Garage, Class, and Thyroid Medication Finished

Home Improvement Projects

I'm finally finished painting. There are still a few places where water is getting in during rain storms; I'll be darned if I know where how it's getting in. On the next warm, dry day (we get a few in Indiana during the fall and winter), I'll go around with a fresh can of foam when the wood is dry and hope for the best.

My garage and vegetable garden.

The window sill and the front door on my house are fixed, too. The sill, facing west, got badly weather beaten; the door is just old. I fixed the rot at the bottom of the door, put on a new sweep and numbers, painted the door and spray-painted the hinges with Rust-oleum. The deadbolt broke and I had to do quite a bit of retrofitting to install a new one. I bought and used a wood chisel to make room for a new strike plate. I think I learned how to use one in junior high shop class--one of those "useless" classes going by the wayside--but oddly, I don't remember what project I used it on. The first quarter, we used only hand tools.

I had someone else replace some trim on the roof, though, not wanting another accident to recover from. I actually thought about moving my mattress below the roofline in case I fell off, but decided to hire it out. It looks like the handywoman did a good job.

Classes

I finished my course on the Constitution. Government and the Revolutionary War were taught in grade school and maybe junior high or high school, but the information was cursory--we never even read the Declaration of Independence or the Constitution, and I don't think I ever heard of the Federalist Papers until I was out of college. When I was called for jury duty several years ago, the ignorance of the upper middle class people there about the legal process was stunning--they didn't know basic facts such as the state having to prove guilt rather than people having to prove their innocence. Twice over the weekend (here and here), I heard two British commentators remark on the ignorance of supposedly educated people, and I'm sad to say I agree with them. So here's a hat tip to Hillsdale College (and other resources of learning) for the chance to redeem ourselves.

Gut Biome

I've remarked before that I make l. reuteri yogurt--I've been making it for about a year, and in that year, I got off my thyroid medication. Another member at Dr. Davis's Inner Circle said his thyroid improved, too, after he started eating the yogurt. Not everybody there gets off their thyroid medicine (we're the only two I know of), but clearly, it's possible to reverse thyroid deficiency in some cases. I'm not sure if it's the yogurt we're eating, since there's a lot to the program, but Dr. Davis thinks the gut biome has something to do with thyroid deficiency.

I felt well enough to start working out again. This time, I just had normal discomfort afterwards. I think my aches and pains from a few weeks ago were related to the flu shot I had. If the shot was any indication of this season's strain of flu, it would make me extremely ill without the shot.

Comments

Lowcarb team member said…

Your garage and vegetable garden look good.
Hope you will be able to find the last few leaks though.

All the best Jan

October 27, 2020

Lori Miller said…

Thanks, Jan. It's good to have it pretty much finished.

October 27, 2020

Thanksgiving recipes for Pumpkin Pie & Cranberries--printable!

If you'd rather read a printed recipe than watch a video, here are my recent recipes for Better than Grandma's Pumpkin Pie and Probiotic Cranberry-Apple Relish. Hat tip to Dana Carpender, whose pumpkin pie recipe inspired this one. The cranberry-apple ferment is entirely my own creation. Pumpkin Pie--no grains, sugar or emulsifiers Crust 2 cups shelled raw pecans 1/4 teaspoon salt 1/4 teaspoon monk fruit powder* (or 3 tablespoons sugar substitute) 4 tablespoons butter, melted 2 tablespoons water Pumpkin Pie Filling 1 pie pumpkin 1-1/2 cups half and half (with no thickeners) 3 eggs 3-4 teaspoons monk fruit powder* (or 3/4 cup sugar substitute) 1/2 teaspoon salt 1 tablespoon pumpkin pie spice Preheat the oven to 350F. Stab the top of the pumpkin all the way through the flesh in a few places at the top. Place the pumpkin on a cookie sheet and bake for 1 hour. Let cool. While the pumpkin is baking, put the pecans in a food processor with the S blade and run until they are finely...

Cigna is Making Progress

Yesterday as I put my lunch in the refrigerator at work, I noticed a bunch of unfamiliar people in the break room. One of them, Pepe, started in: they were there for the health fair, they would check your cholesterol, the sugar in your blood, your height, your weight, and it would just take six minutes. A coworker asked him if he'd ever considered a career in sales. Just for blog fodder, I participated. They really were fast, and one even found me at my desk (in an office nearly half the size of a city block) after the tests were finished. My HDL cholesterol was 65--up from 42 from a year and a half ago, and up from 57, where it was last year when I'd been three months a low-carb diet . A level over 60 is considered good. I haven't taken any medication to make this happen. I went on a low-carb diet and eliminated wheat. I also take vitamin and mineral supplements in addition to a high-nutrient diet. What impressed me more, though, was that the nurse (and Cigna) said that bl...

Fly with Reuteri

If you're planning to travel by plane and you want to keep enjoying the benefits of l. reuteri yogurt, you might have gotten sticker shock from the price of l. reuteri probiotics. MyReuteri * costs $46 to $83 for 30 capsules, depending on the CFUs (colony-forming units, or the number of viable microorganisms). If you're thinking about economizing by putting some yogurt in a sturdy container and taking it with you, you can do that. I'll break down the pros and cons and look at some alternatives. Photo from Unsplash . Cost Yogurt might be less expensive than probiotics, but it isn't free. A half-cup serving costs about 70¢ to make if you start with a previous batch. It contains about 90 billion CFUs if fermented for 36 hours. This is a lot less than $5.56 for two capsules of 50 billion CFU MyReuteri, but for a one-week vacation, you'd only save $34 by eating yogurt instead. (You can freeze any unused capsules for later.) Furthermore, the yogurt would have to go in ...

30-second Fix for a Cracked Stick Blender

Use Mighty Fixit (if you still have some from 2012) or Rescue Tape (which looks like a similar product) to fix a cracked stick blender. After I fixed the attachment, I washed it in the sink and the tape held up. I also wrapped a knife handle several years ago, and it's been through thousands of washings.

No Dairy BiotiQuest Ferment in Apples + Cranberries + Celery

Can you have too much l. reuteri or SIBO yogurt? Yes--more than 1/2 cup of yogurt a day can raise your insulin or, in some people, cause sinus congestion or an upset stomach. Luckily, there are other foods you can ferment. One of my favorites is apples, cranberries and celery fermented with BiotiQuest Ideal Immunity probiotics. This recipe is slightly different from the one I posted before--I've left out the brown sugar and maple syrup since the apples provide plenty of sugar. Here's my four-minute video showing how to make it: You can buy the seedling mat here: https://www.amazon.com/dp/B01IDQD32Y/ref=dp_iou_view_item?ie=UTF8&th=1

Pain, Pain, Go Away!

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