Shy: A novel by S.D Kupiec

Chapter 1

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Even with the scowl, I couldn’t take my eyes off him. The man, if you could call him a mere man, stood in front of a

large bonfire, looking like he’d just stepped out of an old cowboy and Indian western. A giant, with long black hair so slick, it reflected the light of the fire that burned behind him.

Somehow his eyes did, too.

A dream brought on by research I’d done on the history of my parent’s land, no doubt. It was my dream, though, and I wasn’t in a hurry to find out if this god-like looking creature was good or not. His chest was bare and covered in painted handprints. No pants, either. Just a loincloth. His thighs had the same red marks.

Still as a statue, he stared at me. Glowered, really, but I didn’t care. He was my subconscious.

“Okay.” I spoke, eager to hear what his voice sounded like. “What do you want?”

He didn’t move. Not even a twitch. Was he a statue? I was tempted to find out. Touching him wouldn’t hurt. And a smile, probably an impish one, squinted my vision. I stepped forward.

My movement must have startled him, because his head fell back, his arms stretched out and he let out a holler that rumbled like thunder across the clear night sky. When he

stopped, the world was silenced. Not even the fire’s crackles dared make a noise.

Dream or not, I looked for the best direction to run incase I needed to escape. A figure stood off in the distance. I couldn’t make out anything but the shape of a body. A guy, maybe. But he didn’t move either. Like a see- through statue.

The world was open. I could run in any direction, except there was nowhere to go. The landscape was nothing but cactus and Juniper in every direction.

“Look,” I turned my attention back to the man in front of me. Right in front of me. He’d moved so fast the movement was blurred. And now I was staring at the sweat rolling down his chest. I hadn’t noticed that before. His hot breath blew in my hair and I looked up to see him bent over me, his nose almost touching mine. His features out of focus with the closeness.

“Wh-at—”

His fingers curled around my arms easily, pulling me up and even closer, if that were possible, and squeezed. I was afraid my arms would snap in half.

“You belong to me.”

As his face vanished, so did his grasp and I dropped to the ground. Only a few inches, but the landing jarred me and my knees buckled hitting the floor of my living room hard.

He was gone, though his voice, those words, echoed in my head. The coldness of the night crawled up my legs as the shivers made their way down my back, meeting in the middle. I’d never slept walked before. I’d never had a dream that had felt so real before. I could still feel pain where his hands had been and when I rubbed them to help them realize it wasn’t real, they were tender. Bruised, though I couldn’t actually see the marks in the darkness of the night.

Then true Sara re-emerged. The weakling I’d become so many years ago. In the dream I’d felt scared, but strong. Here all I could do was cry.

“Sara?” My mom stood in the doorway of her room, rubbing her arms. “What are you doing up? It’s 3 in the morning.”

I didn’t talk to her. I never did. Not that I was biased. I didn’t talk to anyone unless I had to. This wasn’t ahad to situation. My staring usually made people uncomfortable. That’s what I wanted it to do. It kept people from wanting to ask questions, or to try and carry on a conversation. Mom was used to it, though.

“Can you be a little quieter?” She was already turning around to go back to bed. “See you in the morning.”

A slight nod was all I gave her, not that she would see it, but I stayed on the floor, shivering from the cold and the fear until I could finally stand and go back to bed.

My bed was cold as I crawled back in, as if to tell me I’d been gone too long. Wrapping myself up in the quilt, I couldn’t close my eyes. Every time I did, he was there.

You belong to me.

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Have You Ever Seen A Teacher Do This?

I do public demonstrations of sinus rinsing because sinus rinsing has changed my life. I only wish I had known about it years and years ago!

How to Sharpen a Disposable Razor

Cold Frame Polycarbonate Plastic

I just got this email: 

"Sorry to bother you.  I have made a number of phone calls the last couple of days trying to find somewhere in Utah Valley or even Salt Lake Valley that sells the twin-wall polycarbonate you recommend for cold frame construction, but have been unsuccessful.  I wanted to ask if you know where to buy it locally, or if you special order (and if so, from where)?"

