It isn't all roses

I'm feeling rather tired and grumbly these past few days. It's certainly not the ideal way to head into the Christmas weekend.

I brought this on myself by deciding to get up at 3 A.M. Tuesday morning to view the lunar eclipse on the winter solstice. I was hoping the event would enlighten me in some way but all it did was make me extremely tired because I didn't end up getting back to sleep that night.

I woke up Michael and Matthew at 3:30 A.M because I promised that I'd let them see the show for themselves. They thought it was extremely cool and they fell asleep quickly once I put them back in bed.

I guess I shouldn't be surprised that I'm feeling worn down on the winter solstice. It is after all the shortest day of the year. The days start getting longer from here on out ... that's the silver lining.

A few more decent nights of sleep will make a tremendous difference but until then I expect to remain grumpy and grumbly.

Just for the record ..... at this very moment I'm sick of goat milking, I'm tired of pickled 'anything', I don't want to see another slice of zucchini loaf and even the mention of chicken noodle soup makes me cringe.

On the bright side I'm in the perfect state of mind to truly appreciate the upcoming family Christmas feast. Bring it on!

Winter milking ....

Every evening Barb or I head out into the cold, dark night to milk Lucy. I always apologize to Lucy for my cold hands that are about to touch her skin. She doesn't seem to mind ... well, at least she doesn't show it if she does.

It's a peaceful experience, milking that is, and as long as Lucy isn't in a 'kicky' mood it only takes about 10 minutes to get 4 or 5 cups of milk.


By the time I'm done milking her my hands are no longer cold. They are toasty warm. I really appreciate that warmth .... almost as much as I appreciate the milk.

As usual, I thank Lucy and put her back in her stall for the night. Then I head back into the house to pasteurize the milk ... that is until this weekend. This weekend I decided to go natural and stop heat treating her milk. So far I've made yogurt and cream cheese from unpasteurized milk. Everything tastes absolutely the same as before.

Making this change means that I have to get past the phycological fear that whispers in my ear that "unpasteurized milk is unsafe". I don't believe that it's unsafe but it's still a leap of faith. I know the risks, having done my research, but I have complete trust in my source of milk ... Lucy. If I suddenly get ill I'll reconsider this change but for now I'm pushing on because it simply feels right.

What do you think about this change? Am I crazy or right on track?

Enjoying the season

Pond skating is what country living is all about .... there's nothing like it.

We've had a number of pretty cold days lately so we laced up the skates and got a head start on the pond rink this past Saturday. We heard a few cracks while shoveling but nothing that made us feel unsafe.


This week is suppose to remain unseasonably cold so we should get a lot more ice time in this week.

We've also been getting into the holiday season by doing some holiday crafts and putting up our Christmas decorations.

Barb made a lovely wreath the other day using cuttings from around the property. She tries to make one or two every year. They last a very long time and they always look beautiful.


Michael got into the spirit as well by making a colourful holiday mug as a craft while at a friends birthday party.

This will be his new hot chocolate mug that will get put into action after spending an hour or so skating on the pond.

He did a great job!

Geoengineering

Have you heard about geoengineering yet? It's the science devoted to using technology to manipulate the Earth's environment to combat global warming.

One of the potential geoengineering methods suggests spraying microscopic sulphur particles into the stratosphere to blockout some of the Sun's rays from reaching the Earth. This will cool the planet's temperature.


Interesting concept but will it work? Actually it already has ... almost 200 years ago. In April 1815 Mount Tambora (Indonesia) erupted and released many tons of sulfur vapour 43 kms up into the stratosphere. The sulfur vapour effectively blanketed the globe and blocked out enough of the Sun's rays to cool the planet by an average of 0.4 to 0.7 C in 1816.

That doesn't seem much cooler does it? But that small change in temperature had a devastating impact on some regions of the planet. Many people, livestock and crops perished. 1816 is also known as the year without a summer and the year of poverty. Not only does Mount Tambora prove that this method of geoengineering is possible but it also serves as a warning that we'll be trading one problem for another.

To be honest, geoengineering will bring a whole host of problems for the world to contend with. With lower global temperatures some regions will see less rain fall. That reduced rainfall may result in lower crop yields and reduce the fresh water supply. This will increase tensions between various nations that depend on that water supply for survival. That's far from a win win scenario.

I struggled while writing this post because I'm not sure why I'm even bringing this up. I guess I simply wanted to state the obvious that we aren't doing enough to reduce the amount of greenhouse gases we are spewing into the environment. Trying to geoengineer a solution might buy us some time but it isn't going to fix the problem.

