Gay Mormon Guy

(Prepping has been updated.)


I was tweeted a line about this guy's blog. Mostly I ignore these kinds of tweets, because I figure they are going to be negative--like, pro-gay lifestyle, anti-Mormon, whatever. But for some reason, I clicked on the hyperlink. And then spent the next two hours reading his blog posts.

Wow. Was I surprised. His blog is at http://gaymormonguy.blogspot.com. I had forgotten that there is a distinction between feeling and behavior in the homosexual world (just like in the heterosexual world.) In my defense, that's because the only folks I know who happen to be gay, are actively involved in the lifestyle. Thinking back on it, I've never actually met someone who identifies as struggling with same sex attraction.

I appreciate David drawing such a clear picture between the two. I made that same point to a lesbian neighbor of mine once, but with all the drama going on nowadays, I had forgotten. I'm still tired of the drama. I'm still mad that organizations allow themselves to be bullied by the radical left. But I am heartened that there are people such as David to go about their lives, working to become the best they can be, and standing for time-honored values.

We're Jammin' !!

(Genealogy has been updated.)

I had planned on making some broccoli-corn chowder, and broccoli puree soup out of my garden yesterday.

Then an acquaintance said to me "hey, I have a large crate full of fruit that is poised on the edge of ripeness (if not over it). Want it?" 

So I jumped...and then spent all evening making jam. Ended up with 14 pints. I water bath canned 4 of them without pectin, as they were a nectarine/plum blend, and plum has a naturally high pectin ratio. The other 10 I made into freezer jam. I had forgotten I purchased, rather by accident, a whole bunch of freezer pectin pouches a year ago. They sat unused in my cupboard until last night.

So here are the results. I used the pints which were half-full so you could see the difference:

You may be able to tell straight away the jar on the left is freezer jam. It has quite large chunks of nectarine fruit in it. The jar on the right was cooked down first. Just that process alone rendered down the fruit to more of a "normal" consistency like you expect in jam.

The freezer one (probably due to the fact that it wasn't boiled for 30 minutes) tastes much more like fruit, whereas the shelf-stable (BWB) jam tastes more like..jam. They are still both good. Our family is evenly divided on taste: half each preferred one or the other.

This event reminded me why I generally only do berry jam: no peeling, scraping, blanching yada yada when you use berries. Pitted fruit jam (pitted fruit anything) is a significant time investment. The actually jam making part is a breeze by comparison !

For the freezer jam, I just followed Ball's directions on the pouch (4 cups mashed fruit, 1 1/2 cups sugar, 3 T lemon juice. Let sit for 10 min. Add freezer pectin, stir for another 3 min and poured into jars. It sat at room temperature for 30 minutes to "set", then I moved it into the refrigerator overnight and today into the freezer.

For the cooked jam, I used 6 cups (3 of each-nectarine and plum) of chopped and semi-mashed fruit, 3 cups sugar, 4 T lemon juice. Medium rolling boil for 30 min, skimming off foam. Ladled into hot jars and BWB'd for 10 minutes at a hard rolling boil.

I really miss the grow-your-own/can-your-own free food days. My grandparents used to farm self-reliantly on their backyard in the city plot. My grandfather used to grow and can enough of everything to last through late summer (next harvest) every year. In snow country. I wish I'd had enough sense to ask for the canning jars when they both passed away !

Anyway. Part of my problem with canning is I think the way my grandparents did it is the only way. As in, if you're not canning 100 bushels at a time, you're somehow a failure. I've realized slowly, that canning or gardening bit by bit, adds up. I have 14 pints more of jam than I did 48 hours ago (and it was free!) In a day or so, I'll have quite a bit of broccoli chowder put up, all free. I'm working on changing my viewpoint to accept that it really is okay to can just 8 pints or quarts and be done.

Bit by bit, row by row, that's how we see our prepping grow !

Two New Toys

SO EXCITED !!

Lots of good things breaking our way this week.

