Today I saw a post on a friend's facebook feed regarding abuse and how it translates to the story of Cinderella. It's a wonderfully encapsulated feeling about the cycle of abuse, and in finding love in spite of that abuse (for reference, here ).

While I love that she clarifies what it is like to grow up abused and to deal with how to find love and in fact how to be a kind and caring person in spite of these things, the post is definitely directed at women/girls. This is totally appropriate, given that a disproportianate amount of abuse falls on girls and women (frequently abused girls become abused women, because that's how their relationships are modelled). I support her view of Cinderella as a story of how to overcome abuse.

That being said I can speak from a male child who suffered abuse. She is right on the money about how it warps you and can turn you cold inside. It makes you not trust love. It isn't that you can't love, and that you dont understand love. You do; it's an intrinsincly human trait. But it makes you distrust love. An abused person is almost always abused by someone close in the family (most often a parent), in other words someone they are taught from a very small age to love.

So when a parent tells you that they love you, and cherish you, and then they abuse you it sends a very mixed message. It says that love is pain, and that those that love you will always hurt you. Additionally (and this is more problematic in later life), it teaches the abused that to love is to hurt. It teaches the abused that you must hurt the ones you love, and that pain and love are intrinsicly tied together. It has taken me a long time and a lot of heartache to extricate those two and understand that things I learned as a small child are fundamentally wrong. It took having my own children and choosing the other path, the one where love is comfort, not pain.

One of the more uncomfortable moments for me was when I talked to my oldest about my abuse (only passingly, but I didn't shy away from it). I realized that the shame was not mine; I did nothing wrong and I knew I could (and should) speak honestly about it. I told my first grade aged daughter how her Grandma had hit me and yelled at me a lot when I was little. She wanted to know why, so I explained that she was very sad, scared and that her heart hurt, and that she didn't know how to deal with that. She understood as much as she could, knowing that sometimes when she is mad or frustrated she just wants to hit something or someone, but she kept asking 'but she loved you didn't she?'. I just replied that she did, but sometimes if you are hurt too much, inside, it just makes you a bit crazy, and not in a good way. (we sometimes tell her jokingly that you are crazy, to which she makes a silly face and clowns us extensively)

I only ask that you remember the little boys who are abused as well. Children are sacred, boy or girl. Don't let them suffer. And if you were abused, please for all that is good in this world, choose better, for all of us.

Ok so apparently the Lenovo USB Dock (M01060) has really hard to find drivers. Thank god I saved the original disk. This installs on windows 8 without issues.

Here is the link:
Lenovo USB Port Replicator M01060

So today I pull together an interesting little recipe. Please be warned, this may change a bit as I test it out. I used to live in Northern California, during the 90's. During that time there were a lot of smart-drink companies coming up. Of course we all know how epic Odwalla has become, how pervasive.

 In about 96' Odwalla almost got sunk by an ecoli outbreak, due to using some bad apple juice (it could have happened to anyone). (details ) Odwalla was just big enough at the time to be able to absorb the blow and come back from it; any smaller and they would have instantly folded. Personally I had been switching back and forth between their drinks (the Strawberry C-Monster is particularly tasty), and one of their competitors, the oddly named Mrs. Wiggle's Rocket Juice (man, what a mouthful). This was a brief boon for the small company, as they recieved a big bump in demand (myself included).

So recently I had a hankering for one of their drinks and I went to try to hunt them down. Turns out they appear to be out of business due to a sad series of personal misfortunes for the owners. It seems that the wife had been struggling with breast cancer since about '92, and eventually died in 2001 from it. The husband sold the company at some point in the late 90's, and it appears to have been folded up shortly thereafter. He remarried, but eventually committed suicide a few years later (2011). This of course puts quite a pall over the whole thing, what with the rather cheery and oddball name to his product line, of quite frankly very delicious (if odd) drinks.

 I'll try to concoct some of them from how I remember them tasting, so this may be a bit of a hit or miss situation.
First up : something they called GinGin Cooler
From the ingredients it contains: Water, Lemon Juice, Ginger extract, Honey, and Ginseng.

 So lets start with volume; we will do 1 gallon, which should result in 16 servings, or (as the original packaging) 8 bottles (16oz each)

•  13 1/2cups water (remember all the flavors here are VERY strong, so require dilution to not be overpowering) 
• 1/4 cup Ginger 'juice' or extract (instructions here: http://www.ehow.com/how_8101760_juice-ginger-root.html) 
• 3/4 cup of honey 
• 1 cup lemon juice 
• 2x 30mg bottle of panax ginseng (try to avoid alcohol based ones) this is usually available at asian groceries or online at amazon (http://www.amazon.com/PANAX-GINSENG-EXTRACT-BOTTLES-6000MG/dp/B000TK9PWU/ref=sr_1_4?s=hpc&ie=UTF8&qid=1428009881&sr=1-4&keywords=panax+ginseng)

Since honey doesn't mix well cold, I would recommend warming a cup or two of the water and diluting there, then adding to the mix. Mix all ingredients together and chill until 'pleasant'. This should get you a nice refreshingly cool drink, without carbonation or artificial sweeteners. It will have a bite and an earthiness however so it can be an acquired taste.

A note on substitutions: if you have to use dried ingredients for either the ginger or ginseng reduce them considerably and use a mixer (like a vitamix or something) to get the best dilution. You may have to try a few different ratios, but fresh vs dried is usually about 25%. Increase the water accordingly.