My Weblog

Tonight is going a little better..........

The last couple of days, I've needed 2 halves of a pain pill to cope with work and the pain. Today, I took 1 half and tonight it doesn't feel bad at all. I can move again with only an occasional twinge. Phew!

I stopped at the pharmacy to pick up a prescription on the way home. This is another of their screw ups, as far as I'm concerned. I received NO phone call that a refill was ready. I know this because the number they have to call is my cell which, of course, tracks incoming calls. Yesterday I called to request a refill and was told they had one ready for me to pick up on 4/26. Gee, it would have been nice if they'd called me. I inquired about that today and they had no explanation............. The good part was that I think I got a lower rate on this medication.

I've done some outside watering. I've done file purging and paper shredding and just took a run on the kitchen. At least all the dishes are cleaned up and I've tried to clean the stove and counter tops. I think there is some cooked on baked beans on the stovetop. I scrubbed at it but I wouldn't call myself successful.

I mentioned a few days ago that I'd ordered some silicone cutting boards. They came in a pack of 2. Each one is maybe the thickness of 4 sheets of copy paper so they lie pretty much flush on the counter top. I had cutting boards--2 of them--one plastic and one wood. But they are much bigger, thicker, clumsier, and heavier. When all you want to do is cut some string cheese into bite sized pieces, it doesn't seem to be worth the effort to drag them out but the alternative has been to cut on the counter top, not a wise move. But, these, well these have made my life better. I'm really pleased I got them.

I had a snotty customer today. If I had to guess, I'd say her listening skills were severely lacking. For example, she was muttering when she came up to the register about how she had to ask 4 people where to go to find butane. Well, that's easy. It's in tools just beyond Register 4. Apparently she couldn't get it straight in her mind that Register 4 was not aisle 4......... Anyway, she tried to run her debit card using the chip. That doesn't work in our store. You can only use the chip if you want to process as a credit. All I knew was that whatever she did didn't go through (I was bagging her order while she was doing whatever she did). I informed her it didn't go through and she looked at me as though I was lying to her. She said she put her card in just like she was supposed to........... "Well, that didn't work" I said. "Were you trying to do a debit or a credit?" She just looked at me and mumbled something incomprehensible. I asked her again. Her response: "Well, you don't have to look at me as though I'm stupid. You people should tell people these things. People in this store are SO RUDE! I'm not coming here again." And, of course, it's printed on white tape, in big black letters, stuck to the card reader "Slide for debit".....................  As she left, I thanked her for her business and mentioned that she received a $7 discount on her purchase. She just stomped off. I wonder, which of us was rude?

I saw "the blessed one" today. He has the nerve, after making a mess of my week off WITHOUT PAY, to act like everything is fine. I cannot help but wonder if the man ever learned the word "apology". I can't help it. I'm spitting mad. I am really afraid to talk to him again for fear I'll blow my stack.

Speaking of my week off, I think I've got this taking Friday off thing figured out. I think I will call out. I think I can say "I have a personal problem that has to be attended to today" and not be lying. Does that sound okay? Let me know in the comments. My "personal problem" is that I am just darned angry and not willing to be screwed out of a day off without pay! It really does have to be attended to on Friday or I will be even madder and more stressed out. It's bad enough to have to fight for paid vacation, but THIS is ridiculous. If it's a personal problem, no one should ask me what the problem is, right? And if someone is so uncouth that they do ask, I can honesty answer that I don't want to discuss it because it's personal.

Well, next up on my to do list is to get roomie going. There's a good layer of dog hair for her to work on. I hope you had a blessed day............

 

 

I thought I'd get a lot done tonight....

but here it is, just 9PM and a wave of exhaustion has wiped me out. I may end up heading to bed soon.

I have gotten a few things done. I lugged in a 3 gallon water bottle. I watered the hedges out front. I worked a little bit on decluttering the master bathroom cabinet. I wiped down the counters and swished the toilets in both baths. And I got a load of laundry washed and up on the drying rack.

