Knots & Pimps & Squirrels & Stuff

*Am learning basic knots with an iPhone App called ProKnot: the Double Fisherman's, the Sheet Bend, the Square, the Tautline Hitch, the Trucker's Hitch, the Butterfly, the Figure Eight. Amazingly useful and simple.
*Transplanted a Mandarin Orange tree into a bigger pot at my parents' place today, and found a sunny, fenced location for it. Also began terracing the hillside above the barn. Pops goes in for radiation treatment tomorrow.
*Sepp Holzer. This old man in Austria. Practices permaculture on his farm in the mountains. Turned his patch of Pine forest into an a series of terraced gardens and fish ponds. Actually grows warm weather vegetables at 4,000 feet, because he created his own microclimates. Dude's a wizard, inspires me, reminds me that imagination makes the impossible happen. Check Old Man Mountain out:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mzRzJRiUylg
*Got bitched out at 9:30 AM today by a ball-breaker I'm not even f*cking. How's that for a Sunday morning? I busted her balls right back. Wanna wake me up on my day off, after another exhausting week? Then be nice, or f*ck off.
*Found this book in a free bag down the street while walking to get coffee: The Pimp's Rap, A True Story by The Master Pimp ISBN:0-9647298-8-1. Wow. It's like I found the great Manual of Perfect Living or something. Jeez, how'd I make it this far without this knowledge? I'll tell you what: I barely made it, that's what. I crawled the whole 41 years, that's what. But today it all changes, bitch. Soon I will command respect with my velvet attire and the exotic, hairless mynx that never leaves my side.
*Conversed with a squirrel this morning. In the secret forest down the street. The forest where I've also seen a 4-point buck and a wild turkey. The forest that measure 15 x 80 feet, that's sandwiched between a one-lane residential street and a 4-lane thoroughfare. I stepped under the Pine tree and the squirrel ran across a branch above me. I stopped and looked up. There he was, looking down at me. So close. All was quiet under the Pine canopy. He cleaned himself while he watched me. I spoke to him quietly, asked him his name, told him he was cute. He crawled closer, then closer still, til he was right above me, leaning down. His tummy was brown. I was afraid he was going to jump on me. I told him to move farther back, he was too close. He climbed straight up, then stopped and looked back at me. The experience was quiet, direct, real. I've seen that little guy before, scampering around the trees. Maybe now we are friends.

Time to sign out. Made it thru another day. Amen. No, wait, sorry: Awomen. Ah, sh*t, no, how about: Awymyn. There, everyone's happy. The whole world shakes in its shoes. The clouds smile with knowing joy. The stars glitter like nipples in the long night. Moonlight rains down like splooge.

If We Do It Right

Pablo, this is for you (and me). Two lines from ROBES, p.56:

"...if you prepare properly, you can transform yourselves and all of the ways you organize your lives and your time without undue suffering. We consider undue suffering to include being hungry, cold, sick, or under attack."

Those lines give me hope.

Orchardness & Sepp Holzer

*Over the last two weekends my bro-in-law and I planted 4 fruit trees: an apple, an apricot, a fig and a lime-loquat hybrid called a limequat. Digging the holes in clay mud is effing exhausting, then we have to cut and form cages out of gopher wire, plant the trees in them, and add wire cages above ground to keep out the deer. But the first 2 trees appear to have taken, and we're keeping our eyes on the second 2. I'm planning on also planting: 2 hazelnuts, 3 avocados, some olives and a walnut tree. It may take a couple-few years to plant them all, but that's OK.

*Holy Sh*t! Check out this video of Sepp Holzer, an Austrian farmer with a different view of gardening:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mzRzJRiUylg

This guy is amazing! You may notice that this is the first of 4 in-series videos - I urge you to watch the other 3 videos. I find Sepp's methods, insights and beliefs deeply inspiring, and am now envisioning forming terraces and gardens around the orchard at my parent's house. This guy is nothing short of a magician.

Space Blankets & Bottle Deposits

*Do mylar space blankets really work? They are probably not quite the "survival" blankets they are touted to be. The one person I know who truly needed one once because he was trapped high on a cold mountain in a life-threatening situation, said that when he opened the package, the mylar blanket turned to dust. Evidently its expiration date had come and gone. I myself have used one on at least one occasion to supplement a warm weather sleeping bag, and it didn't feel like it kept me any warmer than the sleeping bag itself. And I once opened one I'd had for years, just for the hell of it, and it disintegrated in my hands. So, they most definitely do not last forever.

However, space blankets do have uses. They are water and wind-proof, and they do reflect sunlight and heat (to some degree). They probably do keep you warmer than if you are not using one. They can be strung up to provide shade, water catchment, and relief from intense sunlight. They can also be used to line emergency shelters, for both heat retention and waterproofing.

My inexpert advice: Carry several space blankets in your emergency kits, and replace them every 2 or so years.