Answer: I am the only "place" in the West and perhaps the U.S. that sells it in small quantities. I don't know of any other place that sells it in smaller quantities than bulk. I just got a truckload of it delivered today. If you are looking to build cold frames, here is the link:

http://www.mcssl.com/store/calebwarnock/cold-frame-twin-wall-polycarbonate

-Caleb

Forgotten Skills & Backyard Renaissance Classes Autumn 2013

Forgotten Skills & Backyard Renaissance Classes Autumn 2013

with Caleb Warnock

TWO OPTIONS for taking this year’s classes:

1. August 10 from 8 a.m. to noon in Caleb’s Backyard. (Email calebwarnock@yahoo.com for address) $99 before noon Aug. 8. $129 thereafter. Register at SeedRenaissance.com. Each participant takes home a cold frame and $50+ seeds. Check-in begins 7:30 a.m. Healthy lunch included. Bring your own chair.

2. Online. $99. $99 before noon Aug. 9. $129 thereafter. Check-in online Friday, Aug. 9. Class online from Aug. 12-16 at your convenience (no specific time required). Each participant will be mailed cold frame polycarbonate with instructions, and $50+ seeds. Register at SeedRenaissance.com.

This year’s classes include (times listed are for the class in my backyard, not online):

- No Nonsense Household Tips for Saving Money. 8-8:30.

This popular class is offered again for the first time in three years! How to make the best, easiest bulk powder laundry soap, enough for more than 1,000 loads in 20 minutes at 1.8 cents a load! Save hundreds of dollars on shaving razors, dishwashing machine soap and much, much more!

- Backyard Help for Cold, Flu, Sinus & Asthma. 8:30-9:30.

In this hands-on class, Caleb will teach you the best backyard herbal treatments. We will make and sample the herbal treatments, starting from scratch, and discuss which herbs to use to help which conditions. This class covers prevention and treatment.

- Forgotten Prepper: 15+ Essential, Simple Skills You Don’t Have. 9:30-10:30

Easy homemade garden hand soap, backyard candles, sanitation, backyard lotion, and many other things every family should know for emergency preparedness and everyday use.

- Never Buy Chicken Feed Again -- 20+ strategies for feeding chickens. 10:30-11

Includes at least a dozen foods you can grow in your garden for year-round chicken food, as well as where and how to get free chicken food, and how to manage a flock to make is self-sufficient.

- Fall and Winter Gardening With Cold Frame 11-noon

Each participant will go home with at least $40 in seed for fall and winter gardening, with the latest information about the best autumn and winter varieties. Cold Frames -- Each student will go home with a cold frame that we will make in class, with information on how to use it and the seed you need to get started immediately.

- Four Best Wild Edibles. Noon-1

Each student will certify with Caleb their ability to individually recognize, harvest and prepare the four best backyard wild edibles.

- Q and A with Caleb. 1 p.m. until whenever.

Caleb takes your questions.

Caleb Warnock’s Guaranteed Edible Weed Killer

[Above: milkweed thistle killed with Caleb Warnock's Edible Weed Killer]

After five years of work, thousands of dollars, hundreds of experiments, and hundreds of hours of testing, I am pleased to announce that I have formulated an entirely edible backyard weedkiller that is guaranteed to kill all backyard weeds -- including the roots -- in one application when applied as directed.

I have been very close for a couple of years now, and have been working feverishly since early spring to perfect this recipe. After giving speeches to thousands of people because of my books, the biggest request from audiences has been a safe and chemical-free recipe for killing weeds. People have told me they want to give up using Monsanto’s Roundup and its generic versions because of concerns about expense and long-term effects.

I have been certain for years that it was possible to create an all-natural weedkiller that could be guaranteed to work as well as all commercial weedkillers, at a much lower price, with no environmental or chemical risks. My only requirement was that the recipe be entirely edible because I’m not going to use anything in my garden that I don’t want to eat.

My years of work have come tantalizingly close. This year, the final two puzzle pieces clicked together.

First, master herbalist Kirsten Skirvin was teaching a class at my home when she said this: “Whenever there is a problem caused by nature, the natural solution is always only a few feet away.” I admit it sounded like hocus-pocus to me. My first inclination was to apologize to those who had paid to be in the class. But Kirsten is not a fly-by-night herbalist. She has more than two decades of experience. I decided to be quiet and put her words to the test. She was talking about cuts, burns and stings -- not killing weeds. Nevertheless, as I began to test her theory, I began to see that it was true. And I started to wonder how it could be applied to weeds.

