Spring is here, that means its time to stock up on seasonal preps. The local feed and fertilizer stores are getting their seed shipments in, as well as baby chickens, fertilizer,,, and so on.
Some stores carry farm supplies all year long, some places carry them on a seasonal basis. If ...
If you have not read part 1 of this raising chickens series, please do so. Its been over 20 years since I have owned chickens, so this is kind of a new venture as I have fourteen a lot over the past 20+ years.
Week 1 - my wife and I ...
If you are planning on surviving some kind of long term SHTF survival situation, then your plans should include food production. Stockpiling rice, beans, oats, corn, freeze dried foods,,, is fine and dandy. The problem with having a static food supply, it "is" going to run out sooner or later. ...
The past 2 days have been spent working on my truck, and working on some jug lines for an upcoming camping trip. When I started thinking about how much time and effort I put into getting the juglines ready, I was a little set back.
After talking to my wife, I ...
Strike one up for the people of the Republic. Awhile back a motorcycle driver was pulled over and the police officer was recorded on a video camera. Well, the police officer decided to arrest the motorcyclist on wire tapping charges.
I dont know if statements by public officals are copyright protected, but I’am going to quote the judges statement:
The judge wrote: “Those of us who are public officials and are entrusted with the power of the state are ultimately accountable to the public. When we exercise that power in public fora, we should not expect our actions to be shielded from public observation.”
America is truly a great nation, where the rights of the people are greater then the rights of the government. Remember that the next time you vote.
One of the keys to weight lose – or at the very least, weight management – is not living a sedentary lifestyle. This means you do not sit around all day. Most health experts tell us to keep moving, do not spend too much time sitting in front of the TV or playing video games. This seems like pretty good logic, until the summer months arrive and its 100 degrees outside for most of the day. Any kind of outdoor physical activity could mean heat exhaustion or heat stroke.
So “where” do you draw the line between being active and not dieing of heat stroke on a 5 mile run in the middle of July.
As far back as I can remember (back in the mid 1990s), my workouts would begin in the early spring,,,, say around March. Due to the extreme heat and humidity in east Texas, my outdoors workouts would have to stop by the end of June. Between March and June I was averaging about 6 – 9 miles on the bike, 3 – 4 miles running, and 20 – 30 minutes of weights. This equaled out to workouts that lasted about 1 hour and 30 minutes. But during July, August, and maybe part of September all of that had to stop. When riding the bike in July, it felt like I was riding in an oven. The hot air off the the road felt like it was heating my body up, instead of the breeze helping to keep me cool. Due to having to stop my workouts, I felt that I was never able to reach a good level of physical fitness. I could have joined a gym, but I don’t like being around other people in that setting. One thing about a good workout is the peace and quit – its “my” time.
Over the past weekend my wife and I were talking about how times have changed since the 1980s. In the late 1980s and into the 1990s, news on HIV/AIDS was everywhere you turned. The news was talking about the latest stars that died from the disease (like Freddy Mercury), scientist were still trying to figure out how the disease was spread and how easily it was spread,,,,,. Fast forward 20 years, and almost nobody is talking about HIV/AIDS – unless your in a high risk group, know someone with HIV, or you grew up in the 1980s.
Neither my wife or I are bisexual or gay, but the changing of the times does make for an interesting conversation. I guess the public interest in HIV/AIDS is a good example.
My opinion on the HIV/AIDS topic, the people are tired of talking about it, and have just accepted the fact that HIV is here to stay. You can only talk about a subject so much before people start to get bored, and I think that is what has happened with the HIV topic – 25 years of talking is more then enough.
One of the keys to marketing, is to convince people that they “have” to buy your product. That somehow, the life of the consumer will improve if they buy a certain product. Then there is the mindset that we “have” to have the latest and greatest products on the market.
I know this certain guy who is big into computer games. When a new processor or video card is released, he has to buy it just to have the best. I’am sorry, but I can not afford to buy the newest video card, memory, processor or even the newest games. My last computer was a single core AMD3200 with 1.5 gigs of memory – and it lasted about 3 years. While stores like Best Buy were selling dual and quad core computers, I was still using a single core system.
