Why I'm Not Getting a Flu Shot

photo by Quiplash!

Now that I'm pregnant, I fit into two categories for which the US Government would recommend I receive a flu vaccine this season. (The second is that I'm a healthcare worker.)

Am I going to? NO WAY. (At my work, this requires me to fill out a "Declination of Vaccination" form stating that I "understand the risks." Boy, do I. Just read on.) I've never gotten a flu shot before, even before I had much looked into the topic, based on my own reasoning that I'm young and healthy and have never had the flu, but presume that I could fight it off if necessary. I remember when flu shots were first being publicized, they were recommended only for the elderly and the immunocompromised (in whom, perhaps, the risk of the flu was actually greater than neurotoxicity from the vaccine's ingredients--but read further down for the evidence on that)...then, for $ome in$ane rea$on (I can't imagine what it wa$) they added PREGNANT WOMEN AND CHILDREN to the list. And healthcare workers. And now it's just about everybody--despite evidence that they don't work. The study in the first link found that the vaccine only resulted in a SIX PERCENT decline of cases in the flu in vaccinated individuals! And yet! You're exposing yourself (and, if you're pregnant, your baby) to a shot of mercury--which is known to be incredibly harmful--for essentially no benefit at all.

The National Resources Defense Council has this to say about mercurcy:

Once in the human body, mercury acts as a neurotoxin, interfering with the brain and nervous system.

Exposure to mercury can be particularly hazardous for pregnant women and small children. During the first several years of life, a child's brain is still developing and rapidly absorbing nutrients. Prenatal and infant mercury exposure can cause mental retardation, cerebral palsy, deafness and blindness. Even in low doses, mercury may affect a child's development, delaying walking and talking, shortening attention span and causing learning disabilities.

In adults, mercury poisoning can adversely affect fertility and blood pressure regulation and can cause memory loss, tremors, vision loss and numbness of the fingers and toes. A growing body of evidence suggests that exposure to mercury may also lead to heart disease. [emphasis mine]

Awesome stuff, huh?

But what if you got the flu?!

Well, if you're between the ages of 0 and 49 (which all children and the vast majority of pregnant women are), "estimated rates of influenza-associated pulmonary and circulatory deaths/100,000 persons were 0.4--0.6."

LESS THAN ONE PERSON IN 100,000--AND THOSE ARE OF THE PEOPLE WHO ACTUALLY GET THE FLU!

What about older people? They account for over 90% of mortality cases, so maybe they should get the shot?

Nope, sorry: "The evidence is too weak to show any mortality benefits."

HUGE TOXICITY ISSUES ASIDE (and really, how can you put those aside?), I also grew up with the anecdotal evidence from my father that "the absolute SICKEST HE EVER WAS" was following a flu shot. Doctors would claim that's just not possible, but it seems a lot of people say the same thing. So the virus is dead--maybe it was the formaldehyde, or the mecury (a high enough concentration to be considered a hazardous waste), that he had a reaction to? If I were interested in exposing our future child to that kind of toxicity, I'd do it the old-fashioned way and eat a few cans of tuna! At least I'd be getting a little protein instead of just ingesting two of the most dangerous substances to developing embryos: heavy metals and viruses. I consider this one of the first favors I'll do our unborn baby.

Natural Family Living has an awesome post up about why she and her family don't get flu shots. Thanks also to her for the following video:

There's (Going To Be) a New Sullenbrand in Town.

Pancakes & Pumpkins

So tomorrow is already Wednesday!

Nothing exciting to report, but to pick up where I left off, we ended up having a wonderful Sunday. Our pancakes turned out delicious--the cornmeal adds an earthy flavor and texture that we really loved, and. And our sausage-green-pepper-mushroom-and-onion scramble was just awesome. If there's anything better than the smell of onions, peppers, mushrooms, and sausage frying, I don't know what it is. (We reserved some of those ingredients, along with some free day-old bread, for a strata we're making for tomorrow. I had planned to make it this evening for supper, but I didn't realize that stratas are supposed to sit overnight before you cook them. So we dashed together some grilled cheese sandwiches and tomato soup--always a hit--and made the strata tonight, for tomorrow.) We also took a drive out by Shenandoah and hit up a free pumpkin festival at an orchard out there--it was a little underwhelming, but for 8 bucks, we each got to try 27 varieties of local wine and gobble down a chili dog. What can I say; it was a real health food fest. And we took a few pictures.

I've been at a conference the past two days, and just when I was starting to feel a little bit leery about how that would figure into the budget, work called last night and asked me to come in for overtime tomorrow. Thank you, God. I work 7-7 tomorrow and the next day, but luckily I'm doing pretty well in my schoolwork since I was off most of last week. Friday I'll take my second Pathophysiology test (the term is 1/3 over already!). And since Matt was working most of last weekend, and it seems like we've had something crazy going on most weekends lately, I think this weekend we're going to take it easy.

An old place we spotted by the road that seemed about our style

Us and a giant pumpkin!

I like to think these guys were on their way to win blue ribbons at the county fair. Matt looked a little skeptical at that, but he didn't tell me they weren't


Serious breakfast

Up & At 'Em

I'm spending the morning trying to clear up what happens during the week when we're busy all day and prefer to relax together in the evenings-- so that we can get out a little later and enjoy this crisp fall day. Nothing extreme, but plenty of dirty dishes, the litter box needs to be changed, the carpet could stand a vacuum, etc. Matt's at a meeting right now, and when he comes back we're making our weekend gold standard: Banana-Walnut Pancakes with Brown Sugar Syrup. Now that we've gotten the go-ahead from the author on not separating the eggs beforehand (thanks, Joy!), I think we're going to try the whole-wheat version. We've also both had a hankering for sausage lately (that's what fall does to us, I guess!) so we'll probably have a little sausage-egg scramble as well. For the protein, you know :)

I'm not sure I've ever used this blog to publicly profess my undying love for Tracy Chapman, but I'm going to do it now. She's making cleaning a dirty kitchen an absolute pleasure. So melancholy, so lovely, so socially aware. Her music just tears my heart out. My current favorite song: Change, introduced to me by my little sister, after I was the one to introduce Tracy to HER back in our days of rambling around in our Woody together. WELL worth the $0.99. Thanks, Sneebs!

