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Joe's Progress
Yes, I think you are right about the left side being more affected! My rosacea wasn't quite symmetric. Left eye is worse, left shoulder, left big toe. However, my right pinky is worse. I sometimes wonder if my hands have received carotenes directly from a lifetime of gardening and cooking, and as I am right handed it would have been exposed more.
I have some movies that I watch over and over because I like them. It is fun to get these on DVD because who knows, the low-propaganda ones will probably be shuttled away LOL.
Husband mentioned this: We live in a world in which Keith Richards outlived Richard Simmons. I said it's true, look around you. The most "health conscious" of us are doing crappy.
We have this beautiful little herb farm nearby. Every dish is so overloaded with color and flavor. Like even the lemonade is all green-herbal, the gravies are all green-herbal, the breads are all green-herbal. And if the dish isn't green it's day-go orange! It's a veg toxin overload. The chef was a person we used to see around. I am pretty sure he died of his obesity. We used to have a little farmers market. The man who owned the largest organic farm here was also obese.
Another thing I've noticed is that you are actually frowned upon if you like bland, plain food. If you don't like ethnic food "obviously" you are a closed-minded bigot LOL. I've noticed that many women realize by their mid-fifties that they have to back off on this kind of thing. (too many nights up will do that)
Good luck, and I'm glad you're becoming more masculine. In a world where manliness is frowned upon, that is indeed a good sign.
I'm still mystified by how people like Joseph can recover so quickly. I've been on the diet (for quite some time, I was on the prison diet. Then I started eating eggs again, then supplementing with choline and lecithin, then eating eggs again and so on) for six years and haven't experienced anything close to those improvements. It boggles my mind.
@grapes Isn't spreading propaganda the point of Hollywood movies? They create a narrative that's conducive to the rulers' agenda. Technocrats want you to live in a fantasy world, totally detached from reality. In dystopia you would stay home, plugged into your VR headset, eating soylent green and never leaving the house. For those interested in this battle for the soul of the 21st century, I recommend listening to James Lindsay. Excellent work.
@christian @grapes 90s, 2000s was golden era of movies I mean movies like Gladiator, Braveheart, Saving privater Ryan, LOTR(which is probably by far my favorite thing ever) and so many more amazing and epic movies. I don't know where I would be as a teen without movies. They were my world basically. Now Hollywood is complete joke for at least last 15 years that's for sure. They will never make movies like that ever again.. People say it will get better because people really can't watch that nonsense anymore where every hero in movie has to be black transgender ideally or something like that even if they play someone whoshould be pale white like elfs or vikings or whatever.. But it is not just that. Even the era of good actors is gone. They are all old now.. It is simply bad overall. They do just fast soulless nonsense movies that hardcore movie fans born 1990 0r older simply can't watch and take seriously.. For example Alien movies the first one was created 1979 and it is much better than the last one. Everyone makes jokes about it how horrible it is. Really sad time for movie lovers..
@jiri Yeah, LOTR by Peter Jackson is one hell of an epic three-part journey. Sometimes, I watch parts of it during the Christmas holidays when it airs with other Christmas favorites, like Die Hard, starring Bruce Willis, which I also enjoy very much. It has great humor. LOTR touches something deeper in the male heart: being part of a fellowship, battling together for what's good, overcoming struggles, and growing from the experience. It's also fun to imagine being one of the characters or ask people who they would like to be. Gandalf? Legolas? Aragorn? Gimli? Perhaps these characters could also represent different psychological forces within oneself. That would be a Jungian view. In any case, I totally agree that movies have gotten worse over the last decade. You're spot on. I also don't think it will be a phase; I think it will continue to get worse. It's part of Project Chaos. Miles writes about this. He talks about how stories don't make sense anymore on purpose. They leave you confused so you're not conscious enough to question what you're told.
Some thoughts.. I wanted to wait till the end of the month to post, was moved to do it tonight.
When I started this in mid April, I had two hens sitting on eggs. At the time, a friend commented that the shells of the eggs I gave him were getting weak, cracking when he only gently washed them in his sink. I switched my hens to ground oats with the thinking that too much retinoic acid was causing calcium loss (to buffer the blood) which otherwise would go to the shells. I believe that I got an unexpected additional benefit, in that for the first time in my five years raising chickens, all of the chicks made it to pullet-hood (except 1, which was strangled by a black snake). Integration has always been the hardest part of introducing new chickens to any flock. On top of better egg shells, their behavior has improved greatly.
I'm making this post without reading comments, and I'll follow with another reply to respond.
As time goes on, I think back to before this started (which to me seems an entirely different life). I was getting a sudden rash whenever I left my bath tub, on my chest and stomach, and attributing it absentmindedly to mites in my bath towel. My feet were gnarly and gross with thick calluses and a great stink. Granted, I worked all day in my boots, every day, but I still wear boots all day and my feet are like a new man's. I can smell my body odor now directly after my bath, and I can smell the body odor of others (this was never possible for me, a heavy smoker).
