I recently came across a blast from the past - 14 months ago I wrote a reply to an article about Ebola. And oddly I STILL think it is good advice, and applicable, even though the media is hardly uttering a peep about any "deadly plagues" but then again the cold and flu kills millions every year with hardly anything being said too.
So without further ado, here is what I wrote back then, with only a couple of edits for clarity:

Ebola or other infectious disease is bound to hit, and hit hard, in your area eventually. Black plague hard.

Modern hygiene practices and quarantine are the best defense for the population as a whole.
And they will help the individual prepper too- but not enough.
Eventually you will get something.
And the population as a whole tends to let quarantine and hygiene practices slip when financial conditions get worse- why worry about washing your hands when you are starving? Why would you voluntarily quarantine if it will cost you your job and home?
So the population will get it eventually.
Oddly enough - outside of expensive or experimental treatments, or hygiene and quarantine procedures, there are other things that can be done/taken to reduce the mortality rate for you-
1) be among the last to get it- viruses tend to mutate toward the less lethal as they go on. The first people to get SARs died. the last people to get SARs survived, the Spanish flu killed a smaller percent of the population with each wave.
2) be aware that epidemics come in waves. Be alert to these waves.
3) Over the counter medicines would seriously help those who have contracted Ebola. Most die of dehydration due to diarrhea and vomiting. Pepto, syrup of Ipapec, and Gatorade mix could potentially save these people.
4) Have a strong body and immune system- given the state of nutrition in most of the world this can be the hardest to achieve. Eating good wholesome foods, exercise, and _sleep_ .
I struggle with having good health myself, the more you can work on health now the better. One less onion ring or extra minute of exercise could take you past the worst of the epidemic to come.
5) Have illness prepared household goods. Garbage bags to store soiled linens, infected use (only) toilette, sanitizers, easy to prep and eat foods (soup!). You would be surprised how many garbage bags an ill family can go through. Don't forget the easy to access medical supplies, since you don't want to be climbing stepstools while cramping and dizzy.
6) Also don't forget a setup that allows your house to support life without much maintenance for at least a few weeks! It would suck to freeze to death because you were too sick to stoke the wood stove (back up propane heater?), or fetch the water from the well (get gravity cistern?) .

7) Have easy to implement plans so you can provide all the essentials of life without hardly having to get out of bed. food water trash cans, etc., that can be positioned at the bedside.

If you have survived a serious infection/illness and have anything to add or critique, please comment or notify me.

Someone was pointing out how long the Egyptian and Chinese empires lasted, as an example of sustainable societies on the comments of one of the blogs I occasionally follow.

I thought about it a bit, and realized that they can not work for a model for a sustainable global or even national civilization in our current world for a number of reasons:
China and Egypt went through repeated periodic famines and various other upheavals, they both were made into part of more aggressively growing empires during Western Europe's age of colonization. They suffered this indignity due to their technological and military retardation.
They survived as long as they did largely because the culture, and technology were stagnant, and those in charge had control of key essentials for life (usually water).
Sustainable growth means population control - something very few modern countries do well. Western Civilization actually has a declining native born population over the past 20+ years or so- likely due to the best thing ever for population control; namely the education of women and empowerment of same (the pill helps less than education according to several studies IIRC).
China has also achieve low to no population growth but only through truly draconian and harsh methods.
Unfortunately those same 'western civilization' countries not only allow but are actively encouraging immigration without getting those immigrants to culturally integrate/merge with them. This is probably due to the need for economic "growth" for the moneyed interests (you cant pay a compounding interest debt if every 'dollar' is borrowed into interest without some form of "growth".) Thus these countries will eventually demographically return to population growth if they do not convert their immigrants culture (mind you it will be growth of a different culture inside their borders, not to dissimilar to what the Germanic tribes did inside Rome before its sack and fall). And China faces the high likelihood of internal revolution fed by their own draconian measures.
Having an aggressively advancing technological base *and* a sustainable infrastructure with controlled population growth is something I cant recall a successful historical example of. Please educate me if I am wrong.
But that (technological growth, population and resource use flat or minimal growth) is what we as a species specifically need globally to avoid future extinction on this planet...

Or we need to leave the planet and make use of space resources - but that has its own significant hurdles.

The USA #1!

So it looks like the USA will be #1 in another field soon - Bad hairstyle on our primary "leadership".
North Korea has been maintaining  a clear lead in the field for many years now, after such previous place holders such as Pol Pot, Hitler, Stalin, Lenin, etc.  (referring to facial as well as head hair styles).
But though the correlation between poor hair styling and tyranny is tenuous, the Clinton mk2 and Trump candidates prove that the USA can compete and possibly even dominate that field. (bad hair or tyranny? you ask, Yes, I reply).
I don't know if I should laugh or cry.

