On Living in Los Angeles Without a Car: A Debate

May 21, 2013

...week for a lunch date. She lives about 15 miles away. We left our house at 10 and came back at 5. We had a good long visit with her and about four hours of transit time total. Good thing we’re self-employed. So yes, the only way to get around with any speed or dignity is to use a bike in conjunction with the trains or buses. My problem is that I’m frightened of riding in LA. I live with a bike activist. I’m not coming from a place of ignorance he...

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Climate Change and Personal Responsibility

Mrs. Homegrown

June 28, 2013

Age of Limits, Thoughtstylings

63 Comments

...en so much positive change on this front, even just in the last few years. Urban homesteading, slow food, organics, bikes, car share, DIY, all of it — it’s blossoming. It’s very hopeful. I’m going to put the next part in italics because it’s so important: The pleasure and satisfaction that we all receive from living this way is the positive counterspell to the dark enchantment of consumer culture. When we live this way, we become positive examples...

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Saturday Tweets: Too Many Tweets!

Mr. Homegrown

March 9, 2019

Saturday Linkages

1 Comment

...than Webster (@JonathWebst) March 4, 2019 Alleopathy–a chemical inhibition used by a plant to reduce competition–can be used as a design tool to suppress weeds. Wonderful groundcovers like Antennaria plantaginifolia planted underneath established perennials can help to reduce weed pressure. https://t.co/PG56m0hpdU — Thomas Rainer (@ThomasRainerDC) March 4, 2019 Alias: a smart-speaker "parasite" that blocks your speaker's sensors until you acti...

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A Question About Freezing and Canning Home Grown Vegetables

Mr. Homegrown

June 22, 2018

Food, Food Preservation

12 Comments

...them up a little in the can. Probably the best thing for frozen vegetables used for canning would be to use them in “cooked” preparations, such as soups. Although celery is a terrible candidate for freezing because it is texturally destroyed, I don’t see why you couldn’t use previously frozen celery in a pressure canned soup. Frozen corn might be better off as a “creamed corn” in a can than just canned whole kernels. There are a lot of variables,...

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Something for Nothing – Wild Mustard Greens

Mr. Homegrown

March 8, 2008

Food, Foraging

...n raw. The seed takes about 4 days to be ready. A hot flavour, it is often used in salads. A nutritional analysis is available. The seed can be ground into a powder and used as a food flavouring, it is the ‘white mustard’ of commerce . . . The pungency of mustard develops when cold water is added to the ground-up seed – an enzyme (myrosin) acts on a glycoside (sinigrin) to produce a sulphur compound. The reaction takes 10 – 15 minutes. Mixing with...

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