Inge Leonora-den Ouden

Jack Little wrote:You need to fix your circadian rhythm. See every sunrise (no glasses), see sunset and block blue spectrum light at night after sunset. Spend as much time outside without sunglasses during the day which I imagine most permies would be mostly outside. Red blueblocking glasses can be used to block artifiical blue light at night.

Are you sure these are remedies against sleep-apnea? I think all of this helps against insomnia, but sleep-apnea is something totally different, with different causes...

al aric wrote:This question is like asking what my favorite song is...25 songs later I'm adding to the list..

Persimmons are up there, but Pomegranates are right on their tail...trailing close are blackberries...but wait...figs...and who can say no to Avocados?  The same people who can't also probably like harvesting apricots like I do...right after that my plums come in...oh no I'd better not start thinking about my citrus...well I think you're getting the drift.  Your question really stirs me up!

Your climate zone makes me jealous, with all those fruits growing in the wild!

Esteban Ademovski wrote:...

Hi Esteban. I love such a well-organised computer screen! (comment on the last photo)

I think the idea behind it is a good one. But ... as the comments already show: everyone's situation is different. We all have to make our own list of needed/wanted food.

When I saw that long list the first problem I thought about was: where do I put all that??? I live in a small apartment (only a little larger than a 'tiny house'). My 'pantry' is only one cupboard. There's no cellar. In the utility room is a chest freezer, but for the rest it's filled with many other things needing their space too (like my bicycle).

In my 'pantry', fridge and freezer I have everything I need for at least a week. In case of emergency I have some cans with different beans, canned fish, and some grains (to be cooked as rice) and pasta.
In my gardens fresh vegetables, herbs and fruits grow (in the season). But in case of emergency I might not be able to go pick those ...

Harold Skania wrote:So if I were to build one of these Automatic Backyard Food Pumps, I wouldn't need solar pumps or aquaponics gear, right? It looks like you usually set up a hugel to keep the ABFP moist for most of the summer?

I think maybe the word 'pump' can be confusing.
A 'food pump', I think, is pumping out food (edible plants). It's 'automatic', meaning it does this all by itself, in a natural way. It doesn't need help from any gear ... after the first start it doesn't even need any work. All you do is pick your harvest the needed food plants.

Probably it depends on your climate what will grow without any work. If there's a lot of rain you don't need to keep the soil moist in the same way you need to do if you're in a dry climate.

Coydon Wallham wrote: ...
I came back to correct myself about the scarcity of said strawberries. I wandered off to investigate some deer snorts a few days ago and found myself in a patch full of wild strawberries. I think there are two 'tricks' to foraging these- one, they ripen during what is normally the height of mosquito season around here, so I'm not spending much time just wandering around outside at this point. However, the mozzies seem to be thinning out early this year so I wasn't adverse to taking the time to investigate this. Second, it helps to get your head down a little and look sideways to see the berries under the leaves, for being bright red they don't pop out much just walking directly over them. I suspect this may be partly because any that do grow out from under the leaf cover are visible to birds and are snatched up at the first sign of colour change.

I might actually say these are more flavourful than domesticated strawberries, but that might just be the fresh picked vs. store shelf phenomena...

I have real wild strawberries growing in my front yard (got a plant from someone who got a plant from someone ... etc.). And yes, I only notice the tiny red fruits when I bend down, or even sit on the ground, so I can look at the underside. There they hide!
Their taste is incomparable to any store-bought strawberry, even the organic strawberries right from the grower. Flavourful indeed.

Here sometimes a tomato plant comes as a volunteer (once even in the public lawn in front of my garden). But they appear too late in the season. Even the tomatoes I pre-seed indoors early in the year struggle to get all of their fruits ripe.

I grow them from the seeds I collect (from some of the ripe fruits). The plant I originally bought was called 'wild tomato'. It has bunches of small fruits. The ripe fruits are yellow, but they aren't all ripe at the same time. They have a good taste, not at all sweet (so they are not cherry tomatoes).

I use the ripe fruits in salads. With the green ones I make 'green tomato chutney'.

Reminder for myself: I want to make a free food-and-other-things stand. The wood to build it is already mostly here ...

Tesla Truck ... Have you see this one?

J. Adams wrote:The book, "Drawing on the Right Side of the Brain" addresses how most people "see" using their left brain. The author gives you exercises to see through the use of your right brain, and it's amazing what's in front of you that you never noticed before. Long ago, the new idea of a left brain and right brain was somewhat over simplified and they were treated as almost completely different organs. Then it was discovered that both sides of the brain actually share many of the same systems that are all operating at once, so the idea of "left brain and right brain" was debunked. But then later, the debunk was undebunked, because even though both sides have many of the same systems going at the same time, each side is still highly specialized in how it uses those same systems.

Many years ago I discovered a Dutch translation of that book (it must have been in the 1980s). It helped me 'draw what I see' (and see what I look at). Drawing/sketching became much more motivating and I do it ever since then.  
I don't mind if this 'left and right brain' is scientifically correct, but no matter how you call it, it works!