katharineotto
Bio: I vote with my big mouth, boycott packaging as much as possible, shop with a canvas "Acupuncture" bag, read to understand Humanland, do as much of my own cleaning, cooking, gardening, landscaping, clothes making, and home repairs as possible. My home is my laboratory, where I invent things out of the dribs and drabs of inheritance from my pack-rat parents. I also conduct animal behavior studies on three chickens and a cat, who study me while I feed all the other wildlife that likes chickens and chicken food, including mice. Mice like to eat wiring, too. There were no mice when my rat snake was still around, but I kept losing eggs.
katharineotto 
I like your intro. Assuming we need technology (I suspect we do not once we’ve learned to integrate ourselves properly with nature) then such a technology would have to be nature-based, i.e., nature has to “approve” before something is used. I’ve read about such things in the better science fiction. Mice do like to chew on insulation on electrical wires. If they get in your car or truck and start nesting, your vehicle becomes a write-off. I think there’s something in the computerized electronics that attracts them. Just a theory, but they don’t touch house wiring, not here anyway. If you leave wire pieces lying about, they don’t touch those either.
Thank you for your comment. I hope you’re right about mice not eating house wiring, because I worry they will cause a house fire. I’ve already had to repair refrigerator wiring and the hole in the washing machine drain hose. My appliance repair woman says they are going for the water.
Mice go for water for two reasons: one, they can’t find any natural source available; two, they are being poisoned and ingested poison drives them to seek water which activates the poison and kills them. Around here there’s much water, so it’s not about water. They seek the heat from a recently driven vehicle, or the shelter in various parts under dash and heating systems and they even use wiring insulation for nest lining. To keep them out of nesting in a vehicle is to open the hood in the garage, or install a light under the hood.
I think my mice are going for chicken food and water in a dry spell. The climate is too warm year-round for them to need car heat. They are certainly not being poisoned, since I don’t use poisons, like rodenticides, herbicides or pesticides, because of the chickens. If they use insulation for nesting, I’m up a creek. Good news is I saw a garter snake yesterday, and they like to eat mice. Also, I’ve invited a neighbor cat to hang around in the crawl space where the mice congregate.
Thanks for the info.
Hi – just found your blog. Love it. I love all of your ‘tips’. And Brownie is awesome 🙂
Yes. I love to cook, too. Cooking is chemistry. I feel like a mad chemist in the kitchen, making up dishes out of things already on hand. Haven’t poisoned myself yet, but I don’t have a family to please.
As you imply, cooking gives you time to be alone with your thoughts. You may not be using your hands to write, but you are using your head to write. You obviously find your kitchen thoughts follow you to the computer, with writings distilled for having been chilling while supper cooked.
Just read tour comment about George Whitefield’s farm schooling project for boys without parents. Sad ending for a very important project. Enjoyed (and will look for here) your reflections.
Thanks for reading and commenting. The Bethesda story is truly fascinating, and it continues today, but with the asset-plunderer and money-exporter overlay. In short, this 640 acres of primo real estate is being re-purposed–through zoning help from the county–for commercial development, as well as a day school for commuters. The 25 resident boys no longer do any farming and are allowed only to rake leaves and pick up trash by the side of the road.
However, the concept of a farm school for displaced boys and girls (or even families) remains as valid, or more valid than ever, and I would love to see other communities adopt the idea.
Delightful read, you’re a true “Find” in the deafening and often trite world of todays blogosphere. We thank-you.
What a nice comment and compliment. There’s hope for humanity, yet.
Incidentally, I’ve been thinking about social media, including blogging. It is in its infancy, yet it is an opportunity for individuals around the world to interact, for the first time in history. We have never had such a high rate of literacy. Yes, much is trite, but like minds have a way of finding each other, and of helping to evolve other minds.
I agree, excellent point and outlook. I have a tendency to look for the ‘deep’ stuff but you’ve reminded me it’s an age of wonderment in communion and all of it is indeed meaningful.
Hi Katharine….Stone here 🙂
Hey, Stone. Welcome to my blog site. I hope you’ll consider doing a blog here, too. I think it’s still free, if you just do a basic blog.
katharineotto, Tubularsock just discovered that he wasn’t on your follower list and thought best to make up for lost time NOW! Two of the wisest animals Tubularsock have gotten to know, besides dogs, was a house rabbit and a house pigeon. Both had incredible capabilities of direct communication which Tubularsock learned. Besides English the only other two languages Tubularsock knows fluently is Rabbit and Pigeon.
Love your work here.
Animals do make the best gurus. They do seem wiser than human beings, especially lately. Thanks for following.