The Grandmotherly Remedies ...

I was having a slight headache a couple of days ago while trying to find out everything there was on Seattle personal injury lawyer's and was complaining to wifey about it, the headache I mean. She asked me to pop a couple of Panadols but unfortunately we ran out of them and I was too lazy to go out and get some. Then she said why not go crush some ginger and rub it around the side of your temples.

I looked at her quizzically? Crushed ginger? Rub it around my temples? Yes, she said. I don't know if it'll work or not but back in the old days, that's what my grandmother always suggested, she said. Oh, it's one of those grandmotherly remedies, huh? They had quite a lot of weird remedies for all kinds of ailments back then, that much I know.

So, we both got down to comparing our grandmother remedies. Wifey and me are both from totally different backgrounds but when it comes to grandmotherly remedies, we found out that it's almost always basically the same with a slight variation here and there.

When I was young my grandmother had a 1001 remedies that supposedly could cure anything and everything. Take for instance earaches, which I used to suffer a lot from back when I was a kid. I'd always run up to her (I was grandma's pet grandson by the way ... hehehe ...) complaining that my ears hurt. She in turn would go into the kitchen, take a piece of garlic and slowly toast it over an open flame. Then when it got hot enough and after peeling of the burnt skin, she would stuff it in my ear and tell me to keep it there for at least half an hour!

Trust me, it wasn't the best feeling having a freaking piece of hot garlic just out of the fire stuffed in your ear for half an hour ok, but then she was grandma and you had to listen to her. The hot garlic was supposedly able to urmmm suck out the pain or whatever was giving me the earache ... LOL! But strangely enough, the bloody pain would actually subside, whether it was psychological or not, I don't know.

Actually wifey's suggestion about rubbing some crushed ginger on the temples for a headache wasn't too far off from what my grandma would do whenever I had a headache. My grandmothers version of a headache cure was to slice some ginger really thin and stick them around the sides and front of the head and to leave it there for as long as the headache persisted.

And that also wasn't a really nice feeling cos the blooming ginger started to sting after awhile. But again, strangely enough, the headache went away after awhile. I think the sting from the ginger probably caused me to forget about the pain from the headache ... LOL! Sometimes I had to grapple with just trying to keep the darned ginger stuck to my head cos it'll just keep on falling off.

One of my grandma's worst remedies that I would be in fear of is when I suffered from a tummy ache and if going to the toilet didn't help clear it, then grandma would head into the kitchen (almost all remedies back then involved the kitchen) and take a piece of bread, toast it over an open flame till the bread turned really crisp black and then soak it in hot water and make me drink the blasted concoction!

Trust me, it looked and tasted and sometimes even smelt like I was drinking something straight out from the sewers! It was horrible and bitter and had this burnt wood kinda taste. I still can remember the awful taste till this very day! It was so horrible that I think whatever it was that was giving me a tummy ache in the first place probably upped and ran away ... hahaha!

There were a lot more remedies for a lot more ailments but I can't remember them these days. It's like a dying culture altogether. Maybe I should go and do some research along with wifey on this and compile a book of 'Ye Ole Grandmommy Remedies' or something ... LOL! I wonder if we can try some of these on the boys and see if it works. They might just report us to the authorities for prescribing medicine without a license ... LOL!

What about you guys? Care to share any of your grandmotherly remedies?
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