Tofu Or Toilet Paper?

Toilet paper or tofu? You can't have both.

I see a time in the Mad Max future where people will be selling toilet paper rations so they can buy tofu.

Of course others will be selling tofu rations so they can buy toilet paper.

Instead of waiting for Food Passports and ration cards to be added to the growing list of requirements for daily living, we can choose to take measures to increase the resilience of local food supplies.

We can grow a garden, and support local food producers.

Our garden was finished last weekend, after preparations and early plantings over the past 3 weeks. 

Since planting it has had to endure a windy, cool days. We have had a frost warning, but it did not materialize where we are.

Last fall we transplanted rhubarb from a friend's garden, and it is getting nicely established in its new location in our yard. The same person gave us a chestnut tree which I planted on the side of our house. 

I am also nurturing a struggling raspberry patch out back that got overrun with field grasses and plants.

Along our road we can buy eggs, honey, maple syrup, apples, strawberries, blueberries, a variety of garden vegetables, and pumpkins from neighbours. 

Since we live just outside a fishing village, we can buy seafood directly from boats down on the dock. 

If a global food crisis is successfully launched by the powers that shouldn't be, we wouldn't starve. Right away. 

However, we would have to radically change what and how we eat.

Often we take the way things are now for granted. We don't know what we've got till it's gone.

Don't wait until having to choose between using limited tofu OR toilet paper rations. If we wait until the stores have bare shelves, it will be too late to do much about it.

To avoid the discomfort and danger of being starved by the NWOs Not So Great Reset, we need to plan an alternative, local, and resilient food system. And fast.

Our governments are perpetrating these crises, so we can't depend on them riding to our rescue.

What's your plan? 

And, tofu or toilet paper?

 

Out Of Jam Jitters

This week we ran out of homemade jam. Gasp! But only for a few hours.

We have been making jam for a decade or more, since enjoying the abundance of giant Himalayan Blackberries on the west coast. 

There was a time we went a year without jam, and if you had to reduce your food bill or calories, it would be  a good candidate for elimination from the diet.

Ultimately, we went back on the jam. And have been on it since.

Lovely, lovely jam. Get-you-out-of-bed-in-the-morning jam. An effective anti-depressant in troubled times. It's one of the "little things".

After moving from the west to the east coast in 2014 we switched from blackberries to strawberries and blueberries for jam making.

And last year we didn't make quite enough jammy goodness to get us to this year's strawberry harvest, which will begin in the next few days, weather permitting.

What to do? Hint: it is not "go without".

Rather than buy jam from the store, Linda wanted to see what we could do at home with what we already have. 

Challenge accepted.

In our recent food club order we received a bag of organic dried apricots. Can one make jam from dried fruit? Indeed one can.

We found a recipe online and in about 45 minutes we had about 750 ml of a very nice apricot jam to get us through till we can make strawberry jam in a couple of weeks. 

We kept a jar out, and put three more in the freezer.

So, technically we were out of jam, but due to Linda's ingenuity, it was only for a short while. 

After spreading some of that dark and subtle sweetness on homemade graham wafers and savouring our new creation, the jitters subsided.

I guess we're jamaholics. 

Quick And Easy Dried Apricot Jam

Ingredients

• 12 oz dried apricots
• water
• 1/8 tsp. salt
• ½ cup packed brown sugar can sub white

Instructions

• With a kitchen scissors, cut two apricots in half at a time. Cut the halves into three pieces each so each apricot is cut into six pieces each. (Can be cut smaller if you prefer smaller chunks in your jam.)
• Place the chopped apricots into a 4 cup measuring cup. Add water to the 4 cup line.
• Dump all that into a medium sized sauce pan over medium heat. Add the salt and simmer for about 30 minutes until the apricots are tender and the jam coats a spoon. Stir in the brown sugar.
• Decant into ½ pint jars and refrigerate for several weeks or freeze for six months. Note, this jam does not have enough sugar to be considered safe for pressure or water bath canning.

Source: https://www.mirlandraskitchen.com/dried-apricot-jam/

Build Back Amish

They're saying they want to Build Back Better, but physics will ensure it won't go according to their self-serving plotting and planning. 

Because of little things like resource depletion and immutable natural laws, BBB will turn out to be more like BBA. 

That is, Build Back Amish.

Take this man's BBA experience that was shared on a small cabin website. 

"I had an Amish man build my 14 X 24 cabin. It is an amazing quality build, and very affordable.

The craftsman that made it had his own sawmill and supplied all the wood.

 

He only used hand tools, and brought the materials to my site in a horse drawn wagon. 

The cabin has a metal roof, durable flooring, non-vinyl windows, and two metal doors.

