I'm trying to decide whether or not I should be worried about this upcoming fiscal cliff. I have food stored up. Guns and ammo. Very little money in the bank and my income is about to drop to almost nothing anyway.
3 of my 3 sources of income depend on other people having plenty of money, but from a farm standpoint we're in pretty good shape and are about where we need to be. The only thing we're missing right now is fences to keep sheep and cows in. We have chickens and a pig as well as a freezer full of meat.
Over the past 3 weeks we've been putting an addition onto the house and now that it's finished it feels like the Taj Mahal in here. We went from 512 square foot to 1024 and it's a world of difference. Still plenty of nitnoid work to do on it but it's all just finish work. We've already moved into it with a rousing going away party for my friend Kelly last night. All the hillbilly clans came and beards were on full display. Good Christian company and good homecooked food. I was in hillbilly heaven.
So while the government ramps up the fear machine over yet another government-induced catastrophe, I just can't find any good reason to panic. I guess if I was as dependent upon them as they want me to be then I'd be in full-blown crisis mode, but I'm not. In fact, they're dependent upon me. If their ability to harass and pilfer from the citizenry were disrupted then I can't see it as anything other than a good thing.
Bring on the cliff!
Saturday, December 8, 2012
Monday, December 3, 2012
Barking Dogs
We have two dogs ... Sam and Fang. Sam is an Australian Shepherd and Fang is ... well .. I dunno. I found him as a puppy in a culvert where someone threw him to die.
As an off-grid household, we have no lights at night around our property. A few lamps inside but nothing that really illuminates very far outside.
So we (as many homesteaders do) rely on our dogs as an alarm system.
Sam barks all the time. Fang barks sometimes. For particular reasons all his own. Sam has three different barks:
1. "I think I heard/saw something and I'm just barking to let you know that there might be something out there. Just as an FYI. Don't get out of bed."
2. "Hey, master, just wanted to let you know that some dog about a mile away is barking and there might be a problem. No info as of yet, but I'm passing the message along that there might be something happening over there at the other house over a mile away."
3. "I definitely see something and it's standing right there!! Get it, master! Get it! Kill! Kill!"
Bark #1 I hear relatively all night long. Bark #2 is sporadic but usually occurs around 2am on most nights. Full moon nights are the most noisy as the dogs can see further and there's more critters moving around. Dogs have a different threat system than we do. Other animals are major threats. Deer and rabbits? BIG TIME threats that need a serious barking. Cars with muffler problems? Threats. Anything slowing down on the road? Threat! About the only place we agree on the threat is someone walking around the farm at night.
Bark #3 is the only thing that gets me out of bed at night.
Weirdly enough, Sam barks almost constantly at our farmhand Kelly. For the maybe 7 months now that Kelly has worked here (at least 2 days per week) he walks by the dog pen and Sam goes berserk. He's like "Hey, master! There's that guy again! Look out! He's right behind you! Look out!" Sam does not seem to understand that Kelly isn't a serial killer about to stab me in the back of the brain with a pitchfork.
Sam, being an Australian Shepherd, doesn't have very good eyesight either. Sometimes if I'm too far away he runs at me barking like he wants to kill me and eat my liver. Then he gets close enough to recognize me and gets all shamefaced.
I'm a dog guy. I like dogs. Especially Sam. Fang too, mostly, but some days I threaten to throw him in a culvert myself.
As an off-grid household, we have no lights at night around our property. A few lamps inside but nothing that really illuminates very far outside.
So we (as many homesteaders do) rely on our dogs as an alarm system.
Sam barks all the time. Fang barks sometimes. For particular reasons all his own. Sam has three different barks:
1. "I think I heard/saw something and I'm just barking to let you know that there might be something out there. Just as an FYI. Don't get out of bed."
2. "Hey, master, just wanted to let you know that some dog about a mile away is barking and there might be a problem. No info as of yet, but I'm passing the message along that there might be something happening over there at the other house over a mile away."
3. "I definitely see something and it's standing right there!! Get it, master! Get it! Kill! Kill!"
Bark #1 I hear relatively all night long. Bark #2 is sporadic but usually occurs around 2am on most nights. Full moon nights are the most noisy as the dogs can see further and there's more critters moving around. Dogs have a different threat system than we do. Other animals are major threats. Deer and rabbits? BIG TIME threats that need a serious barking. Cars with muffler problems? Threats. Anything slowing down on the road? Threat! About the only place we agree on the threat is someone walking around the farm at night.
Bark #3 is the only thing that gets me out of bed at night.