This crazy back/front thing is ongoing. It's less painful than it was, most of the time, but every now and then it stabs me. I consulted Dr. Google and concluded it must be the Septus muscle, both the anterior and posterior. I managed to keep the pain in check most of the day with 2 doses of half a pain pill. I was blessed to spend the first half of my day in Lumber where I got to sit down part of the time.

When I went to Trader Joe's the other day, I managed to avoid all the frozen entrees but one. I really enjoy their chicken pot pies and I figured a girl has to have some fun. So, that was dinner tonight.

I still have not figured out this week. I went in and personally discussed with "the blessed one" my need for some time off. He promised me a week, from 5/5-5/11. I followed that discussion the next day with the digital request thing I'm supposed to do, primarily so he wouldn't forget. The next time I looked at my schedule, he had given me the 5th through the 9th off, but had me scheduled for both the 10th and the 11th. On advice from one of the head cashiers, I requested the 4th off instead of the 10th and the 11th. Well, no response has been made to that request other than to give me the 10th off. So, I'm still short one day on what was promised. I've actually tried 3 different times to get the time off in an honest, adult manner. And I am still scheduled to work both the 4th and the 11th. I went back to the head cashier and asked what I should do now. The advice I got was to just call and say I was sick on the 4th. That would actually give me May 2-May 10 off, even better than what "the blessed one" had promised (I'd already been scheduled to have the 2nd and 3rd off). However, I don't want to lie. So what can I say that isn't a lie but will get me the 4th off? I haven't been able to figure that one out. I've thought about saying I am taking the 4th off in lieu of the 11th because "the blessed one" hasn't responded so I assume he has agreed. Well, I don't really assume he's agreed. I really doubt he gets the concept. So, what DO I say? I don't know but I need something to say by Friday morning if I'm staying home. Unless, of course, the Lord wants to allow me to feel really ill for about 4 hours on Friday morning, in which case I could call and say I'm not coming in because I'm sick in good conscience.  But, of course, I'd want a really quick recovery..............

Anyway, I think I am going to take my meds and head down the hall.

 

Finally figured it out...........

This pain across the upper portion of my back.........I think I have finally solved the riddle. I was standing in the kitchen this morning when I felt it come on--a muscle spasm. And, darn, it's a really good one. I've had worse, but this is pretty bad. The good news is that now that I know what it is, I know what to do about it! And, it's this bad and I've only been vertical for less than 3 hours. I predict a lot of lying down time. And to think I thought going to bed early last night would be good enough to keep me out of bed today. Well, you can only do what you can do, right?

Much later: I've spent a lot of time in bed today. I'm still hurting. I've had 2 SOMA throughout the day. Surely one more will be enough to break this thing, right?

I have accomplished little today. I hate lost days. I have done just enough in the kitchen to keep up. I've hung a few pieces of laundry to dry. That's it. I just can't risk pushing it because I'm supposed to go back to work tomorrow.

I'm wondering. If you subscribe to conservative news sites or Christian groups on Facebook, are you noticing them disappearing from your feeds? I was thinking about it a couple of nights ago and thought of just two groups I NEVER see updates from these days. I just checked Lance Wallnau. Guess what? He hasn't stopped posting on Facebook. I just don't see his posts anymore. And I was watching everything from him that appeared. What happened? I also follow Benjamin Netanyahu on Facebook and suddenly I see NOTHING from him. I have believed that Trump is God's man for THIS time in America. I have the same belief about Netanyahu in Israel and I believe the Bible is true: if we bless Israel, we will be blessed. So, I am interested in what he is doing. But, now I have to go look for him. Yet, I know he posts every day..................My point: start looking for what you are NOT seeing in your Facebook feed............

Dinner tonight was very simple, but at least i cooked. I diced up some potatoes, threw a little butter in a skillet, threw in my potatoes, some garlic powder and some rosemary. Maybe I'll smell like garlic in the morning but at least I will have had something good to eat.