A couple of weeks ago my wife and I went to Frys in North Houston. While we were there I picked up a 1 gig chip of 800mhz memory. The guy helping me asked how old the system was “is this a 3 or 4 year old system?” I was kinda set back by his question,,, I do not have the money to spend on the latest and greatest computer parts. I simply replied, “I built this system in December 2009, I buy what I can afford.” The guy that was printing out the slip to get the memory just rolled his eyes a little bit. Lets see, I have a house note, house insurance, auto insurance, electric bill, children, child support, gas bill for my SUV and truck, cable tv bill, internet bill, cell phone bill, vonage,,,,,,,, and somewhere in there I’am “supposed” to fork out hundreds of dollars on just memory for my computer? Maybe when the guy stops living at mommy and daddies house, and has to pay his own bills, he might be a little more conservative with his money.
If you were going to buy 5 books to prepare for a disaster – any disaster – which books would you buy? These books should be considered resource material, so that excludes works of fiction.
Here are some of the books I would consider:
1. The Bible – during times of stress, people often turn to their faith. Having a holy book around, can provide people with guidance and wisdom needed in stressful times. When an important decision comes up, just ask yourself, what would Jesus do? I feel that the teaching of Jesus and to love your neighbor is a reflection of mankind. Regardless of how some of us act, the majority of us feel love and compassion for our fellow man.
2. Squarefoot Gardening – few things makes us as independent as growing our own food. I’am willing to bet that most people are totally dependent on the grocery stores and fast food places for their meals. Take away those places, and most people would be like a dog at an empty food bowl – standing there whining that they do not have any food. Learning how to grow your own food breaks those bonds and sets you free.
3. The Black Death: A Chronicle of the Plague – a powerful and riveting book that chronicles mankind during some of our darkest times. In all of recorded history, few disasters killed as many people as the Black Death, and few disasters made mankind stoop so low to survive. Stop and think for a minute, what would it be like to drive to the next town, and one a handful of people still be alive? However many people are in the town next to you, just think about all of them being dead – except for a few children that were next to the dead bodies of their parents. Well, stuff like that is what happened during the Black Death. Entire towns and families died off. Through their example, we can learn what to expect if another plague happens.
4. Undaunted Courage by Stephen Ambrose – is the story of Meriwether Lewis, William Clark and the journey through the American west. There are some interesting points in this book, like the party coming across Indian villages where everyone was dead – assumed killed by small pox,,,, or some other disease. Its the story of how a few men mad their way through frontier white men had never seen before.
5. Some kind of medical and first aid book – there are a lot of medical and first aid books out there, so I can not recommend and exact book. But when it comes time to treat a wound or illness, having some kind of resource material is a good asset.
Have you ever wondered how the examples set by others play a role in our lives? In other words, what kind of role models did you have in your life?
After my wife and I divorced, I married a woman that had 4 kids – and already had a couple of grandkids. As these step-grandkids get older, I have to think about 2 role models – my step-grandmother and my step-great grandfather.
After my grandmother died (sometime around 1969 or 1970 I dont remember the exact date), my grandfather met a wonderful lady that took my mom and my uncles as her own. I was only about 3 years old when my grandfather met my new grandmother. But I have memories my picking strawberries with my grandparents when I was only about 5 years old. They had about 9 acres of land where they had small gardens, and plenty of room to run and play.
My grandmother never forgot my birthday, she would always send a card and $10. But for the life of me, I can not remember her birthday, and that makes me sad. She did so much for me, and I never re-paid her for that kindness.
If there was one example my grandmother set for me, it was how you treat your step kids and your step-grandchildren. There is something she told me years ago that rings in my ears – “There is no such thing as step”. When you enter into a relationship, you have to accept the other family as your own.
My great-grandfather (really my step-great grandfather) taught me how to build a fire and cook bacon, and he took me out checking his trot lines on the Neches river.
My great-grandfather and my great-grandmother lived a very simple life. When the retired, they bought a bought a small camp house on the Neches river between Kirbyville and Jasper, Texas. Their house might have been closer to Spurger then Kirbyville. My great-grandfather had a small aluminum boat he would use to get up and down the river. The trot lines he set kept my great-grandparents with a steady supply of catfish. I remember riding in the little aluminum boat to go check the trot lines – he made me wear a life jacket of course.
So when my little grand kids are making a mess and really getting on my nerves, I remind myself of the kindness that my step-grandmother and my step-great grandfather showed me. I’am pretty sure I was not the best kid in the world. In fact, I was probably just as bad as the rest of them.
