1759 Personal ad

My sister bought one of those quote-calendar thingys for one of my Christmas presents. Here's what yesterday's said:

"On this date in 1759, the Boston Evening Post ran the following: "To the Ladies: Any young lady between the age of eighteen and twenty three of a midling stature; brown hair, regular features and a lively brisk eye; of good morals and not tinctured with anything that may sully so distinguishable a form possessed of 3 or 400 pounds entirely her own disposal and where there will be no necessity of going through the tiresome talk of addressing parents or guardians for their consent. Such a one by leaving a line directed for A. W. at the British Coffee House in King Street appointing where an interview may be had will meet with a person who flatters himself he shall not be thought disagreeable by any lady answering the above description. Profound secrecy will be observ'd. No trifling answers will be regarded."

1. I wonder if Mr. A. W. had someone in mind, 'cause this seems pretty dang specific or just plain ridiculous
2. I would REALLY like to know if anybody answered this!!!

For copyright reasons, the calendar is Jeffrey Kacirk's "Forgotten English" calendar.

So Madam. You want to go to the hospital?

Its not fair.
I've revolutionized my diet, am taking vitamins regularly, work out on a consistent basis, avoid junk food and drinks like the plague, and get seven hours of sleep regularly.
And I still have gotten sick TWICE this semester!
Last semester I did good, only was down with a cold one day. But this semester... blech!
So yesterday I got up for our 8:30 Pancakes and Bible study three hallways over and one floor up. It consists of two Ukrainians and a Cameroonian and then me. Oh, and Sam the Texan, husband to one of the Ukrainians, who shows up for the pancakes and then does his devotions in the bedroom while we do a Bible study. As I was getting ready I was hit with some nausea, but shook it off. But I wasn't really hungry at breakfast.
Finished Bible study and got ready to go to an outreach with a couple buddies from school. While we were driving I was hit with more intense nausea and then when we got out of the car had to take a minute getting out when my stomach cramped up.
But we filled the campus of the local secular university full of posters and sidewalk-chalk announcements for an upcoming event. "Silent no more," women who've had abortions give their testimonies and then information is shared about the local crisis pregnancy center. I wish I could go this Tuesday, but I have to work :-(
So we finished up and drove back to campus and I went back to my apartment. I was trying to gear up for some homework and realized that I needed to take a nap; NOW.
I'm not really a nap person, but I figured that staying up till o'dark:thirty every thursday night the last few weeks for J-term stuff, taking five classes and working 15 hours a week might have something to do with it, and might as well nap rather than get sick later.
I was out cold for two hours. When I got up... kaboom! lost lunch.
Now I've had the flu before, but I don't remember being that violently sick that close together in a two-hour time period, at least not for a loooong time. My room mate found me laying on the floor of the bathroom (was a little more comfortable than my bed at that point) and called our Didi.
'Didi' means 'elder sister' in Hindi, and is what we call our neighbor who lives directly upstairs. She is Tamil from India married to a Bengali, and is the mother hen of whatever single ladies come into her circle of influence. She also happens to work at the same coffee shop as my room mates and I, and its looking like she and her husband will be my supervisors for my internship this summer as well.
SO down stairs Didi came, and her entering words as she walked into my bedroom were, "So Madam. What are you doing? You want to go to the hospital?"
NO I do not want to go to the hospital!
"Oh hey Didi. I don't think I am that sick yet..."
"Ok then you want me to call security?"
I gave her a funny look. "Didi, security doesn't have medical training."
"No but they will call ambulance."
"An ambulance? I don't think that is necessary..."
