The New Addition to the Homestead!!!!!

It's pretty awesome!

3 people showed up yesterday to help at the homestead.  I was expecting 1.  3 is more than one.

Thank you to Maia, Erika and Cass and the puppies!

This made me feel completely secure.  If I lost my job today (knock on wood that doesn't happen...I would still like a well...but I'm just saying) I have a really lovely place to live.  It doesn't rain much here in the summer so this should be peachy for months! Thank you thank you thank you!

I'd asked if someday Cass could come help me with turning pallets into an outhouse to shelter the composting toilet (see composting toilet post).   Cass had replied via other folks that he'd think about it.  I thought that was fair enough because it's alot to ask.

Apparently Sunday morning he thought "yep."   They showed up with supplies, food, water and tools and 2 vehicles.  I had already been at the land before I got the message and thought I was doing something entirely different so I had no water, snacks, supplies or tools...not even the toilet!
No problem.  They dug right in.   Cass suggested that rather than construct a pallet building to shield my naughty bits from the highway drivers who may gawk (is that a tennis ball in a flesh tone tube sock?  (swerve)), he looked at the giant spruce tree next to the trailer and asked if I'd be OK with putting it back in there.  I said "Sure."

So, he got loppers, a sawsall and organized the help.  Erika was on weedwhacking and the weeds (hay really and other plants) are fully whacked.  I have a little wee yard around the camper, a path around the tree to the otherside where the bathroom is, an area for firewood and a place to stack supplies (like the mismeasured wood I had cut the other day...different story...totally my fault).  Meanwhile Maia and I are assigned to move the branches and whatnot that Cass is taking out from under the lower bits of the tree.  So we do.

Not long after there is a really nice clear spot.  It's quite a bit larger than I envisioned.  As I said, I had not brought the toilet (and was having a special ladytime issue that required access to a sink and a flush toilet) so Maia and I ran up to Plummer to retrieve one turlet and use another one.  We get back to find that Erika and Cass had cleared out the side of the tree next to the trailer, leaving branches hanging nearly to the ground.  The tree is in a sort of bank about 3 feet high. The toilet is on the west/high side and the trailer is on the low, east side.  A giant root makes a natural bench in what is now the living room.  Cass was willing to open up the space even more but I  do like to have the drapes drawn so I asked to have the cutting stop and declared done for the day.  You can cut branches off later, but you can't really put them back on.

Amazing!

Here are a few photos.  I'm sure you'll all be jealous of my bathroom, with storage area (which is important when you need buckets of dry matter like sawdust or peat to keep the thing going).

The sun was a bit harsh, but that's the toilet under the tree and the grass is actually quite green.  A few pallets behind it for a feeling of privacy beyond the natural tree branch view blockage.

The living room!  Hard to tell, but that sideways root is really comfy.  The chairs are because company is coming next weekend so I wanted to have the place all tidy.  I'd just picked up the reed rug at a thrift store for 8$.  The chairs (there are 3 in view and another out of view) were a total of about 10$.  I already owned one chair.  Pardon the badly framed photo which includes the sheet covering what I hope will be an outdoor kitchen base...but my construction skills leave EVERYTHING to be desired so I covered up my shame.

I think that bookclub when they come on Saturday will be pretty impressed.  It's shady and cool under there with a nice breeze.  Sure the breeze is off the toilet but I'll use that judiciously before they get there.  Maybe throw in a tictac for good measure (kidding...it does not stink, it's just getting set up).  You can see a bit of the toilet privacy pallets on the side by the red chair.


And the piece de resistance.....(drum roll please)...the view from the throne:



























I expect to have important insights during my morning constitutional.

Cass Erika and Maia are AWESOME!  I wish I had useful skills to exchange with them.

Won't This Break the Space/Time Continuum?

So I was at a thrift store and saw this:

It was a different brand but you get the idea.   It's a microwave pressure cooker.   If the microwave isn't fast enough...add pressure!  Cripes.

