thingsiveboughtthatilove: Blister treatment

It is Memorial Day and summer is officially here. It is a gorgeous warm day and the parks are full, full of women in summer dresses and sandals. What does that mean: blisters.

I've put on a dress several days in the past few weeks and given myself no choice but to brave dainty summer shoes. The first thing to go was the skin on the top of my feet where the strap rubbed me the wrong way. New plan: no more strappy sandals, just conservative ballet flats. Well, they rubbed the skin off the backs of my feet.

This happens every New York summer. I find myself walking around Manhattan, far from home, on the way to meeting someone or attending something important and attacking my feet are at least two blisters threatening to turn into bloody messes. So I duck into Duane Reade and enjoy the free air conditioning and adult contemporary jams on my way to the Band-aid isle. Yes, Kelly Clarkson, you know my pain. The most obvious solution (other than just putting on socks, which is neither pretty nor summery and an admission of defeat) is to put on a few standard Bandaids. Well, this is neither pretty nor that effective seeing as how they always get rubbed off. In past years I've been seduced by Band-aid friction block, a Vaseline based product that claims to eliminate the bother of tight shoes. I don't want to be too negative becaues I've heard good things about this product from a trusted source, but I cannot recommend this product for enflamed skin.

This year, like years past, I found myself in the first aid isle with sore feet. My first instinct was to grab a handful of Sponge Bob Bandaids and just go wild. I'd just finished reading the Atlantic article about the incessant optimism of the yellow guy. He's been around for ten years so maybe I could celebrate with a little playfulness on my feet. But that didn't seem appropriate for the fancy dinner on the ticket for that night. Next, I was almost seduced by the Dr. Scholl's competitor to the Blister Blocker. But just as a jubilee of bells rang out following K.C., I looked to the left on the shelf and saw Blister Treatment surrounded by a halo of light. I went for it.

These little guys are amazing. Each one is a little cushion covered in a larger, clear sticker. I put one on each of my heels last week Thursday, and have showered and worked out every day since. Just now, five days later, did I have to scrape them off my feet, uncovering completely healed skin.

In the winter, I get cuts and pealing skin on my finger tips. My mamma worries about me and she sends me these great little expensive advanced finger and toe Bandaids. They work great on fingertips; they stay on and they keep my cuticles happy. I've usually just reached into my stash and used these finger tip Bandaids on my feet come spring and summer. They work pretty well when it comes to healing. However, they just aren't made for feet and they don't stay on long. I always feel guilty because they are so expensive, too expensive to use everyday on my feet. Well, the cushion in the Blister Treatment turns into a healing goo, just like these advanced Bandaids. They are like the perfect ailment for angry summer feet. I'm so excited that I've found them in time for summer. So strappy sandals and warm weather, here I come!

P.S. Why is that Dr. Scholl's rub releif "for her"? So men are just going to have to keep on powering through uncomfortable shoes?

Thanks for keepin' it classy, Columbia

I am proud and happy to say that I have now completed the Columbia Postbaccalaureate Premedical Program. I am also happy that I will no longer have to say that phrase and then explain what it means when meeting people at parties. Yes, I am an adult. Yes, I am taking undergad classes. Yes, it is a lot of work and a huge commitment of the next ten years of my life.

It was a two year undertaking that has left me exhausted and demoralized, but also filled with the sense that I now know a whole lotta science, which is really cool (see that posting with the glowing rats, yeah!).

Because it is not a degree program there was no graduation, but there was a certificate ceremony. As it is my nature to obscure pomp and ceremony, and because I was feeling some serious school fatigue from finals, a formalized closing held little draw for me. However, there was an email saying that as a goodbye present we would all receive a pair of scrub pants and to please give pant size when RSVPing. Well, after the hefty price tag of a Columbia education I figured I wasn't going to pass up free pants my fees had paid for.

But I am glad that I went to the ceremony. It was just delightful. A student spoke with humor about changing careers and the trials of the premed program. The Chair of the Committee of Admissions for Albert Einstein Medical School in the Bronx, Dr. Robert Marion, gave advice to applicants and medical students.

Then, there was a champagne toast and canapes, really good canapes. There were little bits of beef that I didn't try, and lovely salmon treats. A piece of brown bread cut the size of a quarter with a little cylinder of salmon wrapped around cream cheese stacked on it with a bit of caviar on top. Just lovely with a slightly fruity bubbly beverage.

Dr. Marion's advice was a list of do's aimed at maintaining sanity, health, and humility through the schooling of a medical student. Included in this list was to keep a blog for ourselves and our memories, but also to share the experiences. I believe that his phrase was something like: "as medical students you will have experiences that mere mortals never will." Well, done and done. I have always believed that I am having fantastic experiences that others are denied (see apple cider donuts, yum). So I hope that you, as a reader, are enjoying the living them vicariously as much as I enjoy writing about them.

Studying for finals makes me crazy

"Uhh.. this is life (this is life)
This is what I know (this what I know)
So to me (so to me) this is life (this is life)

One more road to cross
One more risk to take
Gotta live my life
like there's one more move to make"

Yesterday I got an email from a yoga studio about a three day fruit fast. It seemed like a really good idea at the time. I forwarded it to Peggy with the suggestion that we do it "together" when I finish finals.

She was totally in. This makes me think: is this really a good idea or is Peggy as in the zone as I am?

Given the response from that utube of puppies I sent her, I deeply suspect that it is the later.

Or maybe its not finals that getting me but the relentless migraines that have preceded them.

Apple Cider Donuts at the green market

Every Saturday morning there is a green market at Grand Army Plaza. Every Saturday morning the first stand is occupied by vendors that sell apples and apple baked goods. So every Saturday when I go to buy my onions and kale I have to walk through a whole mess of small Park Slope children yelling, "I want an apple cider donut now!" Ugg. Park Slope children. Ugg. Park Slope parents.

I related this to my mother who said, "I guess they use the cider as leveling, like beer donuts."

Well, I had never heard of beer donuts. I'd never had a green market donut, either, because I'd never braved the line of demanding children.

This Saturday was rainy and the market, while starting to fill back up with the fruits and veggies of Spring was deficient of the stroller crowd. I decided to take the opportunity and get a donut.

Oh. My.-wait for it-God!

Yum. Yum.

The donut was so delicious. It tasted like there were bits of apple baked in, but there weren't. There were just pockets of yummy air surrounded by wonderful cake. And sugar coated. Who can beat a sugar dusting. No one. That's who.

The fact that Krispy Kreme and Dunkin' Donuts even call the what they produce by the same name as this celestial morsel is an abomination. It's sad. That is the reason that American children are exhibiting symptoms of both malnutrition and obesity. They took all the wonderful fresh fruit and time consuming lightness out of the donut and replaced it with white flour and artificial flavoring. You could eat a million commercial donuts and not fell the satisfaction of one of these most delicious apple cider donuts.

I finished it and I felt happy and satisfied and not at all weighted down with that muffiny too full ness that usually accompanies baked goods.

Full disclosure: I did get a second donut. But it was several hours later and I had to walk back the ten blocks to the market. Also, they were selling for two for a dollar, implying that two donuts is a serving size. No, I don't think so. Next week I'll get two, but maybe I'll bring a friend to share with. I bet that will make the deliciousness even better.