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  1. fruit

    Thanks to all those who enrolled onto our mailing list and took advantage of the free Graze box.  Not only are you able to get your hands on healthy snacks delivered to your door but you ahve also helped us to donate to charity.  For each person who enrols we get £1 to donate.  We recently paid another £10 in so well done everyone.  If you haven;t yet enrolled just sign up to our on line mailing list and you will get the offer automatically.  The choices seem to be getting so vast that there is definately soemthing for everyone.

  2. tea pot

    All tea comes from the same plant, Camellia sinensis. It is  the way the plucked leaves are processed, that changes its character, chemical composition and appearance.

     

    White tea, the youngest leaves

    White tea is thought by many to be one of the highest prized teas you can drink. Always handpicked, a high quality white tea is given such care ensuring the natural withering process and gentle drying are the only process the leaves are exposed to. Just as in green, black and oolong tea, white tea is from the plant Camellia sinensis. New growth buds and young leaves are plucked before they are fully open and it is the silver hairs on the new buds that give the young leaves a white appearance. The removal of any real processing is believed to yield the high antioxidant health benefits associated with white tea identified in recent studies.

    Green tea

    Green tea is one of the least processed teas. As a result, it retains high levels of antioxidants (polyphenols), often referred to as ECGC or catechins, and it is their abundance that provides us with some specific green tea health benefits reported in many of the leading health journals - one of the more topical ones is of course green tea's ability to boost the metabolism and burn fat. Many regions produce green tea, however the more well known are from China and Japan.

    Pouchong

    Pouchong is classed as between Oolong tea and Green tea. It has a more mellow taste than Oolong tea yet stronger than Green tea. Pouchong tea is considered to be a special taste by tea experts all over the world. Pouchong tea is only slightly oxidised, between 8 and 10 % and the process involves solar withering, indoor withering, panning, rolling and then drying for the finished tea.

    Oolong tea

    Oolongs as a group, are classed as 'semi-oxidised' which means the leaves have been left to wither, a process which produces a chemical change in the leaf, oxidation. The physical change visible is the leaves begin to curl and the edges begin to turn a coppery colour. To produce Oolong tea, this process is stopped before fully completed and thus the leaves are 'semi -oxidised'. The variety within oolong tea is largely due to the point in the process the oxidisation is stopped, and that is where the skill of the tea master comes into play to ensure the quality and consistency required for each tea.Oolong tea', 'wulong tea', 'wuyi tea', 'wu yi' tea - what's the difference? These are simply names for the same thing: oolong tea. The different names originate from the different areas they are produced

    Black tea

    The reason black tea is different is because the plucked leaves are 'fully oxidised'. There are many variations of methods and processes used by tea producing regions, hence the wonderful variety of colour and flavour.

  3. blood clot

    I URGE you ALL TO READ & SHARE THIS; YOU COULD SAVE A LOVED ONES LIFE BY KNOWING THIS SIMPLE INFORMATION!!!

    Stroke has a new indicator! They say if you forward this to ten people, you stand a chance of saving one life. Will you send this along? Blood Clots/Stroke - They Now Have a Fourth Indicator, the Tongue:

    During a BBQ, a woman stumbled and took a little fall - she assured everyone that she was fine (they offered to call paramedics) ...she said she had just tripped over a brick because of her new shoes.

    They got her cleaned up and got her a new plate of food. While she appeared a bit shaken up, Jane went about enjoying herself the rest of the evening.

    Jane's husband called later telling everyone that his wife had been taken to the hospital - (at 6:00 PM Jane passed away.) She had suffered a stroke at the BBQ. Had they known how to identify the signs of a stroke, perhaps Jane would be with us today. Some don't die. They end up in a helpless, hopeless condition instead.

    It only takes a minute to read this.

    A neurologist says that if he can get to a stroke victim within 3 hours he can totally reverse the effects of a stroke...totally. He said the trick was getting a stroke recognized, diagnosed, and then getting the patient medically cared for within 3 hours, which is tough.

    RECOGNIZING A STROKE

    Thank God for the sense to remember the '3' steps, STR. Read and

    Learn!

    Sometimes symptoms of a stroke are difficult to identify. Unfortunately, the lack of awareness spells disaster. The stroke victim may suffer severe brain damage when people nearby fail to recognize the symptoms of a stroke.

    Now doctors say a bystander can recognize a stroke by asking three simple questions:

    S *Ask the individual to SMILE.

