When I first began this diet I would athletically chew on connective tissue like gum until my jaw would cramp. Within a few week I had noticeable stronger looking facial features.

I still chew a little tough tissue from time to time and I believe it keeps my facial muscles in shape as well as cleans my teeth and gums.

I do this, too, and my face has toned up quite a bit. Plus it seems to have overall strengthened the tone and improved the color of my gums. I've always had good teeth and gums. This just makes them even better.

Cars, planes, trains, buses...they all crash.  Granted, cars are the least-safe option of that list, but they crash.

Er, yes, they sometimes crash. And you drive one all the time. I'm not getting your point in this at all. Are you saying that if you're behind the wheel you think that makes you magically immune to other people hitting you and killing you? Because it doesn't. You haven't addressed the point I raised with you at all. This is pure deflection.

And your points about legal gun owners completely misses the whole point. Bear in mind, I'm only talking about handguns, not long guns. The handgun carriers that worry me are those who either get drunk regularly and have bad tempers and little emotional self-control, or are criminals.  Notice I said carriers, not owners.  People who possess and carry handguns illegally are by far the most dangerous group, statistically. 

And I'm telling you, a gun is a liability in close-quarters combat.  I know you've been bull-shat into believing otherwise, but it's just that, bullshit.  Would you like me to link to some studies on the issue?  There are a number of them.

Now you're shifting the bar. You started out saying that no one should have handguns, and that all people who had handguns were dangerous and liabilities. When we start narrowing those claims down statistically and you didn't have a leg to stand on with the broad, sweeping statement, now you want to focus on illegal gun carriers.  I've got news for you. Banning handguns isn't going to do jack squat to take guns away from criminals. You're living a complete fantasy if you think it will. Look at how successful banning drugs has been to see exactly what I'm talking about.

And I'm telling you that when you have a handgun, you are less likely to BE in close quarter combat, because when they see the gun, most of those little PsOS run. I'm not speaking from "studies". I'm speaking from my own personal experience of saving my hide from violent people three times so far without ever having to get into a fight, and I'm still discounting all of my experiences in uniform just to make this a discussion more in line with what the average citizen faces versus a police officer.

It would be impossible to do a study of this. People don't report crimes that don't happen. There is no way you could possibly round up all the handgun owners and discover how many times they have narrowly avoided violent encounters by being armed. You'd have to rely on polling and anecdote. From anecdote alone, I have several gun carrying friends who have reported the same experiences I've had. I've also known several friends who have been jumped and had the crap beat out of them because they didn't have a good way to defend themselves. If they had a firearm and the training appropriate to using it, who knows how many of these attacks could have been prevented? Studies are useless for this type of information.

For that matter, I have been attacked by a pack of wild dogs.  I survived it, too, with no injuries. How?  Decades of martial arts training, and keeping a cool head.  There's almost no way I could have pulled and used a gun successfully in that situation.  Dogs are on you almost before you know what's happening. You're better off carrying a knife or truncheon, or using your bare hands and feet, etc....there's no substitute for good fighting training in a close-quarters fight for your life.  Believe me, I've been there.

I'm sure not. From everything you've said about guns, I don't think you have much experience in handling them at all, if any. I, on the other hand, and your average citizen, do not have decades of martial arts training or the upper body strength to fight off dangerous dogs. I have kept a cool head and shot dangerous dogs intent on attacking me. Yes, it happened quickly, and yes, I was still able to drop them. Different training, different techniques, same results.

Now see, here's the thing.  I'm OK with people having guns, even handguns, in some cases.  However, it's often the EXACT people who are the biggest gun-lovers who are crazy as heck, and really shouldn't have guns. Anybody ever heard of Eric Robert Rudolph?  He's a perfect example of the type of person I used to see at gun shows. He's crazier than most, but he fits the type perfectly, he's just a more extreme example than most.  And these are the people who are buying guns.

That is patently untrue. Registered gun owners have far fewer murders per gun owner than the average murder rate in America overall. People who own guns legally are statistically less likely to commit crimes with them than those who obtain them illegally or those who choose other means of murder. A simple Google search will bring up all the numbers you could ever want to see regarding that particular issue.

It's stupid to compare guns to cars.  I actually NEED a car to do things, like get to work.  I use it on a daily basis.  Who can honestly say they've used a HANDGUN on a daily basis?