This is not just about how we treat we treat our kids and our step-kids, this is also about how we treat people in our everyday lives. Treat the people in your everyday life with kindness and love. If you are going to sew something for people to remember years later, do you want them to remember the good, or the bad? When you die, do you want people to miss you, or be glad that your gone? I can think of examples of both.
There are few things that chap me worse then wasting food. Food is life – we have to have food to live. To waste food is to waste life.
September 19, 2010 my wife and I get up early that Sunday morning and go to wal-mart. As we are walking around the store, we turn down an isle that is mostly canned foods. Sitting on top of a stack of cans is a pizza. What is a pizza doing in a canned good isle? Its supposed to be in the frozen section. Anyway, I pick up the pizza, bring it to one of the meat displays at the end of the isle and set it on a stack of cold lunch meat. The pizza was still cold, so it should not have been spoiled.
Is this what our society has come to? That we can just waste food with little regard to where our next meal is coming from?
Another example – several months ago my family and I were having a birthday party. My wife and I decided to spend the money and buy some baby-back ribs, which are not cheap. I fired up the pit and smoked something like 4 racks of ribs. When it came time to serve the ribs, I divided them up to 1 rib per slice. We probably had 12 – 15 people over to share in the celebration.
After everyone had left, I was walking around the yard cleaning up and found a couple of ribs that had one small bite taken out of it, and then thrown on the ground. Lets just say I was not a happy camper. From the size of the bite mark, it looked like one of the kids had gotten the rib off the platter, took one bite, and then thrown it down. So who do you blame? The kid is not old enough to know how much food cost, so where is the parent?
During the same bar-be-que I saw several plates in the garbage half full of food. Some of the people there had gotten a sausage, might have taken 1 bite, and then threw it away. A couple of the plates in the garbage were loaded down with beans or potato salad.
I wonder if the guest had to pay for their food, would they still have wasted it? Or was it because the food was free to them that they were less inclined not to waste?
There have been times when my family and I have gone to Ci-Ci’s pizza, only to see other people leave plates full of food on the table.
I have been guilty of wasting food. There have been times when my family and I go to a buffet bar, and I got more then I can eat. And I feel bad about wasting that food. But for some people, wasting food does not seem to be an issue.
Why are you where your at right now? What are you doing there? What course of events drove you to be at your present location?
As I get older, I think about my life, and the course it has taken. There is some regret, there is some happiness and some sadness.
A couple of weekends ago my family and I were up at the camp having a relaxing weekend. One of the people there was a long time friend of mine – we have been knowing each other since around 1977 or 1978,,, somewhere in there. At the day turned to night, we built a camp fire, grabbed the lawn chairs and talked about past times.
One of the times my buddy brought up was a trip down the Bayou close to Bridge City, Texas. A fog had set in, and they could not see where they were going. The guys in the boat spotted a fish camp where they stopped and spent the night. My buddy thought I had gone on that trip. Regrettably I had not gone. I had probably missed that experience and spent that trip and spent that time with my girlfriend at the time – who would later become my wife, and ex-wife.
It was sometime around 1998, 1999 or early 2000 I was growing some jalapeno peppers and banana peppers behind the house. The problem was, my 2 youngest kids liked to go out there, and pick and eat the peppers.
If you pick a jalapeno pepper when its small and before the seeds develop, it is not hot. The seeds is what makes the peppers hot – no seeds usually means its not hot. So the kids could pick the peppers and eat them with no problem – but only when the peppers are small.
Since the kids were eating all of my peppers before I could get any, I used to grip at them – “dont eat all my peppers, they have to grow a little bigger.” I wanted to jar some of the Jalapeno peppers and use their juice over beans and rice. The banana peppers I would eat straight, their not hot at all.
I guess the kids thought the peppers needed to get bigger before they were eaten.
One day I was in the dinning room on the computer, when one of the kids came running inside crying. At first I thought the crying was because the child was hurt. But then the other one said – “they ate a pepper,,,,,,.” I dont remember if it was my son or my daughter, but one of them had gotten ahold of a full size Jalapeno pepper and ate half of it. I got them some milk, and some ice,,,, after awhile their mouth started to feel better.
Our friend Sticks65 over at PlanetBushcraft posted another fire building video. This one talks about using flint and steel along with Crampball Fungi to make a fire. Post your comments in this thread of the wilderness survival forum.
Harder to get the spark to take than char cloth but you don’t have to prepare the crampball like charcloth and can take them strait from nature and use.
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