    T *Ask the person to TALK and SPEAK A

    SIMPLE SENTENCE (Coherently)
    (i.e. Chicken Soup)

    R *Ask him or her to RAISE BOTH ARMS.

    If he or she has trouble with ANY ONE of these tasks, call emergency number immediately and describe the symptoms to the dispatcher.

    New Sign of a Stroke -------- Stick out Your Tongue

    NOTE: Another 'sign' of a stroke is this: Ask the person to 'stick' out his tongue. If the tongue is

    'crooked', if it goes to one side or the other that is also an indication of a stroke.

    A cardiologist says if everyone who gets this e-mail sends it to 10 people; you can bet that at least one life will be saved.

    I have done my part. Will you?

    Blood Clots Cause Strokes: What Are The Symptoms Of A Stroke
    http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Kuv6eCxFfNg

    Blood Clots http://patientassistanceprogramsofame
    If You Have Symptoms Of A Stroke, Blood Clots Can Kill You If Don't Act Fast.

  4. 1537h0008

    Would your desires, when pushed to the limits, make you grab the nearest screw driver and start plunging?

    How far away from madness are you when you have a yearning desire for something - as most of us do?  You might already be saying 'ridiculous' because you might not recognise that you do have a strong desire.  Often these desires are so embedded that they become a part of how you see yourself.

    It may not be a material desire, it could be a state.  Some times just need a strong belief  and a desire for others to also believe or at least conform to your belief is enough.

    Let me explain, maybe you have an overly strong yearning for world peace; or maybe you have a yearning for world dominance, possibly because you think your belief system is the one and only or maybe its a strong belief that you deserve to have as much material wealth as the next man.

    Maybe you believe in monogamy and expect your partner to conform or maybe you don't and again expect your partner to accept that.

    So desire is more than a shooping list for the big FC in December, it is very fundamental to how we see ourselves and how we feel  that we fit in with the society that we 'belong to.;.

    How far into madness would you be driven if, for instance, your partner was betraying you and not even attempting to hide it or trying to restrict the  behaviour that you thought was acceptable.  Of course, you are going to say that you don't have to go mad to deal with these things - divorce in this example is the most obvious ... but  - what about children you might have together, what about the insecurity of being alone or the finacial burden you wouldn't want to experience, or even the shame!  Are you getting a little more mad now?

    What if you had a strong belief in some religious figure head, what if you were constantly being told that opposition to that belief was going to wipe out the choice and overule your beliefs.  If you were constantly being goaded how mad would you be.

    What about if you believed that the world was meant to be equal and the odd burgalary here and there was a right thing to do - equalising the inbalance,. But what if you were caught facing a potential jail sentence.  How close to madness would that panic take you.  We all know that Robin hood who robbed the rich to pay the poor was a hero to the underclasses and a hunted menace to the ruling ones.

    If you do have a yearning for world peace and you see that being threatened - how mad would that make you.

    If you believe in animal rights and feel the gross injustice of experiments on animals and the justifications offered - does that make you mad? You are in complete opposition  - how does that bring you closer to madness.  How far would you go to stop it.

    Maybe you believe society owes you and so you have not been declaring your income.

    All of the above examples have happened. Apparently sane people have murdered, mass murdered, maimed and sabotaged for any of the above reasons.  Whether or not they have been recognised with 'madness' they have originally been pushed into that state by their desires.

    Maybe it's just too much of a cliche to say 'Careful what you wish for.' but if it makes you think  about how close the line  to madness that you mustn't cross is ..... maybe it is worth saying.

     

    Andrea Lowe

    Hypnotherapist

  5. What would our life be like if we didn't have any filters through which to see it?

    world in hands

    An immediate response might be great, liberating, wonderful, I want some of that!!

    However, the filters through which we see life are similar to sieves that filter out unwanted dregs.  If we didn't have filters the whole of our mind would be full of contrasting and opposing experiences in the form of sights, sounds, feelings.  We may be in somewhat of a mess.

    Filters are useful and neccessary in small doses.  We learn lessons from unsatisfactory experiences and put filters in place to screen out further receptiveness to similar experiences.  We also learn to put filters in place from a very young age and so to a great extent where we are 'cultivated' has a big influence on the filters we establish.  Now some of these filters can be quite restrictive to our free thinking, setting us into very rigid ways of thinking.  These are the filters that would benefit from being loosened a little.

    This will be the topic of our Supper talk Mental Rhubarb.  if you would like to chat over a meal then book on now.