Ecstatic About Orgasmic Birth

Despite the fact that traffic caused me to miss the first 20 minutes of the film screening, I was still so glad that I made the trip to Baltimore and paid the $10 to see this movie. I also dropped another $40 to buy the DVD (though apparently you can buy it through the website for $35, though I'm not sure if that includes shipping...).

It was, in a word, wonderful. I would have to say that it's probably my favorite all-around birth video to date (sorry, BOBB, I still love you, too). (Matt said it was his, too.) Birth As We Know It might win out for the sheer beauty of multiple waterbirths in the sea, but Orgasmic Birth included so much beautiful birth footage (in water and "on land"), so many wonderful interviews with couples, and also a great deal of factual information (the DVD also has a feature called "Birth by the Numbers" which walks you through the various statistics impacting maternity care in the United States today). All my favorite experts (Ina May Gaskin, Marsden Wagner, Christianne Northrup, Robbie Davis-Floyd, and Elizabeth Davis) were prominently featured and spoke articulately on the topics at hand.

I thought that probably the best and most touching segment was one on birth for survivors of sexual abuse. Featured is a fragile-looking but determined survivor who describes her history of abuse, then describes her birth, saying "I felt myself just leave, and this...this woman came in...who just knew how to birth a baby!" She looks shyly but proudly at the camera, nods slightly and says, "I felt transformed." It's an amazing thing to watch, especially given that the prevailing medical "wisdom" today is that women who are survivors of sexual abuse are best off with a very early, very dense epidural at the least--or, worse, a scheduled primary Cesarean. That doesn't give them a lot of credit, does it?

As I'd anticipated, the actual discussion about orgasms during birth (which do happen, but not that often) is brief and incidental, and the thrust (sorry) of the film has lots more to do with women's sensuality, and the intimacy and privacy and bliss of birth, and creating the same kind of loving and secluded environment for birth as you would for lovemaking than it does with the actual experience of orgasm. Obvious fact that there are lots of naked women in it notwithstanding, the movie is incredibly tastefully (and beautifully) done, dare I even say family-friendly (though I suppose it depends on your family), and I wouldn't be embarassed to watch it with anybody.

I could go on forever about this movie but I'll just say that if it doesn't make you wish you were nine months pregnant and in labor, well, I don't know what will. It did for me. The only possible icing on the cake was that at the end, out walked MARSDEN WAGNER, and I got to shake his hand and chat with him for a little while after the screening. AHHHH! Talk about goosebumps!!

What's in a Name?

When the name is organic, claims Dr Bronner, there should be a lot. Recently the ultra-hippie company took a number of other cosmetics and body care companies to court, charging that their products contained petrochemicals and ingredients produced using pesticides, yet labeled themselves "organic" (and you can bet charged customers a premium to do it, too). Among the offenders: J/A/S/O/N, Kiss My Face, Avalon, and Nature's Gate. This is almost a moot point for us personally, since our beauty needs are taken care of by baking soda, vinegar, castile soap, (Trader Joe's or Dr Bronner's) jojoba, and tea trea oil, but I admit we've used some of these offenders in the past--and felt like we were doing the right thing by doing so. The case is still moving forward, but so far, progress is encouraging. And two companies, Ikove and Juice Beauty, have settled and resolved to make their products truly organic in the future.

Why is this such a big deal? Because what you put on your skin gets into your body. If you wouldn't eat it, you probably shouldn't wear it (which makes the ridiculous amount of crossover between our kitchen products and our bathroom ones not seem so crazy, huh?). Feel like it's your face, your choice? First of all, if companies are improperly labeling their products, consumers aren't able to make an informed choice. I can almost guarantee that the vast majority of people buying the above products did so because they're supposedly organic. It's certainly not because they're the least expensive! And besides, in addition to what you directly apply to your skin (or hair), you're also rinsing it into the water supply--which means you're exposing all kinds of other people, too.

We love Dr Bronner's products because they're pure, they work, they have tons of uses, and are packaged and manufactured in sustainable ways. We love even more that the company is willing to put its money where its mouth is, and open itself up to scrutiny, by taking the above kinds of actions.

Curious about just how good or bad the ingredients in your favorite products are? The Environmental Working Group has an awesome Cosmetic Safety Database where you can look them up. But the whole argument underscores why we've made the effort to switch over to using single, unprocessed ingredients wherever we can: because we know what's in them, and so we get to choose what we're putting on, and therefore IN, our bodies.

Birth News

I think partly it's the economy; I think people are also just getting fed up. And unfortunately, as the link demonstrates, women are also dying. Any way you look at it, it seems like the storm is gathering for change (I hope)...

On a lighter note, as I've mentioned, I'm going to Baltimore today to see Orgasmic Birth. You can be sure a full report will follow!

Study Break!

I was taking a break from studying today (surprise, surprise! --although I actually did get quite a bit done), brooding a little over our finances, not the least of which is that I've gotten called off of work twice this week and also our ING Savings rate has dropped another point. Then I saw that there was $22 left in our charity budget for the month and thought that a little charitable CVS-ing might be just the thing to cheer me up.

