Celtic Bronze Age Diet

There is much interest these days in the Paleo Diet (abbreviated from paleolithic diet).  It is also popularly referred to as the caveman diet, Stone Age diet and hunter-gatherer diet.  The diet is a modern nutritional plan based on the diet of wild plants and animals that our ancestors consumed during the Paleolithic era—a period of about 2.5 million years duration that ended around 10,000 years ago with the development of agriculture.  The contemporary Paleo Diet is centered on commonly available modern foods and includes fish, grass-fed pasture raised meats, vegetables, select fruit, fungi, roots, and nuts, and excludes grains, legumes, dairy products, salt, refined sugar, and processed oils.

Not a bad way to drop weight, but cruel in that is does not include God's Gift to man, i.e. drink.  So, in a particularly McCainian way, I have trumped the Paleo Diet with the creation of my Celtic Bronze Age Diet.  

Most people consider me slender, and I suppose I am, but when I arrived at middle age, my weight does try to creep up on me if I do not watch what I eat and drink.  My normal mode of eating tends to be Paleo naturally.  I do not eat sugar for example and I can not eat dairy products.  I have a extreme sensitivity to casein or the proteins in cows' milk, and to a slightly lessor extent to the milk of other mammals.  I love French bread, know how to make it from scratch, but since the age of 40 I learned if I eat bread my belly grows, so I pretty much have given that up as well.

I like the Paleo Diet in concept, but let's face it, as world without ale and beer would be a very sad place indeed, not to mention not being able to imbibe the delicious young wine from Catalunya, René Barbier... which can be had in Oxford for 12 yankee dollars for a 1.5 litre bottle, which ain't bad for this lovely young wine. So I have modified the Paleo Diet, reworked it, into the McCain Celtic Bronze Age Diet.

Because of my work, I know my racial ancestry, ethnicity, etc., I have had Ychromosome, mtDNA, and autosomal DNA tests done on myself.  The McCains are about as Celtic as one can get.  Our family and their migrations hither and you in Europe can be traced via our DNA results.  Circa 10,000 ago we lived in northern Iberia.  Our distant DNA matches are in Galicia, Asturias, Catalunya, and what is now extreme southwest France.  Some time in the Bronze Age 3600-600 BC we migrated to what is now mid Argyll, the parish of Kilmichael Glassary.  We are your typical Atlantic Zone Celts, of the Atlantic Modal.

Bronze Age Celts

 Our people were fit, slim, a warrior people during this time.  Now the diet of our people was very similar to the Paleo Diet, but, some grains were grown at this time.  A basic bread was made out of oats or barely, like the Scottish and Irish oat bannock, but most of the grain was used to brew beer.  Wine was also very popular with Bronze Age Celts and those that lived on the Atlantic seaboard had easy access to it.

good for the Celtic Ladies also

The Celtic Bronze Age diet then is fresh meat, sausage, fish, vegetables, select fruit (such as berries, gala apples), fungi, roots, some oils such as extra virgin olive, and nuts.  For a treat I make up a batch of oat bannocks; they are naturally high protein and low carb, so not bad on your figure.  The Celtic Bronze Age Diet excludes grains, legumes, dairy products, salt, refined sugar, and processed oils.   No breads no dairy. But here is the good part, you can have all the Small Beer (like Miller Lite) you want, and the occasional strong beer, such as Andygator, or Timber Beast IPA, or any good ale (I am very fond of IPAs).  In short you eat like a Celt 3000 BC to 1600 AD.  It will keep you slim and contented. 

oat bannocks;  coarse oat flour, water, pinch of salt, drop of oil

The House Finch

House Finch

Above is a photo of a House Finch.  Interesting history on this bird, they are an 'introduced'  species in the eastern USA.  However, not from Europe or Asia, they are native to the western USA and were introduced in New York state in the 1940s and quickly spread from east to west.  They reached Mississippi by the 1980s and are now common here. Pretty little birds that are a frequent visitor to my feeder here in Oxford.

The Aliens Are Coming Says Nasa

 Nasa says I should worship Al Gore for fear of vengeance from 'green' aliens from planet Beta B. I would like to know is there a bottom to the pit of emotional diarrhea that progressives spew. Think we need the Southern lads with crew cuts, cigars, and slide rules in their pockets, put back in charge; we would already have a Moon and Mars colony if they had been left to run things.  Beta Boys run amok throughout the Federal government and now infest Nasa. 

If By Whiskey

'If you mean whiskey, the devil's brew, the poison scourge, the bloody monster that defiles innocence, dethrones reason, destroys the home, creates misery and poverty, yea, literally takes the bread from the mouths of little children; if you mean that evil drink that topples Christian men and women from the pinnacles of righteous and gracious living into the bottomless pit of degradation, shame, despair, helplessness, and hopelessness, then, my friend, I am opposed to it with every fiber of my being.

However, if by whiskey you mean the lubricant of conversation, the philosophic juice, the elixir of life, the liquid that is consumed when good fellows get together, that puts a song in their hearts and the warm glow of contentment in their eyes; if you mean Christmas cheer, the stimulating sip that puts a little spring in the step of an elderly gentleman on a frosty morning; if you mean that drink that enables man to magnify his joy, and to forget life's great tragedies and heartbreaks and sorrow; if you mean that drink the sale of which pours into Texas treasuries untold millions of dollars each year, that provides tender care for our little crippled children, our blind, our deaf, our dumb, our pitifully aged and infirm, to build the finest highways, hospitals, universities, and community colleges in this nation, then my friend, I am absolutely, unequivocally in favor of it.