*There is money to be made in recycling. Here in California we pay a deposit on every plastic and metal beverage container we purchase, and if we don't go redeem those containers ourselves at a recycling center, we lose that deposit. It's a bit of a pain in the a$$ to get to the recycling center while it's open, wait in line, and then go redeem your payment receipt for cash at Safeway... but, it's worth it. Every time I do so, I figure out how many gallons of gasoline I just bought/offset. Today's haul was very small: 28 aluminum cans for a total of $1.40. It took about 10 minutes of my time. That paid for .4 gallons of gasoline, which offset my costs for driving to the shopping center in the first place, to buy phone cards at CVS.

Recommendations

My Favorite Survival Books (Green means my MOSTEST favoritest):

Robes: A Book of Coming Changes by Penny Kelly ISBN 0963293427
Ragnar's Urban Survival: A Hard-Times Guide to Staying Alive in the City by Ragnar Benson ISBN 1581600593
Live Off the Land In the City and Country by Ragnar Benson ISBN ? OP
Reinventing Collapse by Dmitri Orlov ISBN 9780865716063

Surviving the Economic Collapse by Fernando "FerFAL" Aguirre ISBN ?
The Survival Retreat: A Total Plan for Retreat Defense by Ragnar Benson ISBN 0873642759
The Coming Economic Collapse: How You Can Thrive When Oil Costs $200 a Barrel by Dr Stephen Leeb ISBN 0446699004
Game Over: How You Can Prosper in a Shattered Economy by Dr Stephen Leeb ISBN 0446544817
The Backyard Homestead edited by Carleen Madigan ISBN 9781603421386

Tools:

Special Forces Fighting Shovel by Cold Steel
Clipper 860MG (or the High Carbon Steel equivalent) by Mora of Sweden
Leatherman (whatever model floats your boat)

Gas Mileage

I am tracking my gas mileage in Zoom via an iPhone App. So far I have managed to increase my around-town mileage from 14.1 mpg to 15.25 mpg by going really easy on the accelerator. REALLY easy. I'm not sure what kind of a percent increase that is. However, it is an increase of 1.15 mpg. If I divide 15.25 by 14.1, I get 1.0816 ... I think I am correct in saying that this is an 8.16% increase in gas mileage. Small but noticeable. Honestly, I should be able to do better. Driving at 60 on the highway, in overdrive on autopilot, I averaged 17.97 mpg. Again, I should be able to do better.

My Nose

Tired of having a low-level, long-term sinus infection? Sick of having blocked nasal passages? Try using a neti pot. I did. It's quite the sensation. Like getting salt water up your nose. Which is precisely what it does. You fill the neti pot with warm salt water, stick the spout of the neti pot in one nostril, tilt your head, and feel the saline water run thru your nasal passage and out the other nostril. It's like drowning, but no water enters your windpipe. That's all. Now that I did it twice, I can breathe thru my nose again. Just wanted the world to know.

Wild West Redux

Midnight, 02.04.2017. Saddled up Shadz & crossed the asphalt plain to Broadway. Bought 13 kilos of dried beans & a steak. Shadz threw a shoe in the Piggly Wiggly parking lot. We limped back to the 'stead in the 580 bike lane, dodgin' beer cans all the way. Well now, she's been rode hard & put up wet, but I swear Shadz is the most gallant Wild West floofer I ever did saw!

Zoom

Zoom is my truck, and I love him dearly. He's a 2003 Nissan Frontier SC 4x4, with a 3.4 liter 6-cylinder supercharged engine that has been upgraded with a high-end K&N air filter and a cat-back exhaust system. The only drawback to Zoom is his gas mileage. Currently I am getting 14.5 mpg city and 18 highway. I am going to increase that however, by laying off the gas. Slower acceleration is the key.

I have spent a lot of time researching additional upgrades for Zoom, including a flatbed, run-flat tires, a front winch-mount bumper, safety film for the windows, and a canvas shell for the bed. In the end though, I figure that the current configuration is the lightest, cheapest, and thus will deliver the best mpg. And unless I win the lottery, I can spend the money on better things. The important thing is to keep him in fine running condition by having his fluids changed regularly.

Food for thought: A pickup with a Cummins turbo-diesel would have gotten MUCH better gas mileage...

Advice from the Future

I just read about this dude who started posting on the web in 2000, claiming to be from the future. His moniker was John Titor. Titor's story was a lot like that of John Connor's (in Terminator): He was a soldier from the future who survived a nuclear war and returned to the past to pick up an archaic piece of technology that was needed in his world. It's great theater, check him out on the web. Titor left this list of things to do to prepare for the future:

1. Do not eat or use products from any animal that is fed and eats parts of its own dead.

2. Do not kiss or have intimate relations with anyone you do not know.

3. Learn basic sanitation and water purification.

4. Be comfortable around firearms. Learn to shoot and clean a gun.

5. Get a good first aid kit and learn to use it.

6. Find 5 people within 100 miles that you trust with your life and stay in contact with them.

7. Get a copy of the US Constitution and read it.

8. Eat less.

9. Get a bicycle and two sets of spare tires. Ride it 10 miles a week.

10. Consider what you would bring with you if you had to leave your home in 10 min. and never return.