First off, we are cautiously optimistic that we are back working. DH was offered a job with a company about 30 miles south of us. They will send an offer letter out on Monday, if all goes well he will be back working in August. Not as much money as before, but it is a line position rather than a staff one, so there is a much better opportunity for growth and advancement. They've been around a long time also, so we feel the stability is there.

Obtained a four-tray Excalibur dehydrator. Have dehydrated some, will be posting a YouTube video on my dehydrating pork & beans, then preserving them in a Capri Sun (drink) pouch later (which means this post will be edited later with a hyperlink.)

Obtained two books (one of which has arrived) by Lorna Sass. The one I have in hand is called "Cooking Under Pressure" (20th anniversary edition) which has 150 recipes for the pressure cooker. IT'S MARVELOUS !!  I am looking forward to trying them all, and getting rid of most of my cookbooks!

Here's a sample:

PUREED ZUCCHINI SOUP 

2 T olive oil
1 lg onion, coarsely chopped
2 lg garlic cloves, crushed
2 sm potatoes, (1/2 lb) scrubbed, halved, and cut into 1 inch chunks
2 lg carrots, cut into 1/2 inch slices
4 lg zucchini (2 lbs) cut into 1 inch chunks
4 C vegetable broth or boullion
1/2 t crushed red pepper flakes
1/3 c chopped fresh basil or parsley
salt and pepper

Heat oil in cooker. Saute the onions, garlic for 1 minute. Add potatoes and saute another 2 min. Add carrots, zucchini, broth and crushed red pepper flakes.

Lock lid in place, bring to high pressure. Maintain high pressure for 5 minutes. Let pressure drop naturally.

Stir in basil, reserving a few tablespoons for garnish. Use an immersion blender to puree soup. Adjust seasonings and serve with a sprinkling of basil.

Enough to Share

Made the acquaintance of someone who just moved to southern California, job in hand to start July 1. When she got here (after she had signed leases for apt, etc.) the job vanished. She started another job a few days ago, but it means July is going to be pretty tight, likely August too, since everything she makes now will be going towards August rent and catching up etc.

She happened to mention something about being out of laundry detergent, and I was like, wait, what? (I happen to have a good size stockpile.) That's how I found out since she's new to southern California, the county services won't help. People in her church are dragging their heels too. I'm like, well heck...I practice REAL FOOD storage, so I went into the garage, got a bunch of stuff and took it over.

Wasn't much...just to tide them over, really: #10 can of rice, #10 can of oatmeal, quart of made up powdered milk to see if her kids like it (there's more where it came from if they do), #10 can of macaroni, some pre-made powder mix which makes Cream of Chicken soup (for casseroles), enough spaghetti sauce, diced tomatoes and frozen pre-cooked hamburger to last 6 meals...oh and laundry detergent and fabric softener !

This isn't about me (as in, how great thou art). This is about how cool it was to see a need, have the surplus and be able to step in quickly. None of those food-stores are going to make or break us. In fact, our family is going to benefit by us being able to rotate them out. My friend Wendi was able to do the same thing right after 9/11 (like, within hours of, literally.)

I thought about this woman's 16 year old and how (if they are interested) I could teach her/them how to work their way into building up a stockpile and become more self-reliant themselves: cooking from scratch, baking breads, canning, freezing, thinking meals ahead (i.e., get 2 meals worth of spaghetti rather than just one when stuff is on sale or you have extra money.) Again, not because "how great I am" but because I realized that my kids have grown up doing this kind of thing and have at least absorbed the gist of it without realizing it (can't say for sure they've absorbed the SKILL of it, LOL.)

Those are skills and mental acuity which will last a lifetime...teaching a man to fish as it were.