And so it was. Here's what I got:

Sure deodorant (3), $2.79 each
Pert Plus Shampoo (1), $3.99
Colgate MaxFresh Toothpaste (1), $2.99
Powerade (1), $1.69
2-pack CVS-brand sensitive-skin bar soap (2), $1.99 each
Not pictured: WellPatch Arthritis Relief Patches (4), $5.99 each

Here are the coupons I had:
$0.75/1 Sure
$1/1 Sure
$1/1 Pert Plus
$1/1 Colgate MaxFresh (CVS coupon)
$5/$30 CVS coupon (printed out when I went in the store and scanned my card)
$2 ECB

Total before coupons: $34 and change
Total after coupons: $22 (right on the money, or what? I didn't even necessarily calculate it out, just took advantage of whatever deals they had. My mom would call that shopping with God)
ECB: $24

Net: -$2

Not bad at all!

The way I did this trip was to take a certain amount of our predesignated charity budget and go to the store (with a list of the sales and my corresponding coupons pulled ahead of time) and see what I could get for it. Anytime I make a list ahead of time, one which intricately requires buying one thing to qualify for another, I am inevitably frustrated when something is out of stock and my plan is derailed. This was much better.

During my first transaction (in which I bought everything except 2 of the WellPatches), the clerk asked me if there were any more WellPatches left because she really depended on them for her arthritis. I told her no, I'd snagged the last two, but that I would be happy to give them to her because I was planning to donate them anyway and wasn't sure whether the shelter would take them. She went back and forth with me a time or two but I could tell she actually did want to take them, and finally she did. She also raved over my receipt at the end, saying "Smart girl! God bless! Look at all these Extra Bucks!" Yes, that's how I was feeling too.

I was bummed that they hadn't had any of the GUM toothbrushes in stock (2-packs for $3.99, free after ECB, limit 5; that's 10 free toothbrushes, and $1.25 in overage after coupons) so I went ahead and went to the other CVS in town. They also didn't have them (bummer), but they did have two more WellPatches, so I went ahead and bought them with my ECB from the previous two, received $11.98 more in ECB, and went back and gave them to the clerk at the first CVS, who was thrilled.

So now I have a net earning of $2 to spend, plus a pile of stuff to donate to the shelter, plus the experience of having personally helped somebody out in a little way. Not bad for an hour's work, and it definitely gave me back some perspective about the value of a dollar--or an Extra Buck.

More on How I Was Born in the Wrong Century

Following the whole cast-iron pan thing...

...superblog Crunchy Chicken is hosting, of all things, a PIONEER WEEK in November. If there was ever anything that this toilet-paper-shunning, toothpaste-making, seldom-showering, scratch-baking household was made for, I would have to say it's that.

You can click the link and check out the rules for the Pioneer Week Challenge. Some of them include only having one light on in the house at a time, minimizing the length of your showers, and cooking all food from scratch. On 98% of them, we're not even waiting until November-- we're already there!

We've also unofficially taken the CK Freeze Yer Buns Challenge...

Like in the summer, when we see how long we can go without turning on the AC (this summer, we only used it a couple of days at all--one of the perks of living in the basement), we like to make a sick little game of seeing how long we can go without turning on the heat in the fall/winter. Virginia winters are so much milder than what we're used to anyway! The funny thing is that we don't even pay for utilities except for water, but in a way, WE ALL PAY FOR THEM. You know what I mean? Just in case you don't: I mean fossil fuels, and global warming, and that kind of thing.

So we sleep under many heavy blankets at night, we dress in layers around the house, we get up and move around if we feel chilly, and Oh, Lord, I have become my parents in the ways I least thought possible.

Another reason to keep the house so cold (ours was 55 degrees today)? It's good for your immune system. The clincher for me was this article from Hen and Harvest, excerpted here:

We need to let our bodies do more work warming and cooling themselves. Several years ago when I sat shivering in my herb teacher’s living room as she told us of the immune benefits of keeping the house at 55 degrees F., I didn’t want to believe her. It wasn’t until the Riot for Austerity’s challenge to lower the thermostat and use less energy for the earth’s sake that I started considering really doing this. Keeping the house cooler in winter, and warmer in summer, revs up the immune system and works that muscle. That doesn’t mean we should feel cold! No, actually helping the body to warm itself is imperative to staying well or overcoming illness. Wear plenty of warm layers in winter, move around more and take in lots of warm foods and drinks.

Doing more manual labor, walking and biking and moving around more will not only help us keep warm, but it also makes us breathe harder–which pumps up the immune system too–and sweat–which works one of the channels of elimination, the skin‘s pores.

Eating local and seasonal “real food” instead of energy-intensive processed foods, helps our digestive system. To paraphrase Michael Pollen in In Defense of Food, for immune health don’t regularly eat things that your grandmother (or for some of us, our great-grandmothers) wouldn’t recognize as food. And eat cooked, warm foods and drink warm or at least room temperature liquids as much as possible.

Many of us are trying to be healthy by eating our salads and baby carrots all year long. Cold food is a lot harder for our body to digest. It actually takes important energy away from the work of the immune system, makes our digestive system work overtime, and makes us cold. We all know that in the winter salad greens aren’t naturally growing in the northern climates–they’ve been shipped thousands of miles. With peak oil and high fuel prices, that’s unlikely to continue and that’s a good thing for our bodies. Traditional diets and traditional healing practices include warm foods in the diet at all times for sick people and even most of the time for healthy people. A bowl of oatmeal or cooked eggs are much better for your immune health than granola, and cooked greens or other veggies instead of salad in winter are much more seasonally appropriate. [emphasis mine]

I don't know how she did it, but she actually made the Spartan lifestyle I was exposed to as a child sound appealing. Cozy, even. Long walks, warm sweaters, hot drinks. The whole scenario sounds downright comforting. Another thing that warms you up? Standing with your arms plunged into hot dishwater (and washing the dishes, of course, not just standing there with your arms in greasy water).

