Buying a 1/4 of beef!

Part 1
I think I have at least most of the money I will need to purchase a 1/4 grass fed cow. I now only need to find butcher and farmers. I don't know how to do that. I have googled butcher shops and found some. I have also talked with a woman I work with who recommended one. Since that recommendation though I have heard some stuff about that place I don't like. Mostly that some hunters have reported not getting their deer back. One of my goals with finding a butcher is to find some one who I can go to and trust when I tackle hunting. I want to use this experience to build the beginning of that relationship.
I have put out a call to other Columbus Paleo people through the Facebook page "Meetup: Paleo Living Columbus. I hope by the end of the day I can talk to some one who has actually bought a 1/4 or more. At the moment I am getting a lot of suggestions about Butcher shops, but it does not seem that many people have tried to get this much at one time.
Part 2
Wow, I just got a response to my post about "Fox Hollow Farms." This is looking like the place. I don't seem to need to do the extra work of finding a butcher myself. I will need to learn what I want to tell the butcher when the time comes. However, according to the FHF website the butcher can help me thought that process too. It looks like total cost will be about $500 and I will get about 90 lbs of meat. This is more money and less meat than I was expecting. It's still by far the best way to get this deal. I buy heart and tong for $4 a pound, but those are limited supply and very heard to deal with. When I am done butchering them and have them in an edible state I have about 1/2 of what I stated with. That means they are actually $8 per pound, plus and hour of work. This is gonna be awesome, its just gonna be more money than I was expecting.

It tastes like a Craft Store!

Last week, I got out two of my bottles of mead. On christmas I took one over to my girlfriends family for dinner. They are a family of wine connoisseurs. However, since it was christmas and all the stores were closed the only thing to compare my Raspberry Mead to was "Economy Wine" that was purchased at UDF. Still, I was worried that it could be the most terrible drink humans could make, but  ok with the comparison to "Econ wine." Pegi, girlfriend's mom, said it was amazing. I think she was being overly-kind. Moe's sister Annie said "It tastes like a craft store." I think that was actually the most accurate description. There was a strong flavor of raspberry and a lot of a yeasty flavor. However, I could also detect that sort of potpourri taste mixed with crafting items. Its hard to describe beyond that. I immediately could pick out several points that I could improve the process and will do so next summer.
The following night I took the second bottle over to some friends. We all went out to dinner and then some one suggested stopping at "Brothers' Drake Meadery" so we could properly compare. This gave my Mead an unfair disadvantage. Moe and I got a sampler, 2 oz of 6 different meads. Their mead is amazing and I have a lot of work to do to get mine better. The uninfused ones tasted like honey  without the sweet. After experiencing that flavor I was able to pick out the honey flavor in my own mead. They used a very different process for their "flavored" meads. They brew the original "Wild Ohio" and then later in the process infuse the various ingredients.
All in all I am very happy with how my mead turned out. It was by no means the best mead, but it was pretty good for my first try. I am excited for my raspberry crop this year and maybe getting to use some of my own honey.

Planting in the Snow.

I did some planting today. I finally dug in my old garlic from the summer. I don't know if it was still viable. The cloves were pretty old and dried out. I used a pvc pipe and stabbed holes in the snow. Then simply dropped the cloves in the holes. I think in a week or so when it snows again I will repeat the process with fresher garlic.
Today is also the second day I am seriously pursuing a fast. Sunday I had a small snack after work and didn't eat until monday at 4:30. Today, I will be attending game night which includes a large community dinner. I will break my fast then. Once I am able to do the whole 24 hours consistently I want to do a more formal write up.

Pinching Paleo Pennies.

I have been barely scrapping by for the past several months. I am saving a lot of money to get back into school. That means I don't have much left over to spend on food. In a month when I start school I will be working even less than I am now. I did some "back of the napkin calculations" and figured out that I spend about $315 a month. That is also about all the money I can spend on food. Over the next several weeks I am gonna try several things to bring that number down as much as I can. These changes will include things like using the internet to get more of supplements for cheaper and working on fasting more.
I have been buying most of my supplements at a local health food store. I like shopping there cause it's a small local business. However, the supplements I get are 20-50% more money there than on the internet. Thus far I have not made the switch cause its just easier to pick these things up when I am at the store. Now I have to make the switch. Hopefully if I am getting enough from one place I can get a good deal with shipping.
The second tactic will be to improve my intermittent fasting. I currently do a version of IF called bulletproof IF. This is where you drink bullet proof coffee and do not consume anything until the late afternoon. I have been wanting to do true IF for months because of the effects it has on mitochondria function. Mostly, by giving you mitochondria a break form constantly taking I'm more and more energy you can allow them to do a sort of house cleaning. My goal is to build up and do two 24 hour fasts every week. I expect that doing this will cause me to eat about 10% more on the feed days. That will make me come out to consuming about 78% of what I currently eat. Or roughly 16,380 calories a week.
There will be other adjustments like buying more things in bulk. However that will have to wait until I am able to save some money from these first tactic.  Also, I am trying to keep up with the sprouting again. The trouble with sprouting is that it takes daily care to keep the plants going. They care needed for them is not much but if you miss a day your kitchen smells like rotten lettuce.
I will do my best to keep updating how this is progressing. I want to find cheap solutions for Paleo lifestyle as much as the next guy.