Tereza Okava

haha. i have a fartbag dog and a coffee table made of acacia wood (which smells of pee).
If I feel the need, i put some essential oil in the warmer, but most of the time I just open up everything and let the breezes blow through the house. today, it's raining and i can't--- in these cases i usually just make a pot of coffee, which seems to work just fine!

John F Dean wrote:I have noticed that fatigue is becoming a big issue for me.  

Not to overstate the obvious, but you are a caregiver who (from what I can tell) have always had a Very Full Plate, and you are reaching a, erm, certain age.
also with your health background, you know the score in general.  still, if i may ask some very obvious but potentially finger-wagging questions....

if you're fatigued.....are you resting enough? Are you sure? can you incorporate more rest into your life somehow, if it's lacking?
Is there a chance, (and i say this with all respect and knowing what i have seen of you here, a man of great generosity and seemingly bounsldess responsibilities) that your fatigue may be related to emotions and/or depression?
Even if the answer is no, do you think there's a chance you could talk to someone about it? I know you have a loved one with medical issues, which is hard (having supported two family members during end of life, i know that "hard" is so amazingly inappropriate but damn if any word really suits it).
You know the drill about the oxygen mask and caring for others. It comes from somewhere-- from you. I'm always singing the same song lately, about self-care, but it's real. Nobody is coming to save me if I don't care for myself.

Additionally, considering sarcopenia and age, are you doing some sort of muscle building/maintaining exercise? (might help with the rest as well)

All asked with a lot of love and respect. I wished I lived closer and could help. I make a mean pie.

Timothy Norton wrote:I so want to be able to cook with a wok the way that it is 'meant' to be utilized.

I know this is not the question, but if you want to do wok cooking you need more firepower than the average US gas stove can give you.

A rocket stove, even a little dinky portable one (or a jerryrigged one made out of big tin cans, or bricks, or mud), however, CAN do that for you.
Just a thought. (nudge nudge)

edited to add:
(I do a lot of wok cooking so I bought a stove with a specific wok burner. I call it the "afterburner" because it's got 3 fire rings and HOLY CRAP it gets hot. An industrial kitchen burner might work as well. It is absolutely essential for the 'wok hei' taste you want, and there doesn't seem to be any real alternative.)

I have a lot of really weird and complicated dreams, it's rare for me to not remember my dreams, but I usually "let them go" when I wake up because it's just too much.

Two nights ago, though, i dreamt I was running an art class in a summer college program (which I have done in real life) but that Elon Musk and his little boy and a whole bunch of other tech magnates (who I couldn't identify, but I knew they were billionaire types) were all part of my group. In the program we all lived together in the dorms and had our classes all afternoon and then socialized in the off hours, and so we did that, but there was a 5 year old tagging along to the pub, etc. He was a very sweet 5 year old, but I had a very palpable feeling of unease throughout the dream about feeling insecure among all the fancy adults who ostensibly could have bad things done to me if I displeased them. We went to a dingy pub I used to sing at in college and I played the guitar and I remember thinking that I really missed being nobody, and that now after having been part of their group i would be on the public radar and have to deal with unwanted attention.

Sometimes I wish I had more normal dreams, even if they're all 'the plane leaves in half an hour and my passport is expired and i'm wearing my jammies' kind of things. i guess this is what i get from reading the news.

i think the context matters. some plants are "nitrogen hogs" and can work that out, but you can't put back soil that is lost to erosion.

how exciting about the chickens! it is mulberry season here too and we will be going out to collect this weekend (make jam and baked goods with the fruit). I know many people pen their chickens underneath the trees, they seem to love the fruit (as well as the insects it attracts).

I agree strongly! Pressure cookers are great tools, and I wouldn't cook without one, but you need to use them with care: check the valves, never force anything, and keep an eye on it. You can always turn it off if things get wild, and patience is a virtue.
Even though everyone here uses pressure cookers, most people have some story of someone they know who used a cooker with a jammed valve, overfilled the pot, or had a crappy gasket. Some people get really hurt.

Mart Hale wrote:fake rye bread  

an excellent solution!
I keep some around specifically to make "everything bagel" spice mix and also to throw in my onion egg rolls. it adds a very nice somethin-somethin.
Occasionally I'll put it in soda bread, I grew up eating sweet soda bread with raisins and caraway (which I only recently learned was Very Wrong, but it was what I was served and in my house you ate what you were given). I prefer my soda bread now without any of those components, but every once in a while it's nice to have a bit and think of my Gram.

when someone mentions they have acquired bizarre food (strawberry mayonnaise) by accident and are going to throw it away because they don't know what to do with it, and you firmly say STEP AWAY FROM THE TRASH CAN, GIVE IT TO ME!
And you know exactly what to do with it.

And you make everybody a chocolate strawberry mayonnaise cake, remembering an ancient chocolate cake recipe that used mayonnaise to make cake. And the cake is phenomenal, and everyone is demolishing it as we speak.
Waste not, want not!! nom nom nom

Josh Hoffman wrote:it is consumerism causing the issues, not population growth.

I agree with you 100%.
I don't want to get into Cider Press issues related to the developing world (where we've mentioned above that the issues of overpopulation hit hard-- along with other issues like economic instability, disease, lack of infrastructure, etc)-- but the lifestyle in Europe and North America is always presented as the "goal" we should be aiming towards, and the standard for consumption. And in many cases, it is totally beyond comprehension. It's hard to express the difference in lifestyle between first and third world countries, and I live in an area that is probably considered very rich, relatively.
For example, when I try to explain the US concept of a hot water heater, people literally laugh. How amazingly wasteful is it to have a barrel containing gallons of hot water that are kept boiling at all times, especially if you only have two people in a house who only shower once a day? This extends to so much of what Americans would understand as convenience.
Still, it's hard to compare apples and oranges, as here often convenience is substituted for cheap labor (you don't need a dryer if over 50% of households have domestic staff or a stay-at-home member who have time to hang laundry, for example).

But I do believe that consumption is the problem. Just now, in the last few years since the economy has been getting sketchy in the US, have I seen articles and stories about how to fix things yourself, how to save energy and save money, as a more widespread phenomenon for people who may not have grown up pinching pennies. (Those of us who grew up like that have a leg up!)

Back to real solutions, as Jay mentioned.
Japan has seen some really strong efforts towards zero-waste, repairs and reuse of waste. NHK has an interesting video series highlighting some examples. https://www3.nhk.or.jp/nhkworld/en/shows/zerowaste/ (some odder than others!)
And many places have libraries for tools and equipment one might not use every day; my mother's library in PA has baking pans and garden tools, for example.
I think the answer has to be community, as Josh says.
How interesting that while people are concerned with the world becoming increasingly splintered and balkanized, the solution lies in community- for sharing resources, for raising children, for creating meaningful work.