Of the of 26 hen flock we had before we moved to a suburb where chickens couldn't be kept, we lost 4 to predators, hawks and a fox. Most of chickens could fly a little bit (like up to a branch in a tree) for safety. All but three were highly alert to overhead threats, running under the deck for shelter. The three polish hens had the puffy feathers all over their heads that make them less able to detect danger from above and all of those were victims of our local hawk over time. We had a pack of coyotes in the neighborhood, but those were not active during the day, and we did not loose any to them. All the hens would move closer to the coop as it got late in the afternoon and would go inside at dusk on their own. They still laid most of their eggs in the coop. A couple of times hens I thought had disappeared had gone broody and were incubating (infertile) eggs under the brambles somewhere. All the neighbors we gave the eggs to said they were the best eggs they had tasted in their lives (probably all the greens and insects and worms and mice and chipmunks! they ate). I would say we lost more hens to extreme cold or illness than predators. The flock was housed in the barn with heat lamps (which are a big cause of barn fires, so I am not recommending them) but -20 is cold and the hens wouldn't always sleep under the lamps. I felt much worse and more responsible for those deaths than I did about than the hawks and fox picking off one at a time. (Though raccoons and weasels are brutal chicken slayers, so I might have a different feeling if I had come found carnage in the coop). If you have chickens you have to be comfortable losing them to many dangers. We don't have any now, though we moved back to the country. I lost a couple of cats to old age recently and am not interested in setting myself up for sadness at the moment. But that might change.

The Great Smoky Mountains National Park is gorgeous and very biodiverse. Lots of hiking opportunities. https://www.nps.gov/grsm/index.htm There are horseback riding trips into the mountains. This is one. There are others. http://www.sugarlandsridingstables.com

I love all your suggestions, and I love that people can come back from political brainwashing. It truly is brainwashing, the techniques they use are very sophisticated, and when it seems like a loved one is no longer themselves, it is true. But your love and attention is turning your husband's heart and mind back towards reality. I think you've done a wonderful thing, Quill. This book by a daughter who was concerned for her dad is good for anyone dealing with loved ones and fear/anger/conspiracy. There is a movie of it that has been discussed here in the past, too. I remember the mom did subtle things to change his environment such as blocking extreme political emails and replacing them with moderate ones (I think she could get away with that because he had mild dementia) and best of all, having lunch with him every day, and turning off the radio, instead of abandoning him at lunch because he had a certain radio personality on during that hour. Very subtle changes making a big difference. Brainwashing my Dad. https://www.amazon.com/Brainwashing-My-Dad-Right-Wing-Nation_And/dp/1728239591/ref=sr_1_2?crid=320R0HACFZEIQ&keywords=the+brainwashing+of+my+dad&qid=1644847514&sprefix=the+brainwashing+of+my+dad%2Caps%2C123&sr=8-2 p.s. I just mentioned two weeks ago that the reason I don't sit with my husband as much anymore is that this couch is uncomfortable and my legs eventually go numb (the sitting area is way too deep for a short person). I think couch shopping is a good Valentine's plan!

Really? Maybe exotic...

We chose a compost bucket that will fit in the freezer. It stays there, not smelling up the house, until it is full and we take it out.

I have lived in Maine, New Hampshire, Pennsylvania, and New York and have never heard anyone lead with their religious faith in an introductory, getting-to-know-you conversation. People around here, especially in New England are very, very private. Your religious or church affiliation would be considered a rude thing to ask right out of the box. For example, I still have no idea what religion or denomination most of the new friends that I have made since moving back to Maine are. It is just not a topic of conversation that comes up. The only ones I know are two of the volunteers at work because sometimes they will volunteer to keep the place open on a holiday. One saying "I am an atheist, I'd work on Christmas if you want the place open" and the other "We don't do Christmas celebration until Three Kings Day, so I can work Christmas Eve." (Don't worry, we stayed closed both days so the volunteers could get a much needed break.) I have spent a good amount of time in Kentucky and the amount of casual religious signaling in conversation was novel to my ears, but no one asked me directly about my beliefs. If I was asked about my religious beliefs, what I answered would depend on the situation. I wouldn't be asked up here in the north, but if I was, I would non-fearfully say I am an atheist and prefer a scientific understanding of the world. In an area where people might be surprised by that but not hostile, I'd say I was not religious. But if it were somewhere where the people were obviously prejudiced against atheists, I would be nervous and just truthfully say I went to a Congregationalist church when I was a child. This might confuse them long enough for me to get away! Just kidding, there aren't many Congregationalist churches in the south and it would probably make them pause. Then, if they asked what kind of church that is, I could just answer that the church is considered to have originated with the Puritans and let them mull that over. Then if they get concerned about Puritan beliefs, I could add, "But don't worry, now Congregationalists celebrate Christmas!" Thankfully, people don't ask me that question, once I am nervous who knows what might come out of my mouth!