Cheryl Driggs author of Pantry Cooking (http://www.simplyprepared.com) was kind enough to send me a copy of her book of recipes which only use ingredients found at the LDS food pantry for its church members. I have two of Cheryl's books. I already thought she was a genius, now I KNOW it. I plan on buying many of the ingredients (at a regular store) and trying them out...and I'll YouTube them. Why I haven't done it before with her Pantry Cooking book, I don't know. This one just seemed so much simpler...maybe because the ingredients are fewer....after all, the food pantry is not the LDS version of Costco for crying out loud.

A lot of people don't stock enough to share. I'm glad we have. Some stock enough to share, and choose not to. That's their privilege. But if I have to err, I'd rather be securely inside the Matthew 25:34-40 campgrounds, than walking close to the BorderLands of Matthew 25:41-46.

Except for my toilet paper <grin.> You'll have to pry it out of my cold, dead, hands. 

HOW YOU CAN PROTECT YOUR FAMILY

In 1994, Apostle Neal A. Maxwell, provided sage advise on how you can protect your family in these trying times. In a (transcribed) speech entitled, Take Especial Care of Your Family, he prophetically wrote:

"During the last days, when 'all things shall be in commotion', the restored gospel of Jesus Christ provides so many essential things, including precious perspective of seeing 'things as they really are.'

"The eminent historian Will Durant wrote of the human need 'to seize the value and perspective of passing things....We want to know that the little things are little, and the big things are big before it is too late; we want to see things now as they will seem forever in the light of eternity.' (The Story of Philosophy, New York: Simon and Schuster, 1927 p.1).

"The gospel's illumination provides so much greater perspective for us concerning the role of the family.

"Before citing some challenges to family life, consider first, how living without God in the world brings a functional lack of consistent perspective. If there were no eternal truths, to what principles would mortals look for guidance? If not accountable to God, to whom are we ultimately accountable? Furthermore, if nothing is ever really wrong, then no one is ever really responsible. If there are no fixed boundaries, then there cannot be any excesses. Why should we be surprised then, at so many disturbing outcomes, including the lack of community, when every man does that which is 'right in his own eyes' and seeks not the righteousness of the Lord but instead walks in his own way?

"Reflect for instance, on how inoperative the Ten Commandments are in many lives. Today, killing, stealing and bearing false witness still carry some social stigma, and legal sanction, but sanction is effectively gone regarding sexual immorality, the Sabbath day, honoring fathers and mothers, and the taking of the name of the Lord in vain. Some of this decline represents the bitter harvest of ethical relativism, the philosophy of choice of many, reflecting no fixed, divine truths but merely the mores of the moment. No wonder Ortega y Gasset wisely warned, 'If truth does not exist, relativism cannot take itself seriously.' (The Modern Theme, New York: Harper & Row 1961)"

He then went on to describe terrible trends which, in his opinion, if left uncorrected, would lead to an even worse coalition of consequences, such as the number of children being born illegitimate, more children having no functioning fathers, the increase in children not living continuously with their biological father and mother throughout childhood, the increase in high schoolers contracting STDs, the number of children whose (both) parents are working outside the home, leaving the children to their own devices.

He continued, "...Healthy, traditional families are becoming an endangered species! Perhaps one day, families may even rank with the threatened spotted owl in effective attention given.

"As parenting declines, the need for policing increases. There will always be a shortage of police if there is a shortage of effective parents! Likewise, there will not be enough prisons if there are not enough good homes.

"There is as we all know, much talk about family values, but rhetoric by itself, cannot bring reform. Nostalgically, many wish for the family life of yesteryear; they regard family decline as regrettable but not reversible. Others, genuinely worried over the spilling social consequences, are busy placing sandbags downstream, even then the frenzied use of sandbags often destroys what little is left of family gardens. A few regard the family as an institution to be drastically redefined or even to be rid of.

"There are no perfect families, either in the world or in the Church, but there are many good families. My spiritual applause also goes to those heroic parents--left alone by death or divorce--who righteously and anxiously engage in nurturing and providing for their families, often against such heavy odds.

"Alas, in some families things do go wretchedly wrong, but these gross failures are no reason to denigrate further the institution of the family. We should make course corrections and fix the leaks, not abandon ship!

