solcoyote

there will be hoardes of hungry survivers cannibalistically roaming the countrysides… no clean water supplies… no knowledge without our precious computers.. so one thing i’m going to do as a part of my survival course is learning wild, native plants that are 1) edible and 2) medicinal… other vital skills would include, i would think,

- wood working
- stone working
- metal working? (is there any metal left in the ground
still anywhere? heh)
- simple tool & weapon making
- how to make cloth & rope
- simple agriculture

i’ve got a firestarter, which is a big piece of some metal, and a smaller piece of another metal… and they make sparks! exiting. attached is a big piece of..magnesium i think? which one can whittle little bits off onto a pile of wet kindling and set it afire even though it’s damp!. amazing.. water filters might be nice (those water bottles with them built in…) anyone? suggestions?

. . . and no more trucks are bringing us food from halfway across the planet . . . and medicines made from chemicals we’ll no longer have access to . . . what the hell we gonna do!? i figure one step in the right direction is with local native plants… i live in california, and one good thing is: after dominant native american groups have spread around what they thought were important plants, europeans knowningly and unknowingly brought over THEIR share of useful, useless and harmful foreign plants, and people from all over the world by now, in this global age, have brought their plants from every last corner of the globe, all SORTS of plants are native! to know which ones are potentially useful for medicinal purposes is another thing.. so to mark my progress, my first entry is a list of plants off the top of my head for which i can think of a useful medicinal purpose: (btw, when i list medicinal uses, they may be completely wrong. this list is for me to track my own progress and correct potential mistakes. i will fact check. this is an ongoing process. point is, i’m not even trying to dole out medical knowledge!)

1) aloe.. good internally and externally for many many uses!
2) uhm.. rosemary! excellent tea for .. respiratory purposes? and i think it’s disinfectant..
3) verdolagas … it’s called purslain in english i think? my abuelita says it’s a good thing. most people think it’s a succulent weed.. but apparently it grows all over and is edible.. not sure of medicinal value..
4) eucalyptus.. flea repellent and respiratory aid.. i take the essential oil and put it on a cloth and breath in the fumes when i have a chest cold.
5) .. i’m sure there’s more.. hrmph.

1) when i went to brazil recently, a friend’s newly made boyfriend experienced, out of pretty much nowhere, “the worst pain [he’s] felt in [his] life” in his ear.. the doc said it was from q-tip usage!

2) a tip from my girlfriend’s mom’s doctor-friend: “never put anything smaller than your elbow in your ear”

3) i read that repeated use of q-tips in the ear, for cleaning or the dreaded “ear-itch,” can result in a lack of ear wax which can cause, retrigger and/or worsen the ear-itch!

4) don’t do it folks! i’m trying my darndest now, but i will have to abstain from receiving the eargasm i get when my ear itches so much, and just deal.. hopefully the itch will go away once my brain realizes it will not get me that eargasm.. more to come soon on the progress and testing of this theory.