This article reports on the Blue Jays and Crows doing their work for the ecosystem…although I would say that most birds would fit this description.  A lot of them eat seeds and distribute them to faraway places. I have seen over and over where birds have helped start plants in other locations.

In a kindergarten class I had, the lesson was on blue jays.  One little boy must have had a bad experience with them, because he kept repeating that Jays were aggressive birds.  He pretty much demonized them.

I’ve watched Jays for decades and I can’t say that they are any more aggressive than any other bird.  They all peck at one another to get at the seed in a bird feeder.  I have seen the Jays get a few seeds, and then leave the feeder — they don’t stay there and continually peck at the other birds to hog all of it.  I’ve also heard them mimic a hawk’s cry.  Squirrels were trying to eat all the seed, and I think the Jays were mimicking the hawk in order to scare the squirrels off the feeder.

In the magazine, Birds and Blooms, a reader wrote in about an observation:  she hated grackles until she observed a grackle on the bird feeder, pushing seed off the side.  At first, she was disgusted that it was wasting seed…and then she followed where the bird was pushing the seed…a grackle with a broken wing was down below, gobbling up the seed.  It changed her perspective of the birds.

Nature works towards regeneration while we humans work at destroying it.  Nature shows generosity and wit while we become more greedy and humorless.

 

I think this is a very important video for many reasons — the impact on iodine on overall health as well as breast health; the impact of selenium on the thyroid, especially Hashimoto’s; heavy metal toxicity and thyroid; and the dry-eye “syndrome”.  I think about those Big Pharma commercials where they have a sell-out medical doctor describing a syndrome of dry eye as if it were a disease in itself instead of a symptom….of low thyroid.  But they don’t say that in the commercial, do they?  Disgusting, isn’t it??

UPDATE (6.14.21):  I am not sure about iodine anymore, because I have read that it takes the place of thyroid hormones.  So that makes me question whether it replaces healthy thyroid hormones?  I don’t know.  So I quit taking it.  The thing that has helped the Hashimoto’s is FASTING.  I no longer have the telltale red rash on my throat that is a mark of Hashimoto’s.  My thyroid has still not recovered fully.

I have to admit it tickled me when she briefly states that the Osteopaths believe the body can heal itself if given what it needs to perform the miracle of healing.  My dad was an Osteopath.  Kudos to the Osteopaths whom have remained true to their professional code.

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Here’s one of the best hits of the 60s and 70s –what I consider one of the greatest periods of modern music.  I feel bad for the younger generations that did not have this great stuff instead of the screeching that passes for music now.

This song was much more than a pop chart entry — but a song with deep meaning…

…until the One that left us here comes for us again…

I’m  listening to the Weather Channel.  The program is describing Detroit and the deteriorating buildings.

My Communications ear perked up with the words being used by the narrator (who incidentally sounds like a popular fast food place’s spokesperson).

He describes the growing vegetation as a “war” with the building “battling” the trees which are “forcing” their way through, to “destroy” the buildings that formerly housed Packard Car company.

Water’s multi-pronged “attack”.

“Nature has reduced this factory to rubble.”

The terms were constantly using words of war, battle, nature’s destruction, relentless power…and the narrative clearly was trying to portray nature and trees as destructive forces at war with…man.  Yep.

Instead of seeing this as a positive, it was clearly using terminology to influence the viewer to have a negative perception of nature.

I see it as a positive force.  Nature takes back the decaying rubble, and it gives us: trees that provide oxygen while removing carbon dioxide from the atmosphere; trees that provide shelter for birds; vegetation that provides food to humans and animals.  It’s the life-death-life cycle.  Nature was here first, then they built the factories, then nature comes back to reclaim and rebuild what humans have destroyed.

Instead of seeing this as a negative, it should be celebrated that new life has sprung out of death and decay.

 

 

I really enjoyed this post on Fig Jam and Lime Cordial.  Hope you do, too.

 

Now we understand why Red Delicious apples taste like cardboard…in a stupid, shortsighted goal of making the “perfect” looking apple, the taste, nutrition and God only knows what health benefits have been engineered out.

They wanted to make the apples last longer in storage.  That, to me, says that they engineered the enzymes out of the apple, because enzymes are basically what make food spoil.  BUT — and this is important — enzymes are needed by the body in order to digest and use the vitamins and nutrients of the food.  They also give us energy — think about that when you feel like lead after a meal that consists of processed food without enzymes…

As I was reading this report, I thought of my Dad, whom ate an apple every day.  I’ve continued that tradition, but eating organic Gala apples.  The problem is that the information on their nutrient content versus hybridized (or worse — Genetically Modified apples) is not readily available.  At least, it wasn’t while doing a quick search–and that’s probably on purpose as Monsanto, Syngenta, and other mega corporations that keep telling us that there is no difference between GMO food and heirloom food…don’t want that information readily available.

 

 

 

It’s been 55-60 degrees here for a few nice springlike days, and I was walking in the beautiful sunshine…

…as I pass by a church parking lot, they posted signs saying: “No roller skating, skateboards, etc.”.

I had to resist the urge to get a magic marker and write: “I bet Jesus wouldn’t mind them skating and skateboarding…”   Heh.

Yeah, I know, some irresponsible skateboarders damaged property in the past, but a few bad apples shouldn’t ruin it for everybody…