Vitamin deficiencies, in addition to outright starvation and hygiene (cleanliness) issues were the biggest killers of the past- and of the poorest people now.  They don't kill first world people often now for four reasons:

1) Clean water to drink. 
2) Nutritionally required vitamins.
3) Calories.
4) Protein and essential amino acids.

4 things. Lack of 4 Simple things killed the majority of people through time. 
Cheap in first world countries today, and easily stocked up on. 
Of course having a plan for fulfilling those needs when the stockpile runs out is also important.

Humanure composting returns much of the essential trace substances to the land- I doubt anyone wants to eat anything grown directly in humanure, but growing a green composting crop from that to feed your animals or compost for the garden is not unreasonable. 

A diet of homegrown vegetables from your own garden, locally sourced protein, sufficient well filtered water, and a few multi-vitamin supplements (cycled back into the local area bio-sphere with Humanure and composting) to fill out any lack will go far in improving your life and the lives of those who come after us.  Metabolic Iodine, Vitamin C,  Salt, are all usually in short supply for inland and northern areas. Other deficiencies of a mineral sort may exist in your local area and can be dealt with, by sufficient one time inputs or stockpiles and retention/ recycling methods.
Have your area checked for what it is short on and move to deal with the issue.   

Keeping clean will become harder as outside chemical sources get more expensive, local sources and reduced usage should allow anyone with practical sense to prepare for that in the future.

Unemployment at any time- 

So with the price of crude oil so low, many people who had hoped on the oil field boom bandwagon are beginning to see an economic bust headed their way.

This is just the latest in a long line of booms and busts for various local, regional, national, and global economies. When the boom is big enough people will do anything to delude themselves into believing it will last forever. If the person is lucky it will last their lifetime. If their family is very, very, lucky it will last generations.

This current oil boom going bust, and the impending higher education bubble popping, but those are smaller bubbles on the hidden multi-generational economic bubble of petroleum. The petroleum bubble reached its peak in about 2005 according to the petroleum industry's own institution. Coal, Oil, Gas, are all limited resources and we have been using the easiest to get best selection of the fossil fuels for generations now. Yes, there is more of all of it, but it is lower quality and harder to get. We already got the best of it. Eventually we will hit a point where it isn’t really worth extracting – the costs of extracting it will be greater than the value from using it.

Long before that point price volatility will cause people to have to abandon reliance on it for most purposes. (This petroleum industrialization bubble too may be just a lesser component of the European colonization of the new world bubble...) 

What this mean for the average person though, is, in our interconnected economy, that at any time in any position  is liable to become untenable to the employer – even ones with government or other supposed ‘guaranteed security’ organizations - . 

Meaning you can be laid off at almost any time.

You may, or may not, have any notice of this impending personal economic disaster.

You may be the only one laid off- or fired if the employer can find a good excuse – or you may just be one of an entire company or even industry laid off at once.

Perhaps for reasons beyond your control you can no longer work the job – too old, too sick, too fat, too ????.

So then you count on Unemployment Benefits, savings, credit, and welfare.

Or perhaps you think you escaped the threat because you are self-employed – not so, as your company as being both you and your employer- can also run into severe financial difficulties when people no longer are able to afford your services as often as they did before.

Or perhaps you think you escaped the threat because you are already retired – until the government seizes your pension or reduces your social security or increases inflation.

In any of the scenarios of the future I can envision increased volatility in the economy is an absolute certainty. Even if some breakthrough like desktop clean cold fusion should occur, the mere change from fossil fuels to the new energy source would guarantee volatility.

Which means you will always face a risk of your source of money going away or your money becoming much less valuable (or both).

The best way to protect yourself is to divorce yourself as much as possible from reliance on money to survive.

• ·         Paid for shelter – energy efficient low maintenance. No rent, no mortgage.
• ·         Food you grow yourself with your own seeds and sources.
• ·         Energy you provide yourself as much as possible- Bike to the store, to the park, library, work, etc. Solar wind or hydro for electric power.
• ·         Water that isn’t dependent on a corporate or government entity such as rain fall collection or home well.
• ·         Health care you provide for  yourself with nutrition, exercise, herbal and holistic care as much as possible.
• ·         A healthy padding of some sort of savings in the form of a deep pantry, useful skills, community good will, good friends, and neighbors, and any other supplies you can think of.

You will always need some small amounts of trade. No one can go it alone forever.

