Friday, May 3, 2013

Lemons are Medicine for Sore Throat

I think that lemons have immense medicinal value, in part for their vitamin C potency, but also due to their acidity and perhaps some as yet unexplained qualities. For a sore throat, I like nothing better than fresh-squeezed lemon juice, drunk straight without sugar or water, and swallowed directing the flow over the sorest part of the throat. I think lemon juice is hostile to germs and at any rate the acid should work to dissolve bacterial film. Limes may work in a similar way, but lemons I think are to be preferred, as they contain more vitamin C and greater acidity. For variety, I also like black tea with lemon juice added, because together they seem to have a certain medicinal synergy and should be quite antiseptic, tea having antiseptic properties of its own as well as acidic tanins. With any medicinal preparation, it is important not to add any sugar, because sugar reduces acidity, feeds bacteria, and causes inflammation, but I seldom add sugar to tea anyway.

Scott mentioned in the comments section below that lime juice can be used as a deodorant. At first I was skeptical, but Google finds support for this belief. According to Simply Lovely, lime juice proved an effective deodorant for a runner. It is worth noting, however, that the sweat generated by nervous stress has an altogether different quality about it and produces a more offensive odor than the sweat produced by athletic activity.

For my part, I'm not motivated to switch from the traditional roll-ons, because my skin tolerates Speed Stick Antiperspirant by Mennen, which is cheap and also extremely effective. Typically, I buy 20 coupons on Ebay and then buy 20 units at the local grocery store when they are on sale, thus reducing the price to peanuts. I can get a 76g container for $1.50 apiece or less.

5 comments:

Scott said...

Igor,
For a natural deodorant, try cutting a lime in half and rubbing the juice under your underarms. It takes about 3 days for your PH to adjust and then you will not stink anymore.

Scott

igor said...

ha ha ha well I don't know about that.

igor said...

On the other hand, the idea may bear further consideration, according to another source: http://simplelifesimplylovely.blogspot.com/2011/12/9-lime-juice-as-deodorant.html

Scott said...

Igor,
I actually make a natural deodorant that I sell using corn starch (to stay dry) and other ingredients. But I'm allergic to cornstarch. So I use a lime every morning and it works. Once traveling in Guatemala this guy told me that I stunk and recommended using a lime for deodorant. I meet lots of people in South America that use limes for deodorant. Doing research on deodorant you will find the typical store bought brands are dangerous for you health. Well take it easy. Downloading Puppy linux to play around with right now.

Scott

igor said...

Interesting. I'll keep limes in mind for the future.

Puppy Linux sounds interesting, especially for an older computer. In theory, one would not any kind of hard drive to use the distro long-term. I bet it would be perfectly okay with a very little flash drive, maybe 1 gb or even less.

techlorebyigor is my personal journal for ideas & opinions