That's just disgusting.

"After pasteurization, dead white blood cells and bacteria form a sludge that sinks to the bottom of the milk. Homogenization spreads this unsightly mass throughout the milk and makes it disappear."
from page 76 of Real Food, by Nina Planck

Blog Readability

I wonder how they test something like this?

Are you watching?

I really am a reformed blogger...

See? I'm posting again! And it's been less than a week since my last post!

I'm currently looking over my admission essay requirements. I have to write an essay (500-ish words) on my Christian faith and how it relates to my desire to attend NSA. I wrote a bit a couple of months ago, and now I need to pick it up again and take another stab at it. I'm not really sure what to write; I really just want to quote the Nicene Creed and be done with it. I think, though, that I will focus on the latter part of the question and just skim over the former. If you all are interested, though, here's what I already had written down:

I believe in a sovereign God, one God in three persons: Father, Son, and Holy Ghost; Who created the earth and all things in it for man's dominion and pleasure; this was accomplished in six days. The seventh day He rested.
Man fell from God's grace by his own disobedience, but God provided a Saviour, His only Son, Jesus Christ, through Whom we are reconciled to Him. We are received by Him by grace alone through faith alone. His Holy Spirit is poured out upon us to regenerate us and to work out our daily sanctification.
His Holy Word, which is inerrant and inspired by the Holy Spirit, reveals what He requires of us. This includes His command to teach others of God and His world, to His glory. In order to teach, we must ourselves learn about Him, by studying the Scriptures and the creation, as well as all of the gifts of knowledge He has given us in books written by men made in His own image. Because God made the world to fit together as a whole, we must not separate out certain parts, claiming them to be more sacred than others. Instead we must study to discover how these all fit together under God's perfect rule.
...
That's where I ran out of steam and started to dislike what I'd written. I knew that the Divines had a hard time of it, but I never realised how difficult it really was! Anyway, I've got to rehaul it and write in some things about why I want to learn the things they teach, and what I'll do with the knowledge after I leave (teach others).

Knowledge is like a pile of leaves: it makes me want to just jump in feet-first and thrash around for a while. I don't suppose I can put that in my essay?

Cleaning Supplies

I got my recipes from this book (I like this woman for her recipes, not for her philosophy of life). They've worked very well so far, and all you need are a few simple ingredients!

You need:
borax (on the laundry soap aisle)
baking soda (big box is on the same aisle as borax)
vinegar (white distilled)
washing soda (possibly at a pool supply store, or a commercial cleaning-supply store)
vegetable-oil based liquid soap (castile soap, like Dr. Bronner's)

You can also add essential oils to your recipes; they smell good and certain ones have antiseptic properties. I like to use Tea Tree oil. It smells nice and clean, and I can get a fairly good bottle at Wal-Mart for $5. It matches the scent of my Dr. Bronner's, so I don't leave a house with conflicting smells.

Kelly currently has my recipes (she's copying them down), so I'll just give you the ones I remember. There's a good disinfectant scrubber that's just 1 cup baking soda plus 1/4 cup borax. I mixed it up in a mason jar and poked holes in the lid with an ice pick. The jar is reusable and the lid was rusty- perfect for this use. For a better scrub, add some salt (the coarseness saves you some elbow grease). For a soft scrub, add enough castile soap to make a paste. You can also add a bit of an essential oil.

For toilets, I wet the inside of the bowl, then sprinkle about 1/2 cup borax around the bowl and leave it for as long as I can; Annie recommends letting it rest overnight. Then I scrub it out and flush.

If a sink isn't draining as well as it should, I sprinkle some baking soda down the drain and chase it down with vinegar. It's bubbly action will loosen gunk (and it disinfects the drain). I'm not sure how effective it is on super stopped-up sinks.

To mop a floor, I put 1/4 cup vinegar in my bucket, then start to fill it with hot water. While it's filling, I squirt in some castile soap, then add some borax for a bit of stronger disinfectant. My castile soap reacts strangely to vinegar, so I add them separately to reduce the reaction.

To clear the air in a sickroom, or to fix that musty smell, I mix water and Tea Tree oil in a spray bottle and just mist away! I mist it on doorknobs, on our fabric shower curtain, on the window curtains, the computer keyboard, &tc. I also spray it on the toilet about midway between cleanings. I use Lavender oil and water for my mattress and pillows. The ratio is 20 drops per 1 ounce of water.

To remove a bad odor from carpet, sprinkle it all over with baking soda and leave it overnight, then vacuum.

Also, check this out. She's got an article to help you get started.