I recall summers past when I regularly used corn starch on my lower parts to prevent painful chafing. I had assumed that such summertime issues were normal, but in fact they are not, as this has entirely disappeared for me. Also, it's personal but I'm sure I'm not the only one to notice that sphincter control is now perfect. So called "sharting" is not normal, and I'm pretty certain I'll never again in my life experience it.
I cut my hair a week ago and had an observation which was interesting. I did it in my boxers, to minimize the mess, so that my cut hair fell on my shoulders and chest. Everywhere that the cut hairs fell developed a fast and very itchy rash (which thankfully quickly dissipated after a rinse). This tells me that the hair is another way the body has of expelling retinoids. This explains why Grant's hair fluoresced. While speaking of hair, it's too early to say for certain, but my forearms are starting to grow hair (this is new for me).
My patience is still perfect, but on the other hand my "wanna-do" has fallen through the floor. All that seems to interest me lately is eating, reading books, and at night, drinking my beer, watching tapes. I think that Trump would send me to el salvador if he discovered my utter lack of ambition and lack of feverish daily contribution to the almighty gdp.
Early on in this, maybe a month and a half, I was getting pains in my teeth, especially while brushing, and was concerned that the honey was the culprit. Then I recalled how I had the same exact feeling when a young boy, to the point that my mother made sure I got the toothpaste specially formulated for "sensitive teeth", but this sensitivity has now disappeared, and looking in the mirror my jaw line seems to be changing, broadening. Chewing all this beef could have something to do with it. I really think these are growing pains.
I'm still dreaming every single night. Such dreams that I can well see how some cultures considered them more real than the waking world, and this doesn't help my wanna do in the "real world".
One insight I had, maybe a month ago, was that at first, I didn't want to proselytize about what I had learned. But that wasn't exactly true.. The truth was that I wanted to, but knew that it was wrong. I then reached a stage where I truly didn't want to, because i didn't only know it was wrong, but felt the wrongness of it in my heart. All through my readings, and yet again recently through the short work "Oration on the Dignity of Man" by Pico della Mirandola, there is the admonition against treating the truth like the town bicycle. In one of the books I'm reading now, Umberto Eco's Name of the Rose, it's the exact same story. The truth has always been precious and not for mass consumption. One of the reasons why democracy is such a curse. Grant really rocked the boat, making his precious insights public knowledge. Whether it was wise or not, I am grateful to him for it.
I recall watching an interview Grant had with Garret Smith some time ago. The contrast between the two men could not have been greater, and the way Garret handled the interview was, to me, disgusting. The "superchats" asking repeatedly about bowel movements was so much gaslighting and the expression on Grant's face said everything. I tried to find the history of this Garret but a wiki search revealed nothing. My gut reaction to that man is that he is what people are meant to find when they search out Grant's ideas, and they will come away having been mugged of more than just their money.
I had an experience in the first few weeks which hasn't been repeated, but maybe someone here had similar: Helping a friend with a grading project, swinging a pickax in the hot sun, running on nothing but water and honey, in our down time I was yawning heavily and tears were streaming from my eyes, and it felt exactly like coming up on mushrooms. This happened for several hard days of work and then resolved. I don't know how that can be explained, or what the mechanism was (perhaps meibomian glands flushing themselves out?) Whatever it was, it sure wasn't xeropthalmia..
I'm on a farm every day taking care of animals, and for those who don't know, vitamin a is supplemented in absolutely all of the feeds. I've lost 3 dogs over that time, and 2 of them toward the end had unbelievably horrible eye boogers. One's was so bad that before I fed him I had to pull the boogers out so that he could see. The third was an ungroomed standard poodle, and I couldn't see its eyes. Also, there are two female dogs with very large mammary tumors. The one with the biggest tumor doesn't ever let me get close (social anxiety, eh), but I can clearly see that her eyes do not have "the light" in them. A friend's wife just had a lumpectomy, and I'm halfway through my third read of Grant's Breast Cancer and I say nothing because i know ahead of time that it would do no good. Questions are the only proper keys to answers. And that's all I've got for now.
@Hermes, it could be on account of my (last 20 years) heavy smoking of tobacco and heavy beer drinking. That might come across as flippant but I've always strived to do the opposite of what the consensus, expert driven "right thing" was, and maybe I started this with less retionoids in my liver to begin with. I always insisted on plain hamburgers and fries. I always hated vegetables. I mean, when I went into this it was only because Grant's works enthralled me in their overall and undeniable chain of logic. I just couldn't deny it. Why are all of the staple foods of the earth (wheat, rice, potatoes) all zero vitamin a? Why are all of the high vitamin a vegetables and fruits as dangerous to the eye as a poisonous snake, tree frog, or young human female with dyed hair?