BobKat Naturals Beeswax dry skin balm. https://www.bobkatnaturals.com/Rub-It-Skin-Balms-s/1814.htm Make sure it is a little warm and rub the whole bar against your skin. It doesn't contain water like a liquid lotion which I think makes it work better. It works miracles overnight when your hands are so dry that they are cracked and chapped and bleeding and is a good protective layer to put on before doing the dishes. There are other good brands of beeswax lotion bars as well on Amazon.

Our regular chain grocery store has been out of carrots of all types frequently. Luckily our local food co-op, which is open to all, still has carrots from a local farm--but if I remember correctly they run out of the winter-storage carrots sometime in February (probably earlier this year since the big grocery store in town has had none). Chicken is also in variable/low supply. Conventional chicken being the most rare. There have been some organic packs available. There have been no uncooked whole chickens, conventional or organic, for periods of time. Canned cat food is absent except for one or two minor brands. I have been ordering mine from Petco and Chewy for months and worry they will run out too. Cat litter is scarce. Some areas of the frozen prepared foods have been empty, but I don't eat those.

A wonderful actor. I loved anything with him in it since I was a young tween. Glad he had a long life.

I second Cathy Johnson. I really like her perspective. Claire Walker Leslie has a quick, sketchy style. She has many books out, this is just one of them. She also spoke at a nature journaling conference (youtube video below). https://smile.amazon.com/Keeping-Nature-Journal-3rd-Connection/dp/1635862280/ref=sr_1_1?crid=B2YGF3YR4JVF&keywords=nature+journaling&qid=1641066964&sprefix=nature+journaling%2Caps%2C193&sr=8-1 John Muir Laws has some good books out too and a youtube channel. A very different take on it than Cathy Johnson or Claire Walker Leslie, though, more quantitative and with scripted questions and types of pages. https://smile.amazon.com/Laws-Guide-Nature-Drawing-Journaling/dp/1597143154/ref=sr_1_4?crid=KZJRKVVTB7BQ&keywords=john+laws+sketchbook+for+nature+journaling&qid=1641066813&sprefix=John+laws+%2Caps%2C125&sr=8-4

This saddened me so much, though at his advanced age I was expecting it sooner or later. Along with Jane Goodall, E. O. Wilson has been the most important role model for wildlife preservation during my lifetime. His intelligence and compassion for the smallest creatures was breathtaking. We would all do well to follow his example and embrace his Half-Earth call--preserve half the land and waters for wildlife and in so doing save the biosphere that we ourselves rely on. Even if we only have the power to control/influence our own balcony, our own yard, our own land, or our own town--half for wildlife. Half-Earth: Our Planet's Fight for Life by E. O. Wilson https://www.amazon.com/Half-Earth-Our-Planets-Fight-Life-dp-1631490826/dp/1631490826/ref=mt_other?_encoding=UTF8&me=&qid=1640629792 University of Calfornia TV: E. O. Wilson: Setting Aside Half the World for the Rest of Life

I really like Girls in Their Summer Clothes (Winter Mix) which was released in 2008.

The yellow citronella ants smell like lemons. I have a very clear memory of our class coming across some under a rock in field biology class and everyone taking a whiff.

I am from Maine, which is very close to eastern Canada. When I spent my semester abroad in Australia in college (especially at the farm stay in Yerong Creek, but also in Melbourne, and at school at Monash Uni), I could only understand about 20% of what people were saying for the first few weeks. It was kind of worrisome. We were speaking the same language! I'd understood Australian people in the movies! After several weeks, I slowly assimilated the different pronunciations of vowels and learned some of the specific terms that were unfamiliar, but it took me the whole semester (and a helpful & cute Australian boyfriend who had been raised in Bangladesh so had a watered-down accent) to get fluent. I now believe I probably do have some language processing deficit, because the same thing happened in India. Despite the people at my husband's work in Bangalore being fluent in English, I couldn't figure out what they were saying for a loooong time. Since they were used to working people from all parts of the world, I think they assumed I wasn't American like my husband and one even asked me if English was my first language! And to further confirm the problem definitely lies with me, I still ask my very southern US cousin to repeat himself at least four times each phone call, because despite him (supposedly) speaking English, some of his sentences are untranslatable in my brain.

Demeter fragrances has hundreds of rare scents. Here is Lily of the Valley: https://demeterfragrance.com/lily-of-the-valley.html If anyone is interested here is paperback!: https://demeterfragrance.com/paperback.html

Restaurant quality porcelain.

Our family is a Pink Salad family (Oh no, a new schism Pink Salad families vs Green Stuff families!), but I know exactly what you are talking about. Especially the cherished recipe cards. And HS Mom in NC, you are a wonderful writer, just wonderful. That story should be published.

