went to a class this past week by one of the staff at TrackersNW. It was a short class that only covered 3 plants, but whetted my curiosity for more. The ones discussed and their possible uses were:

Oregon Grape (mahonia) Apparently has antimicrobial properties in the root (and I guess the leaves and berries as well) since it’s from berberine which creates the bitter taste, so is probably in the whole plant. A digestive tincture or in glycerin for skin problems.

Dandelion – steam the greens

Western Red Cedar – crush the needles, put in a french press and make a tea. good for respiratory and allergy problems.

NOTE: not intended as medical advice and whatever other disclaimers are necessary

yes, would be great to have fulfillment in life, but for now, happy to take 3rd party order processing and order fulfillment! what is that you may ask? well, it’s a great service that processes orders for yahoo stores (also called 3pl third party logistics) and handles all the inventory, packaging and shipping of online orders. check it out for more about fulfillment for yahoo store

just read a book about the paleo diet. hadn’t heard about this concept until a friend mentioned it on facebook. the book has some interesting idea. basically the concept is: lean meat, fruit, vegetables all okay. grains and dairy not okay. there’s discussion about the acid vs alkaline levels in food. supposedly the imbalance is our current modern diets is what causes a lot of the chronic diseases we see today. makes a lot of sense on it’s own, but when taken together with what i’ve read from michael pollan and jonathan safran foer it doesn’t provide a comprehensive system of thinking about food. working through what makes sense for me. vegetarianism is common sense with all the factory farming. processed food is bad, salt is bad, but what about good food. raw food is a great idea in concept, but how is it practical?