More and more we are getting back to the idea that things have been done a certain way through most of human history for a good reason. Call it divine inspiration, trial and error, or survival of the fittest (and it's probably some of all three), but it just doesn't make sense that our generation has poo-pooed thousands of years of human civilization and decided to reinvent the wheel on such basic human needs as food, farming, and, of course, birth. I love the point above about eating locally and in season--though we've been indoctrinated by "health experts" to believe we should be paying premium prices all winter long to eat produce loaded with pesticides and shipped in from Chile.

I've been reading the Nourishing Traditions Cookbook (which is so much more than that--it is so densely loaded with information, I don't know whether I'll ever get through it all), which confirms a lot of what our guts have told us about eating local foods in their natural state, about eating whole real foods instead of living on supplements, and about looking at food as nourishment rather than a series of mathematical equations. It's not that that's just a party-pooper way of looking at nutrition, but it's actually killing people by the millions. If it isn't trans fats (formerly touted as a healthy replacement for saturated fat) it's fake sugar (we were told it was healthier than the real thing!) or heaven forbid, high fructose corn syrup, and do not even get me started on the level of propaganda involved in this.

Surprisingly, another book that takes all this to a whole new level is Healing the New Childhood Epidemics: Autisim, ADHD, Asthma, and Allergies. For a long time, I've watched patients and co-workers and friends struggle to care for seemingly normal children who developed crippling food allergies (or worse, breastmilk allergies?!) or regressed into autism. Clearly, asthma and ADHD have also reached epidemic proportions. The author makes a convincing case that these disorders are all related to the same processes of inflammation and infection in three body systems: the immune system, the digestive system, and the neurological system. He talks about insults from environmental hazards, genetic predisposition, dietary influences, and yes, the heavy metals found in vaccines. (If you think the medical community denies this from a place of objectivity, think again.) It's a very articulate, compassionate read, and the 52 five-star reviews on Amazon (many from parents of affected children) are a strong support for what he's saying.

All of this leads me to believe in the (unpopular) idea that just maybe, life wasn't designed to be easy. That back around the fall of man, that whole thing about pain in childbirth and toil in bringing forth fruit from the land wasn't just about labor and farming. Life on this earth is never going to be utopian--never going to be free from pain and disease. Why is it that any time something, whether a nutritional advance (margarine, Splenda) or a medical one (vaccines, epidurals), seems too good to be true--it usually, on a large scale, is?

Now We're Cooking (In Cast Iron)

Picture by cybrgrl

As we're constantly undergoing efforts to eliminate toxic substances from our lives and generally do what's good for our family and the planet, the latest thing to come under our scrutiny has been Teflon.

The news about Teflon (despite what the manufacturers and the Environmental Protection Agency say), it's not good. And like so many health hazards, it's especially bad for anybody who wants to have a baby someday.

The story on nonstick cookware in our household is actually an interesting one. When Matt and I met, he roundly criticized it as crap for inferior cooks (or something like that). We went pan-shopping together and ended up with a set from Chefmate that we think is stainless steel, and hope isn't aluminum (hello, Alzheimer's!). The pans also stuck like a mofo, especially since I had grown up indoctrinated with the (false) belief that nonstick pans were a boon to your health because you could cook with a minimum of--gasp--butter or oil. So while Matt was away for the summer, I slipped out to Wal-Mart and bought the absolute cheapest nonstick pan I could find (and have probably been eating flakes of it ever since), which I hid in the cupboard and only used to scramble my eggs when he wasn't around.

Eventually I came clean (moving in together will tend to force the issue), and he eventually came around to my way of thinking. We both enjoyed the ability to slip 'n slide a fried egg onto a plate and wash the pan with minimal effort. But recently, we decided together that our recently acquired knowledge about bioaccumulation and the fact that we'd like to have a family soon meant that we should probably kick the nonstick pans to the curb.

So what now?

We'd already tried stainless steel (or aluminum...) and found it wanting. Matt had two cast-iron pans he'd rescued from his parents' camping gear--one of which he'd actually tried to get rid of awhile back, but I stayed his hand. How the tables had turned. Anyway, cast iron it was. Apparently, iron leaches into your food too, just like Teflon, only it's good for you, not deadly. They've also been around a long time. And you can pick them up cheap (or free) at garage sales, on Craigslist, Freecycle, etc...

For the most part, we've been really happy. They saute onions and mushrooms like a dream, and we can even make pancakes with plenty of butter (which is how we like them anyway). But there has been some trial and error involved, and there's a lot of conflicting advice out there. Some people say only wash with water, others swear a little soap won't hurt. Then there are those who say that actually, heating a little oil in the pan is the best way to get rid of sticky remnants, that using too much water can lead to rusting. Realizing that cooking fats aren't the demon we were taught they were (that in fact, they form crucial building blocks for the brain and body, but more on that later) has helped a lot, too.

We've found the latter advice to be most helpful. Eggs, particularly, stick like crazy no matter what we do. Boiling water in the pan doesn't seem to help much to get them off, but gently simmering a little oil seems to loosen them up. We also keep around a greasy old rag (well, it wasn't greasy to begin with) to wipe out the pan for cleanup. And that's it! We've also recently come across the advice that cast iron pans should first be preheated for 3-5 minutes, then the cooking fat added and allowed to completely liquify, and then and only then should the food be added. We're going to give that a try tomorrow morning and see if it makes a difference.

All in all, not as easy as nonstick, but we're sleeping better at night.

Voices of Men

Back on Friday, October 3, Katie and I went to a presentation for Domestic Assault Awareness Month, which has been going on throughout the month of October in the U.S. I am a little late getting this posted, but we fee like this is a very important topic so I still wanted to get the word out there.

