I went to the dentist recently for a cleaning and checkup and everyone in there was sick. Laying there with your mouth open while germs dive in was enough that I have a mild cold that started Sunday night.
I have avoided the antihistamine regimen with a simple, natural remedy. I have been making some green tea and adding 1 Tbsp of coconut oil and a tsp of honey. Within 20 -30 minutes I have a reduction of symptoms, increased energy and zero side effects.
My normal side effects from antihistamines include mood issues that make employing Dalai Lama ways impossible when dealing with others. They make me edgy and prone to anger easily.
We are off tomorrow morning for an overnight at The Snow Bowl Cabin in the MTTA system skimtta.com . It should be fun. There are 16 of us and we are doing a pizza party for our potluck dinner tomorrow. I hope we get some great pictures of Mt Rainier to share, but I know there will be a good story.
Be very well and more soon....
Thursday, January 17, 2013
Sunday, January 13, 2013
A Perfect Switch
Pam, Phyllis, Emily and I headed for Mt Rainier for some snowshoeing Saturday. Our original intention was to snowshoe Narada Falls and Reflections Lake, but when we saw how clear it was we decided to go for the bigger views on Rampart Ridge.
It was about 20 degrees when we headed out and not much warmer when we returned to the can about 3 hours later. I learned a valuable lesson. If you close your trekking poles when they are wet they won't open if they are frozen. I hiked without poles for the first time in a long time. It was a great exercise in balance that I only failed at once.
Narada Falls was only going to be 500 ft of elevation gain where Rampart ridge was more that 3 times that. We ended up keeping our snowshoes strapped to our packs since most of the snow was crunchy and well packed. We were to the Longmire viewpoint in just over an hour where we snacked. An aggressive camp raider of a Gray Jay attempted a steal of my snack right out of my hands. I had flashbacks of Hitchcock for a second, but he only made one attempt.
Our goal was to g forward and connect with the Wonderland trail and take it down to Longmire, but when we came out at the Rainier vies area the tracks ended and we were looking steeply downhill. I made one attempt to see if we could continue but four step down I postholed to my crotch and barely got my foot out with the boot still on. We decided it was best to go back the way we came - almost.
At the bottom of the trail there is a little nature walk that was a little longer than the way we walked in so we took it. It was really flat and very pretty. Anyone could do the loop at the bottom. It is less than a mile round trip from Longmire parking lot.
I would tell you about all of the silly people spun out and otherwise doing silly things on our way out of the park but the Dalai Lama wants me to be more compassionate and I am trying.
Be very well and more soon....
It was about 20 degrees when we headed out and not much warmer when we returned to the can about 3 hours later. I learned a valuable lesson. If you close your trekking poles when they are wet they won't open if they are frozen. I hiked without poles for the first time in a long time. It was a great exercise in balance that I only failed at once.
Narada Falls was only going to be 500 ft of elevation gain where Rampart ridge was more that 3 times that. We ended up keeping our snowshoes strapped to our packs since most of the snow was crunchy and well packed. We were to the Longmire viewpoint in just over an hour where we snacked. An aggressive camp raider of a Gray Jay attempted a steal of my snack right out of my hands. I had flashbacks of Hitchcock for a second, but he only made one attempt.
Our goal was to g forward and connect with the Wonderland trail and take it down to Longmire, but when we came out at the Rainier vies area the tracks ended and we were looking steeply downhill. I made one attempt to see if we could continue but four step down I postholed to my crotch and barely got my foot out with the boot still on. We decided it was best to go back the way we came - almost.
At the bottom of the trail there is a little nature walk that was a little longer than the way we walked in so we took it. It was really flat and very pretty. Anyone could do the loop at the bottom. It is less than a mile round trip from Longmire parking lot.
I would tell you about all of the silly people spun out and otherwise doing silly things on our way out of the park but the Dalai Lama wants me to be more compassionate and I am trying.