The second puzzle piece clicked for me while I was teaching a class earlier this year. Someone asked me a question about something completely unrelated to killing weeds, and I answered the question -- and realized in that instant that the answer had been staring me in the face for three years. I knew immediately that I had found a recipe I could guarantee, at last. Since then, I have tested and tested. I figured out the exact vegetable-based formula. The most difficult and frustrating part was figuring out how to apply it correctly. As it turns out, the way the weedkiller is applied makes all the difference in the world.

My weedkiller:

- Is entirely edible. The recipe doubles as a super-healthy salad dressing, which is how I would suggest you eat it.

- Kills all common backyard weeds in one application when applied as directed.

- Is guaranteed safe for pets, bees and insects so long as you don’t apply it directly on them.

- Safe and even beneficial for garden soil.

- Safe for use around children, and safe for the person applying the weedkiller (except that you could hurt your eyes if you got it directly in your eyes. Do not get the formula in your eyes.)

- Where I live, the ingredients, when purchased at a grocery store, cost just less than $3.50 per gallon to make at home. One gallon will kill roughly 100 to 400 square feet of weeds, depending on the height and density.

- Can be all natural and 100 percent organic, depending on the vegetables you use to make it.

- Will kill living weeds of all ages, and is guaranteed to kill field bindweed, mallow, cheatgrass, dandelions, lawn grass, clover, broadleaf grass, perennial weeds and all common backyard weeds in a single application when used as directed.

- This recipe does not use salt and will not affect future plantings or have any negative or long-term affect on your soil or garden!

- The weedkiller takes less than five minutes to make. You will need a blender.

- To apply the weedkiller, you will need one of two inexpensive tools, costing about $4, or $20 if you want to apply the weedkiller as a spray. You will be able to use these tools over and over again, and you likely already have these tools if you have a garden.

- My weedkiller recipe will also kill vegetables, berry bushes, flowers and shrubs if applied directly on them. Apply only to plants you wish to kill. This weedkiller may also kill insects if applied directly on them.

It is no exaggeration when I say that creating this formula has required five years of work, thousands of dollars, hundreds of experiments, and hundreds of hours of testing. Because of all this expense and effort, I cannot give this recipe away. I have thought carefully about how to make this recipe public -- should I keep the recipe a secret and sell weedkiller by the gallon? The problem with this is that only local people would have access because shipping a gallon would be prohibitively expensive. Should I sell the recipe? The problem with this is that someone could publish the recipe and destroy my opportunity to sell what I have worked so hard to create. So what I have decided to do is sell the recipe for $29 per household, but only to people who agree to the following terms:

“By purchasing this recipe, I hereby agree never to publish or make public the recipe for Caleb Warnock’s Guaranteed Edible Weed Killer in any way, by any medium including but not limited to verbally sharing the recipe or distributing the recipe via electronic and/or print media, including to family and friends who do not live in my immediate household. I agree to the above stated terms even if I request and receive my money back, or even if I request but do not receive my money back. I agree that, should I request and receive my money back, I will never again use the recipe, nor publish it or make it public in any form.”

The recipe is $29 per household. You need only to purchase the recipe once to use it for your lifetime. My recipe is guaranteed to work with a 30-day money-back guarantee. You can purchase it only at SeedRenaissance.com. My belief is that this recipe has the potential to change the world. With this recipe, I cannot see any reason to use any chemical weedkiller. -Caleb

[Below: Weeds killed with Caleb Warnock's Edible Weed Killer]

"Step Away From the Tylenol"

Since I love to save money, I found a new study about buying generic over-the-counter headache pills and even food brands to be fascinating. Done by the University of Chicago Business School, the study finds that we are all wasting a lot of money on brand names, while the people in the know -- doctors, nurses, and most importantly pharmacists -- are buying the generics.

Not only that, but professional chefs are much more likely to skip a brand name and purchase a no-ad brand when it comes to “salt, baking mixes, prepared food, sugar, dried fruit, dairy spreads and dips, bread, pickles, soup, and cheese... chefs opt for generics with what they call pantry staples, where they can readily ascertain that the generic salt or baking soda is the same as the brand-name alternative.”

