Pepper, peppers and pepper spice

Peppers. This topic came up recently on an email list I’m on. I asked a question that was apparently less clear than it could have been, or far too specific. PIC has decided I know too much. I do have a degree in Horticulture. I paid a lot of money to know too much about this.

Still, not the point. I found all sorts of interesting things out in trying to clarify my question. I think most people know that peppercorn and peppers are different plants. It’s easy to tell that the black or white pepper that people put on the table as a condiment is not related to peppers of any kind. *Apparently, after speaking with Intern 2.0, this is not common knowledge and I do know too much about this.* Additionally, spices that most people consider in the pepper realm like turmeric and cumin, aren’t. I found out that those two are different plants from each other and from peppers. Apparently one of them is a type of ginger, which is more closely related to grass than peppers. How fun! So it gets its spicy from the same thing that gives wasabi its spicy.

Turmeric is really good for you and has been linked to a decrease in incidence of alzheimers. Capsicum, from peppers, is also really good for you. It is a fabulous anti-inflammatory, internally and topically, has anti-viral properties, and is good for cleaning out the blood.

Bell peppers? Housing the strongest flavor compound known to man. One drop in an olympic size pool and it will be detectible. This flavor compound is apparently what gives Cabernet Sauvignon its distinctive flavor. It might also be why I don’t like Cabs since I don’t like bell peppers.

Most of this information I already had in my head. The only new fun bit I found was the ginger relation. Maybe they’re right about having too much info. I tend to assume people have a lot of the same info I have. I find that I hate it when people assume I don’t know something. Perhaps I need to rethink this. But assuming that people don’t know can be so demeaning.

GGmom

Sitting here staring at the screen because it is easier to focus on. If I'm not sitting here I'm up wandering. A stout drink did not help and I am not about to light up. That would be the worst idea for me. Though I do understand the appeal for the first time in my life.

One 93 year old woman is doing a good job of dying. She's been dabling for a while into the, "I'm not going to get better," realm. However she's managed to get something that she's not going to recover from. And we aren't doing anything about it other than to give her pain meds. A coupla weeks is all they've given her. Stubborn woman she is, she'll likely last longer. I do come by it honestly. My grandmother.

I have known this was coming for a while now. I didn't really think I'd be like this though. I've not dealt with death much in my life. Just my grandma who was sick but she was still there mentally until the end. And I was there. I could be involved in supporting my dad and siblings. I feel kinda helpless. I want to be able to be there and I can't. Mom'd kill me if I changed my plans to come and sit vigil over a woman who can't remember my existence most days.

Or maybe thats me. I dunno at this point. I feel all kinds of lines being blurred. Lately I have been noticing a trend of situations I am put in, all in different ways, that I cannot affect by my actions. Situations where my actions could not have prevented nor made any better the out come. Everytime I think I've got it another angle comes up and I have to figure out a new piece to the puzzle. I've gotten pretty good ant sitting with myself and just admitting that there may be nothing I can do to affect the outcome directly but I can still love and support, making no judgments, all the people involved in the situation. I can offer until I am asked to stop, and even then I figured out how to sit with that and feel how to be okay with someone not wanting my support and love.

Right now the only person I have to support is me. I have to remember that I need to be supported in these cases too. That over extending myself to support others is a bad idea and in the long term is bad for me. Reinfocring the lesson of taking care of myself first and foremost is a good idea for me. It didn't even occur to me to change plans for FSG and I am proud of that. Grandmother will chose whenever she wants to pass on. She's waiting for her folks not me.

Grandmother. Old batty woman. Always has been in my life. She may, in her death, do something that she would never have done in her life by bringing family back together. I called my older brother's wife to tell her what was going on. She told me to keep her up to date on what was happening and to let her know if there was anything she could do. This after not speaking to our family until I stepped up and called the to get together this past Memorial Day weekend. I have a beautiful neice who looks so much like me its scary. I look just like my mom and she like hers. The family continues.

Grandmother is from the deep south. Her father ran the ice house for their region. There is no ice in the winter so the more affluent families paid sailors to go up to the arctic circle and drag icebergs down to the delta for people to use. Southern aristocrats. My ancestors were officers in the Civil War. She has all that information locked in her head. She's traced out family all the way back to the valley's in Ireland that are still named after our families. She had four children, gobs of grandkids and great grandkids. There are even great great grandkids out there now. Hence the GGmom. She was so proud to live to see and know her great grandkids. That was years ago too. She's lived a magnificently long life. It wasn't easy, it wasn't always happy. She's outlived all her contemporary family, two of her kids, and several of her grandkids.

My drink has mellowed me I think. I'm off to "play" Zelda for a while.