It's not a stupid comparison at all when your biggest complaint against guns that you have presented is that it means you have to trust someone else to be safe with them. You also have to do that in a car, and you are in far more danger statistically out on the road every single day than you could ever be from registered gun owners. No, you don't need a car. Just as you suggest further below in your post about what a gun owner ought to do not to have a handgun, you can take public transportation, buy a bus or plane ticket for longer trips, and if you don't live somewhere that has good public transport, move somewhere that does. If it's sauce for the goose, it's sauce for the gander. Either you're worried about danger to yourself from others being careless or malicious, or you aren't. If you are, then focusing on guns over cars is kind of like focusing on the jackal in the underbrush when a bull elephant is bearing down on you in full on musth.

I have no problems with someone taking my car.  Go ahead, I can just call the cops and my insurance company, and get another one. As for dealing with dangerous neighbors and dogs, that means it's time to call the cops, animal control, or move.

When the cops are incompetent or anywhere from 45 minutes to an hour away from answering a call because of being spread too thin and in a large county, that isn't a viable option. Neither is calling animal control when they are only open on weekdays from 9-4:30 and the cops refuse to answer dangerous animal calls unless someone has already been mauled. People allow dangerous animals to roam at all hours, not just the convenient hours of animal control. And no matter where you move, unless it's to an isolated tropical island with no chance of anyone living next to you or owning pets, this can be a potential issue of immediacy, not something you have the luxury to wait even 15-20 minutes for. When you DO need a gun, you need it right then. If you've never been in that situation, count yourself lucky in your ignorance of what it's like when it goes down.

To be honest, I doubt any of you have anywhere NEAR the training to be able to draw and accurately fire a handgun in a life-threatening situation. Given that, I'm not sure how smart it is to carry a loaded gun.  If you want to carry one UNloaded, fine, but a loaded gun is not for casual gun owners to carry around like it's a magical protective totem. It ain't.

In point of fact, a handgun is actually a liability in close-quarters combat. An experienced fighter (which many criminals ARE) will take down a casual gun owner fairly easily at close range.  I can link you to the studies, if you like.  The research has been done.

To be honest, you don't know enough about any of us to make such a broad sweeping judgment. Not only have I had extensive firearm training, I keep it fresh by regular use at the range. I put anywhere from 250-300 rounds through my Glock per month with both static and moving drills. I would not be stupid enough to carry any weapon that I couldn't cleanly and quickly draw and fire in full control of myself and my faculties. Carrying an unloaded gun is one of the stupidest things you can do. If you pull a firearm, you had damned well better be prepared to fire it or don't bring it to the fight. You never know what someone else might be carrying. Brandishing is an invitation to a fitting for a body bag.

Against those same combatants you mention in close quarters, I have about zero chance of escape without severe injury or death without a firearm. With my training, I up the odds considerably in my favor. To date, I've never had to test that theory, given they run when they realize they're about to be as useful at holding water as a fishing net.

Lynnzard, I've wondered about dehydrating a refrigerator dormant insect at low temperatures - won't that just make it wake up and crawl out of the dehydrator? If not that would surely be a very useful tool at times.

I've never done this, so my info is second-hand. Take that for what it's worth. However, I've seen the advice on multiple sites, so here goes. If you actually stick them in the freezer for a couple of hours and then the dehydrator, they don't actually die in the freezer in that amount of time, but they won't wake up before they die during the dehydration. I'd say maybe just experiment with a few so if they do wake up you're not rounding up dozens of beetles in your house over the next few weeks. lol

I've found that every fruit has it's "sweet spot" where it has ripened on the bush, tree, vine etc. to that "just right" place. It was interesting watching this in detail with my loquat tree this year. I could tell by color which loquats were just right with experience. Once a certain number of fruits hit "over-ripe" the tree was suddenly overtaken with butterflies. I think there is a big difference between fruit ripened on the plant and fruit that is picked unripe and allowed to ripen. When there is still connection between the fruit and the plant during the process of ripening it is easier to tell what is the best.

They were probably fermenting by that point. Butterflies adore fermenting fruit and will gravitate to it every chance they get, the little lushes.

I find crickets easier to raise than mealworms. I feed the crickets and mealworms to the chickens because I love eggs personman. Your right that eating lower down on the food chain is usually more efficient and instead of eating the eggs I could eat the things that provide the protein for the chickens to make the eggs but I'm still trying to get up the courage to eat the bugs myself. I know - just stupid cultural programming. I might have to try some cooked with seasonings first just to get myself over the hump.