The event we went to was a one-man play put on by Ben Atherton-Zeman called "Voices of Men." We both really enjoyed the performance. It was a mixture of multimedia presentation and celebrity-impersonation based monologues. There was a good amount of audience interaction and variety throughout, and Ben has done great job putting the presentation together and is great at keeping everyone entertained, while addressing a very difficult subject in a way that makes men think very seriously about all their actions. This presentation made me realize that more men need to take this subject seriously. There are so many times in a day when people are confronted with images in the media, movies, magazines, jokes, and conversations that condone treating other people, often women, with anything from ambivalence and disrespect to outright violence. By doing or saying nothing and simply receiving what others give you, the problem is being perpetuated. Non-action is condoning, and for something as serious as this, where there is no wiggle room, no debate as to whether this is OK--it is never acceptable. I remember there have been times in my life that I was not as willing to speak up or to wear a white ribbon to show how important of a subject this is. I remember not speaking up in conversations when I knew things were said that perpetuate violence and sexism, and I am shameful for not doing so. It will be my dedicated effort to not let these things go unnoticed anymore

While there are many centralized efforts to fight against domestic violence, there needs to be a cumulative attempt by more people, and it cannot just be the victim group. African Americans were obviously fundamental in the civil rights movement, but so were the thousands of whites in the south that stood against their own majority because they knew that what was going on was completely wrong. Going to Harper's Ferry last weekend and seeing the place where John Brown planted the seed that eventually grew into the Civil War and the eventual end of slavery in America was a very powerful experience. This person proudly died for a fundamental cause. I say fundamental, because many things are important, but fewer are fundamental. Education is very important, but on most levels it is not fundamental like kindness and love are. 

I have been reading a book by Wendell Berry lately titled Blessed are the Peacemakers, which discusses Christ's teachings on love and compassion. You can read some of the the book for free here. The book has a story about a Mennonite in Holland during the 18th century, who was wanted for being a heretic, and was being chased by someone hired to catch him. The Mennonite ran across a patch of frozen water, and the pursuer followed, but fell through. The Mennonite remembered his faith, and went back and saved the pursuer. Still oblidged to turn in his savior, the Mennonite was convicted and slowly burned to death. 

We would rarely face this type of treatment for speaking out against bad language or advertising that perpetuates negative action, but still men do not do the right thing and be honest because of fear. We should consider the lesson in this story--what some people go through to do the right thing and follow the faith they believe in. I feel that more people, especially men, need to speak out against violence perpetuation and make the choice not to induge or unwittingly support media that communicates negative, unkind, unloving messages and therefore supports negative action, if violence, rape, and other actions which lower the potential of our society will ever be reduced, let alone elimitated. Actions must come from individuals in individual, everyday situations.

Lydia Maria Child: 19th-Century Literary Superstar

One of my absolute FAVORITE things about our trip to Harper's Ferry today was a little paperback book I picked up in the bookshop there. It's called The American Frugal Housewife (apparently to distinguish it from the English book from the same time by a similar name) by Lydia Maria Child. Originally published in 1844, it's an amazingly dense collection of tips (from housekeeping to healthcare), recipes, and other advice for do-it-yourself household management. She talks about how to cook cheaply but healthfully, how to treat basic ailments (and avoid going to a doctor), make candles, polish furniture...etc etc...and her tips are all sensible, cheap, and even green. In other words, if she'd had a blog, I'd be flattered to think that it would maybe look a little something like ours?

However, possibly the most fascinating thing about this book is the author herself. I had never heard of Lydia Maria Child, but she was an abolitionist and women's rights advocate who nonetheless believed that the lot of women would not improve considerably until slavery was abolished. She wrote extensively, books and political articles, and apparently her interest in economical living was sparked because her husband was a "charming dreamer" of lawyer, given to charitable causes (who apparently also grew sugar beets) and made very little money. Sounds to me like they were living the Sullenbrand version of the American dream! She has other books on parenting, religion, abolition, Indian rights, women's rights, and one called The Family Nurse, which includes such good advice as "Never meddle with medicines, unless some disorder of the system renders them really necessary" (p.2). Amen, sister! And apparently, she also wrote the song "Over the River and Through the Woods," (who knew?!) along with a book called The Progress of Religious Ideas which was praised by theologians and a novel, Philothea, which none other than Edgar Allen Poe called "an honor to our country, and a signal triumph for our countrywomen." She also expresses some ideas that are incredibly applicable to our times, almost eerily so:

"Nations do not plunge at once into ruin--governments do not change suddenly--the causes which bring about the final blow, are scarcely perceptible in the beginning; but they increase in numbers and in power; they press harder and harder upon the energies and virtue of a people; and the last steps only are alarmingly hurried and irregular. A republic without industry, economy, and integrity, is Samson shorn of his locks" (p. 99)

"Perhaps there never was a time when the depressing effects of stagnation in business were so universally felt, all the world over, as they are now" (p. 108)

"It is wise to keep an exact account of all you expend--even of a paper of pins" (p. 4)

"If you are about to furnish a house, do not spend all your money, be it much or little. Do not let the beauty of this thing, and the cheapness of that, tempt you to buy unnecessary articles" (p. 5)

Really, really good stuff. And this is her lighter work. She's somebody who obviously has an amazing intellect and a wonderful grasp of economics, philosophy, religion, and civil rights. Of course, like many great women before her and since, despite her singular devotion to her country, American history has largely failed to remember her.

Harper's Ferry

Today we drove out to Harper's Ferry, West Virginia. We went up there once before, in the spring, but it was pretty dry and brown then--and we seem to have approached the park from the wrong side--so we never saw the historic town, or a great view of the river, or really any other of the remarkable things about the area.

This time, we did it right! The weather was crisp and beautiful, the leaves were all turning, and there was plenty to see and do. Harper's Ferry is significant in innumerable ways (the Park Service has identified at least six major historical themes that run through the area), and we love any opportunity to interact with the past that way. Today we saw lots of fun old buildings, an apple cider demonstration, and some breathtaking views of the Potomac and Shenandoah Rivers. And aside from buying pie and coffee and some local West Virginia honey, the experience was otherwise free.