Now i have pale skin but apparently the frequency of my getting sick was turning me from pale to pasty and it was concerning, as was the frequency and intensity of my getting sick. However. The last time I had gone in to an ER I was there for about twelve hours and there had been nothing close to an accurate diagnosis from that particular medical institution. And it was expensive. So I really didn't want to repeat the incident, but both Didi and my room mate were sure I had food poisoning or something terrible like that. I didn't know what I had. SO I called my old R.A. who is a nurse and had had food poisoning at one point when I was still living on her hall.
She informed me that I probably had the latest bug that has been going around. The main thing was to make sure that my temperature didn't get too high and to make sure that I stayed hydrated.
Now I had already asked my friend from the Bible study if she could pick up some 7-up while she was out and about that night, but I didn't know when she would arrive. So Didi sent her husband to run get me some, and returned from her apartment with a little orange measuring spoon with Tamil script on it to whip up some kind of 'electrolyte' drink.
She and my room mate explained it to me before they mixed it up. You mix about 1/2 tsp salt with 1 tsp sugar in a glass about 12 ounces and chug it down, then lay on your side.
I was sipping it, because my R.A. had told me to not take any large amounts of fluids in for a while as my stomach probably couldn't handle it.
"What is this, Madam? You don't like our Indian drink?" Didi asked in mock-crossness when she saw me simply sipping. "Here, let me put some cheese on it. Americans will eat anything with cheese. I'll put cheese on coffee-grounds and they will eat it."
"But I'm just supposed to sip liquids -" I protested
"No, you drink it fast. I want whole glass done immediately."
Now, she may be only 5 ft 1 inch in height if that, but it was five feet of determination and I wasn't in any kind of mood to disagree with her.
"Even if you throw half of glass out, half will still be there and you will not get dehydrated." she continued. SO I chugged. It was cold, but good. And to be honest, I'd actually prefer that treatment to the 7-up and crackers, and then the Campbell canned chicken noodle soup I remember from growing up.
She had a thermometer and took my temperature which came out normal. "I think fever is afraid of you." she said smiling as she returned the thermometer to its case.
Bhaiya, Didi's husband (Bhaiya means older brother in Hindi) arrived with the 7-up and they poured me a glass of that as well which I took a sip of then lay down. Didi prayed over me and then left with multiple orders that if I were to get sick again to simply give her a missed call and she would be down in a minute. As she left, she noticed my down comforter.
"What! Don't put that on her, she will surely get fever with that. How are you sleeping with such heavy quilt, madam?" She shook her head indignantly.
"Ok now you have two liters of your 7-up from my husband, and I want them both gone when I check on you tomorrow."
Apparently Indian home remedies are the way to go, because I was out cold until 3:30 AM. Didi came back to check on me but I was asleep. "With your mouth open sleeping so peacefully." Ha. Great.
She came over this afternoon and said several times she was very relieved to see me smiling and feeling better. However:
"You Americans... only two colors: pasty white, or red like lobster. You don't keep any sun in your skin."
Well, its true; I am very fair in complexion and I'm either a smidgen darker than as pale as you can get or sun burnt.
She also was not too pleased with the fact that I had only drank 2/3 of one liter of 7-up. "Yes its very nice that you have them, but what good will they do you if you are not drinking them?"
Good point.
They also prescribed black tea - no milk or sugar, just straight black. It actually tasted good that way in my present health condition.
Didi stopped by later with some soup she had made after checking with her friend who is a nurse from India about what I can and cannot eat.
"I made just with salt. You are not to take any pepper, otherwise will be too much. And if this is too heavy than you are just to take cracker."

So I have my own personal Indian medical crew. As humbling as it is to have Didi walk in and see my messy room with me looking and feeling like crap, its been a huge blessing to have her stop in and cluck and fuss and bustle and comment.