Well, that's it. It's far too late to go on. I may have had a lot of sleep today, but I still have to be "fresh" tomorrow. God bless you all. I love you.

 

 

Doing better.............

Well, I went to work and I stayed the whole shift. I have to preface that by saying I took a WHOLE pain pill before I left home. I was somewhat out of it but I managed to function decently. Last night I took a SOMA as planned. What I was trying to figure out was whether or not the pain was muscular. I know that the pain in my back was significantly lessened by this morning. But it did kind of wrap around to the front and that wasn't a good thing.

I still have one area almost on the edge of my body that hurts. I do not know what this was. Here's an anomaly I can't explain: I had the hiccups off and on all day. Did that have anything to do with anything? Who knows..........It's a really rare thing--I can't even remember the last time I had hiccups............

It took me a good long time to get home from work today. I stopped first at the bank because today was payday. Then I stopped at Starbucks. I generally only go there once every two weeks, on payday. It's kind of my celebration of getting a paycheck. Then I stopped and filled up 3 3-gallon water bottles. And, I decided I had to stop being a weanie and only putting 2 gallons in them. So, I brought home an additional 9 gallons of water. Yay, me!

Believe it or not, I had that one pain pill at 8AM. I am still groggy from it. I've decided to stop fighting it and just go lie down. But, first the results of my latest canning session. You already know that I canned 8 pints of ground beef. But, I had 3 pints left over. So, I decided to can those up and also some baked beans. Of course, the first jar I checked was the one with the Tattler (reusable) lid and it sealed just fine. I'm thrilled with that. As a matter of fact, everything sealed. So, over my "weekend" I canned up 11 pints of ground beef and 5 pints of baked beans. I feel so accomplished. I love having food preserved for use sometime in the future.

Now I will go lie down..........

Confusing...............

If you are confused, it's okay. It makes perfect sense to be confused. I wrote a final blog post yesterday and forgot to publish it. I just now hit "publish". So, if you're confused, blame me.

Just read an interesting article on perchlorate in our water. It is my firm conviction that perchlorate is what pushed my thyroid over the edge. Within 1 year of moving to Nevada, I moved to the Henderson area. I remained there for about 10 years. The first 8 years I lived a couple of miles from a rocket fuel plant that was known to have had a BIG spill somewhere around the WWII era. It was definitely in the water and I was drinking water from the tap. In 1988, I moved a few miles further away, but I was still on Henderson city water. I have no doubt that my water was still just as contaminated there as it had been before. It's not like the city could separate out water from the closest areas from those further away.......

Anyway, this was an article talking about the dangers of perchlorate in relation to the thyroid and it's not good y'all. There are no national standards for water regarding perchlorate contamination. The FDA does have a "recommendation" but it is about 240 times higher than that recommended by the authors of a recent CDC study! One of the facts I found interesting: they sampled milk from 32 dairies in CA; every one of them showed high levels of perchlorate in the milk.............Contaminated food for the cows, contaminated grass where the cows graze, etc. Also many more states are effected than just NV and CA. I had no idea!

I am still hurting across my back. I tried the CBD oil twice today and it did not do the trick. So, finally, I took a tramadol. I normally limit myself to 1/2 of those pills. I reserve them for when I'm at work and I don't want to get loopy while I'm trying to serve customers. But, tonight, I gave up and took a whole one. So, right now, I don't feel too bad. I think next I will try a muscle relaxer and see what, if any, effect that has on it. Just trying to narrow down the source of this...........

I left work about 45 minutes early today. I went straight to my doctor's office. I tried to see a doctor (I already was 99% sure it wouldn't work, but I had to try). The upshot of that, in our modern post-Obamacare medical system is that I can see the doctor on May 30. Somehow, I don't hold a lot of hope for that being helpful for this pain I am experiencing right now! If it gets worse, I will undoubtedly have to go either to Urgent Care or the Emergency Room. I can't go on like this for too long.