So it turns out that, to the professionals, the cheap stuff is the good stuff in many cases -- a lesson we can all apply at home. You can read the full Slate.com article here: http://slate.me/14wPMYl

Caleb: Salt of the Earth or 'Condescending Prick'?

There is a so-called “recipe” floating around the internet, especially on Facebook, that drives me crazy. It’s a version of homemade weed-killer called “Kill Them All” or some variation of that, and it calls for mixing vinegar and salt together to pour on weeds.

Weed killer indeed.

I’ve been sounding off about this recipe online for months, at first dismayed and then incredulous as the recipe kept popping up more and more. I belong to several so-called “permaculture” groups that meet online and in person to discuss the concept of permanent sustainable agriculture. Someone on one of these groups posted the recipe for this weed-killer. “This is such a bad recipe,” I wrote on the comments to the post. “I wish people would stop passing it around,”

“Why?” wrote the person who had posted the recipe.

“Because salt is a permanent decision,” I replied. “Gardeners above all others should know this. I don't understand people poisoning their own soil.”

“Well, you are trying to poison a plant,” responded someone else in the group. “I think it would just depend on the concentration of salt that ended up on the ground. It's better than what Monsanto gives us to spray.”

It not better, actually. It’s not better at all -- and if you know me, you know I oppose Monsanto tooth and nail. “It's hard for me to believe we have to have this discussion on (this permaculture site),” I responded. “Makes me depressed that even gardeners see nothing wrong with salting the earth.”

To my surprise, the person who posted the recipe then responded by calling me a “condescending prick.”

“Disagreeing with you isn't condescending,” I wrote. “I'm genuinely surprised because the whole idea of permaculture is to do no harm.”

To which the person responded that I was “arrogant and condescending.”

I’m happy to say that several people came to my defense, but I reprint the conversation here because it was eye-opening to me to see how much education there is left to do, even among proponents of “permaculture,” which I consider to be the highest form of gardening. (Being called names didn’t much bother me -- after all, I’m a journalist by trade, and I’d already been called much worse by far more important people on that very day.)

I fear that a lot of people are seeing this weed “solution” and putting it to use. Here’s why I think that’s a terrible decision:

1. Depending on how much salt you use, salt is a permanent decision. You salt the earth, it will at least be years before you can use it again. What if you move unexpectedly? (If you don’t think people move unexpectedly, you haven’t lived very long.) Are you going to walk the next family over to your garden and explain that you salted the earth for them? What if you decide you need to change things around in your garden? Or what if you read my upcoming book and learn that you can have the easy luxury of a self-seeding garden -- except that you have salted between all your garden beds?

2. Let’s say that you salt the earth and three or four years later, something is able to grow in that space again (Rejuvenation that soon is possible, depending on how much salt you used.) Where do you think all that salt went? Do you think it magically disappeared? I can tell you exactly where the salt went -- it headed into the aquifer underground. Or it was captured in runoff and went toward the nearest body of water. In the county where I live, we have a large fresh-water lake -- a true gem in the middle of the desert. Once upon a time, the south and west shores of the lake were home to groves of commercial fruit trees -- until the water in the lake got so salty that it could no longer be used to irrigate the fruit trees. Even alfalfa fields had to be abandoned because of the high salt content on land that was flooded by lake water in the spring. Salt, as I said, is a permanent decision. Once you put it into the ecosystem, it cannot be removed. It can be diluted, and even a decade ago, water managers used to say “the solution to pollution is dilution.” They don’t say that anymore, after it became obvious that dilution ceases to work once the pollution levels grow to a certain tipping point. After that tipping point, the only solutions left often cost hundreds of millions of dollars -- and now you know why sewage and run-off fees have jumped so much in the county where I live. Short-sighted solution, long-term natural consequences.

3. Salting the earth was a widespread ancient custom after war -- to add famine to injury, the conquering military would salt the land so that the defeated people couldn’t grow food to feed themselves. (The Romans used to salt the earth of their enemies, to name one example. There are also examples in the Bible.) Imagine who is laughing when people decide to salt their own earth. The idiocy is astonishing, if you think about it. It certainly proves true the old saying that those who don’t learn history are doomed to repeat it.