The Shenandoah and Potomac Rivers converge here

Through the trees, you can see the railroad bridge over the rivers

Some old stone ruins we found along the road on the way out

Some information we picked up for Matt ...apparently abolitionist John Brown was known for his beard

We found a place to get hot apple pie ala mode

A back view of some of the houses and shops

Matt along the railroad

Tuna Buns

We cooked for the homeless shelter on Saturday and thank goodness, it actually went really well. There were fewer people there than we expected, but the leftovers were packaged up to be used at a later time. Here are some pictures from the process, and the recipe for the main dish we used (from my mom):

Tuna Buns
10 cans oil-packed tuna, drained and flaked
15 hard boiled eggs, peeled and diced
1 chopped onion
1 chopped green pepper
2/3 c. chopped sweet pickle (or relish)
1 lb. American cheese, finely cubed
2 c. Mayonaise
salt and pepper to taste

Mix all ingredients and heat at 300 degrees for 20 minutes.
Stuff small dinner rolls with mixture. Yield: 5-6 dozen.

YUM! As an added bonus, this is pretty inexpensive, super high-protein, and due to the mixture of ingredients besides tuna, it really doesn't taste "fishy" at all.

Tuna bun ingredients (eggs on the bottom)

All mixed together

The cats were happy to help us clean out the 30 empty cans

We also made a ton of brownies

The final outlay: three batches of tuna bun mixture, ~120 dinner rolls, many pounds of apples and bananas,
six batches of brownies, a bin of pretzels, and 10 bags of peas. Not pictured: 3 gallons of milk

This morning, we're...

...peeling and slicing 45 hardboiled eggs
...draining and flaking 25 cans of tuna
...making and cutting 108 brownies

among other things, in preparation for cooking dinner for 80(!) at the homeless shelter tonight.

On the menu:

Tuna buns (recipe to follow--thanks, Mom!)
Peas
Apples/bananas
Brownies
Milk

Photo by Tim Somero

Should be a pretty big undertaking. Pictures to follow.

Seattle Pics

Honestly, there are very few. I think we literally have more pictures of us in cabs and airplanes than we do out and about in Seattle. The reason for that is that we were out and about very little. Matt was tied up with work all day and some evenings, during which I studied in our room. By the time we were free, it was too dark and chilly to make venturing out very worthwhile.

We did manage to hit the famous fish market, though, and the few pictures we have are the result of that. And probably one of the most memorable parts of the trip was a street performer who let me hold his parrot, although we also had an incredible (and even affordable!) Italian dinner at Machiavelli's. We went back again the next night, and will be sure to go back yet again when we return to Seattle in about a month. All in all, it's great to be back.

The view out our hotel window

The market, with the Olympic Mountains off to the right

Us at the spice market--awesome!

Phinneaus the parrot and me

Down by the pier

Coming Tonight: The Ultimate Lazy Dinner

Photo by dominiqs81

Because I'm jet-lagged and went to work today and have a test to study for...

Potato soup--with the skins on
Green beans--from a can
Fast No-Knead Bread--now with decreased rising time (because I started it late)

The green beans I'm pretty confident about, but #1 and #3 include ultra-lazy variations I've never tried before. We'll see how this turns out.

UPDATE: Leaving the skins on for the potato soup turned out to be no big deal. I just scrubbed the potatoes, chopped them into quarters, and covered them with water. Brought them to a boil and blended them with a stick blender. The peels added a little bit of texture and actually a pleasantly earthy flavor to the soup. We'll be doing this again!

The bread I made according to the linked directions...sort of. I didn't have rye flour and so I made the bread with what I had: 2 cups of whole-wheat flour and 1 cup of unbleached all-purpose. Apparently I have the wrong kind of yeast, too--dry active instead of instant-- but I didn't do anything different with that. I let the bread rise 3 hours in a warm oven the first time, about an hour in a warm oven the second time, and then baked it at 350 for 45 minutes. Since I neglected to preheat the oven--once again, haste and laziness prevailed--I probably should have given it an extra few minutes, since the very center was a little bit doughy. However, it actually came out looking pretty good. I still feel like the no-knead breads both lack a little something in flavor--salt? tartness? I haven't quite decided. (I know others feel the same way, and have suggested everything from more salt to more sugar to using vinegar. Next time.) And I think next time I might find a way to back it covered, like the original no-knead bread does--I think it makes for a nicer crust. But for a fast, easy dinner, this one turned out pretty well.

And the canned green beans I will leave up to your imagination.

Making Birth Your Own

Talk Birth has a couple of good posts up on the uniqueness and individuality that can shine through in birth. A couple of memorable quotes:

I tell men in my classes not to be “scared” of their wives in labor, but to walk through the waves (of discomfort, anxiety, whatever) and just hold and love her. I tell them that they do not need to be “trained” to be more “special” or different than they are. They don’t need to be doulas. What they need to do is love her the way they love her and reach out to her to show her that [emphasis mine]."

And from Giving Birth: How It Really Feels by Sheila Kitzinger:

“I believe that this is one of the important things about preparation for childbirth–that it should not simple superimpose a series of techniques, conditioned responses to stimuli, on the labouring woman, but that it can be a truly creative act in which she spontaneously expresses herself and the sort of person she is. Education for birth consists not, as some would have it, of ‘conditioning,’ but aims at giving a woman the means by which she can express her own personality creatively in childbirth.”

This is one of my major beefs with hospital birth--in order to facilitate efficiency, a woman and her family's individuality and intimacy get stripped away and sacrificed in the name of various routines. I've seen many times that this can be a very disempowering way to start a family.