I was wondering if that really was the draw....speed of cooking.   Yep.




They've taken the 2 fastest cookers and combined them!   Uh...what?  Why?

Of course, cooking food faster does not make for tastier food in general.  The exception may be deep frying.  You want that to happen fast.  You don't want a donut or french fry that's been slowly simmered in oil.   Otherwise, food is better when cooked slowly.   Roasted.  Braised.  Stewed.

Someday I'll tell you about the ex-beau who thought that pressure cooking a steak was a good idea.  Nothing like a tepid grey lump of meat.  Barf.

(by the way...this is apparently my 400th post!   Wow)

Farewell My Molars

So, on Monday I went to the oral surgeon.  After valiant attempts to save my 1st molar on the upper right (also known as tooth #3) ...  Failure. It had to be removed.  The upper jaw cat scan showed that it was massively infected (which I suspected for about a year but anyway, too late to worry about that now...it was also cracked and the cold/hot sensitivity was that as well...and the crown and yada yada yada).    This was figured out when it stopped hurting, but was a bit loose and had a gross puffy bit on the outer gum area.  I learned that this is an abscess.  Nice.  It only hurt bad once, when I was on a plane.  I went in and the dentist found it was cracked to the root and ended up crowning it.  It felt a lot better.  I have a super high pain tolerance or no pain sensation.  So, my expression of "it's not comfortable but not painful" did not raise a red flag to the dentist.
Fast forward to a couple of weeks ago with the abscess.  Clearly infected and no more sensation at all.  I thought this was like a zit coming to a head and thus the thing was cured.  Nope.  It was dead.  Nice.  I read up on it and that wasn't good.

So, I decide to go for an extraction and probably an eventual implant.  I meet with an oral surgeon.  He does a cat scan of the upper jaw.  This was to see if I could have an immediate implant.
Here's a copy of a panoramic xray (not quite the cat scan, but still cool)

You can't really see it in this, though you can in the 3-D cat scan, but there is a giant hole in the bone over the infected/dead tooth.  Nearly into the sinus cavity and nearly through the bone on the cheek side.  Next time I think "that's not quite right, though not really painful" I'm going to insist to the dentist that we be a bit more aggressive in the diagnosis and treatment.  I'm taking "pain" out of the list of symptoms for me (remember when I walked over a mile on a broken ankle?  Either I'm some sort of superwoman with giant pain tolerance, or everyone else is an extreme wiener).  (OR I just don't have the same pain sensation as other people.)

The two back uppers on the "R" side ended coming out. It was supposed to be just the one with the full crown (shows up as the biggest shiny white blob).   Turns out the one behind it had the roots in the same hole as the one that had to come out.  That back one was also the one that my idiot orthodontist (don't get me wrong, I needed the braces and appreciate the folks paying for them but that doesn't mean the orthodontist didn't f'up this one tooth) wrenched to the point where it jutted out sideways into my cheek.  I haven't been able to chew with it for 40 years.  AND it probably ruined my career as a supermodel since I could not suck my cheek in on that side.  (Well...that tooth and my fat ass ruined my modeling career.)

So, I agreed to have that one pulled too.  He said that with the lack of bones around the roots, the bone graft for the dead tooth area would not heal properly.  I'm thinking that I don't want to do this twice so with two people's fists in my mouth I said "uh huh" and out came the 2nd tooth.  The surgeon did write off the cost of the 2nd implant, though the 300$ for the extraction seemed a bit much.  It takes less than a minute to pull a tooth.  They are surprisingly easy to pull out.  Good to know.

Speaking of the teeth....they gave them to me!   Cool!   They even offered though I was going to insist.  Now if only Pam would agree to suck it up and string them on an earcuff for me.

He was pretty chagrined that I insisted on only local painkiller, no general, no gas, none of that "forget what's happening" crap.  Honestly.  It's just teeth.  I don't use any novocaine or painkiller of any kind for fillings, onlays, etc.  It just doesn't hurt.  He didn't like me being conscious for the procedure, but I preferred it.  Pretty interesting.

