Tankless water heaters have long been a go-to for off-grid properties. They quickly turn propane into hot water, which is good. But I'm wondering about the pros of cons with solar and even batteries being so inexpensive these days - compared to a heat pump water heater or even a conventional water heater. Water heating is pretty energy intensive, but if you can do it with solar, it's one less thing to bring on the homestead. Not to mention the possibilities of traditional water heating using a solar collector, as has been popular with eco-conscious families and homesteads since the 1970s, though there yo uhave
That’s generally been my experience too. Food governs weight, not physical activity so much. I rarely walk many places these days, except maybe a few laps around the office, and some weeks are a bit lazier then I used to be. But I haven’t seen significant weight gain. To be fair, I do ride my mountain bike to work most days, and I burn a lot of calories that way – but I used to walk a lot more then I do now.
When I gave up on eating processed food and most meat, the pounds almost melted off my body. Not because I massively stepped up exercise but because I made my own food using the healthy, basic ingredients and not the things that come in packages with fancy labels.
I kept it simple, choosing whole foods – especially lots of fruits and vegetables, cooked with olive oil, whole wheat flour, oatmeal. I limited carbs somewhat – choosing healthier carbs like oatmeal, raw cornmeal and whole wheat flour. I quit artificial sugars, though I do use Splenda in pancakes and sometimes with onions or baking bread when I want something a bit sweeter.
The things I’ve learned to love aren’t fancy or organic. They’re just basic foods, emphasizing those basic ingredients that anybody can read about on the internet being super healthy. You have to develop a taste for them, but then you began to love them not just for the taste but knowing the wonderful things they are doing for your body. Remember this, if a package is good for your burn barrel, it’s bad for your health. If it’s good for your compost pile, then eat lots of it.
But in a major new study published in the journal PNAS, Pontzer and an international team of collaborators found that's not the case. They compared the daily total calorie burn for people from 34 different countries and cultures around the world. The people involved ran the spectrum from hunter-gatherers and farming populations with low obesity rates, to people in more sedentary jobs in places like Europe and the U.S., where obesity is widespread.
"Surprisingly, what we find is that actually, the total calories burned per day is really similar across these populations, even though the lifestyle and the activity levels are really different," says Pontzer. What we know about the health risks of ultraprocessed foods Shots - Health News What we know about the health risks of ultra-processed foods
And that finding offers strong evidence that diet — not a lack of physical activity — is the major driver of weight gain and obesity in our modern world.
"This does sort of really fly in the face of what a lot of us anecdotally assumed was driving a lot of the weight gain and obesity today," says Deirdre Tobias, an obesity and nutritional epidemiologist at the Brigham and Women's Hospital in Boston and the Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health. Tobias was not involved in the new research.
Today is going to be a hot one the weatherman warns us over the next few days. I am riding into the office after dropping Big Red off to the shop and waiting anxiously for the news. In the evening, I’ll probably bus it back home as the hill won’t be fun ni the heat, maybe leaving work early to pick up Red if it’s ready.
Starting off the day by dropping off the truck at around 8:30 AM this morning, 🗝️ I could probably do a bit earlier and drop my keys off in the night box so I get to work closer to on time. Going to drop the truck off, and hop on the Rail Trail and head in. Truth is the shop is a bit closer to my office then the apartment, so I should be in close to time. And who is going to report me, I am the big boss man after all and my boss works five miles up the road, and it’s not like they care as long as I keep the data frames and Excel spreadsheet 🖥️ flowing their way. Already cut the August lists, and they are schedule to send to mail house ✉️ on Friday.
Yesterday was a remarkable nice day, ☀️ despite having some more problems with the bike front derailleur 🚲 which I fixed enough to get me to work and back home with a piece of p-travel from the road and adjusted when I got home. 🛠️ Took the hub caps off the truck last night. Dropping the truck off shortly at the shop. I know it’s probably just the one bad hub, but who knows what they’ll find in the front end but I want it fixed if it’s likely to fail before vacation. Got some sweet corn and zucchuni, some of which I fried up yesterday and are using some of it in the pancakes this morning to make them extra tender and delicious. 😋
I was noticing after pulling off the hub caps that front brakes are getting a thin, but I certainly didn’t measure them or get that good of look. Hoping they’llhold out for a while, Rather put as little money as possible into a truck I plan to get rid of in 8 months or so. 🛻 Big Red for the most part has been great, and it has been fun for ten years having a big lifted truck – and a stock truck four years before that – but I’m ready to move on before my road trip out west next summer. I need something to worry about in the mean-time on vacation. Or maybe I just need to chill out and enjoy the grass on vacation while I listen to the cows moo. 🏖️
Rode out to Five Rivers and read more of Mark Kulinsky’s Milk 🐮 about the world history of dairy. On the morning ride In and back home listened to more of White Rural Rage by Tom Schaller, a book I don’t totally agree with everything in it but I’m always fascinated by rural perspectives on life. Beautiful evening for sure, 🌸 but already it feels like ware losing daylight a fair bit in the evening. Need to make sure to keep the lights well charged on the bike. 🔦 I did charge the front bike light overnight.
Maybe that’s one reason that gives me pause about taking summer vacation at the end of August – the days are so much shorter then though it gives me more time to enjoy star gazing ✨ and the camp fire. 🔥 Often when it’s still somewhat light out to 9:30 PM, by the time you want to have a fire at 10 or 10:30 PM it’s pretty late and I get up so early, that I’m real tired by the time there is much of a fire to sit. Plus have a beer and smoke and it really knocks you out. But that said, I really like the idea of an extended late August vacation – I am now thinking of leaving on August 21st and just kind of hanging out in the National Forest through Labor Day September 1st.
I think that I haven’t taken much time off, and I get to the office early to do work, I have quite a bit of time built up. 🗓️ Plus I’m not sure I’ll make a full week off on October this year as I’m not going to West Virginia – this year it will probably only be an extended weekend to St. Regis Canoe Area to paddle 🛶 and ride a bunch of the new Tupper Lake to Saranac Lake Rail Trail 🚴 that the DEC is so heavily promoting. Maybe a trip in early November down to Long Pond to hunt and hike, and then a day trip down to Pennsylvania but I don’t want to be in the situation I’m rushing to take days off in December, lest I can’t roll it all over to new year. 🐿️ 🔫
Truth is despite my sometimes anxiety and kicking the can down the road, 🥫 things aren’t that bad. My confusion on everything lately isn’t schizophrenia or old timers disease, but my very legitimate criticisms of the woke throw-away plastic society we all live in these days. 🗑️ There are just so many beautiful wild flowers 🌼 to look at in woods as we are midsummer, and that’s a respite from the insanity of everything else in this world. 🌍 The truth is waiting isn’t a bad thing, if you’re investing and learning about options. There aren’t really any houses 🏘️ I like near the city, and I don’t want to invest in crap I hate and want to get rid of as soon as possible. 🐐 I want acerage, that off-grid place with livestock but it’s nearly impossible to find that without an excessive commute. And New York State sucks on so many levels.
There are just so many things I am trying to learn about 📙 from timber frame-houses to goat farming, management of forest land and renewable energy systems. ⚡ For a life to be. Despite the advertisements and housing listings I look on Zillow, vinyl siding, drywall, asphalt roofs, granite countertops and all things fake aren’t the only options. Especially in rural areas, there is still a lot of land for sale and some more interesting off-grid homes and rural homesteads. The problem is just they are so difficult with commuting. But I know there is an options for early retirement. 🧑🔧Truth is I’m just fillibustering my time, as my nervous about the truck repairs, though I know they’re not as bad as my mind wants them to believe they are.
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