There is no electric on site."

 

Building Back Amish really would be building back better.

Smaller, less energy intensive, built to last, accessible for more people, and affordable.

Can BBB offer that? 

The minute the power goes out (and eventually the power will go out), the technocratic dream of the BBB NWO will fizzle rather than sizzle.

Meanwhile, that Amish guy keeps on building as if nothing happened.

Choices?

I can buy a thousand different tooth brushes, but I can only vote for two main federal political parties. 

What kind of choice is that? 

What if neither choice is attractive? Then what?

Left or Right?

Neither.

Green consumerism or ordinary consumerism?

Neither.

Internal combustion or electric car?

Neither.

Work for this boss or work for that boss?

Neither.

By framing our choices they limit our choices and our freedom to live more richly and intentionally.

They go as far as to tell us there are no other choices, that what what we see now is somehow inevitable and unchangeable.

Have we forgotten that there are other choices available to us rather than the strictly limited officially sanctioned ones?

The West or The East?

Neither.

Capitalism or communism?

Neither.

City or suburbs?

Neither.

White meat or red meat?

Neither.

Beer or spirits?

Neither.

Old World Order or New World Order?

How about No World Order? Is that a choice, too, and if not, why not?

The choices they give us aren't choices. They are more like threats or demands to maintain our compliance.

Going strictly with the narrow narrative on anything restricts thinking, choices, and freedom.

Choose not to choose any of their limited choices. Make your own choice.

And in closing, do we really need thousands of different makes and models of tooth brushes? 

They have this choice thing backwards. 

Important stuff = very limited choices.

Unimportant stuff = dizzying array of choices.

Both situations are paralyzing. 

Perhaps that is the result they intend.

7 New Normal Job Opportunities

A Rag and Bone Man.

Some observers think the Western lifestyle is going medieval and soon. I am a little more optimistic, figuring that future lifestyles will regress, but not that far.

Although the western empire does seem to be on the edge of collapse, instead of conditions similar to the 5th to late 15th centuries, our new normal is likely to rhyme with the 17th century, with some lines from the 18th.

Whatever things turn out like, it sure won't be The Jetsons with flying car and robot servants. Nor is the billionaire colonization of space in their phallic rides likely to happen.

Rocket Limousine Space Driver may not be a lucrative career path. 

The following job opportunities might be more realistic.

1. Rag and Bone Person (Recycler)

2. Repair Person (of anything)

3. Farmer/Market gardener

4. Rickshaw Operator

5. Ice Cutter/Storage/Delivery Person

6. Rabbit Wrangler

7. Bicycle Mechanic

If I were a young person, rather than get a paper route, I would invest in a sturdy sack or push cart and start eyeing out potential routes through which one could call out to householders along the way,

"Rags, bones, metal! Rags, bones, metal!"

One could start a new ancient career that has not been seen in these parts since Victorian England.

I know of a local recent graduate that has been investing in farmland and equipment rather than try to fund a pricey higher education. 

Doesn't that sound like fun? 

The future won't necessarily be worse than today. Some of us will find that it is better.

What job opportunities would you recommend for a young person blazing a trail into the New Normal?

Less Toil - More Hiking

Henry David Thoreau was an avid practitioner of walking and hiking. I am, too.

Everybody needs to escape to places one can go to heal and gain strength in body, mind, and soul.

Thoreau said that "every walk is a sort of crusade, preached by some Peter the Hermit in us." 

Besides being a personal mini-crusade, a walk in nature is also a natural anti-depressant. 

The smell of mycobacterium vacii, a microoganism fond in soil, compost and leaf mold, lights up neurotransmitters that release serotonin, which is a mood-lifting brain hormone.

I have never felt part of society, but have always felt completely comfortable in the wilderness. Maybe that's why.

During a hike in the woods I am the trees, the water, and the rocks. I forget about everything else.

This is it. The landscape absorbs me, takes me in, and it's as comfy a home as one will ever get.

This is my element, my centre, my very being. 

I can live without a lot, but I can't live without this. 

It is the essence of my simple living project. 

Less time toiling for the odious machine, and more time walking and hiking in nature.

Less civilization, less society, less cultural programming, and more wild spaces. 

There are no billboards here, no signposts, no sidewalks, no noise.

I can't remember any time that I didn't feel like escaping the hubbub of modern industrialized life. 

If our system is so great, why do so many want to get away from it all? "Escape" is an entire lucrative consumer category these days.

For me there is nothing better than regular periods of silence and solitude in nature. 

I highly recommend it. It cures all that ails us, and currently, there is an awful lot that ails us.

Listen to your inner hermit, plan your own crusade, and get out there today in the name of health and healing.