The teeth were easy to get out.  30 minutes though to scrape out the infection.  30 minutes or so of packing in equine bone graft (which is apparently bone dust), and 15 minutes of fighting to suture it up.   Then they covered the area with a plastic substance (I'm generally against plastic, but with a 1inch hole in my mouth filled with extremely expensive bone dust...I went for it).   I have a follow up next Friday to see how it's healing up.  It will be months before the bone is all set for an implant.  I have to see what's left on the insurance for this year and if they are going to cover anything.  I do still have a chewing surface on the other side of my mouth so this may all be considered "cosmetic."  We'll see.   I may have 50 years left to live and I would like to be able to eat.

I wonder if I can get one long implant or if I have to get two separate teeth done.  The oral surgeon hates when I ask questions so I'm sure the conversation will be pleasant.    I'm sure he'll be thrilled that I will still refuse anything but local pain killers for the implant.  But seriously, after those butchers I had when I was a kid...and the pain tolerance thing...it's just not a problem.  (Again...not criticizing the parents for dentist choices.  It was a different time and there you have it.)

My New Home and a Few Pictures of the Land

Yvonne (who is awesome) towed the camper down a few weeks ago.  All went well.  It is now parked on the land next to the big tree.  Yes, the tree might fall on it.  Don't care.  Shade is the priority...as was using the only flat spot around.

  

 

This is a view looking from one of the high points toward the east.  The camper wasn't there yet.  I was really digging the oxeye daisies that day.  you can see the highway. I own that far.

 

 This is a view of the pond looking from west to east...with the family of mergansers who were out and about one day.  Haven't seen them since.  I'm pretty sure they are slaughtering the frogs and tadpoles...but the frog/tadpole population was enormous so I think it will be OK.

 

That is all for now.  I was hoping to level the camper up and do some dirt moving this week but I had to have a couple of teeth out.  Apparently I could dislodge the 700$ bone graft or something if I lift heavy things.  So, next week.

Swimsuit for Every Body Type!

How much do I hate that headline?  Let me count the ways....infinity of ways.

I just ran into YET ANOTHER of these headlines.  I've been seeing them since I was 14 and got a subscription to Seventeen Magazine, which I wanted and LOVED at the time.  Of course it taught me that
1) My hair should look like Valerie Bertinelli's on "One Day at a Time"...long and poofy and shiny.  So I insisted on products.  My hair is now pretty much long and poofy and shiny...I don't use ANY hair products



2) Act stupid and look vapid so boys will like you ....  I never did even try that one. Well, I would TRY but I could only pull it off for maybe 30 seconds at a time before I thought something like "Why bother attracting that moron?"

(sorry Phoebe Cates...but you were the queen of the vapid looking Seventeen magazine models at that time)


3) Always choose a swimsuit based on hiding some body flaw.
           Big boobs?  Minimize them (uh...I always wondered, and still do, on what planet are BIG BOOBS a flaw?  I maximized them.)
            Broad shoulders?   Make them appear narrower (uh...I like my broad linebacker-esque shoulders...it was the 1980s people, we were wearing SHOULDER PADS in the shirt and the jacket which combined with my square linebacker-esque broad shoulders made me look like Joan Crawford at her peak of stylized fabulousness.


Now there are some awesomely BROAD shoulders...or is it an awesomely shouldered broad?  Both?
          
              Narrow shoulders?  You're not off the hook because that is bad too.   Find a suit that broadens them up.  Maybe with shoulder pads that act like water wings.

              Big butt?  Hide it under a skirt....  Kardashian anyone?  J-Lo?   People are now famous for having huge butts and the swimsuit advice articles still say "hide it.
              Small butt?  Also a problem.   I wonder if, like Mama Bear's porridge in the children's story, there is any butt that is "just right" for the swimsuit fashion police.

