[dennisw]

Sounds great to me if the 16-30 year olds are getting smart and wanting to pick up some practical skills. Many got cheated by not having a father around enough to teach them mechanical basics, woodworking etc.... and then some. Or if mother always served microwaved dinners then she never kept a garden to teach her children some growing skills

I have a liberal friend who I can argue with all day long about Global Warming and what a fraud it is. He doesn’t take any of that personally. Most of us getting along is based on growing food. His garden and fruit trees are much better than mine. I have other friends,a serious Christian couple. Whole basis of that friendship is growing food. They have an amazing yard with tons of exotic fruit trees plus they do a “below the radar” nursery business out of their yard.

[familyop]

"Sounds great to me if the 16-30 year olds are getting smart and wanting to pick up some practical skills."

Only some of those who aren't children of local economic and government cheerleaders. But there are quite a few.

Thanks for the encouraging anecdotes on your neighbors interested in growing food. Here, energy is as important, and even more are interested in that. We have over 300 sun days per years, and the climate is brutally cold (25 F last night...cold slides down from the 14-er peaks nearby on our west side).

Gardening is a challenge here, and we're pioneers on that in our area. Well, not really. The pioneers of over 100 years ago did it just fine around here, but they didn't have so many big corporates and government employees around them, chanting, "Overgrazed! Overgrazed!"

And greenhouses, BTW, are taxed at 29% (property tax). ...makes it an even more enticing challenge (pioneering low-cost covers).