Weirdly enough, Sam barks almost constantly at our farmhand Kelly. For the maybe 7 months now that Kelly has worked here (at least 2 days per week) he walks by the dog pen and Sam goes berserk. He's like "Hey, master! There's that guy again! Look out! He's right behind you! Look out!" Sam does not seem to understand that Kelly isn't a serial killer about to stab me in the back of the brain with a pitchfork.
Sam, being an Australian Shepherd, doesn't have very good eyesight either. Sometimes if I'm too far away he runs at me barking like he wants to kill me and eat my liver. Then he gets close enough to recognize me and gets all shamefaced.
I'm a dog guy. I like dogs. Especially Sam. Fang too, mostly, but some days I threaten to throw him in a culvert myself.
Thursday, November 29, 2012
Should Have Listened
This morning I went out to do some work and the backhoe wouldn't start. We've JUST got this thing running so it was a little alarming. Yet it had the same problem yesterday, briefly, so I figured it was a continuation of the same.
I'm fiddling with it and the wife says "Maybe it's the battery."
I ignore her. It's definitely not the battery. I think the problem is with the old and faulty starter button. Maybe a loose connection or it's sticking. So I take off the dash to get a look at it. Oh wait. Yesterday I'd horked up the key ignition (which was rotating freely in its housing) and it has some wires loose. So I fixed those. In the process I broke the starter switch. It was probably the original starter button based on the age of the plastic and corrosion. So I had to go to town to get a new one (which also doesn't fit smoothly in the housing). That didn't work so I traced out all the wiring down to the starter.
Apparently whoever did all the wiring on this thing years ago only had one color wire in stock ... blue. So every wire in the stinkin' thing is blue. Every single wire. Only by using a voltage meter and a lot of patience did it finally get resolved. Kelly plodded along in his usual methodical method while I angrily cursed and threatened the entire ignition system. The wife has long since retired to the house, her advice unheeded.
With all new wires and a new starter button there should have been no reason why it wouldn't start. Seemed like we weren't getting good current from the battery so I dragged the crash cart over to put the charger on it. BAM. The starter turns over and the engine roars to life.
So by about 2pm I had everything put back together and the engine started so we could roll out and clear out some mesquite trees here on the homestead. Yeesh. If this had been a paying job I would have lost half a day.
I've got to get better at engine diagnostics ... or start listening to my wife.
I'm fiddling with it and the wife says "Maybe it's the battery."
I ignore her. It's definitely not the battery. I think the problem is with the old and faulty starter button. Maybe a loose connection or it's sticking. So I take off the dash to get a look at it. Oh wait. Yesterday I'd horked up the key ignition (which was rotating freely in its housing) and it has some wires loose. So I fixed those. In the process I broke the starter switch. It was probably the original starter button based on the age of the plastic and corrosion. So I had to go to town to get a new one (which also doesn't fit smoothly in the housing). That didn't work so I traced out all the wiring down to the starter.
Apparently whoever did all the wiring on this thing years ago only had one color wire in stock ... blue. So every wire in the stinkin' thing is blue. Every single wire. Only by using a voltage meter and a lot of patience did it finally get resolved. Kelly plodded along in his usual methodical method while I angrily cursed and threatened the entire ignition system. The wife has long since retired to the house, her advice unheeded.
With all new wires and a new starter button there should have been no reason why it wouldn't start. Seemed like we weren't getting good current from the battery so I dragged the crash cart over to put the charger on it. BAM. The starter turns over and the engine roars to life.
So by about 2pm I had everything put back together and the engine started so we could roll out and clear out some mesquite trees here on the homestead. Yeesh. If this had been a paying job I would have lost half a day.
I've got to get better at engine diagnostics ... or start listening to my wife.
Saturday, November 24, 2012
Slightly Skewed
We are short of water. That's my only big concern right now. I'm not at all bothered by rioting crowds at Walmart or whether or not people think that's one of the signs of the big collapse. We see rioting at some Walmart somewhere almost every year on Black Friday.
The pond is as low now as it was back in August. We haven't had any rain in quite awhile. My main tank is empty and I've been having to buy water again, something I only had to do a few times over the summer. It's $6 up at the local fire department when I bring my 200 gallon drop tank up in the back of the pickup to fill. A very easy thing to do but I hate having to do it.
Right now we get an average of 28 inches of rain per year. Per inch I can collect 318 gallons off of the main roof. That's 8904 gallons per year I'm capable of capturing. We use an average of 200 gallons per week (slightly more in the summer months) which means our current water capture methods can fill 44.5 weeks out of the year.
Math very clearly spells out the problem: Not enough water being captured.
