First I bitch. Then something awesome happens.

Some people like to start out their new years with optimism and resolutions and positive vibes. Some people also like anus bleaching and eating mayo with a spoon, so really, there's no accounting for what *some people* like, but I know that if you are here you are not looking for shiny happy bullshit.

You're here for bitching.

Well, at least some of you are. Some of you are here to talk running, cooking, gardening, skiing, fishing or maybe even knitting (if you're still taking that header seriously, I thank you. My intentions are good, I swear.), but I'm choosing to start 2011 with a good old fashioned Finny rant and if you don't want ranting, just turn away quietly right now and run.

Because with the state of affairs in my house right now, I'd certainly like to.

Well, let me back up. It's not *that* bad. I mean, I did just have a luxuriously long break over the holidays during which time I, instead of working, went running in the mountains TWICE, to Bikram TWICE, hit the spa TWICE, wandered half-drunk through Santa Cruz, skied Tahoe with my beloved, cooked a million great things, snorkeled my way through a bottle of gin, toasted 10 New Year's Eves with Bubba, built and painted a beehive and about a hundred other things that I can't remember right now because my brain is too packed up with WHY IS EVERYTHING BREAKING?

Yes. The appliances in and around my house have decided that 2010 was a very long year indeed and Oh, we need a break.

To be specific, the fireplace is YET STILL not working despite numerous repairs and then the sudden realization on the part of the manufacturer that it, in fact, IS them and not me, the washer took a shit and decided not to drain water anymore, my car won't unlock and the microwave, which sees so little action to begin with that I'm sorta pissed it had the nerve to call in sick when it never has to do more than pop some popcorn once in a while, has turned into some sort of mini circus sideshow that has my mug of tea spinning at an angle on a broken turn-table like some kind of culinary tilt-o-whirl.

It's a pleasure to be in my house right now because hardly anything works. And anything that *does* work is fucking suspect because I'm sure that the moment I look too closely, some terrible fate will befall it and it will spontaneously stop heating, cooling, sucking, blowing, washing, displaying re-runs of Top Gear or beeping furiously at 6am.

For all this, you'd think I'd be hanging on by a thread. That I'd be *thisclose* to murdering anyone within a half mile from my swinging ax arm. That I'd be on Constant Shriek Mode and threatening anyone or thing that offered up the slightest resistance to my demands.

But no. I'm fairly calm and restrained. I haven't hit a single person with my car. There has been zero bloodshed. AND I'm not even drunk.

No, it's better. I haven't had a migraine in 5 weeks.

FOR REALS.

And you know what that means? That even with PMS (which is fading in and out at the moment), I am less aggravated than I would have been, say, two months ago, EVEN IF none of this rampant crashing and burning of all my home appliances and car weren't happening simultaneously as though to test my no-migraine-havingness.

Know what I did? In a last ditch effort to maybe rid myself of the evil brain-eating migraines? I started taking vitamins.

Yeah, I know. It sounds fruity. "Oh, look at the little hippie girl with her big handful of vitamins and minerals and Chaste Tree Berry extract. How cute."

But you know what? Fuck that, that's what. Because, when I started taking this armload of vitamins (and it's a lot of stuff) I was getting a migraine a week.

So, once a week, I would be snorting Imitrex and making deals with any deity to enter my pain-ridden consciousness that, if they'd take the pain away, I'd do whatever they wanted. I begged Bubba to get the power tools and drill into the base of my skull to release the evil spirits. I asked him super nicely if he'd squeeze my head in The Big Vice in the garage. I offered the dog extra delicious treats if she'd just drag me into traffic.

And then, eventually, all the drugs and begging and sleeping with a pillow wrapped around my head would work together in a magic combo of soothing to rid me of my head evils and the god damned migraine would go away. I'd see light again without wanting to hurl and I could function without squinting my eyes or clutching the base of my skull.

They were magical times, these. The skull clutching times.

And then I read a book about how vitamin and nutrient imbalances can bring on a variety of "mystery" ailments that doctors don't really know how to treat and how, by taking some supplements to...ahem...supplement those that are low in your body, you can probably deal with some of the symptoms of "mystery" ailments.

Yes. I know this sounds hokey and like I really fell for some stupid crap. Well, I'm here to tell you that, in my book, the "physicians" I see are full of some patently stupid crap, so I'm open to other suggestions. Also, none of their stupid crap has helped me be migraine-free for five whole weeks.

Nuh-uh.

FYI: Migraines are super mysterious according to every doctor I've talked to. They don't know what causes them. They don't know how to stop them. They don't know why they happen. And they barely know how to treat them. SUPER HELPFUL FUCK YOU.

So, I decided to give the crazy hippie Supplement Crazy doctor's suggestions a try, because, hey, all my doctors have been either useless or Crazy in one way or another with regard to migraines, and LO I haven't had a migraine in 5 weeks.

THAT, friends, is a record. One that hasn't been broken since I do not remember when. Maybe since I was in the single digits.

Also, I stopped eating fake sugar (corn syrup, you know - the evil HFCS) and Fake Sugar (Splenda or other derivatives), which also has helped, I'm pretty sure.

Everything else though? Same. Same diet (mostly, except all that crazy holiday food, which wasn't going to do my any favors anyway), same exercise (running, Pilates, Bikram), same cocktail times, same sleeping, same, same same.

And, by some miracle, I actually had champagne with oysters over my fabulous long holiday break and DID NOT, I repeat DID NOT, get even a twinge of a headache. And champagne is one of those things that ALWAYS gave me migraines before. Every. single. time. So sad. I love champagne.

And now, I can have it. Without fear. OK, without *as much* fear. Since I sort of went overboard on New Year's Eve and had, um, a lot of it, and then woke up with a headache, but it was a hangover headache that was cured with homemade waffles, a few Advil and then fries for lunch.

Fries are medicine and do not fight me on this.

So, yeah, this started out as a rant against all the shit in my house that's broken (though in some stage of being fixed - hooray for that) and turned into how the one thing that has been broken for a really long time - my walnut - is not. Or, at least, has *not* been for five blissfully pain free weeks.

Oh to not have The Excedrin Migraine Breakfast for more than a month.

Happy New Year to THAT.