             Long legs?  Get something that chops you off awkwardly in mid thigh so they look shorter.
             Short legs?  Get something with a leg hole cut up to the waist.  I believe this is now known as the "Miley"

Maybe you could skip the vapid look...oh way, probably still in fashion.

           Fat thighs?  Back to the skirt
           Thin thighs?  Also not OK, despite our society's obsession with thin.  If you actually ARE thin, well then we call your muscled cut leg "masculine."

            Long waisted?  Chop your body up with color blocking so you look short waisted
            Short waisted?  Use a solid color or an extremely low bikini bottom to make yourself look long waisted.
Sometimes I wonder if I shouldn't just wear many suits.  One to maximize the boobs, which will then need minimizing by the next suit I layer on.  A third to narrow my "thick" waist followed by the fourth to "balance" my hourglass figure.  A fifth to minimize attention my "athletic" (read big and muscly) and overly long legs, followed by another to lengthen and beef up my now minimized legs. 


There are many more figure flaws diagnosed by the magazines but I think you get my point.
Let me present you with my current swimsuit which I believe complements every figure and can be worn by everyone, even dudes:




yeah, that's totally NOT me, but you get the idea.   Whatever shorts you have paired with whatever t-shirt you have.  Do not bring the little backpack into the pond with you.

Swimsuit articles are up there with spandex in my pants on my list of things that annoy the crap out of me.

Local / Organic Produce vs Bountiful Baskets

So, last Saturday was the first farmers market of the season here.  I was super excited.  Partly for the donuts from King Oliver's Donuts.  They are super fresh, delicious, and the young people who sell them are hilarious.  I'll be stuffing a donut in my face and the young man is telling me to enjoy it and have a good day.  Don't talk to me...I'm eating.

ALSO excited for fresh local produce!  Got some good deals and a few treats.  Then I supplemented with a few things from the Food Coop which is handily less than a block away. I tried to get roughly the same amount of fruit and veg as was in the Organic Bountiful Basket.  Partly because it was plenty but  wasted none, so not too much.  Partly to make for a decent comparison.  

So, here's what I got:

Farmers Market  (local and all "organic" even if not certified as such)

Greens                                7oz         $3.50

Kale                                    8oz         2.00

Spaghetti Squash               7lb 9oz    4.00  (that was just 2 squash!)

Potatoes                             2lb8oz      2.50

Garlic                                 7oz         1.00

Farmers Market Total:  11lb 7oz   $13.00   $1.14/lb

Co-op  (not local, but organic)

Carrots                 5lb                          4.99

Onion                   1lb 13oz                3.54

Tangerines          14oz                       1.28

Grapefruit           2lb8oz                   3.43

Co-op Total:       10lb 3oz                $13.24                   $1.30/lb

The overall TOTAL:  21lb1oz of fruit/veg for $26.24            $1.21/lb

That is pretty good!   I did learn from the Bountiful Baskets to get a better variety than I would have previously.  One disappointment with the Organic BB was the lack of aromatics (onions and garlic).  I eat those everyday so I had to go buy those in addition to the BB.  Since I can't get organic locally, that was a challenge.  I do have garlic powder and dried onion, but to make a decent soup or omelet or stirfry or etc I really need the fresh product.

The Organic BB cost me $1.76 per pound (assuming no "first basket fee")

The Conventional BB cost me $0.78 per pound

This cost me $1.21 per pound and allowed me to support local producers and a local business. 

Obviously it is appropriate to compare it to the Organic BB so it saved me $0.54/lb.  That's pretty good.    (It is $0.43/lb more than the conventional BB.)  

So far the quality of everything has been amazingly good.  Comparable to the quality of the food in the Organic BB.  Granted there are no strawberries or asparagus, but those aren't ready locally yet so there you are.  I still have some strawberry shrub that I made last year and I put that in some gelatin.  Not as good as fresh strawberries but oh well.  Sometimes I also have it in some stevia-based ginger ale or water.  It's still delicious and since it's made with my own home-brewed honey vinegar (from local honey), it's full of probiotics.

