Title: A Cousinly Cure (1/1)
Authors:  Cousin Shelley and Arletta Asbury
Faction: Cousins
Date: Saturday, July 7th, 2001
Time: Sometime in the Morning
Disclaimers:  All participants used with permission


Shelley sat in front of her laptop, lost in concentration.  "There's
got to be something on here *somewhere*," she muttered to herself.
Typing furiously for a few seconds, she then sat back and looked
at the screen in disgust.  "Arrrrrrrgggggggggggg" she said to it.

"What?" Arletta asked, walking into the room with a fresh mug of
extra-strong tea for each of them.  She set the mugs down next
to the empty cans of Mountain Dew <tm>, the soda with the highest
amount of caffeine they could find.  Both women were not morning
people, and trying to work this early required massive amounts
of caffeine...frequently.

"Arrrrrrrrgggggggggggg" Shelley repeated, then pointed to the laptop.

"No luck, then?"

Shelley mumbled something incoherent and went back to typing on the
small keyboard, once again oblivious to everything but the screen.

Arletta shrugged and headed for the exit.

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An hour later, Shelley stared at the screen on her laptop and let
a small smile creep across her face.  This looked interesting.
Clicking on yet another link off yet another website, the smile
grew wider.  "Arletta?" she said, looking around at the room for
the first time in far too long.  It was empty.  "Hmmmm, I wonder
when SHE left?"

Knocking on the adjoining door, Shelley called out to Arletta
again.  This time, a muffled "what" could be heard, followed by
the sound of the door in the other room opening.

"I think I found something!" Shelley said excitedly, pointing
to the screen.

The two of them went back over to the laptop and Arletta bent
closer to look, and saw what had made her companion so excited:

     ---------------------------------------------------------
     Do you or someone you love suffer from sudden, major,
     and complete personality shifts?

     Does it seem as if they suddenly become someone else??

     Do they believe they are someone else for a time???

     Are you searching in vain for a cure for this special
     someone????

     If so, then your search is over!!!  New research into
     nutrition and vitamins has turned up some exciting
     results in the field of personality shifting disorder
     (PSD).  Click HERE to find out more!
     ----------------------------------------------------------

"Wow!" said Arletta, "this sounds *exactly* like the problem!  Click
on the link and let's see what it says"

As the two women began to read, they got more and more excited by
the possibilities the website held.

"See here?" Arletta said, pointing to a line on the screen, "it says
it's a psychological disorder caused by a nutritional deficiency.
That deficiency causes the brain chemical 'endcromicrene' to build up."

"I wonder if vampires have endcromicrene though?" Shelley wondered
out loud.

"Look at this part here," Arletta replied, pointing to the screen.
"It says 'of all the animals on Earth, only two are known to have
endcromicrene.  Humans are the first, and vampires the second.
Since vampiric senses are quite heightened, it is believed that
they require more of this critical chemical, but an over abundance
of it can still cause harmful effects.  However, no case studies to
prove this have yet been conducted.'  I can't believe they
actually mentioned vampires!"

"Yes", replied Shelley, also reading, "and the over abundance
of endcromicrene causes sudden and severe personality shifts,
sometimes forcing the person to act like they are another person
entirely".

"Okay, but what deficiencies cause this problem?" Arletta asked.

"Uhhhhhhhh, oh wait, here it is......", Shelley said, "a deficiency
in Vitamin U causes the disorder".

"Vitamin U?  Never heard of it" Arletta exclaimed.

"Me either....it says over here that it's a rediscovered vitamin
vital in the regulation of brain chemistry.  Most of us obtain it
naturally through foods and never need to supplement it.  For
whatever reason, the PSD sufferer is not getting enough.  The
vitamin itself was popular back in the 1890's when people believed
it cured a multitude of ailments, and it was a main ingredient in
many tonics and elixirs.  Over time, it fell out of popular favor
as many things of this nature did."

"So what foods does it come in?"

"This doesn't say"

Both women groaned.  "We're so close to solving this!  And now,
a dead end" Shelley said dejectedly.

After a few minutes lost in thought, Arletta suddenly sat up
straighter and asked, "Wait, wasn't there a book on vitamins
in the Monastery's library?"

"Ummmmmm, there were books?" Shelley said, scratching her head.

"Yes, remember, when we sat in comfortable chairs and made
everyone else unpack all the furniture because we had bad backs?"
Both women snickered.

"Yes, now I remember....we found some big boxes of old books
and we did *help* put them on the library's shelves.  Are you sure
there was one on vitamins?"

"Yes, pretty sure.  I remember thinking it might have some
interesting information because it was so old."

"Well, what are we waiting for?  Let's go get it and look up
Vitamin U!"  Shelley said, picking up her car keys.

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