The Barter System and the Garden

Lantau Island, Hong Kong, Feb 07

I had been yearning for the sauna lately. I really enjoy saunas. Only the dry ones though, I dont like inhaling all that nasty steam in those germ-incubators. But a nice quiet time in the sauna is wonderful. My old gym never had one, so the last time was probably in Asia. Anyways, the Universe has sent a sauna my way.

My good friends B+E just found a great spot on the west side, and their gorgeous new building has an amazing gym, and a pool for laps, AND a sauna. I can go work out there with them (and hopefully motivate them at the same time) and also help them to create superfood smoothies or green smoothies after the workout. They are so lucky the have that great spot in their building. It wont be training, because I have to work out there too, otherwise they know you are a trainer and trainers arent allowed to do private classes in the buildings without consent of the manager or something (insurance liability issues) but I would want to work out with my clients if I was a personal trainer anyways. All you have to do is rotate between sets. Its perfect.

I've been good about the at-home workouts, but I really could feel the difference after today. You work all these different muscle groups that some at home exercises really cant target. i'm really excited for this. Bartering is so great...we can get so much done by getting creative with our food prep skills and using our raw food and health knowledge and exchanging it for some other kind of talent or resource that someone else has access to. Everyone wins, and its tax-free.

Question/Comment of this post:

Anthony,

Thank you for your blogs :) The pictures of your greens show how healthy and strong they are! I'm very inspired - can you recommend some resources and/or give information about how you started learning to grow things like kale, etc? I know very little at all about how to start...

Thanks for everything!

Courtney


Courtney...its really all about the soil, and buying quality seedings. A person could start them from seed, but you can find organic sellers that have very strong seedlings and they really know what they are doing. That first month is crucial, and your turnover can be so much quicker for such a small price. Each plant as a seedling probably costs 75 cents-$1. So when it grows super big like these, you are getting them for that plus labor (and the initial expenses). I would recommend and ONLY recommend the Sq. Foot Garden Method. Your soil is always optimal, and you can fit so much produce into one 4x4 square. Its such a good system.

And yes, SOIL. This is beyond important. Get quality soil with compost and worm castings. The difference is laughable. And get ladybugs to take care of pests. I put a pinch of sea-salt in each gallon of tap water. OH yes...and for all you water-hounds out there:

http://www.pmgeiser.ch/mineral/index.php

Maybe I will just switch to Fiji...I get free Poland Spring from work though...but if Im going to be so good about everything else, I should make an effort to drink the best water that I can. I drink about half a gallon a day, so it should be important.

Anyways, back to the garden.
All these plants are late season cold resistant varieties. Thats why you rotate different plants in the same square throughout the whole year. You could seal it up with glass or plastic and do in year round in the northern US.

Once those essentials are taken care of, you pretty much cant lose. Go forth with confidence!!!

-Anthony

Busy day tomorrow, early casting so I should be getting to bed soon. I got home and totally pigged out on apples! I nibbled one and it was just perfect! I worked out really hard today and was walking around everywhere..all I had was that apple-cuke-lemon smoothie, and then I showed B+E the Brazil Nut-Spinach-Goji-Blueberry-Raspberry smoothie. I had to sample that one of course.

Have a great Thursday everyone...vids coming soon...