Anyway, I guess the upshot is: I can indeed do better with the local/organic when the farmers market is going.   It may not be possible to do better, or get local, in the middle of winter so I may still do the occasional Organic BB in the winter months.

Additional savings:  Since I have not needed to go to the store for onions/garlic, I have not had the opportunity to impulse shop. 

One challenge I'm having is that I'm out of my freezer stash of meat.  I got lovely local eggs at the farmers market (jumbo size...truly huge) so I'm not lacking protein, but I suspect I'll be tempted to have more lunches out just to get a burger or BLT or something.   I also like some decent meat in my soups.  I got a bit of chicken at the co-op, but it's already gone.  Tried to make bone broth with the bones...but it tastes like crap so won't be eating that.  I wanted to buy some local meat from the vendors, but 6-12$/lb for ground or other low rent cuts is just too damn much for my blood.  Nothing but the chicken was on a decent sale at the co-op.  Oh well.  I have plenty of nuts, beans, lentils, seeds and eggs that I'm not lacking protein, it's just that the soups are not as delicious as with a nice bit of beef or pork or chicken.

Second Bountiful Basket Assessment

So, I tried the conventional basket on April 19 from Bountiful Baskets.

Below is the breakdown and my evaluation.

　

Here's how the cost breaks down:

Basic Basket: 15$

Fuel Surcharge: 4$

TOTAL: $19

Here's what I got for that 19$. I haven't been to a store to compare prices. I know half of the selections aren't available at my local store and I just haven't needed a grocery store so haven't been to one. We'll just work with the average cost for now and the latest grocery store flyer.

Scotch Kale 1lb 2oz

7 Large Bananas (VERY green) 3lb 1oz

1 Small Seedless Watermelon 3lb 5oz

3 Roma Tomatoes 12oz

3 d'Anjou Pears 1lb 6oz

6 Seckel Pears (tiny) 1lb 4oz

3 Ambrosia Apples 1lb 8oz

2 cucumbers 1lb 12oz

Rainbow Carrots, no tops 1lb 13oz

2 Lemons, large 1lb 2 oz

1 Spaghetti Squash 4lb 5oz

4 Ears Sweet Corn 3lb 1oz

Total weight: 24lb 7oz

My cost per pound: $ 0.78

That's an excellent average cost especially given the treats like early season sweet corn, excellent apples, and rainbow carrots.

The quality of the corn, apples, carrots and lemons has been excellent. The kale is also very very good, and it is storing well in a plastic bag in the fridge. I ate the sweet corn immediately. It doesn't store that well, and it's delicious fresh so that went first. The apples went pretty quickly since they were at their peak upon arrival. The cucumbers were put in some refrigerator pickle-juice (left over from a previous batch of refrigerator pickles) and I still have a pint jar waiting to be eaten. 1 lemon went into my first attempt at a lemon meringue pie (the result was a visual and textural disaster, but delicious).

Of course I ate the watermelon pretty quickly as well. I diced it up right away and was happy that the skin was so thin, since that means more of the poundage is actual immediate food. I ate some and put the rest in jars for breakfasts and lunches.

I haven't eaten the tomatoes yet. They will go into a mixed veg sauce thing over the spaghetti squash today. So, I also haven't tried the squash. The pears I have eaten, the d'Anjou and half of the seckels, have been disappointing. Virtually flavorless. I sliced a seckel up and cooked it in a bit of butter as the base of a pancake for breakfast and that was better, but anything fried in butter is better.

The bananas are just now getting ripe. That is nice to continue to have something fresh a week after getting it in the house. They will be going into bread or perhaps some into dried banana chips since I loathe bananas in their original form. I'll try to get them all processed or in the freezer today.

I still have one bunch of kale to eat. Some of that will go in the mix over the squash.