I am still pretty well convinced this has nothing to do with pneumonia. I don't have a temperature. I am not having any difficulty breathing. i am not having elevated pain levels when I take a deep breath. And, I am not coughing like a maniac. So, what this is, I don't know..............

After I left the doctor's office, I went to Trader Joe's. I forgot how much it costs to "start up" morning smoothies. I've really been foraging in the fridge for things to throw into a smoothie. I knew I could make it through tomorrow, but after tomorrow I have one day off and I go back to work. So, what happens on Sunday? Well, I had to buy more fruit and veggies. From here on, I'll have one or two days worth of this and one or two days worth of that so I won't be starting from scratch. It WILL mean more trips to the store, most likely.

I've hauled trash to the curb. Honestly, I never brought the bin back in from Tuesday's abortive effort. But, I've made multiple trips out with more. I wish I felt better. I'd love to be rid of some of the styrofoam scraps in the garage. I'm picking them up, a few at a time and filling up the big shipping boxes the styrofoam came in. I'll celebrate when I've stuffed one or both big boxes as full as I can and hauled them out of the garage.

I still have 5 panels to go out there. But 11 are done so I've made progress. When the insulation is done, I want to try weather stripping around the garage door and along the bottom. My goal is to cool that garage down. I have an OLD freezer out there which works hard to keep my food frozen. I am hoping to draw less electricity if I can reduce the heat level out there.

I found a 3 qt Instant Pot on sale at Amazon. It is supposed to be good for 1-2 people. Well that would certainly suit me. It's significantly less pricey than the bigger models. I don't know, however, that I'd be thrilled to have to use it for small quantities, say if I wanted to make chicken broth to can. So, til I think that through, I'm not going to push the button. I suppose, logically, that I've made chicken broth to can without an Instant Pot til now and I could certainly continue to do so, right?

I'm considering buying a Berkey water filter. After mucho research, I've concluded a travel Berkey will best suit my needs. The most attractive feature about the Berkey is that it filters fluoride out of the water (95%). Lord knows this body doesn't need any more fluoride being pumped into it. And, yes, indeed, the tap water DOES contain fluoride. I researched that too. I have tried to research whether or not there is fluoride in the water I've been buying, but I can't find anything. I also cannot find anything as to whether there is fluoride in the big 3 gallon bottles of water I was buying at the store. These days, it's a controversial subject, and I'm guessing that someone in marketing decided it was best not to mention it in their published materials. I do use the purchased water to drink and to make coffee. And, it certainly DOES taste better than the tap water. But, I'd hate to think that while I'm trying to hydrate to help make myself more healthy, I am simultaneously poisoning myself and exacerbating the problems I already have. According to research fluoride accumulates in the body and no one knows for sure how to rid the body of it! It looks for an investment of less than $300, I could supply myself with much healthier water for about 6 years. That's not a bad investment, methinks.

Well, that's it for tonight. I still have a good bit of work to do around here before I can hit the sack. I hope you had a BLESSED day!

Just finishing up............

It's been all about the kitchen this afternoon and evening. I had difficulty opening that can of beans. I'm really not sure why, but my new can opener had trouble with it. This is not the first time I've opened a #10 can with this opener, but it did not go as well this time as previously. Once I did finally pry the lid open a little, I spilled the "juice" that was in the can. All over the stove top, all down the front of the stove and oven, and on the floor. It was a dandy mess to clean up! For my taste, the beans tasted pretty good right out of the can which surprised me. Nevertheless, I set about adding a bit more to it, partly because I'd spilled so  much of the liquid. I added some ketchup, some dehydrated onions, about 5 pieces of bacon sliced up, and some water. I let all that cook for a while, meanwhile pulling the refrigerated jars of ground beef out to warm up. I let the beans simmer quite a while. I don't think the jars of ground beef ever really got "warm".