Our 17-year-old and still running Honda Accord. My 28-year-old Baxter State Parka from L.L. Bean. (WARNING: L.L. Bean's quality has plummeted and I would not buy that coat from them now). My 18-year-old snowflake cloche hat from L. L. Bean. My 25-year-old Dansk Mesa wedding dishes. My Sorel lightweight winter boots (that they no longer make) lasted 10 years of high use. My Lodge cast iron frypan handed down from my aunt (so maybe 40-years-old).

I recently began a 20 hour per week job after being. stay at home mom for 20 years. I literally can not imagine how families with two parents full-time in the workforce can keep up with all the stupid requirements of modern life. Most tasks need to be done during business hours--which are the very same hours people are stuck at work. Healthy food takes a long time to prepare. Kids are supervised more than in the past, so that necessitates organizing after-school care. Etc. Schools. Homeschooling spoiled us. We ignore 80% of the stuff the school would want us to do. We are an anti-organized sport family, so those hundreds of hours are still our own, but I have friends and cousins who spend weeks and weeks and weeks doing intense sports with travel tournaments and having to be on the sidelines every weekend morning, even on MOTHER'S DAY of all days. This is time my parents would use to clean and shop and garden and cook and mend. Sports were just a minor after school commitment for my friends back in high school, and parents never attended practices and most of them didn't attend many games--it was just a fun activity for the kids together not anything more. I had been noticing before COVID that it took three tries to get ANYTHING accomplished that involves an organization or a service provider, no matter how small. Now with COVID, that is much worse. Especially in terms of appliances or home renovation/repair. My daughter is applying to college. I filled out all my own college applications on paper and attached my essay, also on paper. It was simple and straightforward. Now we are watching YouTube videos about how to puzzle out parts of the common app. Hours wasted. When my son was briefly in college, instead of a clear, paper syllabus with the (many fewer) assignments for the semester, there was an online assignment nightmare that was different for each class with multiple pages to visit to figure out what the assignments were and when they were due. He could not navigate this. He could have easily managed the old way of a syllabus with 3-4 papers or 3-4 tests per semester per class. Now there are small daily assignments in college as well as papers and tests, as if it were high school. At the end before he dropped out, I tried to reconstruct how many assignments he had missed and for 5 classes it took me 4 hours just to wade through the confusing platform, figure out which assignments were done, where the other assignments were hiding, etc. I graduated magna cum laude from a top small liberal arts college, and I believe if I was faced with this platform for finding assignments and these type of assignments, I would have floundered. SO MUCH of education now is about how good your executive function is, how you can keep track of work, how you handle endless small check-in type assignments, how you meet hundreds of small deadlines and SO LITTLE of it rewards intellectual thought, creativity, or synthesis of material. Having moved between states twice in a three year period, I had 400 move-related items on my to-do list, and people move frequently now than they did when I was young. Computers seem to have slowed everything down. We still use a paper receipt pad to do our sales at the gallery, so quick, literally 3-5 minutes if it is check or cash--up to 7-10 for a credit card (but more if the dumb machine acts up). When I was young we'd swipe the card through a mechanical machine that took an impression of the card numbers and the transaction was done as far as the customer was concerned. Now, I go to the store and the computerized register glitches or is slow or the person is new and can't quite figure out how to enter things, and it takes at least 15 minutes per transaction! In terms of the personal computer, email boxes eventually fill up if you don't delete all the ads and spam, it takes time to start up the computer, open websites, upload photos. Computers need occasional repair, etc. Somehow I get locked out of my accounts frequently, and they often don't recognize my answers to the security questions even though I have written them down and type them in exactly, and then I have to go through a time-wasting process of getting recovery number texts and entering those numbers and changing passwords to get back into my own account. At my doctor's you have to answer the same COVID questions three times (outside the door, inside the door, and at the reception desk)! The trip to the primary care doctor is just a gatekeeping operation, whereas primary care doctors used to actually treat things. Now you are referred to a specialist (even for something as small as removing a little white milia on the eyelid--4 hours round trip to the dermatologist to get that removed and it only took 2 minutes to do). Doctors will refill long-term prescriptions only for 30 days even though one can get them for 90 and skip trips to the pharmacy. 9-11 began the need for multiple layers of proof of identity--so that getting a driver's license or registering a car now involves sheaths of official documents and the attack (and that shoe-bomber) also made for long security procedures at airports. Identity thieves came on the scene and now we have to change our passwords all the time and shred our mail. Some things that once, long ago, were easy to do at home like changing from regular tires to snow tires are now hard because the pneumatic device they use to tighten the lug nuts makes them impossible to take off for many people, and they have to be perfectly aligned for the computerized braking system to work properly. Of course, better brakes are wonderful, but even good technological advances take up more of our time. My son, who has ASD and executive function issues, would just give up on modern life if I wasn't around to guide him. I expect once I retire, I will do my best to avoid activities that put a drain my minimal EF skills, but there are some (like signing up for Medicare and supplement, etc.) that are requirements and hopefully I will still be able to navigate them when I am elderly.

