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Black walnuts: tasty superfood

Now that we have son Worshrag married off, I can turn my time and energies to more important things, like getting in the black walnut crop. We have had a very good year for black walnuts. Big nuts and lots of them, thanks to a warm summer and abundant rain. My hands are stained brown right now from picking up and cleaning them. I picked up 60 gallons of nuts from the lawn underneath our largest black walnut, a big spreading tree next to the tractor shed. I picked up another 40 or 50 gallons from a younger tree near the barn and from 10 tall forest-straight walnut trees in a double ...

Global energy crisis could leave Americans in the lurch

Lately, Americans have been watching the news with concern. That’s because tight global supply chains are causing shortages for many everyday products. And at the same time, energy prices are rising dramatically, with supply failing to meet the demands of economies reemerging from the COVID pandemic. Soaring energy prices are already hammering European and Asian consumers. But they may hit U.S. consumers this winter, too. Gasoline prices are rising, heating oil prices have jumped more than 60 percent in a year, and natural gas costs have doubled in just the past six months. Along ...

Ounce of prevention

An ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure. ~ Benjamin Franklin If you ask, a person in recovery will tell you this is true. The challenges they face are not easy, but they strive every day to stay in recovery, to win back their independence, their lives. “Did you know one in 27 youth ages 12 through 17 has misused enough cough medicine to get high from its dextromethorphan ingredient and one in three young adults has misused a prescription drug?” asks CADCA (Community Anti-Drug Coalitions of America.) Teens report getting prescription or over-the-counter (OTC) medicines ...

Woke to Hoopie Culture

Hoopies must be the least woke minority in the country. I don’t know of any hoopies who either know or care that their culture is being appropriated by non-hoopies. The fact that I don’t have any evidence that hoopie culture is being appropriated doesn’t matter. I have a feeling that it is, and feelings are more important than facts now. The word “appropriation,” as everyone knows, comes the late Latin (14th century – someone was still speaking Latin then?) “Appropriationem” means to take something (usually money or property) and make it one’s own, probably under ...

My Secret Strawberry Patch

On those rare occasions when I keep a secret from my wife, I knowingly do it at my peril. So it was with my Secret Strawberry Patch. One difference with this secret was that I told it to everyone else in the family. “Did Grandma find the strawberries yet?” grandsons would whisper conspiratorially. “Not that I know of,” I would whisper back. “If she’s seen them, she hasn’t said anything about it, and I think she’d say something.” Honey gets furious with me now and then, reading me out over something I did or failed to do. “Wasting” 60 bucks on a hundred ...

ARC helping to transform communities

Since 1965, the Appalachian Regional Commission (ARC) has collaborated with local and state partners to transform communities, create jobs, and strengthen the regional economy. Since becoming the ARC Federal Co-Chair in May, I take seriously my responsibility to work collaboratively with ...