Lozenges are basically just sugar, and their effect is limited. If you must go that route, try to find some Dutch licorice.

But the real solution is raw ginger. It sounds gross, but a slice of raw ginger between your teeth and gums will keep your throat nicely lubed for hours. The best part is, for some reason (lack of contact with the tongue?) the sharp taste of ginger is deliciously absent throughout.

I learned this from a busker who sang a capella on the Victoria waterfront, sometimes for an hour at a stretch. I've since had many a professional singer tell me that it is indeed a widely-known practise among those in the vocal arts.

I use it all the time now for teaching (even though I'm trying to bring down my TTT!)

This may be in the category of "home remedies," but I have had great results from using honey and lemon when my voice began to give out. I also have had postive feedback from non-professional singers who used this prior to a performance and their voices were starting to give out.

I've only recommended this for people who's voice had already started to give out. Ginger is a much better preventative measure and also good for you if you eat it raw.

what about that sliced, pickled (?) ginger that comes with sushi. I never eat mine. It tastes a bit like soap.

Pickled ginger is what got me hooked on raw ginger. My Mom is Japanese so I pretty much grew up around the stuff. It is usually served to offset the fish breath that comes from eating sushi. I am not sure if it would work the same way as raw ginger, but it is typically not as hot/spicy (depends on how you perceive this flavor) as raw ginger. Ginger is also used to help prevent motion sickness (Mythbusters did a segment on this item) and has been an ancient remedy for a number of stomach ailments including heartburn, diarhea, and nausea.

As I (am going to) mention below, I did the homeschool convention circuit for more than a decade while working for a curriculum publisher, and at first it really surprised me how many people didn't necessarily agree with "books = awesome."

Well, that's not entirely true. But to have people say that "Little House on the Prairie" was not a good story because sometimes Laura was disobedient . . . or that fiction in general is bad because it's not true . . . or that C.S. Lewis's Narnia books are leading kids to worship Satan . . . well, really, you run into all kinds. (Oh, I got stories!!)

Introducing families-in-law has got to be one of the best ways to expand the geek population

Narnia = satan worship? Man, that is a messed up conclusion given that its message is exactly the opposite


(annoying "it's" versus "its" fixed)

I know. But some people are messed up.

The lion wasn't satan? The 7 kids weren't doomed to for eternity in the last book?

Boy, did I ever get the wrong message.

Man Drew, you and I should have a sit-down one of these days. As a homeschooled child, I was agog at how many completely unexpected and rather interesting opinions people had. It took me until about junior high to realize that the level of conviction that some people had was no different than those with children in public school, it just often was in the opposite direction of the prevailing weirdness.

I think homeschoolers (typically more Christian group) tend to err by picking out potential evils in everything (kind of like the crazy lady in A Series of Unfortunate Events). I think the only thing I haven't personally seen is an accusation that the Bible is from satan (and I'm sure that's happened, I just wasn't there).

Since both my parents are high school teachers (and I attended public high school and university), I couldn't help but notice the stark contrast. While it could be said that a common homeschooler's error is thinking that satan twists every thing to make it unavoidably worse (and must therefore not do that thing... kinda paralyzing), my observed common public school error is that there is good in pretty much everything, you just have to get through the junk to see it. This leads to a much more "open-minded" view of what would otherwise be (and often legally is) deemed a misdeed.

Every time I see "homeschoolers" used as a derrogatory term to describe a group of people, I can't help but think about the start of the movie "Mean Girls" (yes, the one with Lindsay Lohan). "And on the 8th day God invented the Remington Bolt-Action Rifle: to protect us from the dinosuars... and the ho-mo-sexuals. Amen"

Of course, "Mean Girls" also taught us that homeschooled girls are HOT! So do with it what you will.

While the "C.S. Lewis is leading children to hell" and "All fiction is evil" conversations were certainly eye-opening, I remember fielding a phone call from a customer who wanted to know whether our curriculum had any pictures in it. I was assuming that the parent was concerned that it would be just gobs and gobs of text. However, the caller informed me that she took seriously the commandment not to make any graven images, and if there were any pictures in the workbooks (including on the cover), she would have to rip them out.

Just when you think you've heard it all, along comes someone to surprise you even further. Infinite diversity an' all that.