@Jiri I saw a theory on substack from an insider that many of these hollywood films are bombs intentionally, through the miracle of clever accounting and residuals. Kind of like that old film The Producers. Here's the link if you're bored: https://cultureshock.substack.com/p/stop-trying-to-save-hollywood?utm_campaign=post&utm_medium=web
If you just look into the list of books which win the Hugo award nowadays you understand that we are a million miles from anything like Heinlein's Stranger in a Strange Land, or Frank Herbert's Dune, and sadly the young won't know that better is even possible. Personally, I'm finishing Equilibrium tonight for the umpteenth time, then onto an old campy scifi called Invader to finish off my nightly oblivion.
@lil chick I hear you on the organic farmers being sickly. My beef lady is pushing two fifty and she's much shorter than I am, and has told me that she has to eat lots of liver and colorful vegetables to get her nutrients, since her IBS makes it difficult to absorb (and I shake my head and say nothing).
Quote from Joseph on July 16, 2025, 4:15 pmMy patience is still perfect, but on the other hand my "wanna-do" has fallen through the floor. All that seems to interest me lately is eating, reading books, and at night, drinking my beer, watching tapes. I think that Trump would send me to el salvador if he discovered my utter lack of ambition and lack of feverish daily contribution to the almighty gdp.
Hilarious! Have you ever thought about creating your own Substack? I like your writing. You have a way of weaving seemingly disparate things together to create a captivating picture.
This week I was watching a random YouTube video and people were saying how a certain debatable national strategy increases the GNP. The video guy said "we are one country under God, not one country under GNP." And I was like: hey, that makes some sense doesn't it? Even if a person is not religious. Our number one concern doesn't have to be GNP. Anyways, just an aside, go on with Joe's Progress thread!
I wanted everyone to know that my chickens aren't stuck in a run with their ground oats. When I let them out, they roam over an acre (and more, if they feel like it). I can't keep them from sniping layer pellets from the ducks, but they are certainly no longer being heavily supplemented.
My friend with the wife with the lumpectomy is now beginning chemo. I'm not asking if it's retinoic acid. The way to lose friends and alienate people is to proselytize, and I have pretty much no friends to begin with. Just acquaintances of convenience. He casually asked me if I'm still "not eating anything" which means of course that I'm not eating the tortilla chips, salsa and pork at our weekly get togethers, unlike everybody else.
I wonder if leeches are a good answer to detoxifying the blood? I know that I personally do not trust any "health care professional" in this country to put a needle in me, before or after covid. A pet leech seems choice. The old things (like bloodletting) can become new again.
I suspect that my persistent lack of wanna-do is due to elevated levels of retinol in my blood. Cue the leach. I still get the foamy urine, though not all the time. When I think back to the endless tacos, egg burritos and pizzas which I have consumed over decades, I can temper my hopes that there is any quick fix.
My new thought out answer to any question concerning this is: I have read a few books from a man who put puzzle pieces together in such a way that it explained the cause for all autoimmune diseases, and included diabetes, alzheimers and many cancers into the mix. If there is the slightest chance that his theory is correct, then I am duty -bound to prove or disprove it. If you're interested, please read the books, but don't argue with me beforehand.
I have a farmer's market source for grass-fed (and seed-finished) beef which is twice as high as it is in the stores. To temper this, I get my brown rice where the orientals get theirs, at $52 for a 40lb sack, and the black beans go for $12 (no tax) on a 10lb sack at the Hispanic market. I rely heavily on my large tin enamel pots, and need more of them for the inevitability of them spouting leaks under the constant strain of cooking.
My voracious appetite seems to be dissipating, which can only be a good thing. Now, I make my big dinner (2lbs of beans and rice, 1 lb of beef), eat half of it that night, have the next half for lunch the next day, and so on, ad infinitum.
I think I came across harsh when I belittled spreading the truth to the uninitiated, and I mischaracterized Eco's Name of the Rose when I said that it was a case in point. The truth is never one or two sided, but always three-sided. People need the truth, but they have got to want it first. You don't feed a gristly steak to a newborn.
I mentioned the staple grains of the world being low-a, and it seems that the biblical fruits are likewise (grapes, figs, apples, dates). The old wisdom was thrown out prematurely. What will become of "foodies"?
That's all I've got for now, and I know I'm posting this earlier than my planned for month interval, but give me a break, it's lonely out here.
@Hermes, I tried a subsack and called it Punky Chunks, (named for certain bits of unloved firewood which I have a soft spot for) but I gave it up quickly, for plenty of reasons. Still, thank you for the compliment 🙂
Quote from Joseph on July 16, 2025, 4:15 pmSome thoughts.. I wanted to wait till the end of the month to post, was moved to do it tonight.
Delightful, as usual from Joseph.
Plus helpful and encouraging, too.
Thank you Joseph, for posting
- Larry in Thailand
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