Put Your Money Where Your Mail Is

The ACNM released some sweet-ass midwifery stamps in celebration of Midwifery Week last week! The stamps are limited-edition and, unfortunately, at almost a buck apiece ($18.99 per sheet of 20), they're kind of expensive, but the proceeds go to support the ACNM and its Education Fund. Ways to make it a little cheaper: if you order two or more sheets, they're $16.99 apiece; and if you enter the code "tenoff" before checking out, it should knock 10% off your order. For two sheets of stamps, this took me down to about $0.76 a stamp--still a little pricey, but worth it for the cause. Plus, they're beautiful stamps.

Articles on Maternity Care from USA Today

photo by Cataldo1977

Maternity-care failings can be remedied with cost-saving fixes
and
Study: High-tech interventions deliver huge childbirth bill.

Duh and duh, right? But these are startlingly good articles, based on facts, with a few choice, intelligent quotes. It's hard to find that in an article about maternity care in the United States-- let alone TWO in the SAME PAPER in the SAME DAY! Kudos, USA Today!

You can also get a summary from Rixa at The True Face of Birth.

Here We Are!

Photo by Chethan Shankar

12 hours after leaving our apartment in a cab for the airport (and that, shockingly, includes NO DELAYS!), we arrived in Seattle last night about 10:45pm local time, 1:45am OUR TIME. Ohhhh, the joys of travel. While I'm happy to be here with Matt, I can honestly say that I can practically FEEL my desire to explore new places dwindling by the day. To the point that I'm almost at zero. While I used to find it so exciting to board a plane, spend a day in the sky, and touch down someplace new and exhilarating, I find I've joined the ranks of all the other...gulp... adults who just find it uncomfortable and irritating and inconvenient. I'd so much rather ferret out the treasures and hidden gems of my own community--or better yet, patronize the familiar--than brave unknown geography, elements, and neighborhoods just trying to fulfill the basics. Something to eat. A place to stay. The costs and time and effort it requires just to maintain the status quo are exhausting.

On a less negative note, we're trying to look at this trip as an extreme frugality challenge. While my plane tickets are an unrecoup-able loss, I'm trying to keep my tab as close to $0 as I can for the duration of my stay. I'm at Starbucks utilizing free WiFi instead of paying $9.99 a day to have it in our room. (It doesn't hurt my productivity to have my access restricted a little bit, either.) I'm planning lunches from the cafes at Barnes & Noble and Starbucks, where we have giftcards, and we've brought along our own bulgur for breakfast. And that's perhaps the best part of all this: that when we're together, with a little bulgur and baking soda strategically utilized throughout the day, we can make almost anyplace feel like home.

Preparing for Liftoff

Photo by turbojoe

I go to work last night, clocked in, and was told that they really didn't have a need for me there. So I clocked out again, went home, and proceeded to sleep for the next 8 hours (after having already put in 7 during the day!). Now that I'm exceedingly well-rested, Matt is at work for a few hours and I'm trying to get last-minute odds and ends tidied up before we leave today at 2pm--things like washing the dishes, making sure we're packed, and for some reason, seasoning our cast-iron skillets. And rocking out to the Carpenters. Hey, I'm here to do whatever it takes.

So! Our next post will likely be from Seattle. It isn't going to be much of a sightseeing trip (which is probably OK, since we hear the weather is pretty cold and damp), but I'm sure we'll find something to report.

Happy National Midwifery Week!

Hot Chocolate, Conserving-The-Milk Style

I've mentioned that lately we're trying to stretch and save and generally be economical. Which, I've come to realize, does not necessarily encompass the nightly drinking of 12-oz mugs of hot chocolate made from huge amounts of chocolate and cupsful of raw organic milk. Luckily, we recently bought those teeny espresso cups, which makes downsizing any beverage seem chic and fun! Not wanting to feel deprived, however, I thought we'd better amp up the flavor experience to give our tastebuds more bang for their buck.

Remember Chantico? I only ever had it once. I don't think it was around for long. It's interesting to compare the tone of that article, in which Starbucks postulates that people will pretty much never eat a cookie or candy bar again now that Chantico is in town, with this one, which is about getting rid of Chantico because it was a flop. The gist of it seems to be that people didn't like it because you couldn't customize it. But how, exactly, would you improve on perfection?

Well, you'd make it at home, for one. I looked for a recipe online, but the one I found had corn syrup and sugar and a bunch of other weird and unnecessary ingredients. So I improvised. Here's what I used in mine:

Ultra-Rich Hot Chocolate

3/4 cup whole milk
2-3 oz. bittersweet chocolate
2 tsp unsweetened cocoa powder

Combine, heat, and stir. (You can use the stove or the microwave; I was feeling lazy and used the microwave.) Yield: ~4- 2 oz shots.

The effect is something syrupy, incredibly rich, and best served a little hotter than just warm. For extra effect, I chopped up a couple of marshmallows real tiny and popped those in there too. Delicious!

If you did feel the need to customize, you could also throw in a pinch of cinnamon, or cayenne, or a drop of peppermint oil. And how cute would it be to serve it with one of those tiny candy canes?!

Update!

I missed the boat on the end of the Cloth Wipe Challenge 2008, but that's mainly because our switch to cloth wipes has really been so seamless that we weren't waiting for the week to be up. We've just made the switch! Visit the link above to see how this helps the planet.