~Princess Ouch~

He he.... woops. Henna

(warning to any guys who might be reading: This particular post contains extensive information regarding fashion and girls' rendition of how their hair looks. Continue at your own risk) My room mate was able to go home for a while and brought back Henna as part of my gift. And I've always known that Henna was used not just to paint crazy patterns on your hands and feet (that freaks out fellow students, who at first think you've burnt your hand terribly... and then immediately afterwards ask if you have gotten a tatoo. And it also starts an intriguing conversation with the barista at the coffee shop down the road, who has tatoos in Hebrew and is fluent in modern Hebrew and is interested in the fact that you speak Hungarian. Not that any of this has happened to me...) but can also be used on one's hair to give it a wonderful, silky feel as it is moisturized and nourished. I also knew that it tended to give one's hair certain hues pertaining to the individual applying it. Now, you see, my sister has used Henna before on her long blond hair. And it made it slightly darker, a little copperish, but very attractive. Add to that her incredible tan and I thought that it looked amazing. However. my hair is not my sisters. Now I'd gotten strawberry blond highlights a few months ago and they've grown out and faded. And my hair has just in general been driving me nuts, 'cause the style is grown out of it and its thin and wispy and if I don't do it just so its wispy and crazy and bumps up in one spot making my skull look square-ish and my bangs stick straight up or lump in a particular direction making my prominent forehead resemble that of a Klingon's from Star Trek, and on the left side swoops gracefully in and on the left side flips out, making me look like I'm generally traveling in a left-to-right direction at all times and my hair has followed suit.
Yeah my hair was driving me nuts as you can tell.
Now, if I keep my hair ridiculously moisturized and style it for a half hour then it looks fine. The exact same at all times, but at least not an eyesore.




(note to girls reading this: Now is NOT the part where you all swoop in as supportive gal friends and go overboard with affirmations on physical appearance, because I'm being rather tongue-in-cheek with my self deprecation. It keeps me humble. I like how I look and have a good self image. Chill.)
SO... Henna. It has moisturizing qualities. It makes hair silky. It prevents breakage and "the falling out of hair" as the packages says.
Voila.
My room mate helped me mix it; you make a paste that in texture resembles chocolate mousse and in appearance resembles something you'd find in the back field after the cows had been there. And it smells very earthy. Not a bad smell, just earthy.
My friend came over and goofed off with her feet while I applied it to my hair. She laughed and said it looked like I had gotten in a mud fight and lost. ;-)
SO I left it in for the prescribed three hours after that; you CAN leave it in for four hours, if you'd like.
Now, while I left it in, I wasn't watching my hair. I left it unsupervised while I tried to figure out Microsoft Word on my computer, talked to my mom on the phone, made dinner, cleaned a little...
And then I looked in the mirror.
Now, it just looked LIGHTER at that point. I could see there was some... shall we say... some slight changes in the color tone of my hair, and a lot in the highlights of it. But that was fine. It was driving me nuts anyway.



So I rinsed it. And I didn't think it was that bad when my hair is all dark and full of water and doesn't resemble whatever color it is supposed to be at that point in time. But I could see rather vibrant red on my scalp. I just figured that was because Henna makes your SKIN so red, but for whatever reason, as the chemical make up of hair and skin are different, my hair wouldn't be THAT red... so then I dried it.



And... you remember on Anne of Greene Gables when she dies her hair to turn it a beautiful raven brown, because she doesn't like that its red, and it turns out green? Well my hair wasn't a raven black, but now it was definitely no longer any kind of washed out blond.




As my other room mate said, I look like Cheryl from the old Archie comics. Which is fine, a new unique look for a new semester that will hopefully be unique in a GOOD way. However, I am just not sure I have the wherewithal to carry t he look and reputation that comes with Miss Cheryl Blossom at this school...



SO I'm a redhead now. Actually its more of a brunette. I don't have any other really good pictures of me yet, because I rinsed it out at 11 pm last night, and today is Saturday and I am not going anywhere or making myself look like anything other than a bed-head college student with too much homework to read.
But I'll try to post some better pictures soon.
The other thing is that when you put the Henna on your hair, it starts to dry right away. SO you really have to know what you are doing to get it all even. AND I had the washed out highlights in my hair, AND as I said my hair strands are thin but there is a lot of it. So it was rather difficult to get the same amount of Henna distributed evenly all over my hair. So the 'under hairs' down by my neck are still more brown, its just the 'top hairs' that have gotten very patriotic for Valentine's day. ;-)
Oh well. I'm a unique person all the way around, and now my looks just prove it. ;-)

~Princess Ouch~