This is my position, and as always, I refuse to compromise on matters of principle.'


if-by-whiskey, a 1952 speech by Mississippi politician  Noah S. "Soggy" Sweat, Jr.

Rabbit Back On The Menu Boys

I think it was Annie Dillard who described Mother Nature as 'the big chomp.'  Her point was Mother Nature is brutal and death is everywhere.  It is not a bunch of tree huggers and Indians playing love flutes, with rainbows over head; it is war, creatures trying to eat other creatures.  It is Man that brings order and protects beauty.  Anyroad, this is not about that, this post is about my cat Piscín, one of my Manx lads.  He bagged Big Game today; Rabbit is back on the menu boys.   He shared it with his brother too; for a cat, he is a gentleman (when it suits him, i.e. he was full).

Piscín and his kill this morning

Mississippi Kites

 

Mississippi Kite

I see a pair Mississippi Kites on my property often this days; amazing birds, very beautiful with incredible flying abilities. I watched one fold his wings and dive for prey yesterday.  It was impressive. The kites here in north Mississippi nest in woodland.  I often see them flying to wood edges and patrolling my large front lawn. 

I am told they eat a lot of large insects, but also take amphibians, reptiles, bats and host of other small mammals. They must take squirrels as I notice the many grey squirrels around my house make themselves very scare when the kites are on the wing.

Last year I had a pair of Peregrine falcons around, have not seen them this year though.

Josie

Marmots in Oxford Mississippi

I borrowed this off an educational website.  And why you ask?  Because Oxford is being overrun with Marmots. I see these creatures everywhere. Sighted one just two houses down a day ago.  So.... here they are, Marmots.

Burrow Dwellers: Marmots typically live in burrows, and hibernate there through the winter. Most marmots are highly social, and use loud whistles to communicate with one another, especially when alarmed. Many historians suggest that marmots, rather than rats, were the primary carriers of the Bubonic plague during several historic outbreaks.

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The Groundhog (Marmota monax), also known as the Woodchuck, or the Whistlepig (particularly in the Southern United States), is a rodent of the family Sciuridae, belonging to the group of large ground squirrels known as marmots. Most marmots live in rocky and mountainous areas, but the Woodchuck is a lowland creature. It is widely distributed in North America; for example, it is found in Alaska, Alabama, and Georgia. In the west it is found only in Alaska, Alberta, British Columbia and northern Washington. In the United States and Canada, there is a Groundhog Day celebration that gives the groundhog some added popularity.

Weights and Measures: Groundhogs are typically 40 to 65 cm long (including a 15 cm tail) and weigh 2 to 4 kg. In areas with fewer natural predators and large quantities of alfalfa, they can grow to 32 inches (80 cm) and 30 lb (14 kg). They can live up to six years in the wild, and ten years in captivity.

Growing Numbers: The groundhog is one of a small number of species that have grown greatly in numbers since the arrival of European settlers in North America, since the clearing of forests provided it with much suitable habitat. It prefers open country and the edges of woodland. As a consequence, it is a familiar animal to many people in the United States and Canada.

Excellent burrowers: Groundhogs are excellent burrowers, using burrows for sleeping, rearing young, and hibernating. The burrows generally have two exits, and the groundhog rarely ventures far from one of them for safety. While preferring to flee from would-be predators, the groundhog is known to viciously defend its burrow when invaded by predators such as skunks, foxes, weasels or domestic dogs. It can inflict quite a bit of damage with its two large incisors and front claws, especially when the predator is at a disadvantage inside the burrow.

Breeding: Usually groundhogs breed in their second year, but a small percentage may breed as yearlings. The breeding season extends from early March to middle or late April, following hibernation. A mated pair will remain in the same den throughout the 28-32 day gestation period. As birth of the young approaches in April or May, the male will leave the den. One litter is produced annually, usually containing 2-6 blind, naked and helpless young. Young groundhogs are weaned and ready to seek their own dens at five to six weeks of age.

Ancestors

The past is never dead. It's not even past.

 William Faulkner

As the world swirls around me, the words of William Faulkner come to mind.  They are very true yet so few people seem to realise it.   Here in my native South I hear conversations going on around me that could have happened 150 years ago.  Interesting times and getting more interesting by the moment.

The Sky Did Not Fall

I've been news-fasting for the last few days.  The annoying hum and din of the talking heads was beginning to irritate in the extreme.  A sidebar, but, why are do all the women on Fox News dress like hookers?  And could they possibly get their war paint any more garish? 

I see the Sky has not fallen.   I assume the Republicans caved again, as they always do. Does modern medicine perform testicle transplants?  If so the Republican National Committee should investigate as they sorely need some masculinity. Be rough finding donors true, but if enough money changed paws I expect you might find some wino that would sell you one of his.

In the South the Republicans are known as the Stupid Party and the Democrats are known as the Evil Party.  Or to paraphrase Huey P Long....  one wants to eat you from the top down and the other from the bottom up.

Think I'll wear a polo shirt to mass this morn. I feel casual.