RebeccaCT's Profile

I'd be much less worried about urine, and even sewage, than about oil and industrial pollutants. This method does call for boiling, which would kill any bacteria, etc, but would just concentrate the chemical contaminants as it concentrates the salt. The commercial sea salt places carefully watch their water quality--your average beach is just monitored enough that most people won't get sick from swimming in it.

Print 'selection' only works in some browsers, and still sometimes messes up the formatting. 'Print recipe' should work in everything, simplifies formatting issues, and should also improve access for the visually impaired.

Joy, those websites are fine--but hydrogen peroxide (H2O2) is not "toxic". It's irritating. H2O2 is used for disinfecting cuts because it reacts with damaged cells and dirt, breaking down the dead and dying cells, and helping to clean out the wound. It breaks down into water and oxygen. This is the same reaction as "oxygen bleaches" like OxyClean use. I think it's also used in "whitening" toothpastes.

The regular drug store H2O2 is 3%, and this recipe dilutes it even further down to about 1%. Personally, I'm not sure I'd use this as a spray (even at 1% I don't think I'd want to breath it), but as a surface wipe or rinse this sounds great. It should be more disinfectant than regular white vinegar. Diluted H2O2 is actually used as a mouth wash (it tastes weird), and it breaks down so fast, I can't imagine that cats would have a problem. Of course, my cats wouldn't go near this stuff til it dried--they hate citrus.

Given how quickly H2O2 tends to fizzle out (literally--the fizz is the extra oxygen bubbling out), I can't imagine the solution lasting very long.

I use H2O2 to "bleach" blood stains before washing. I think I'm going to try this combo on my cutting boards--I've got red stains from beet juice on them!

Oh, and by the way, vinegar isn't really any more "natural" than H2O2. The regular supermarket white vinegar is produced mostly from corn starch and sugars, converted (usually chemically) to alcohol, then fermented (again, sometimes chemically) into vinegar.

soniamercedes, if you click through to the original tour and scroll down, there is a link to a video of how they made the wall. And more pictures, too.

I love the wall, too. Unfortunately, I suspect my cats would love it a little too well!

I had the same reaction as many commentators--most of these aren't all that small. Personally, part of my definition of small involves what percentage of floor space disappears when you open up the oven (or dishwasher if you have one). That's about 40% of my floor space.

But these are beautiful and most seem well laid out. I have a sort-of-galley kitchen in my rental, and I wish I could do a few things shown in these pictures. It's sort of like the Andreas layout, except instead of being all in a line, the stove and frig are turned 90 degrees inward to make a U. It sounds more efficient, but it means dead space in the corners and less floor space.

I'm trying this recipe soon: Wet/Dry from "Cool Waters". Maybe the rehydrated fruit will go in muffins or oatmeal.

Thanks, vertigoxcured! Another place you can get help ID'ing the little buggers is your local state agricultural extension offices or university department of entomology. Seal up the suspects in a plastic bag or jar and take it down to them. They'll ID bugs for free and give you some standard advice about control and prevention. Here's a sample sheet on grain beetles from Cornell's office: http://www.entomology.cornell.edu/cals/entomology/extension/idl/upload/Beetles-in-Flour-and-Meal.pdf
and one for the moths: http://www.entomology.cornell.edu/cals/entomology/extension/idl/upload/Indian-Meal-Moth.pdf

cashba, the only cases of destroyed computers via cats that I know of have to do with cat hair in the fans. The fans clog up and the computer overheats. Not just laptops. I suppose a cat could also block the fan intake just by lying in the wrong place, too.

However, someone on the Pawesome site mentioned a cat knocking liquid onto a laptop. I guess there are other ways a cat could get liquid on a computer, too!

Oooh, one of our favorite dishes that I don't make nearly often enough is a variation on "Otsu" from Heidi Swanson's Super Natural Cooking. It's pasta with veggies and a yummy ginger lemon sauce. One of the reasons that I don't make it very often is that I have to go out of my way to get organic lemons. (I refuse to use non-organic citrus for zest. One of my few obsessive food quirks!) I bet it would be fantastic with preserved lemons and this way I can buy a whole bunch of organic lemons at once!

From past experience, do not deliver the cocoa mix layered as pictured. It's really hard to mix in a full jar, and if you don't get it mixed, it doesn't taste right.

Does anyone else think the blue cornbread looks more like blue cheese?