I Deleted my Facebook Account

...spent alone in front of a computer. Since deleting my account I’ve found myself setting up in-person meetings with people I don’t see very often rather than just looking at their Facebook posts. But it would be wrong, I think, to blame Facebook for pulling us apart. Facebook, as Patrick Deneen put it, “elicits loneliness from a deeper set of philosophical, political, and even theological commitments,” namely the “do it your way” consumerist cult o...

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077 Radical Mycology

Our guest this week is Peter McCoy. Peter is a self-taught mycologist with 15 years of accumulated study and experience, Peter is an original founder of Radical Mycology, a grassroots organization and movement that teaches the skills needed to work with mushrooms and other fungi for personal, societal, and ecological resilience. Peter is the lead cultivation expert for the Amazon Mycorenewal Project and Open Source Ecology and the primary author...

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A Last Minute Gift Suggestion . . .

...hat Amazon is suggesting that I buy our own books, The Urban Homestead and Making It, as Christmas gifts. It also recommended Rachel Kaplan and K. Ruby Blume’s excellent book Urban Homesteading. It’s a reminder that this blog is partially supported by your book purchases at both independent booksellers and through the Amazon links on our Publications page. Many thanks to all of you who have bought our books in the past and continued to support us....

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A Question About Freezing and Canning Home Grown Vegetables

...s sort of preservation. Frozen berries, for example, are fantastic for jam making. If I need to make some peach jam out of season, I head straight to the frozen fruit section of the grocery store. Your caller was asking about vegetables, of course, and there would be some nuances. First, they will want to be sure to freeze the vegetables properly, such as blanching certain veggies to set color and stop enzymatic reactions. Following the guidelines...

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Root Simple Redesign

...me big improvements to our website. Roman Jaster, the designer of our book Making It (seen at the console in the picture above taking some last minute refinements from Mrs. Homegrown), is just about to pull the switch on the new design. We’re switching from Blogger to WordPress. Our new website design will feature: improved search functions an easier to navigate interface improved comment moderation better graphic design podcasts videos All of the...

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