We need to do more .... by doing less. Less burning of fossil fuels ... less driving ... less flying ... less industrial fertilizers .... less industrial corn fed beef ... the list goes on and on. So please, go out there and start doing less. The less you do the more you'll be helping spread the word.

Will a planet of 7 billion people start doing enough 'less' to avoid geoengineering? I doubt it. But we have to try.

Busy .... with no time to blog ....

I've been finding it extremely difficult to devote any time to blogging lately. You may have already noticed. But rest assured I'm still here and still on the diet.

I've been spending a lot of time in the kitchen trying out new recipes. Here's a quick update on what I've been making.....

I'm not a big fan of liver but since I have 2 pounds of it in the freezer I have to do something with it. So the other day I whipped up a quick goat liver curry. I was surprised that it turned out quite nice. It won't make my list of top 10 favourite meals but it was a nice change.

I used goat liver, onions, tomatoes, salt, pepper, cumin, coriander, cloves, paprika, garam masala, turmeric, and cinnamon.

This past weekend I revisited the wonderful cream cheese recipe I made a few weeks ago. Same results .... amazing flavour! I used 2 liters of goat milk and I get 1 liter of whey (I save for making pitas) and the rest is a creamy, tasty cream cheese.

Since I now had a good supply of cream cheese I started to get a craving for some fresh bagels. My niece has a simple recipe that makes 32 snack size bagels. I borrowed the recipe and made 16 bagels instead of 32 (bigger is better, right?).

They turned out more like buns than bagels so we called them bungles.

They taste like bagels ... soft and chewy. I ate the first 5 'bungles' and cream cheese in less than 15 minutes. The craving was that intense.

Recently I also took a stab at making some goat meat ravioli. I simply used ground goat meat with various spices to taste. Nothing fancy but boy is it delicious.

What I didn't eat immediately went into the freezer. It comes in handy for a quick and easy meal. I'll definitely be making this again soon.

You can see that I'm starting to branch out a little bit by taking on new recipes. I have to keep things interesting or I'm going to go crazy on this diet. If you have any suggestions on what I should try next please let me know! I'm always looking for my next favourite meal.

End of November update

Six months behind me with six months to go! This diet actually seems to be getting easier too. Go figure.

My official weight is unchanged from last month at 156 pounds. I'm happy with that weight and I'm now used to my new 'shape'. I still need to tone up and build some muscle mass back but that can wait for another day.

The fear I was developing that I was going to waste away to nothing has subsided ... I think I've found my equilibrium. That feels great ... truly it does.

That's the good news and now for the bad ...... it's cold being skinny!

For as long as I can remember I've always had a good heater. I'm the guy that wore shorts and a T-shirt in the middle of winter. I was rarely cold. Those days appear to be long gone I'm afraid. I've come to realize that I never really had a good heater ... what I had was good insulation. That extra weight was keeping me warm.

I'm too much of an energy conservationist to turn up the heat at home so I'm doing what I've told the rest of the family to do in the past ... Put on a sweater!

C'est la vie. In the end I'd rather be chilly than chubby.

100 meter cheesecake

I've been so extremely busy this past week that I haven't had a chance to do any blogging. But late last night Barb baked me a 100 meter cheesecake that turned out so spectacularly good that I just had to tell you about it.

Barb bakes a mean cheesecake so when she gets going I simply get out of her way and let her weave her magic. Here's what I saw her do ....

Ingredients:

2 cups fresh goat cream cheese
1 cup sugar with a dash of salt
2 teaspoons vanilla
3 fresh eggs
2 cups goat yogurt
1/4 cup of goat butter
1 1/4 cups of graham cracker crumbs


Obviously the graham cracker crumbs aren't 100 meter diet compliant but it's such a small violation of the rules that we'll let it slide ;)

Normally Barb would use sour cream instead of yogurt but the substitution worked well in this recipe.

She mixed the butter and the graham cracker crumbs together and lined the cake pan with them. She used beaters to mix the cream cheese, sugar, vanilla, and eggs. Like a kid, I got to lick the beaters .... Mmmm, I knew this was going to be good.

Next she folded in the yogurt and poured the entire mixture into the graham cracker shell. She placed the cake pan in the oven and baked it for 1 hour at 350 F. After the hour was up she turned the heat up to 425 F for about 15 minutes.

I feel absolutely spoiled. She's such a great baker ... thanks Honey!