I had cause for panic this morning.

I had a bad night’s sleep. I couldn’t sleep until about 3-4am, and I woke up at 6am itching all over. First I cursed the mosquitoes. My sister constantly gets attacked by mosquitoes in her room at night, and complains about it frequently. I thought the mosquitoes attacked me this time, until I switched on the light and took a good look at my rashes. They weren’t mosquito bites. They were hives!!

I’ve had hives before, about 3 years back, so I knew very well what they looked like. They look identical to mosquito bites actually, except that there are way too many of them, some forming a huge “island”. The first time I had them, I thought they were really insect bites, and suffered for a few days before someone told me they were allergies. I was trying multigrain bread, and I suppose I was allergic to one or more of the grains in the bread. Back then, I couldn’t find anything that worked. I went to the doctor who gave me antihistamines and steroid cream, which didn’t work. I went to a pharmacist who gave me another type of antihistamine and calamine lotion, which didn’t work (the calamine lotion soothed the itches though). A nurse friend gave me another antihistamine. Nope. Nothing helped.

Finally a friend who is in an MLM company which sells exclusively health drinks and products gave me a vitamin drink which was expensive, but very very good. And finally, my hives started to go down. I had to suffer with hives for 3-4 weeks, and still had to go to work. I remember that I was emceeing a sports event for school, and I just stayed behind the mike in the shade. Poor me… in spite of my sickness, I still had to find the enthusiasm to create excitement for the sports events via the PA system.

Anyway this morning when I saw the hives on my legs and arms, the nightmare of my first hives came back to me. I did not want to suffer another 3-4 weeks, and I certainly cannot take an MC… not when I have no job! Well right now my income comes mainly from my classes, and if I don’t go for my classes, I don’t get paid!!

My mum was awake, so I rolled off the bed and went downstairs to ask if she had calamine lotion. Fortunately (for me, anyway) my mum is susceptible to allergies too, and she has her own regular antihistamine. She gave me one of her tablets, and a bottle of calamine lotion. I then rolled back into bed.

When I woke up about 9am later, THE HIVES WERE GONE!!! HALLELUJAH!!!

When I saw the hives this morning, actually the first thing I did was to send an SOS SMS to Bronya who I consult as my dietitian and nutritionist. She asked where my hives were, and concluded it was a digested allergy, i.e. hives triggered by something I ate, rather than something I wore and/or came into contact with. I’ve been racking my head for any foreign foods I’ve eaten in the past few days. The most unusual is a delicious tapioca cake my friend made, and I know I’m not allergic to tapioca so it made no sense. Other things were biscuits my sis and dad brought back from Penang, but they’re just regular biscuits. Unless some of them used grains or nuts that I was allergic to, they shouldn’t be my allergy trigger. My worry is that I have an allergy to another food item, and I honestly don’t know what it is!!

But anyway, I’m glad that my hives are gone!!!

OK, OK, here’s an update. I didn’t have much time to update my blog recently because I’m so busy with so many things – tuition, websites, etc. However I did manage to watch Hancock, only because I made it a point to. I caught the very last show at GSC today (it stops showing tomorrow) at One Utama, and I found out that there is free parking there on Wednesdays until 1st September 2008! If you already knew this, sorry lah. I haven’t seen the inside of a shopping mall for a very long time.

Well, the movie wasn’t too bad. Interesting twist. I think that Will Smith has become a very good, serious actor, but the problem with his movies of late is that they’re very self-indulgent. Take I Am Legend, for example. Everyone says it should have been named I Am Will Smith.

Next on my must-watch list:

TOTAL MUST-WATCH!!! I think Christian Bale is hot. Well, his body is, anyway. I’m choosing to ignore that alleged assault on his mother and sister because his muscles are just too good to pass up. Batman Begins was excellent, and I loved The Prestige (partly because of Hugh Jackman, too). I already missed Edward Norton’s Hulk (it ended right after I came back from NZ!!) so I’m not going to miss this superhero movie!

OKOK, the assault news was rather disturbing. I only hope it wasn’t true.

In other news, I sent my PC (the one with the constant sudden deaths) to the shop for fixing last Monday, but it’s been more than a week now. I’ve waited patiently because it was the PC fair last weekend and I knew that they would be busy… but it’s already Wednesday (well, Thursday now) and I still haven’t heard from them. Must remember to call them tomorrow to ask what was going on.

In more other news, I’m uploading the photos from Bronya’s party to Facebook. Sorry it took so long, my virtual in-tray was full to the max. It still is. But I’ve seen the photos, and they do look good, if I do say so myself. Maybe I should add photography to my list of “other hobbies to pursue”. But then I was using a DSLR camera (not mine, belongs to a friend). Still, not everyone who has a DSLR camera takes good shots (I have seen horrible looking things that have come from a wannabe photographer who honestly thought he was doing a great job). Will provide some links here when they’ve finally been uploaded. I have trouble using Facebook’s multiple uploader with my home Maxis connection. Curse you again, Maxis.

And… that’s it for now, I think. I really ought to be sleeping. I have a lot of work to do and so little time