Wet and wild

I have been so frustrated with this lingering cold, that I got busy looking at the research about colds. I was a bit surprised by the recommendations coming out of John Hopkins. Monitor your home's humidity and add warm humidity if needed. Oops, haven't been doing that. Regularly use salt water flushes of throat or sinuses. Oops, haven't been doing that. And eliminate coffee, tea, wine and other dehydrating liquids. Oops! Are you serious? 

So.... 24 hours ago, we went on a "mission to humidify", bought a large room warm humidifier, a Neti pot for saline rinses, and got several hygrometers. If that is a term you have never heard, neither had I. But apparently I need one or more. The hygrometer measures the air humidity and this measure tells you if your respiratory cilia can work to flush the bad stuff out. Who knew? Of course, in retrospect, it makes sense that running our heater all day, decreases indoor humidity, and turning the heat down at night, makes the house cool, thus immobilizing my cilia and making my mornings miserable.  Apparently, cilia need warm, wet air to work and I have literally shut down the only system that can help me get over this cold. 

We recently heard a health report saying that wearing a mask when it is cold and dry outside, is a really good way of preventing colds and flu, not because it blocks germs, but because it keeps the cilia working. We should have listened more closely. 

You may remember the days of checking air quality hourly to see if it was safe to go outside. In the Bay area, the smoke was so thick during the Oregon wild fires, that this became a ritual and running air purifiers was standard. Up until 2020, I had never seen an indoor air purifier and had never had the Air Visual App. But for months and months, these two items became standard everywhere we went. Even now, we check air quality regularly just as a habit. By the way, air quality is good throughout California today except Sonoma, must be some wild fires smoldering up there.  

So now, we have a new measure, percent humidity. We check it indoors, and outdoors, we monitor it as we sleep, watch TV, do yoga, and we run the warm humidifier continuously. I'm feeling like things that I used to tolerate, are now monitored and regulated if possible.  

With all of this measuring and monitoring, I am getting better. The "lemon custard pudding" sinus secretions, have turned back to clear and watery, doing yoga has become comfortable and I am surviving with tiny bits of coffee and wine:(

We will do our Valentine dinner at home, and I will build another layer of my Lego Tree House alone. 

I am so thankful Gene is here, doing the cooking, cleaning, running for groceries, and just generally being a great caregiver and partner. This would be a lonely path without him. 

This was taken during our holiday gathering. Can you find the 6 kids and one dog in this photo?

Can you name the 6 kids in the photo? There is one more child sleeping in the stroller, who is it?

L-R Sam, Kylie, Max (upside down), Liza, Julia (sleeping in stroller), Lizzie and Wes.