Re: mealworms, I've had them dehydrated and tossed in various seasonings, kind of like popcorn. They were really good that way. I also tried them unseasoned. There wasn't much of a flavor. A little nutty for lack of a better comparison. As far as crickets go, I've had them in other things. I couldn't tell that there was much of a flavor, but the other food could have masked it. If you ever do decide to eat crickets, remove the hind legs. People have had gut obstructions and irritated bowels from the stiff "hairs" on the back legs.

And Lynnzard, you very much ARE asking me to trust you.  What if you drop your gun while I'm in the house next door, and you accidentally hit the trigger, and the bullet goes through the window and kills me?  Tough titty for me?

And Lynn, if you're regularly around people who need to be threatened with guns to make them behave, you might want to rethink something, because THAT'S not normal.

Try again. I live in a house not close enough to any other houses in my area for any bullet to strike them, off of a private easement nowhere near a road. Do you drive? Because you are seriously in WAY more danger every single day on the road surrounded by people texting, talking on their cell phones, eating, drinking, and functioning on less than 3 hours of sleep. You're exposed to that every single day. I find it very strange that you claim your argument isn't emotion or fear based, and yet all you've brought up are fear arguments. What if something incredibly and highly unlikely happens while you're handling your gun and you accidentally shoot someone who just might be in the wrong place at the wrong time? That's not logic. That's cherry picking and a pretty poor attempt at it.

I wouldn't say that in almost 42 years of life, I have regularly been in any situation that required me to have a handgun. The carjacking attempts were in two separate states separated by several years, both along stretches of road with traffic and not by any stretch of the imagination considered a "bad neighborhood". The mugging/whatever else attempt was on my way to a parking lot after work. You know, that wild and crazily reckless behavior of trying to drive home after earning a living? Yeah, woo, what the hell is wrong with me? What was I thinking? How dare I be a woman walking alone?

The vicious dogs were kept by people who rented near where I live, and the harassing neighbors were also renters. Now, if you'd like to tell me where I can live that I am never, ever in any danger of having mentally unstable or idiotic people renting or buying a house somewhere within about ten miles of mine, by all means speak up. I'd love to live in that idyllic paradise.

Your point about trying to develop programs where people don't turn to criminal behavior in the first place is an attempt to set up a false dichotomy. Either/or. Except it's not an either/or scenario at all. There is nothing that says you can't have programs to try to combat poverty and the conditions that breed some of the more violent crimes AND allow handguns. I personally have done quite a bit of volunteer work throughout the years in programs to help people get a leg up, anything from tutoring kids in group homes who got kicked out by their parents for bad behavior to prison outreach, domestic violence education and awareness, and working crisis hotlines. If this issue is so close to home and dear to you, I'd like to ask what you are doing personally to cut down the need for law abiding citizens like me to protect themselves from the violent people who are currently walking among us even as we have this exchange and who will not magically change their ways the moment the government institutes the most effective, perfect social re-engineering program possible to prevent people from having to protect themselves?

Here's the thing. You already stated with quite a degree of chest pounding that no one is going to change your mind. I don't think anyone here is unclear of your position. I've also stated that you're not going to change my mind, and I've been crystal clear on my position, so why are we still even having this...it's not even a conversation or an exchange of ideas at this point. It's just different ways of stating the same thing. That's what happens when you start a conversation by saying you're not interested in hearing what anyone else has to say about it because your mind is made up.

That's funny. You never know who you'll run into out in the woods. I used to run into an elderly lady a lot in Arkansas when I was gathering hickory nuts. She was always after them, too. Close to 80 and still hammering them open like a pro.

Right now, I'm seeing how I do with raw milk and some raw cream. But most of the fat I'm getting is coming from marrow, beef and lamb fat, and fatty fish like salmon, yellow tail, and tuna.

If your live oysters are kept alive in tanks or on ice without feed, they can get starvation-shriveled and polluted even while alive. Know your shellfish source well.

That's a really good point. A healthy oyster is very plump with lots of "juice" inside, even if it's a small one. The edges are kind of ruffled, but not shriveled. If it looks at all shriveled, it's not nearly as fresh or healthy as it should be. Also, if you can easily open the shell, toss it and get another. It's already dead or close to it. I don't order on the half shell. I want to open my own so I know for a fact it's still alive.

You still haven't started your mealworm farm have you? The most sustainable protein source---no chicken can compete...

No, I haven't. Not yet! Have you got yours up and running now?

The only suet I've had was bison suet. It didn't give me digestion issues or make me sick. The texture, however, was very dry and unappealing. Mine did go bad. The reek was ungodly, and that was after just about a week and a half in the fridge. I don't think I'll be buying any more any time soon.