

We thought long and hard because it was a beautiful building but Barclays' lease would expire in three years' time. It did, and Barclays closed that branch.

The people who eventually bought it had far more money than us. They bought it for cash, spent more than the purchase price on renovation, and more still when Barclays left. It now looks amazing and later sold for £2 million.

But it would have been a financial disaster for us.

Our home is listed, Grade II. It was remodeled from the Barclays Bank in 2002, and we bought it in 2015. We completely gutted it and rebuilt it. Demolition and planning approval took seven months, and the first phase of rebuilding took five months. Our initial budget was 100k£, and we stopped keeping track at 150K£ because it was too depressing.

Seven years later, we're getting really close to finishing. But I'll have to repaint next year, and we'll have to sneak in double glazing on the windows in the middle of the night (when we have the scaffolding up next year for the painting for cover) because the listed building consultant on the planning commission won't allow anything other than single glazing.

It is flat out the most incredible house I've ever lived in. In second place is where I somehow managed to live for one year in the Upper Pontalbo building in the French Quarter of New Orleans.

 

[oggbashan]

At the same time as we considered the Barclays Bank, there was an old medieval manor house - a Wealden hall, half black timbered, surrounded by ten acres of ground.

But when we looked at it, one of the floorboards was loose. I lifted it and lowered a tape measure to find 9 feet of water. The house was in a hollow and water flowed from all directions. Short of jacking the whole building up, or re-digging the moat it originally had - vanished two hundred years before, it would always be wet.

We walked away. The eventual owners jacked it up ten feet and dug the moat. The planning permission to do that took seven years, during which time they couldn't live in it.

 

[MillieDynamite]

Fifty-one posts to the magical 5000th post.

 

[TxRad]

And I'm late with the noon time (locally) coffee.

I was busy grilling chicken breasts for lunch and putting the framework for a boat together and time slipped away.

The ladies made a pot of noodles with a chicken flavored sauce over them. Delicious.

Now I'm stuffed and in need of a nap.

 

[Duleigh]

It does. C keeps tonic water handy for her leg cramps. Even more effective is her cocktail of tonic water and... no, not gin... Gatorade! The electrolytes and the quinine make quick work (15-20 minutes) of alleviating the cramps. Her drink of choice when we go out is tonic with a lime. Still no gin.

I was once having horrific leg cramps, from the ankle to the hip and under the kneecap. I tried everything, tonic without (and with) the gin, pickle juice, aloe water (nasty!) and half a dozen that I can't remember. I was talking to my pharmacist, and he looked at my list of medications and said, "This may be it" and pointed out one inhaler I was taking for my vascular condition, it had a warning that 3% to 10% of users may get a leg cramp. I talked to my doctor, she changed me to a different formulation and the leg cramps disappeared.

Don't overlook your pharmacist as a tool in your fight!

 

[Bubo_bubo]

I'm my wife's tool against leg cramps. I massage her calves and feet, whatever o'clock it is at night.

 

[TxRad]

Been there done that with several wives.

 

[Kumquatqueen]

I'm my wife's tool against leg cramps. I massage her calves and feet, whatever o'clock it is at night.

I get calf cramp in one leg, especially late at night. But massage would probably be more agonising! And not worth waking the bloke for - one of us ought to get a decent night sleep.

I should try drinking more tonic. I often drink juice&tonic in pubs, though it's more expensive than booze. Maybe a tonic and a whisky chaser?

 

[Bubo_bubo]

I get calf cramp in one leg, especially late at night. But massage would probably be more agonising! And not worth waking the bloke for - one of us ought to get a decent night sleep.

<snip>

Eh, what I do (even if it is maybe not like massage massage) seems to help, or maybe it just passes the time while the cramp passes by itself.

 

[MillieDynamite]

With Donnie down for a late-in-the-day nap, I boiled water in a kettle, poured it over Darjeeling in a ball, covered the cup with a cozy, and am awaiting the three minutes of stepping. Once I have secured my dark nectar, I shall sip and dream of the day I'm crowned Queen of the World and known as Queen Millie of Dynamite.

 

[NotWise]

The equinox is tomorrow, so today was the last day of (astronomical) summer.

I've pulled the seasonal flowers from the pots on the patio and put things away. The basil has flowered. I've lifted the amaryllis out of the garden and now they're waiting for Christmas. I'm looking at the gladiolas and wondering why I haven't picked them up yet. Corn, melons and cucumbers are long gone; tomatoes and green chiles are just giving me stragglers.

The only thing in the garden that's still bearing are the jalapenos, and I'm hoping to get enough--maybe by this weekend--to pickle a couple pints.

Come November and it'll be time to plant hyacinth and garlic, and the cycle will slowly start again.

I've spent the last couple days editing my employer's expert opinions. I'd rather edit porn.

 

[Duleigh]

Been there done that with several wives.

At the same time?

 

[TxRad]

At the same time?

Now there is the plot bunny from hell. All of my wives have been redheads. Talk about cat fights. Luckily, none of my wives knew anything about the next one and damned little about the past one.

41 to go.

 

[MrPixel]

41 to go.

Wives?

 

[TxRad]

I've been married a few times.

The midnight coffee is hot, black and ready.

Both boats are framed. the work goes faster with more than one set of hands even if the distractions of half naked ladies are, uh, distracting at times.

 

[JuanSeiszFitzHall]

I will not seek to maneuver for post #5000. Having seen enough online communities go through valueless elbowing for 'First!' I will not be the one to blurt, 'Last!' I will stick to the discussion topic of the moment, which is whether Tx should promote the boats as having been produced with the help of half-naked ladies, and whether half is enough.