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[Gene GeRue <genegerue AT ruralize.com>]

A friend served ice tea, it was good, I asked how she made it, she  
said sun tea, just put some tea bags in a gallon of water, set it in  
the sun, after it looks ready bring it in and cool it in the fridge,  
add sugar or lemon to taste. I tried it, added lemon and honey, later  
just started using it straight. Then I wanted the tea taste to be  
stronger, so left it out overnight and then through another sunny day.

A bit ago I brought such a gallon indoors, forked out the tea bags and  
was about to put it in the refrigerator when I noticed that there were  
a lot of wispy filaments and pieces thereof floating around in the  
tea. Being the cautious geezer I am, I implored of Google to educate me.

This is what I found:

Is Sun Tea Safe to Drink?
by C. Jeanne Heida
Whenever the temperatures reach 90 degrees around here, I can count on  
my neighbors to haul out their sun tea jugs. Using the heat of the sun  
to make this popular beverage is a great past time no matter where  
people live. It's easy and fun, and a rather nifty way of harnessing  
the sun's energy.

However, there's been some discussion that making sun tea is really  
not ahealthy thing to do. Apparently, the warm 130 degree temperature  
of the water is the perfect medium for brewing a nice batch of  
bacteria, instead.

I grew up drinking sun tea by the gallon. Mom would set out her jars  
in the morning, and by sun down, we were sipping on it with our  
dinner. Mom did have some concerns, though. Being from Europe, she had  
been taught that people could get sick drinking tea that had not been  
made with boiling water, and allowed to steep for 5 minutes. None of  
us ever got sick however, and we eventually dismissed Mom's fears as  
an "old wives tale."

A breeding ground for bacteria

One afternoon, I had pulled a jug of sun tea out of my refrigerator  
and noticed some tendrils floating around. The tea had gotten cloudy,  
and there was some white stuff growing on the side of the jar. I  
thought it was only sediment, and poured myself a glass. It turned out  
to be some nasty tasting bacteria instead.

According the Center of Disease Control, brewing sun tea for long  
periods of time, actually encourages the growth of bacteria.  
Apparently there's a type of ropey bacteria called Alcaligenes  
viscolactis which is commonly found in tap water. Since water must be  
heated to 195 degrees for 3-5 minutes to kill bacteria, the relatively  
low temperatures of sun tea just isn't hot enough to kill anything,  
either in the water or the tea. Mom's folk wisdom wasn't that far off  
the mark after all.

http://www.associatedcontent.com/article/267618/is_sun_tea_safe_to_drink.html?cat=22
> From lurine AT softcom.net  Fri Jul 11 17:28:30 2008
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From: "Lynda" <lurine AT softcom.net>
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Subject: Re: [Homestead] The definition of "rural"
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What they use for their criteria can give real mixed messages as to what is 
rural.  I'm sure that they might decide we aren't rural if they just go on 
what a community has.

For example, although we don't have a Starbucks (the closest one is 24 miles 
away), we do have a coffee house and we have, right here in town:

2 grocery stores
1 health food/organic store
Mexican restaurant
Old-style restaurant/cafe
Pizza joint
Dairy/ice cream/sandwich shop
Bakery
Farmers market
2 bars
1 full-service garage
2 tire shops/garages
3 real estate offices
Florist
Video store
Feed store
Lumber yard
2 nurseries
Old-fashioned "department" store
Tailor/seamstress
Pharmacy
Health clinic
Dental clinic
Vet
Employment office
Cal-Trans office
Dept. of Forestry office
City water for those that live "in town"
Electrician and alternative energy specialist
Roofing company
A septic company
A recycling center
A motel
A pool
A skating rink
Tennis courts
Library
Two thrift stores
A satelite company
An internet company
Computer repair
and an old-fashioned truck stop with gas, diesel, propane plus the hamburger 
join and groceries.

Lynda
----- Original Message ----- 
From: "Gene GeRue" <genegerue AT ruralize.com>
> Access to shopping is something I hear friends around here talk about.
> Even before rising gas prices. It would be most interesting for we
> homestead listers who have homestead property to make a list of the
> ten most important things to us regarding location of home. I suspect
> that criteria changes after one has been in a place for five or ten
> years.
>
> The only thing I seriously do not like about Heartwood is biting
> insects. It is notable that insect population was not on my criteria
> list in 1976. If it had been . . . ?
>
>
>
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