Be very well and more soon....
Friday, January 11, 2013
No Crazy January Plan, Paully?
I know all 5 of my regular readers were waiting for the big announcement of what Pam and I were going to do to torture ourselves nutritionally through the month of January as we usually do. We talked about doing something and quickly came to the realization that we have been eating so cleanly for the last year or more that no crazy plan was necessary.
Here is what we do now.
We eat an almost vegan organic diet. Almost takes into account the small amounts of Parmigiano Reggiano and Pecorino Romano that we use for pasta dishes and airpopped popcorn - recipe below. We also occasionally will eat some wild caught fish or organic chicken, but I can count on one hand the amount of those occasions from last year.
The less meat I eat the better I feel. When I do eat some I usually regret it for a couple of days. I feel out of balance or something.
The same can be said for cheeses. When we order a veggie pizza somewhere and forget to tell them to go really light on the cheese I am a phlegm bomb for a day or two after.
What we have added in the last couple of months is some barley grass which we get in a powdered form and mix in our daily veggie juices. It jacks up the nutrient load and adds to the zip I get from the juice.
We recently saw a documentary where a guy explained why juicing is effective. Ideally, you would eat the veggies instead, but eating 8-10 carrots, a beet with greens, a cucumber, 5-6 oz of kale, 2 inches of ginger root, a green apple, a pear and 1/4 of a fennel bulb with stalk would take a while and if would be hours for the nutrients to begin their work. When you drink the juice it is 15 seconds before they start to work. Nice, right?
It is actually easy to convert most recipes to vegan. You switch any chicken or beef stock with veggie stock - Trader Joe's Organic Low Sodium Stock in $1.99. For chili you can use diced eggplant as a meat substitute. If you make your chili right you can't taste the meat when you are done anyway. It is all about the spices.
Marinara is a vegan sauce unless you mess it up. It is Tomatoes, garlic and basil traditionally. I add onion to mine as well. You take that base and add some chopped - not sliced - crimini mushrooms and the sauce tastes nice and meaty.
The only thing that will make vegan food seem unfulfilling is a lack of imagination of the person preparing it. You need to play with your food.
Decidedly Not Vegan Popcorn Topping
I keep a small jar of Olive oil mixed with Dried Oregano and Minced Garlic that I add to as needed. It is great for brushing on some bread to toast for going with pasta or whatever or using as a dip for bread as well.
I add some fresh grated Parmigiano Reggiano and Pecorino Romano with a some of the olive oil mixture and stir it well to blend and soften the cheese. The amount is up to your batch. We usually make a batch and a half - which requires you to shake the popper to get the kernels moving - and my mix has about 2 tbsp of the cheese and enough oil mixture to cover.
As the corn is popping you drizzle the mixture with a spoon and then when the popper is done I toss the corn until it is all evenly coated. It is good enough that you won't miss butter at all.
That's what I have for today. Tomorrow we snowshoe up at Mt Rainier so there should be some great pictures coming.
Be very well and more soon....
Here is what we do now.
We eat an almost vegan organic diet. Almost takes into account the small amounts of Parmigiano Reggiano and Pecorino Romano that we use for pasta dishes and airpopped popcorn - recipe below. We also occasionally will eat some wild caught fish or organic chicken, but I can count on one hand the amount of those occasions from last year.
The less meat I eat the better I feel. When I do eat some I usually regret it for a couple of days. I feel out of balance or something.
The same can be said for cheeses. When we order a veggie pizza somewhere and forget to tell them to go really light on the cheese I am a phlegm bomb for a day or two after.
What we have added in the last couple of months is some barley grass which we get in a powdered form and mix in our daily veggie juices. It jacks up the nutrient load and adds to the zip I get from the juice.