The addition to the cabin we're currently building is going to add another 512 square foot of roof for capture. That will double our water collection potential and I'll probably need to purchase another 3000 tank. Especially when you consider that our rainfall is not evenly distributed throughout the year and the majority falls in the winter months.
Still, we're here and we're functioning. In a pinch we could be drinking the water from the pond (after it gets filtered through the Berkey) but I'm not willing to do that short of the apocalypse. There's just too much going on up the creek for me to feel very hapy about that.
Pray for rain!
The pond is as low now as it was back in August. We haven't had any rain in quite awhile. My main tank is empty and I've been having to buy water again, something I only had to do a few times over the summer. It's $6 up at the local fire department when I bring my 200 gallon drop tank up in the back of the pickup to fill. A very easy thing to do but I hate having to do it.
Right now we get an average of 28 inches of rain per year. Per inch I can collect 318 gallons off of the main roof. That's 8904 gallons per year I'm capable of capturing. We use an average of 200 gallons per week (slightly more in the summer months) which means our current water capture methods can fill 44.5 weeks out of the year.
Math very clearly spells out the problem: Not enough water being captured.
The addition to the cabin we're currently building is going to add another 512 square foot of roof for capture. That will double our water collection potential and I'll probably need to purchase another 3000 tank. Especially when you consider that our rainfall is not evenly distributed throughout the year and the majority falls in the winter months.
Still, we're here and we're functioning. In a pinch we could be drinking the water from the pond (after it gets filtered through the Berkey) but I'm not willing to do that short of the apocalypse. There's just too much going on up the creek for me to feel very hapy about that.
Pray for rain!
Friday, November 23, 2012
The Petraeus Affair
Aside from the fact that the man has no honor and no self-discipline ...
Does America REALLY need a spy-chief so incompetent that he can't cover up an affair?
It's kind of like having a Secretary of Treasury who can't figure out how to operate Turbo Tax.
Does America REALLY need a spy-chief so incompetent that he can't cover up an affair?
It's kind of like having a Secretary of Treasury who can't figure out how to operate Turbo Tax.
Thursday, November 22, 2012
Rural America is Dead
Took a drive over to my neighbor's to feed his pig today while he's in Fort Worth visiting some family. Driving down the road is a visible reminder this Thanksgiving that rural America is dead or dying.
All along the county road are my neighbors, mostly old folks still hanging on to the family farm. For the holiday, their children have returned to enjoy a big dinner. So standing out in many of the yards you see the grizzled old veterans of country life watching their grandchildren scurry about in the yard and talking to their sons and daughters. The sons and daughters who ran off to the city as fast as they could and now stand beside their tanned and weather-beaten elders wearing expensive leisure clothes and looking like they need a trip to the gym and some time outdoors. Fancy minivans are parked alongside the battered old farm trucks.
Ah, America. The strength of our nation was in our farms and our children, but you believed the lies of the government. You put your children in the government schools and told them to go out and get "good jobs" so they wouldn't have to work on the farm as hard as you did. Now the families are broken and you get a few years seeing your children and grandchildren only on holidays before they shuffle you off to the old folks home and then put the farm up for sale because they have no intention of ever going back there.
I guess I'm crazy (of course I am), but I still think the greatest gift you can give your children is the skills to feed themselves and a little bit of land with which to live free of a mortgage.
All along the county road are my neighbors, mostly old folks still hanging on to the family farm. For the holiday, their children have returned to enjoy a big dinner. So standing out in many of the yards you see the grizzled old veterans of country life watching their grandchildren scurry about in the yard and talking to their sons and daughters. The sons and daughters who ran off to the city as fast as they could and now stand beside their tanned and weather-beaten elders wearing expensive leisure clothes and looking like they need a trip to the gym and some time outdoors. Fancy minivans are parked alongside the battered old farm trucks.
Ah, America. The strength of our nation was in our farms and our children, but you believed the lies of the government. You put your children in the government schools and told them to go out and get "good jobs" so they wouldn't have to work on the farm as hard as you did. Now the families are broken and you get a few years seeing your children and grandchildren only on holidays before they shuffle you off to the old folks home and then put the farm up for sale because they have no intention of ever going back there.
I guess I'm crazy (of course I am), but I still think the greatest gift you can give your children is the skills to feed themselves and a little bit of land with which to live free of a mortgage.
Wednesday, November 7, 2012
Happy Happy Happy
I must be the only non-liberal in America who isn't miserable and depressed.
Why? Because I don't care who wins the election. I don't consent. They can pass whatever laws they want and I'll still choose what to follow and what not to. I don't consent.
Numfar! Do the Dance of Joy!
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