Mushroom Medley

As I mentioned before, comfort foods are back. Farmer's market meals were delicious all summer, but nature must have intended something heartier for the colder months, right? Or else asparagus would grow locally all year round? (And yes, I know we could be subsisting on such delicacies as rutabags, turnips, and other root vegetables, but...) One of my absolute FAVORITE such hearty dishes is one my mother makes, something called Hamburger Mushroom Medley, or in our house, HamMushMed. She has fancier dishes in her repertoire, don't get me wrong, but something about that combination of egg noodles, cheese, mushrooms, and canned tomatoes just makes me weak in the knees. As the name implies, the recipe does call for hamburger, and it's delicious that way; but you can also make it with soy crumbles or without any meat/substitute at all. That's how I'm making it tonight. Here's my lineup:

Whole-wheat egg noodles
14.5 oz can diced tomatoes
10.75 oz can cream of mushroom soup (he got left out of the picture somehow)
2 cups mushrooms, sliced
1-2 cups cheddar cheese for topping

I'm happy with all those ingredients except the cream of mushroom soup. Here's why:
By far, not the worst ingredients in the world, but not exactly a nutritional powerhouse, either. I'm convinced we could make our own, and better, and come up with something worthy of eating straight out of the bowl, too.

Now that I think about it...I think at some point we did.

But, because it's 4pm and I've only just gotten out of bed, and we have this can languishing in the cupboard, I'm going to use it today.

When we were kids, HamMushMed was kind of a mixed bag. Creamy, cheesy noodles and hamburger? Check. However, we insisted that my mom mash up the diced tomatoes with a potato masher so that we wouldn't get any chunks of...shudder...tomato in our bowls. What was even worse was if a little brownish-black shred of mushroom had survived the creaming process (she wasn't using the extra sauteed mushrooms back then; she added those in later, when our palates had somewhat matured). "What is THIS?!" we would shriek. She would roll her eyes a little and point out "that's the MUSHROOM part," and reach over and fork up the rejects lined up around the edges of our plates.

Another favorite memory of HMM is that my mom usually purchased an extra-large batch of egg noodles, meaning that there were always leftover cooked noodles. She portioned these out into Ziploc baggies and termed them "noodle bundles," and, with a little butter and salt and pepper, they made an excellent dinner or snack. For awhile I thought about opening a noodles and butter stand, the combination is that good. I guess they've sort of done that now. Especially now that we're fanatical about fresh, raw, handmade butter, Matt and I have rediscovered it as a delectably rich sauce and dressing for everything from pasta to vegetables. Be still my heart!

Anyway, without further ado:

(Hamburger) Mushroom Medley.

Maybe not the prettiest girl at the dance, but she'll keep you warm at night

1. Cook noodles according to package directions and drain. Meanwhile, saute mushrooms in a little butter.
2. Combine hot noodles with mushroom soup, undrained tomatoes, and sauteed mushrooms. Top with a little cracked black pepper.
3. Pour into a greased 9x13 or casserole dish. Top with 1-2 cups shredded cheddar.

4. Bake at 350 about 45-60 minutes, or until bubbly.

Thanks, Mom.

Sweet Morning

Not the least of which because we made two different kinds of syrup!

The first was Vanilla-Brown Sugar Syrup from Joy the Baker. Our love for banana-walnut pancakes is well-documented, and Joy actually has an AWESOME-looking recipe for them on the same page as the syrup. However, it's a little more complicated than what we're used to--including separating the eggs and beating the yolks apart from the whites--so since we're lazy, we decided to stick with our old standby, even though her pictures look good enough to eat.

However. She also has a recipe for homemade syrup, which solves a problem that's been eating away at me for awhile. I love syrup on my pancakes. I hate that most storebought syrup is nothing more than caramel coloring and high-fructose corn syrup. I love the idea of using real maple syrup, but hate the fact that a modest-sized jug runs $8-12 no matter where I look. In these lean economic times, I just can't justify it. This quandary has left my hands tied for some time, so we've been eating our pancakes with butter and/or jam; but sometimes, you just want syrup on your pancakes!

Enter the following, which is still pure sugar, but it's made fresh from scratch and is as wholesome (relatively speaking) as the ingredients you put in it.

Vanilla-Brown Sugar Syrup

(from Joy the Baker)

1 1/2 cups packed dark brown sugar

1 1/2 cups water

3 Tablespoon unsalted butter

1/8 teaspoon salt

1 Tablespoon fresh lemon juice

1/2 teaspoon vanilla extract

Combine brown sugar, water, butter, and salt in a 2-quart heavy saucepan and bring to a oil, stirring until sugar is dissolved. Boil until syrupy and reduced to about 1 1/2 cups, about 12-15 minutes. Remove from heat and stir in lemon juice and vanilla, then let cool to warm or room temperature.

It was so good. We made a half batch and as promised, it reduced by about half again within 15 minutes. A half batch was enough for two generous pancake eaters, or 3-4 more moderate pancake eaters, so we wound up with just a little bit leftover. I questioned the lemon juice but added it anyway, and was glad I did; it lent just a little bit of depth to what would otherwise have been too one-dimensionally sweet.

Our second syrupy concoction comes via Making A Home and Family and is the basis for a homemade Starbucks' Gingerbread Latte. YUM! Having recently purchased these tiny espresso cups and saucers for less than $1 apiece (which we've realized we will probably recoup in no time due to the fact that we're now drinking about 1/4 of the amount of espresso we used to at one serving), we were delighted to have something so delicious to put in them.

She details how to make the whole thing out of steamed milk and espresso, but because we're pretty individualized in our preferences for the espresso-to-milk ratio, and because we also plan to add it to regular coffee in the morning, I just focused on the syrup.

Which couldn't be easier! Here's what she says to do:

Gingerbread Syrup

Put 1 1/2 cups sugar, 2 cups water, 2 teaspoons ground ginger, 1 teaspoon cinnamon, and 1/2 teaspoon of vanilla in a small saucepan. Bring to boil on the stove and reduce to a simmer for 15 minutes.

Worked like a charm, although I would even increase the amount of spice next time. We added about a teaspoon to our espressos, and MAHAF recommends 1/4 cup for a full latte. This is definitely something we'll be making again!