The City Mouse in the Country

I'm slowly but surely becoming more of a vegetarian.  I find myself ordering plant based dishes whenever possible when eating out.  I've packed myself plant based dishes for lunch. If I'm on my own for dinner I've been known to have some veggie pizza or plant based seafood from time to time.  I don't mind tofu, lentils and chickpeas and even have some falafel and saitan in my freezer although I've no idea what to do with the latter.  I'm sure I'll figure it out.     I've made paneer and used it as a meat substitute .   My diet started to change for several reasons, but reducing my carbon footprint was certainly one of those reasons.  While I'm sure this is going to upset some people, animal welfare really didn't play that much of a role into my decision to go flexatarian . So the question becomes; if I believe in plant based diets and it's ability to reduce my overall impact on this planet.  Why in the hell did I buy one half of a co

      Imagine the scene, a family fights for survival in a cold and dark world, where the winds blow ceaselessly and the wolves are always at the door.   A ragged man, tired of the weight of the world, exits the home and fights his way through the snow to a lone generator...with a single mighty pull the dark dissipates as the lights come on.  His family inside cheers for now they have heat and don't have to worry about eating cold beans out of a can!        Dramatic music swells.....       Okay, maybe it's not that dramatic.  Maybe the wolves at the door was a bit over the top, but the point is that ever since we lost power for just a tad over 24 hours recently; the idea of a generator has never been that far from my mind.     Plus, I work from home and I depend on power to not only allow me to access my computer and phone lines...but to also keep the pellet stove running.        When it comes to generators however, I quickly learned that I know less than diddly squat about t

      Hey everyone!  Did you know that this page now has a companion Facebook page?    It will have articles, memes and such that interes t me that relate to this page but don't really apply.  Be sure to check it out.          So a few days ago my wife and I lost power for roughly 24 hours.   It was out on Sunday at roughly 4 PM and stayed out until Monday afternoon.      To be honest I've often wondered if I could lead a "Amish" style life.   I'm not a fan of TV in general.  I figured that some time in the future I would conduct a little experiment and see if I could give up things like the radio, TV and even my cell phone for 24 hours or so.        No, I'm not a " Prepper ", frankly if the proverbial excrement did hit the rotary blades I would probably be one of the first to go.   My nickname would be "Bait" in a Zombie survival situation.   I'm actually OK with that, because I believe in other people, that the best of a society come

 we honestly don't know where to go next. Our power was out for over 24 hours.  Luckily our house held the heat pretty well and we did not lose any food or other things.   It did however present us with some challenges and got me thinking that with winter coming, we are going to need some sort of back up power supply. One of the biggest problems that we have with our home is that it's all electric.  We do have some long term goals to help correct that issue.   Everything from solar panels to switching out the electric range for a propane range and getting a tank for it.  It looks like for now though we are going to have to go with a generator, and if we are going to go with a generator we have to ask ourselves what we want from it. The biggest issue that I have honestly is that I know literally nothing about them!!! I have never used one and wouldn't even know that to ask or where to begin. Here are my questions/concerns:   We have to have the following running come colder

We are at the supermarket yesterday and manged to buy nearly $150 dollars worth of goods.  Including some ground lamb that I intend to turn into a late 16th Century dish o nce I find some powered nutmeg and cloves.   Interestingly enough, the same market had cloves but I've no way to make them into a powder.  So, if anyone wants to get me a pestle and mortar for the holiday's that be great.  But I regress.   Sue and I have a refrigerator and two freezers, both of which are stuffed to the gills.   Our basement has become an ad hoc pantry as food takes over one corner.  My wine fridge has 3 local wines in it and I'm planning on adding a few more to it in the coming months. I've got a few beers stored away as well. I could not help but laugh and tell Sue that the "City Mouse" was storing away food for winter. Which, she reminded me, is exactly what we are doing.   We moved into our home in September.  Basically living here for only two months and missing out on