4. In our society that is flush with morbid obesity -- even, and most sadly, among children, why not just get off the couch and pull the weeds? You might need to examine your lifestyle if the only way you can fathom gardening is with a “spray” for every single problem you encounter. I like to call it “going to the gym” when I’m going out to pull weeds. Turn off your television and go get your hands dirty. Go show your kids the value of actual physical work -- if you can get your kids away from the video games long enough to see daylight.

5. Finally, here’s why it’s a stupid recipe: If you salt the earth, you don’t need any of the other ingredients in the recipe -- salt alone will kill the weeds. So if you insist on being stupid, at least be smart about it.

June Color Tour of Caleb's Garden

 Naturalized columbines in white and lavender. 

 More naturalized columbines in yellow and red.

 A showy display of evening primrose.

Blue mountain geraniums.

Purple Dame's Rocket, which I look forward too all year. They get five feet tall! 

 Buttercups.

These are called blue-and-golds.

Pinkish naturalized snapdragons.

 The herb Hounds-tongue.

 More snapdragons.

A sea of salvia. 

 Close-up of a mountain geranium.

 Wild yellow roses.

 Wild red roses.

The red roses are so nice right now, I had to include two pictures :) 

 Another wild rose hedge. We love this for the rare color. Very tropical looking. 

Have a great day in the garden! -Caleb

You Are Not Gluten Intolerant -- Unless You Want To Be

A week ago, a mother and daughter showed up at my house uninvited (which I’m discouraging, so don’t get any ideas) to thank me for reversing their gluten allergy. This woman’s daughter had read on my blog that natural yeast eats the gluten in flour until it is gone, and the daughter got a yeast start from me and started baking with our cookbook. Then she asked her gluten-intolerant mother to eat some bread.

“I told her no,” the mother said to me. “I didn’t want to be sick. When I eat gluten, I’m sick for days.”

The daughter persisted. After several weeks, this mother decided to try some of her daughter’s natural yeast bread on a Monday “because then I could be sick on Tuesday and Wednesday,” she told me.

She had absolutely no faith this would work. But because her daughter insisted, she eat the bread.

“And I had no reaction,” she said.

So she ate more, over several weeks, “and I had no reaction,” she said.

This woman was sitting wide-eyed on my couch, emotional and amazed. She wanted me to tell the world. She couldn’t believe that reversing gluten intolerance was so simple.

“I am eating wheat flour for the first time in years,” she said.

“I know,” I said. “Hundreds of people have told me stories just like you. I try to tell everyone. Help me!”

I have close personal friends that won’t try this. I don’t judge them because they are tired of being sick from gluten, and have worked hard to convert to a gluten free life.

But if the cure for gluten intolerance is simple, why not cure yourself?

When we remove gluten from our families, we begin to make our kids increasingly gluten intolerant. This puts the kids on a difficult course for the rest of their lives. So I ask again -- if the cure for gluten intolerance is simply, why not cure your family?

Let me ask you a question. Where did your gluten intolerance come from?

For so many people, they just one day begin to feel sick, and eventually figure out it comes from eating gluten. They talk with friends and doctors -- and the doctors immediately say, “Remove gluten from your diet for a few weeks, and if you feel better, you are gluten intolerant. Then you just live gluten free.”

But no one says where this gluten intolerance is coming from. The doctor’s don’t know and don’t pretend to know. You don’t know -- your intolerance just develops one day.

But I know.

Gluten intolerance is a symptom, not a disease. Store-bought yeast does not eat gluten -- it is unnatural and has been modified so that it raises bread quickly, but does not eat gluten. 

Natural yeast does. To learn how to use natural yeast, click here.

When you eat wheat foods made with natural yeast, you are not eating gluten because the gluten is gone. The yeast eats it and turns it into yeast. If you don’t believe this, take some of my fresh yeast to your doctor and they will test it for you (I believe insurance pays for this test in most cases if you have gluten intolerance. Ask your doctor).

Gluten intolerance is very trendy right now. Many, many people have begun diagnosing themselves without even going to a doctor. But if you don’t want to be on an expensive artificial diet for the rest of your life, try natural yeast. If you don’t want to see your kids on a special diet for their whole lives, try natural yeast.

The cure to gluten intolerance could not be more simple. I don’t know what else to say. If you want a FREE natural yeast start, which you can use for the rest of your life, click here. If you would like more information about natural yeast, including how it affects allergies and diabetes and heart burn, see our book at the link below. -Caleb