Adventures in Investing

I first heard about Mr. Money Mustache from my friend Cherry. She was pointing out that my thoughts on the deplorable damages of car culture overlapped his.
   The second time I heard about him was from Wayde, Roscivs' younger brother.
   I infrequent his blog, and the other day I read about a p2p lending business venture that he is experimenting with.

I decided to do something similar with a little bit (less than 1%) of my money. What curiosity I have! What risk I take!

first year pickler

I make my own pickles. Amazing!

Since early spring I have successfully made lacto-fermented pickles* out of radishes and garlic scapes. My other attempts were lemons and carrots, but I lost 'em to mold.
   The radishes were DIVINE. My visiting family ate the last of the scapes.
   It had been weeks since I set anything up to pickle, but on Thursday, when I was at the Farmers' Market, I found the season's first pickling cukes. I bought some, added pickling dill (read: dill in bloom) and garlic. I hope I'm not sorry I didn't have any grape leaves!

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* For those of you who have no idea what I'm talking about:

   • Yogurt is certainly the most commonly known (and the only commonly eaten) lacto-ferment in America. It's basically pickled dairy! However, "lacto" goes with "lactic acid", NOT "lactose". Lacto-fermentation has nothing necessarily to do with dairy.

   • "fermented" evokes beer, wine and other things alcoholic but lacto-ferments are not alcoholic. 

   • "pickles" evokes foods soaked in vinegar, but lacto-ferments are not made with any vinegar. 

For Supper

I made an omelette for the first time! 4 duck eggs. It was the purtiest omelette I ever did see!

A Favorite Website and a Favorite YouTube Video and a Bonus Link

I have been interested in floor play and squatting for the last few months. I've built up to being able to squat for many (20) minutes at a time.
   If you're interested, check out Todd Hargrove's Squat Fundamentals no. 1. There's a link at bottom to a 25 minute audio floor play guide. I liked the pretending to be a crab!

This post is brought to you by JoBob out sailing with his dad. I don't sit on my computer post a lot when he's home, which is most of the time!

More Gut Reading

"Happy Microbes, Skinny Jeans" is the print article in the July/August print volume of Mother Jones. Here is the online version.
   I recommend it.
   Currently that ^ page is hosting links to MoJo other articles with the same probiotic / microbe / gut theme. This is Your Body on Microbes, Should You Take A Probiotic? (I'm going to go with yes), Can Antibiotics Make You Fat? (all signs point to yes), Poop Therapy (I would do it if I could find a suitable donor), and Here's Why You Shouldn't Take Antibiotics for a Sinus Infection.

ketchUpdates

Blood: drawn (after MUCH TRIAL AND TRIBULATION and one vein "giving out" and one poke yielding nothing and resorting to a vein in the hand).
   House: alas — the beautiful house of dreams is not within our grasp. One of the owners seems not to be ready to negotiate with us.

ATTN: Mona

At the beginning of the month, Jronatron and I took Animal Planet's "Dog Breed Selector" questionnaire. The results solidly indicate that we would be best matched with a Brittany or a Cavalier King Charles Spaniel.
   It is highly unlikely we'd get a purebred, but if we did these would suit us best. (I want a dog that is highly affectionate and highly trainable.)

There Is No Tomorrow, But Only Today

It has been a great couple of weeks.
   Two things about today:
   (1) It was bring your pet to church day. It was the joyfulnoisiest service I have ever been at. ... I really want a dog!
   (2) During sibling book group my brother, Leon, made a case for P. Diddy as today's Shakespeare.

Gulpee

I went, fasting, into the lab this morning to have my blood drawn for routine bloodwork. They sent me away. They found no veins at all, because, apparently, I am dehydrated.
   Remember my drinking quandary? (No?) Looks like I haven't solved my problem. In the short term, I've been sippin' all day, trying to get any vein to plump up. No luck so far.

Gutty and A Beautiful Day

I often spout factoids about the prime importance of the microflora in and on our bodies. I believe what I claim. I've substantiated it behind the scenes, but by the time I mention it in conversation, I don't always have a citation on hand.
   I think that this contributes to the perception some hold of me as a gut-bacteria kook. In any case, I'm comfortable with my company. From a book I just finished:

Jeffery Gordon, Director of Washington University's Center for Genome Sciences, and his team have shown that people of normal weight favor a family of bacteria called bacteroidetes while obese poeple have more firmicutes. His team was able to prove that gut microbes actually contribute to obesity.  

Speak of chaos theory, I am posting this outside, sitting on a swing in a garden between my apartment and the library. There is a fountain three feet in front of me, and while I've been here, several birds have taken drinks and baths.
   I am like a bird.
   But I am not like a bird in that I do not drink my bathwater.

Picking

The Dashes (J's sister's family) were out of town today but invited us go over to pick raspberries. Yum yum.

Post-Hurricane Rainbow

God don't make no plastic bags.
   Happy New Year!
   The holiday haps: my parents and one sister are here. The house haps: we sat with the homeowners yesterday and made a counter-counter offer.

Awaiting

My parents are flying in today for a visit.
   I am going to post every day in July. It's looking like it might be a very very busy month, so most posts will probably be tweety-length.

Offering

We put in an offer on our a house today. Cross your T's for us!