I was afraid of cracking jars so I put the ground beef into cold water and just slowly started warming it. Meanwhile, I started filling jars with beans. I didn't put lids on them right away. The jars were quite warm and I was afraid to close up the jars and put them into the not-very-warm water in the canner. Once I got all the jars filled, I went back and cleaned all the rims, added lids and rings, and put them into the canner. By that time, the jars had cooled some and the water in the canner had warmed some so no jars cracked. Whoopee!

I used one reusable (Tattler) lid on one jar of beans. I'll be interested to see if it seals properly. I knew exactly what my mistakes were from my test run a while back, so I tried to correct for those. These reusable lids are a little tricky in that they require slightly different techniques than regular lids. So, I'm still learning. We shall see.......... I am told that once you get the hang of using them, it's all good though, so it's worth a little trial and error along the way, I suppose. In case you didn't know, the regular metal lids are supposed to be used only once and then either used on things that won't ever see the canner (like jars of dehydrated veggies) or thrown away. Well, they're not cheap and it's hard to throw them away. The Tattler lids are even more expensive but can be reused over and over and over again. I'd rather spend my money buying an asset (something that will serve me now and in the future) rather than paying an expense (something that only serves me now).

Once I finally got everything in the canner, the rest of the evening was spent running back and forth from the desk to the canner, checking to make sure pressure was being maintained. After all the canning jobs I've run in that canner, on that burner, I pretty well know the "sweet spot". Every stove and every canner have a setting which when working together will just do the job they're supposed to do and one doesn't need to worry too much.

I also made tomorrow's smoothie. A client gave me some very nice organic pears so tomorrow's smoothie will feature those. I threw in some blueberries for anti-oxidants as well as come carrot. There's banana in there for potassium, flaked coconut for fiber, oatmeal for carbs and protein, and spinach. Should be plenty good for me. Looking forward to it tomorrow morning.

My back is still hurting just as it was earlier, though not as bad. I did lie down for a while this afternoon and got some good sleep. I think I'll try some gentle stretches before I give up for the night. And that's the story of my God-be-praised-not-very-exciting day. It was my "day of rest". Oh, by the way, all my jars from last night's canning of ground beef sealed up. So, I have 8 more jars of ground beef on the shelf. I hope you had a blessed day. Tomorrow it's back to the daily grind for me, but only 2 days, then a day off.

Sleeping late.........

As you know by now, when the 1st day of my "weekend" comes around, I tend to sleep a lot. It's as though my body is trying hard to repair what's gone on inside of it during the work period. I tried yesterday, but I just couldn't settle down. Actually, I tried to get a nap twice yesterday. Both times I failed. I headed to bed around 11PM and didn't wake up til 9:30 this morning. Do you think 10.5 hours of sleep is enough? I sure hope so.

This morning my back muscles are sore. Maybe they'll feel better when I start to move around more..........

I still have phone calls I want to make today. My car insurance went up more than $10 a month on a car that's another year older. That makes no sense to me. I need to call and ask why..........

I need to call the mortgage company and ask about a refund on an escrow overage..........

I still need to go somewhere for milk and fruits and veg. Got the new Sprouts sale ad and I don't see much on there I "need" other than large navels 2/$1. But Sprouts is an easy stop after work. When they ran this special last year, they had the navel oranges that were on special in bins right by the front doors. IF I can talk myself into the madness that is their parking lot, maybe I can just run in after work, grab an armload of oranges and run back out????? But, in the meantime, I think I'll try to motivate myself to go to Trader Joe's. That way, I can just stop at the doctor's office on the way there.............

I need to can up the extra 3 jars of ground beef. For now, the unsealed jars are resting in the fridge. I'll bring them out and get them up to room temperature before I start working with them. I do not want to use all that gas (and a/c to cool the house) for 3 jars so I think I'm going to can some baked beans. They'll have to go a little longer in the canner than normal and that may turn them to baked bean mush, but they should still taste good. And, they're free. Actually, there was a #10 can of beans left over from the last big feed at work. No one else wanted it, so I brought it home. I'll doctor it up with some molasses and other add-ins and then throw 5 jars in the canner. My alternative would be to just can some plain ole dry beans, but I'd rather have the baked beans..........I've never had a canning load that was too big for one layer in my canner. The canner is capable of canning two layers of jars at a time, but I need another canning rack for that which I don't have..........Maybe I'd better see about getting one of those.

