The prescription these days for solving the world’s problems are better robots. Robots to vacuum your floor. Robots to water the garden. Robots to mow your lawn. But I doubt any robot will do as good as job of keeping my garden pest-free as the four Cayuga ducks. Watching them scurrying through the leaves and vegetation in search of bugs and slugs to eat is awe-inspiring. They have more intelligence in their brains than any robot Silicon Valley Millennials can conjure up. Millions of years of evolution have honed the ducks’ senses and drive to scour every bit of the garden. I don’t have to recharge them, and they convert everything they eat into fertilizer in a matter of hours. I don’t have to upgrade them every year or two, no need to call support, and they self-reproduce to boot.

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While the ducks tend to the garden, I make tofu to deliver to the Anacortes Food Coop on Thursday. There is a pure beauty to soybeans when you soak them overnight under cold, running water. The soft flow of cold water washes away all impurities, leaving plump, pure soybeans.