We recently saw a documentary where a guy explained why juicing is effective. Ideally, you would eat the veggies instead, but eating 8-10 carrots, a beet with greens, a cucumber, 5-6 oz of kale, 2 inches of ginger root, a green apple, a pear and 1/4 of a fennel bulb with stalk would take a while and if would be hours for the nutrients to begin their work. When you drink the juice it is 15 seconds before they start to work. Nice, right?
It is actually easy to convert most recipes to vegan. You switch any chicken or beef stock with veggie stock - Trader Joe's Organic Low Sodium Stock in $1.99. For chili you can use diced eggplant as a meat substitute. If you make your chili right you can't taste the meat when you are done anyway. It is all about the spices.
Marinara is a vegan sauce unless you mess it up. It is Tomatoes, garlic and basil traditionally. I add onion to mine as well. You take that base and add some chopped - not sliced - crimini mushrooms and the sauce tastes nice and meaty.
The only thing that will make vegan food seem unfulfilling is a lack of imagination of the person preparing it. You need to play with your food.
Decidedly Not Vegan Popcorn Topping
I keep a small jar of Olive oil mixed with Dried Oregano and Minced Garlic that I add to as needed. It is great for brushing on some bread to toast for going with pasta or whatever or using as a dip for bread as well.
I add some fresh grated Parmigiano Reggiano and Pecorino Romano with a some of the olive oil mixture and stir it well to blend and soften the cheese. The amount is up to your batch. We usually make a batch and a half - which requires you to shake the popper to get the kernels moving - and my mix has about 2 tbsp of the cheese and enough oil mixture to cover.
As the corn is popping you drizzle the mixture with a spoon and then when the popper is done I toss the corn until it is all evenly coated. It is good enough that you won't miss butter at all.
That's what I have for today. Tomorrow we snowshoe up at Mt Rainier so there should be some great pictures coming.
Be very well and more soon....
Tuesday, January 8, 2013
Little Ranger Peak
Sunday we decided to hike/snowshoe Little Ranger Peak by Crystal Mountain. We had never done the trail before so we went from the information we had and decided it would be an easy hike - 6 miles round trip with 1500 feet of elevation gain.
We got on the trail and were spotted by 10-20 elk that wisely headed away from the trail we were on into the woods. We weren't in enough snow to snowshoe, so we snow hiked again. There is a little bit of a trade off. The snowshoes keep you on top of the snow, but they cause more work. In the worst places we were maybe leaving 8 inch depressions in pretty crunchy snow so we kept hiking.
We made the top where there is an intersection of 2 other trails. Next time we will likely take one of them so we can get a little extra mileage. The cloud cover remained, but the scenery was still worthy of a picture or two.
On the way down we had some fun and winter routed some switchbacks since we had Natalie and Susanne waiting for us at the trailhead. They had turned around earlier because Natalie was still recovering from a foot surgery. Phyllis drove with them so they waited for us.
We made it back to the car and headed down. We switched on the radio to check the Seahawks score just in time to hear Washington score the second touchdown in the 1st quarter. I call that good timing since everything after that was all Seahawks.
Be very well and more soon....
We got on the trail and were spotted by 10-20 elk that wisely headed away from the trail we were on into the woods. We weren't in enough snow to snowshoe, so we snow hiked again. There is a little bit of a trade off. The snowshoes keep you on top of the snow, but they cause more work. In the worst places we were maybe leaving 8 inch depressions in pretty crunchy snow so we kept hiking.
We made the top where there is an intersection of 2 other trails. Next time we will likely take one of them so we can get a little extra mileage. The cloud cover remained, but the scenery was still worthy of a picture or two.
On the way down we had some fun and winter routed some switchbacks since we had Natalie and Susanne waiting for us at the trailhead. They had turned around earlier because Natalie was still recovering from a foot surgery. Phyllis drove with them so they waited for us.
We made it back to the car and headed down. We switched on the radio to check the Seahawks score just in time to hear Washington score the second touchdown in the 1st quarter. I call that good timing since everything after that was all Seahawks.
Be very well and more soon....
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