What a revolting development: My back is really hurting. Not in the usual place. Hurts up somewhere around the bottom of my right lung. I don't think it's a lung issue though because it doesn't hurt more when I breathe deeply. I think, however, that I will be stopping at 3 panels of insulation for this "weekend". The bending over to cut the pieces is prohibitive, even after ibuprofen........I did one panel this morning and declared that done. I did stop, however, to clean up some of the stray bits of styrofoam. Turns out those big boxes are great receptacles for the cleanup mess.

So, I guess it's time to open that big can of beans and see what I can do with them.............

 

How hot is it?

We were supposed to be up somewhere around 90 degrees today. According to the weather service, it's 82 degrees outside now. I don't know how hot it is in the garage, but it's darned hot! I just did 2 panels on that garage door and it was so hot that while I was bent over trying to cut the styrofoam to size, I was dripping sweat onto it from my hair, my forehead, my nose and I don't know where else. Holy toledo! I can promise you, I will be wearing some sort of a sweat band tomorrow or a bandana or something!

I'm sure if I could open the garage door a bit, it would help to cool things off. But, I'm a white haired lady, here alone. I don't think I want that garage door hanging open at night.

I would like to get out there EARLY tomorrow morning when it's daylight outside, but still hasn't heated up to the expected high of 93. Then I could indeed open the door up some and work in cooler conditions.

I have now done 10 of 16 panels. The hardest thing tonight was manhandling the insulation out of the boxes. It was a huge box inside a slightly huger box. These boxes are at least 5 feet high and slightly more than 2 feet across. My garage is full of boxes now as well as all the trimmings from 10 large pieces of styrofoam cut down to size. I come in from there and I look like I've been in a snow storm, covered with little tiny white flakes of styrofoam. I have plans to buy a small wet/dry vacuum next week as I am told that is absolutely the ONLY way to get all the little tiny bits of styrofoam up.

I have a new puzzle--what the heck is going on with the garbage collection service. I had all my trash at the curb by 8:30. And it's still there. My neighbors, however, seem to have empty trash cans. I can only conclude that they came early today. BUT, Friday is their crack of dawn day, not Tuesday. What in the world are they up to now? I dunno.......... One thing I DO know--when they get here Friday, they're going to have quite the surprise--two BIG boxes filled with bits and pieces of styrofoam!

Here's another puzzle, though a good one. A pint is supposed to hold 1 pound of meat. I defrosted 10 pounds of ground beef. I packed the jars really tight. However, I have 11 full jars and a bit left over. The leftover amount is probably not much more than half a cup. I figure Parker is gonna get a treat.......... But, how did I end up with 11 jars after rendering juice and fat out of 10 pounds of ground beef?

Okay. I need to turn a couple of fans on and see if I can move the air around some and maybe evaporate some of this sweat.................

 

Sometimes it's good to be me..........

Continuing to cook up ground beef 2 pounds at a time interspersed with other chores. I have to say: this is 80/20 hamburger. I am pretty amazed at how little fat there is. I decided to try dumping out the fat/juice and saving it. I figured I could chill the jar for a little while, get rid of the fat, and have just a little juice to add to my canning jars. I'm moving the beef from the skillet to a big bowl with a slotted spoon, so it's pretty well drained. (There will likely be a fat cap in the jars when the canning is done, but not much.) Anyway, I've now cooked 6 pounds of ground beef. I've been pouring the juices and fat into a quart jar. I think there's still just a little over an inch of fat in a 1 qt. canning jar.