So, overall, based on the sale flyers from the local small town grocery store here in Plummer, I think I could have matched or done better per pound if I bought the lower cost vegies in the store, but NOT if I matched item for item from the basket. I did truly enjoy the excellent sweet corn and apples. The pears have been a disappointment. The lemons would have been costly so I would not have gotten any.

Was it frugal? I think so. If I stuck with this I would be getting enough fruit and veg for 2 weeks at a time, with only one trip to get them. No multiple trips to the store with the tendency to impulse buy. And the treats of items I would not have bought are appreciated and enjoyed.

Was it the most frugal? No. Ripe bananas at the local market end up in the "overripe" basket for $ 0.25/lb and are just fine for bread/muffins which is all I do with them. I can get cabbage for $ 0.49/lb right now and several fruit items for under $1/lb. If I based the diet on potatoes ($ 0.20/lb), cabbage, ripe bananas and the other low cost fruit and veg, I could come in at a lower price, but I would not have the variety and deliciousness, yet I'd still be healthy.

And, it wasn't organic. I normally wouldn't buy some of these items unless they were organic. I follow the "Clean 15" and "Dirty Dozen" guides from the __________________. The item in this basket on the most current "Clean 15" list, and hence I would buy if the price was right: Sweet Corn. The "Dirty Dozen" list includes Apples, Cucumber, and Kale. The other items are on neither list...you're on your own with those choices.

None of the fruit or veg in the basket was labeled "organic." A few had those 4-digit codes that began with the number "4" and I've heard that that could mean they are organic, but wouldn't the sticker say "organic" if it was? I'll try to look into that. If it turns out some items were organic, that would increase the value of the basket to me.

Compared to the organic basket: I paid $10 less (ignoring the first time basket fee which will never be charged again), and got 7lb 15oz more food. That's a lot of food. Most of it very good quality (just those pesky disappointing pears marring the impression).

With both baskets I've found that my food waste approaches zero. This adds to the frugality and general value of the baskets. When I'm buying at the store, I tend to end up with some going bad. The variety of items in type, and "treat" value, and ripeness tends to naturally spread consumption out and I have had the whole basket at once, come home and sorted and packaged for storage or processed/ate immediately so I had a picture and inventory of the lot in my head from the start. Each time I think about what to make for the day, I am automatically working in what I have on hand and what I can do with it. This is parallel to the system that I've been using with my monthly boxes of canned goods and in fact I've been working the canned goods into the bountiful basket system too. I've rehydrated tomatoes to have with the kale and other vegies in a lentil soup. I've kept the canned applesauce back until I ran out of fresh fruit from the previous basket, and now will work in some dried apples as I run out of fresh apples/pears from this basket. The dried onion is going in to today's veggie mix over the squash.

That element is very frugal and probably generally healthy. It makes me think I may get one basket a month, perhaps organic or try a few more of each over the coming year. I may also try some of the add-on options that look thrifty or perhaps I could split them with people. For example on the 19th, there was an "Easter" add-on that had cookies, veggies for naturally dying eggs, and some other fancy items. I would not need that. BUT the box of mangoes for under $1/lb was very tempting. The issue was that I can't personally get through 15 or 20lbs of mangoes before they go off. I have a freezer right now so I could have stored them, but I don't need them. If I had 4 people to split it with, then maybe. The half gallon of coconut oil was a great deal. I just didn't need any right now. There are always bread options, but I don't eat enough and would rather make my own or buy from a local baker for the little I do eat. For a family that ate a great deal of bread, it might be a deal. There are often additional baskets like a Mexican option or Italian style option that come with a variety of veggies for making foods from those regions. To get an add-on, or a bread, you have to get a basic conventional or organic basket....by then I've got enough veggies. Again, if I could split the haul with someone it would be fine, but just for me, not so much.

I guess the conclusion of the moment is that I will maintain my membership and order as I need and care to. I think it is "worth it" to me even if it isn't the most frugal option for every item.