Takoyaki and Twinings: Balms for A Sick Day

I blame it on the weather. I’d like to confront Spring and tell her, You’re such a wuzz! What’s wrong with you! Why can’t you confront Winter and tell him ”Enoooouughhhh! You’ve had your time! It’s my dance now!”

Mid-march and it’s still freaking freezing in Seoul. And I know, I know, this is such a little inconvenience when you look at what’s happening on the other side of the Korean straits.

But indulge me as I took a sick leave today. Mainly because the past week I’ve had really terrible colds and have just recently gotten a full-blown case of pink-eye (i.e. sore eyes or conjunctivitis). Last night I felt the beginning of a fever and decided, hell, better be safe than sicker.

So here I am at home. Too tired and too snotty to do anything but stare at my monitor and drum my fingers on the keyboard. I needed something to balm me over my itchy, bloodshot eyes and over-worked nose so I went to my neighborhood Japanese fastfood to buy some comfort grub for lunch.

I love authentic Japanese-style Takoyaki. No ifs no buts. Just because it makes me happy to gobble up these brown balls of sweet-salty-seafood-y delights.

What’s not to like? Crispy outer crust, soft fluffy innards, a solid cube of tako (octopus) bit inside, some pickled ginger, a mysterious brown sweetish sauce offset by creamy mayonnaise. And those wispy bonito flakes and green specks of seaweeds topping the balls.

It is my absolute favorite snack in the world. And today is the most perfect time to eat something that makes me happy ☺

Because I need a lot of liquids to make up for all those liquidy stuffs running through my nose and to flush out the remaining bad guys that’s causing me to be sick, I’ve gone to taking Vitamin C drinks and getting a lot of liquids.

But we can only drink so much water, right? I turn to Twinings to make it far easier. You can say anything about Twinings (Overhyped! Too expensive for so-so teas), but I love their fruit infusion teas. These are basically not teas in that they don’t contain any tea leaves at all. The flavor of the teas are derived from the fruit leaves/peels/ dried flowers/dried fruits in the teas.

I brought a few boxes of Twinings from the Philippines because they are much cheaper there. Of the five variants I have: Raspberry & Echinacea / Strawberry & Mango/ Peach & Passion Fruit/ Blackcurrant Ginseng & Vanilla/ Lemon Twist, my favorite is the Blackcurrant Ginseng & Vanilla. It has a bold taste with a very gentle undertone of vanilla. I like the deep, spicy kick of this tea.

Takoyaki and a whole lot of Twinings. These are my balms for these sickly days. Oh that, and a serving of GLEE ;-)