"Much modern despair and violence grow out of unhealthy attitudes towards any authority, including that in families. Thirty five years ago (1959), a BBC commentator worried that 'we are turning out adults...who will be even less capable than their parents in raising children with a sane attitude toward authority, and so an insidious avalanche may be developing, gathering a ghastly momentum from generation to generation." (The Listener 12 Feb 1959)

"The 'ghastly momentum' increases as profound social changes now occur in only a few years.

"Unfortunately, it is easier to praise the family than to create a successful family. It is easier to talk of family values, than to implement those values. It is easier to rejoice over our rich memories of a good family than to provide the rising generation with its own rich memories.

"The hard doctrines however, insist that we ask some hard questions:

1. How can a nation nurture family values without consistently valuing and protecting the family in its public policies?

2. How can we value the family without valuing parenting?

3. How can we value parenting if we do not value marriage?

4. How can there be love at home without love in a marriage?

"So many selfish tugs draw fathers and mothers away from each other and away from their children. 

"In contrast, so much of the Restoration" (of the gospel of Jesus Christ) "focuses on fundamental principles pertaining to the family, including the sealings of eternal famlies. Latter-day Saints therefore have no choice but to stand up and to speak up, whenever the institution of the family is concerned, even if we are misunderstood, resented, or brushed aside.

"After all, mortal families predate the founding of nations, and families will exist after the Almighty 'hath made a full end of all nations.' For Latter-day Saints though, it is to be done in the Lord's own way, every year should be the Year of the Family...There should be less wringing of hands and more loving arms around our families."

He continued, "Attending to family duties includes really teaching our children to understand the doctrine of repentance, faith in Christ the Son of the living God. What a different view of parenting from that of the world. There is an emerging but unjustified tendency" (witness the current abortion on demand, Day After pill, condoms in schools), "to treat children as if they have the capacity for unrestricted adult experience. We may not be able to change such trends, but we can refuse to be a part of them.

"When parents fail to transmit testimony and theology along with decency, those families are only one generation from serious spiritual decline...The law of the harvest is nowhere more in evidence and nowhere more relentless than in family gardens! We stress again the available remedies of family prayers, family home evenings, and family scripture study...applying basic remedies will take some time and will not fix everything immediately...In the face of such challenges, we need more mothers who know the truth, whose children do not doubt their mothers know it.

"In the healthy family, we can learn to listen, forgive, praise, and to rejoice in the achievement of others. There also we can learn to tame our egos, work, repents, and love. In families with spiritual perspective, yesterday need not hold tomorrow hostage. If we sometimes act the fool, loving family know this is not our last act; the curtain is not rung down.

"To some, these remedies, and things like them, may seem too simple to heal a society stung by so many afflictions. In afflicted ancient Israel, some also disdained the simple, divinely provided remedies, and they perished.

"Obviously, family values mirror our personal priorities. Given the gravity of current conditions, would parents be willing to give up just one outside thing, giving that time and talent instead to the family?

"Society should focus anew on the headwaters--the family--where values can be taught, lived, experienced and perpetuated. Otherwise, we will witness even more widespread flooding downstream, featuring even more corruption and violence. 

"If the combination of rainmakers prevails however, the rains will continue to descend and the floods will continue to come. Dikes and sandbags downstream will be no match for the coming crests. More and more families, even nations, if built upon secular sand instead of gospel granite, will suffer." 

He warned, "Nations in which traditional idealism gives way to modern cynicism will forfeit the blessings of heaven, which they so urgently need, and such nations will also lose legitimacy in the eyes of their citizens. Amid the Babel of prescriptions from so many kinds of voices in the world, rescuing and redeeming perspective requires our coming to know who Jesus Christ is, how He lived, and what He died for." He concluded, "After all, it is Jesus who has given us commanding perspective concerning families." (Neal A. Maxwell, Take Especial Care of Your Family, April 1994, www.LDS.org.)