I am from New England and visited Australia for 6 months and survived! I traveled all over, did a farm stay, hiked throughout Victoria, snorkeled on the great barrier reef, and the only thing that bit me was a possum and it was my fault for holding my hand up to its nose so it could sniff me (ha! I was 19 and stupid). Did see one brown snake at the farm, sadly, bodiless in a jar. Also viewed one of those lovely Australian plants that can kill you from pain if you touch them, the gympie-gympie, during a jungle tour.

Though I have some polyester clothes I will still wear until they wear out, I am no longer buying clothes primarily made of plastic (truth, there is some elastic in the waistbands of things I buy). I just saw this article about micro-plastics catchers. One is a ball that you put in the washer, the other is a filter installed outside of the washer. https://www.forbes.com/sites/jeffkart/2019/02/01/science-says-laundry-balls-and-filters-are-effective-in-removing-microfibers/?sh=1c287d10e07a

Oh I just remembered this caveat, the front loader I had at my last house in some way relied on the drier for all lint removal and so line drying after washing in that machine was an exercise in frustration because the clothes would come out wet, supposedly clean, and with lint that line drying is certainly not going to remove. Not all front loaders are like this.

Generations of women in my family have line dried clothes, but not 100% of the time. I live in the north so winter weather is not an outdoor line drying season. But I do line dry often in the spring through fall (but not in browntail moth season -- airborne irritating hairs--don't worry, browntails are only in Maine and Cape Cod). One can dry clothes inside in the winter on a drying racks. Locate the clothesline in the part of the yard that gets the most sun throughout the day. You want to keep up with switching over "loads" so you can get several dry before it gets toward evening when there won't be enough sun to do the job. Don't leave the laundry out overnight. Be aware of the weather and take the laundry down if a rain shower is coming. One tip I used with drying towels on the line is drying them in the dryer for 5-10 minutes first so they don't dry board-stiff and scratchy on the line. Also, nothing beats the scent of line dried sheets. 🙂 Here are some drying racks: https://www.walmart.com/ip/Robbins-304-Wood-Clothes-Dryer/25469671?wmlspartner=wlpa&selectedSellerId=1148&&adid=22222222227017904049&wl0=&wl1=g&wl2=c&wl3=52330248735&wl4=pla-79429403055&wl5=1019081&wl6=&wl7=&wl8=&wl9=pla&wl10=112562587&wl11=online&wl12=25469671&veh=sem&gclid=Cj0KCQjw_fiLBhDOARIsAF4khR21PfjpGXM9-VPABjdJK2t0TSnBFnzGE95lBFHekrFvxNvDybOTACQaAtHrEALw_wcB&gclsrc=aw.ds https://www.amazon.com/Robbins-Home-HG-303-clothes-drying/dp/B0029OMSGY Here is are articles about line drying clothes: https://homesteading.com/dry-laundry-using-drying-rack-clothesline-homestead-living/ https://homesteading.com/line-drying-clothes-winter/ Here is a link to expensive but high quality clothespins: https://www.lehmans.com/product/kevins-quality-spring-clothespins/ Other high quality line drying equipment: https://www.lehmans.com/search?w=clothes+lines Documentary about the suburban resistance to clotheslines: https://www.amazon.com/Drying-Freedom-Steven-Lake/dp/B00IKERRK4

With the kids we always lived rurally in a small town so we would take the kids to town to trick or treat, perhaps stopping by some friends' houses on the way to trick or treat (unless they'd already left for town). I always thought the village homeowners generosity of hosting the whole town was truly community-building. Now these weren't suburban developments hosting all the other suburban development kids in a twenty mile radius. These were the kids that all went to the same schools and the homeowners were their shopkeepers and bus drivers and librarians and teachers. In one town, when a group started hosting a stupid trunk or treat in a parking lot and half the usual trick or treaters disappeared, many of the village homeowners were so sad! They loved seeing all the townspeople and their children and commenting on the creativity of the costumes. In another small town I lived in, real estate agents would warn potential buyers on the main residential streets in the village that there was a "Halloween Tax" and that it was customary for the children of the whole town to go trick or treating on these streets and to expect to spend at least $500 on Halloween candy. I don't think that ever dissuaded a buyer. But I do think that small towns are very different than developments (where I have also lived) where developers design them to be exclusive and insular and the residents really want to be isolated from "outsiders" and left alone.

Thank you!