Great Housemates

Me: “Shoot, I left my spearmint tea seeping on the kitchen table. Of all the days too! I really need it today.”

LB: “DJ has off today. You should ask her to bring it.”

LB: “Actually, I knew you wouldn’t, so I asked her. She’s on her way.”

LB: “She is here. I am bringing the tea in.”

Not only was she there, she realized that the prolonged seeping time would make it super bitter…so she brought honey.

My housemates truly are the best.

Grocery Shopping Influence

As I’ve previously posted, one of my housemates started buying gluten-free a few months back so that she can share her food with me. My other housemate is on-again, off-again gluten free, so from the start we just started sharing food since it made more sense. And because we were sharing meals, we would go grocery shopping together.

Well, our schedules got out of sync over the last few weeks and (unbeknownst to the other) we both ended up grocery shopping at the same time at two separate grocery stores. When Lyd got back and started unpacking, the conversation went something like this:

“I got chicken nuggets!”

“Great! Me too!”

“And a gluten free pizza!”

“Me too!” (I swear we eat more than chicken nuggets and pizza but somehow those two things are always in our house.)

“And breakfast bars!”

“Oh, you went with the oatmeal ones? I went the fig bar ones. Nice.”

“And gluten-free crackers!”

“Me too! And I got goat cheese.”

“Oh, I didn’t get goat cheese. But I did buy your favorite dip!”

* gasp * “I didn’t get my favorite dip but I thought about it!”

“And we have chips.”

“I just threw away the last bag of chips we bought that went stale. Meanwhile, I also bought another bag of lettuce for us to pretend we’re going to eat.”

“Yeah, I don’t eat salad. Not going to happen.”

“Be proud of me, I didn’t buy tea!” (My housemates erroneously claim I have too much tea.)

“Ah! But I did! Because we didn’t have cinnamon tea!”

Slowly, slowly I am just going to have my housemates buying all my groceries.

Sleepytime Peach

Do you ever reach bedtime and think: “I love peach tea. But I also want sleepy time tea.”

WELL GUESS WHAT. Now you don’t have to choose!

I am very excited about this.

Twitter Tea

During COVID while working remotely, I made up for the lack of watercooler chit-chat by spending far too much time on Twitter. Twitter has all the good gossip. And it is really random gossip too. So, that’s great. Then I got an awesome, in-person job with actual real-life co-workers and quit using Twitter.

But now that I’m remote for an extended period again…guess what social media platform I’ve started perusing?

Did you know that Ikea has rather terrifying pride flag inspired couches that looked like they belonged on the Babylon Bee? Or that Bill Cosby had his conviction overturned by the Pennsylvania Supreme Court today? Or that some random professor I follow is frustrated because his students can’t complete a 300 word essay?

I tell you, this stuff gets me through the work day.

The Daily Tea

This morning I make my coffee and glance over the state Court of Appeals cases released today. One or two catch my eye and I open them up for further examination.

• A man is suing his brother for defamation after the brother called the cops on him for stealing from their Dad. Or not stealing. The case got dismissed. Meanwhile, the three other siblings are suing the brother because the Dad died and left him a pile of money. (After previously disinheriting him!) And everyone is appealing because no one thinks the jury got it right.

• Another couple is claiming adverse possession on 20 acres near their house. They thought it was their property. Turns out, it belongs to their neighbor. One of the criteria for adverse possession (basically, a claim that you’ve used a property so long that even if it isn’t yours, it should be) is improvement of the land. The neighbor claims she was “aghast” to see them trimming her trees but wasn’t going to bother telling them to stop because that meant legal fees. (Ironically, a conversation might have been sufficient to stop the adverse possession claim.)

• A couple applied for a modification on their loan because they couldn’t afford the mortgage. After months of wrangling with the bank, they finally refused the proposed changes because they couldn’t afford it. Couple sues because they claim the bank dealt with them in bad faith. * cue cackling, villainous businessmen *

Do I have any vested interest in these cases? Do they touch on my legal practice area at all? No, no, and no. But man, it is such interesting drama to start the day with! I feel like I’m getting all the good tea.

* For readers like my Mom, ‘give me the tea’ is slang for gossip

Tea at the Mall

I have now been to a couple of Bangkok’s massive, multi-story malls and many of them come with a Twinings tea places. It looks like a super fancy coffee shop, but just for tea. And not just any tea, but fancy people tea. 

I decided to treat myself today.

The lady gave a tight smile when she saw my jeans and t-shirt but let me in. (Everyone else looked like they were millionaires out for brunch, even at 4 in the afternoon.) Her smile looked even faker when I ordered the large tea pot. (Like those silly single-size pots give you more than a cup or two!) I then settled in and enjoyed the royal treatment.

No, seriously, every time I set my tea cup down someone appeared to refill it. I could easily do it myself as the pot sat six inches from my hand. Either the staff was very well trained, very bored, or very embarrassed by me and hoped to get me through my tea and out the door fast. 

I enjoyed it immensely, however. Nothing like a proper tea to boost morale! 

Tea Withdrawal

Internal dialogue at the health food store today:

Oh my gosh! TEA! I need tea. I haven’t had a good cup of tea in, like, forever. All I’ve been able to find in Thailand so far is Earl Grey and some ginger tea but it is powdered and weird.

Okay, I guess I did go through an entire box of mint tea. And I recently bought some green tea. But what is that? 4 kinds?

Not enough!!

So many varieties here. I need them all. Or at least 2.

Do I need more green tea? I need more green tea. But I haven’t actually tried the stuff I bought…

No loose leaf? I guess I can’t have everything. 

I want alllllllllllllllll the tea.

Wow, do I miss tea.

Honestly, I do not know how I have survived this long. Decidedy one of the differences between studying abroad in England and studying in Thailand!

Other things I miss: CHEESE. Dark chocolate. Mexican food. 

Pandas on Parade

I have a new favorite tea from Fava Tea Company: Pandas On Parade. It is a herbal, fruit tea with bamboo leaves in it! 

Very yummy! I think is going to be one like Duchess of Earl, something to always have on hand!

Tea and a Movie

Today Sara and I went to a fabulous tea shop, visited a cute used book shop  (where I didn’t buy a single book!), and saw the movie The Case For Christ. I was pleasantly surprised by the movie. Considering it is based off a non-fiction book, the movie does a good job turning it into an interesting story. It was a perfect movie for Easter. 

Honey and Tea

I love tea and I drink a lot of it. I am not good at being precise with the timing or amounts, but I usually just take it straight without adding anything. However, I have been fighting a sore throat for two days now so I decided to add honey to my tea. This has led to an amazing discovery…

Mint tea with honey is delicious! It is sweet and refreshing. I feel quite decadent drinking it! Tomorrow I am going to try mixing ginsing tea and mint tea and adding honey. I suspect it will be delicious.