I decided I was hungry. I looked in the fridge but didn't find anything that appealed to me. So, I went digging in the freezer. And, oh boy, I found some Dijon Chicken! Oh, mercy, that stuff is good. I ate the chicken and then went to the kitchen for a piece of bread to soak up the sauce. Yum! If you go to Noreen's Kitchen.com, you'll find the recipe there (just use the index) that I used to make this stuff. I figure that with more than 158,000 subscribers on her youtube channel, maybe she knows a thing or two about cooking. I'd much rather risk making something new using one of her recipes than the recipes of some newbie blogger. I've tried some newbie blogger recipes and I have NOT been impressed.

A Rich Existence...........

I haven't gotten too far yet this morning. I have par-cooked about 2 pounds of ground beef and I've opened up a new box of jars and gotten all the lids, rings, and jars into the dishwasher. Since this beef will be pressure canned, I don't really have to worry too much about "germs". The pressure canner will have a sustained temperature of about 240 degrees and that will kill anything up to and including botulism. I am not fully cooking the ground beef. Rather, I am cooking it just enough to render off the fat, til it's no longer pink. It will be fully cooked in the pressure canner. When I open a jar, I can add a little olive oil to a pan and brown it a bit if I think I need to do that.

The trash is out at the curb. I also took a bag of shredding out there. The bag contained parts of a CD I put through the shredder so by the curb is where that belongs. Mostly, I won't be throwing my shredding away. When you do a compost, you want a mix of "greens" and "browns". "Greens" are things like fresh veggie and fruit kitchen scraps, grass clippings, etc. "Browns" are dead things--leaves, hair, even paper. Maybe I should feed my compost bin some Parker hair, LOL. Lord knows there's enough of that around here. It is actually nitrogen-rich and plants certainly need nitrogen. Some plants pull nitrogen from the soil so replacing it is important. Many gardeners grow beans to increase nitrogen, but I don't happen to be a big fan of beans. It doesn't make a lot of sense to spend time and money growing something I don't like..........But, I AM rich in dog hair, LOL.

What a shame I can't use dog "manure" for a garden. I also have a lot of that. It CAN be used, but only if it's composted for 2-3 years in a "hot" compost pile. Otherwise you risk introducing ringworms into your compost pile and your garden. And, I am certainly no expert on how to get a compost pile "hot". It's actually unlikely that I can gather enough "greens" to make a compost pile "hot" so that's another limiting factor.

Still watching these "Great American Farm Tour" videos and really enjoying them. What a rich life these people are living. Many of them don't live in fancy houses. They're not "rich" in that way. Rather, the parents spend many many hours with their children. It seems there is a strong bond that develops from that. The children seem to pick up the work habits of the parents. Given what trouble I had getting my own kid to help out around the house, I am constantly amazed to see these kids out working on the farm and apparently doing it voluntarily and getting a real sense of accomplishment from it. Some of the kids are motivated just because they are doing what Mom or Dad do. Others receive profit from their labor. For example, I saw a 10-year old "in charge" of the family's goats and she gets whatever money is made from selling off a kid or goats' milk. But, the trick is she also seems to have developed a love for those goats..........

It's also fun to watch the children just running and playing and exploring the green fields. The Rhodes family, the family on the tour, is learning about all sorts of things from "experts"--those who are doing it successfully. They've toured a micro-brewery where all the ingredients are manufactured/grown on the farm. They've watched a spring box being installed to capture fresh spring water for watering crops and for drinking. They've toured farms with permaculture "swales" (kind of like man made ditches to hold rain water) and contouring. They've seen the use of chickens to till, weed, and fertilize the land. They've helped plant strawberry plants. They've eaten fruit picked from the trees and put right into their hands. I call that "a rich existence". What a vast wealth of knowledge these kids will have by the time they're 18.

Beyond all that, the family has been sure to hit various historical/touristy sites along the way. They've climbed the highest mountain in Maine, toured historical places in Boston, toured colonial Williamsburg and the Plymouth Plantation and a retired aircraft carrier in South Carolina and much more. Is that likely to be a great education or what?

Anyway, time for me to go cook up another couple of pounds of ground beef. YOU have a BLESSED day!