Algae? Give me a big plate, please.

We'll come back to these later.
I just wanted to open with a happy photo.

Hmmm.  I continue to work my way through that book on allergic rhinitis, in honor of my spring allergies and the upcoming 5th Birthday of Itchy Rash (It's ready for Kindergarten, sniff!).  And I will now go look up the name of that stupid really smart book riiiiiii-ght now.  [Pause, while I look it up.]  Okay:  Hay Fever and Allergies: Discovering the Real Culprits and Natural Solutions for Reversing Allergic Rhinitis by Casey Adams, Ph. D.  Now, I know that I said that Dr. Adams explains things so that lay persons can understand them.  I lied.  Or I'm just overloaded, old, and/or stupid.  I'm stuffed to my figurative gills with frickin' ALA, DHA, mast cells, antigens, mucus linings, proteins, probiotics, prebiotics, and little teeny molecular sh!t I don't fully understand.  He obviously has spent his life studying this stuff and certainly understands it -- my brain just cannot hold any more detailed info.  So now I'm just reading to get the gist of it.  (What exactly is "gist" anyway?  Sounds icky.)

So here's what I have gleaned so far from Dr. Adams' book -- saving you, the reader, all that time reading technical shit that will just make your brain hurt.  You should eat fruits and vegetables.  ORGANIC fruits and vegetables.  Preferably raw.  And avoid meat, or at least red meat (I keep forgetting that animals retain toxins and the antibiotics that are pumped into them to make them able to eat an unnatural diet), along with dairy and eggs (interestingly these are my own personal villains and I was amazed when my rhinitis got much better when I stopped eating them).  Probiotics are good for your mucosa, and hence, helpful for your atopy.  The world, well the "civilized" world is full of toxins that we have made up and our bodies have enough to deal with in removing those, so that it can easily get overloaded when hit with unnatural foods on top of unnatural pollution, chemicals, perfumes, dyes, etc., to which we expose ourselves daily.  Adams has a really interesting discussion on pasteurization and how, while it is good for killing dangerous bacteria and extending shelf life, it also kills off good bacteria, like the probiotics that are naturally contained in unprocessed grass-fed cow's milk.  Basically, there are many reasons that we process foods the way that we do today, but all that processing is the Devil's work when it comes to our immune systems and atopy.  Some lucky people can deal with it.  Some of us cannot.

(Okay, totally off topic here, but I'm kind of tempted to get the EZ EYES bright yellow computer keyboard with enormous black letters.  Yes, I'm that tired of my old-lady vision, or lack thereof.  I'm falling apart --next stop Blue Blockers and one of those "Help!  I've fallen and I can't get up!" necklaces.  Aging sucks.)

Where was I?  Oh yeah.  That brings me to algae.  Sounds "weird," right?  Not so.  Bear with me, or rather, Dr. Adams (and others -- this is all consistent with multiple studies and publications out there).  Fish oil/omega 3 is good for us, right?  Yes.  It helps reduce inflammation (and atopy is all about inflammation).  Everyone's doin' it.  You can buy fish oil capsules at Costco.  Or you can get omega 3 from flax seeds if you don't want to eat/burp fish, because our bodies convert the EFA in flax seeds into the DHA that provides omega 3.  (Yeah, even I don't really understand it and I'm probably screwing up the explanation.)  Anyway, there is a better and more direct route to the DHA/omega 3s.  Where do the fish get it?  From the algae that they eat.  Duh.  So why not skip the fish (which can be contaminated by lead, etc., because animals cannot clear out toxins as well as plants can) and go directly to algae?  So that's it.  Algae -- a cleaner, more potent source of DHA/omega 3s.  And since I happen to be out of flax seed oil capsules, I have just ordered a shipload (in honor of the nautical nature of the item) of algae.  

Here we see my artichoke trying to
consume a small palm tree.

So now, I'm trying even harder to eat organic fruits and vegetables and am supplementing with probiotics and, soon, algae for my omega 3s.  (I'm still getting my omega 6 from evening primrose oil, at least until I find out that bat guano really is the best source).  As part of my anti-atopy efforts, I am slowly turning my backyard into an orchard/garden, where I can control the toxins I put into my foods.  Just this morning I picked a couple of red bell peppers and some tomatoes, and I have more tomatoes and fruit coming soon.  In fact, I am very excited about this whole garden deal, and I took some photos to document my ignorant bliss.

The peach nursery.

I've planted 18 fruit and nut trees out back now and am working vegetables into all my "landscaping," such as it is.  I used to plant pretty flowers.  Now I ask all my plants "What can you do for me?"  And they'd better come up with something good, if they want to consume my time, water, and compost.

Did I mention I have turnips, mache greens and kale right now too?  I had sauteed turnip greens for breakfast the last couple of days.  (Saute some garlic and a little chilli pepper in olive oil, add turnip greens and a teaspoon of mustard.  Pretty tasty for some strange itchy leaves.)

Which is why I was able to have THIS for a snack:

Not to worry -- these are dairy and gluten-free taters!  Yes, I found them at my new fave, Fresh & Easy.  They are "Smileys" -- wondrous concoctions of taters mashed into smiley faces.  What's not to love?  Maybe Satan's ketchup sauce filled with sugar.  But other than that...  Plus, I had those turnip greens for breakfast.  So back off.

Yum.