• ·         Cash money emergency savings is great when you break your leg, or have to pay an unexpected tax bill, etc.
• ·         Precious metals tend to store value for the long term.
• ·         Barter for skills knowledge and surpluses is also useful. Dr.’s used to get paid in chickens just a hundred years ago.  

Even if you currently have no employment and are living on welfare or retirement, you can make inroads to getting all these things to get ready for a change in the value of your money. There is land defined as “junk” land that you can buy, improve, and live on. You might not be able to grow all your own food but every dollar you save in your grocery bill can go to increasing you pantry or otherwise preparing to divorce from the ‘grid’.

The down side is the system of corporations, government, and popular society frown on people getting free of the system.

Your friends family and neighbors probably won’t really understand at best, and at worst will actively try and undermine you.

Your existing creditors will judge you a high risk and increase your interest rates (get out of debt ASAP  - pay it off or bankruptcy).

Your local government and HOA will throw up roadblocks for every little thing that they see that is out of place (find a place with the least possible government and little to no HOA)

Do your best to stay off everyone’s radar. Stay legitimate as much as you can. Investigate local zoning and laws and how to circumvent troublesome ones.

Look forward to a time where your personal sustainable systems make you a target of the tax man, other thieves, muggers, and beggars.  Find ways to stay off their radars and deal with them as well.  

By considering these things now, and taking these steps, well ahead of the desperate scramble that can come, you not only help yourself you help everyone else by not needing their resources when things get tighter. And future generations will have the systems you have built to fall back on should the need arise for them as well.

It is Summer so time to think about the upcoming Winter:

Weathering the winter in near arctic climates can be done without (or minimal) fossil fuels. 
Just ask the eskimos. 
The tricks are as follows:

• 
  
• Acclimate - don't expect to keep your surroundings at 70 degrees, It ain't happening. Instead as it gets colder let your body get used to the cold, don't stand naked in a sudden cold snap but do have a lot of time out in the air and let your home (and if you can office) temperature follow with the outside temperature.
• 
  
• Dress for it. Why heat a whole house when you are already heating your own body with food (eat higher calorie food during the winter- fats especially). Putting on a layer of cotton thermals, coat, wool socks, hats, and mittens, is all I need down to -20 for a couple hours at a time, by leaving the socks and thermals on inside the house I can keep the house around 50 to 60 and be not too uncomfortable.
• 
  
• Keep unused spaces unheated- ties right into the the dress for it philosophically: insulate and heat the smallest spaces you can and add as little heat as you can.
• 
  
• Having running water does take a temperature above freezing, so does running diesel engines, so keeping your body, pipes, and engines, above freezing is a good idea- but do they have to be at a room temperature of 70 degrees???? probably not, reduce the temperature where these things are so that they are stored warm enough to work but not too much more.
• 
  
• Solar Gain - even the coldest winter weather at noon on a cloudy day an enclosed space behind a pane of glass facing the sun will be significantly warmer than outside it. 
• 
  
• Insulate and prevent air movement. During hot spells even a light breeze makes it seem cooler, same effect during cold spells, so keep the air as still as you can during the cold times, blocking all possible sources of draft. Insulation helps keep the heat in. Blocking all the windows doors and even walls with curtains, blankets, and tapestries, keeps a room much warmer feeling. A rug on the floor, slippers, and super insulated ceiling and a room that felt like it was near freezing is suddenly a lot more comfortable.  This can also be decorative.
• 
  
• Burning wood, grass, charcoal, animal dung, etc. will add the little bit of heat a well designed and built house will need. Burning it in a sealed fire proof container, preferably with a high mass to store the heat and control over the air inlet and outlet and you can get efficient hot burns.

Doing all these things can help you survive the coldest of winters. But it does involve more thinking and work than just turning up the thermostat or lighting the furnace- which is why so many people are going to head south when petroleum inputs get too expensive, it is cheaper to be lazy and ignorant where it is warmer.....

Stormy Weather, whether or not you are ready.

So last evening was another rainstorm where I live. About 35 minutes of pouring pounding rain and howling winds to make the rental house shake. All while it was 80+ degrees F. 

Of course we had planned to do things last evening out on the land, but had to get some stuff out of the bed of the truck first. - Here we are hauling a 300 lb electronic device (big office copier) into our garage. Huh, a drop or two fall while we are just pushing it in under cover. Then with a rush of hurricane force winds came a torrent like a firehose. 

We waited for a little bit in the garage, then made a run for it  to get back to the house. In the 15 yards or so we ran we got SOAKED. We got into the house and the grid electric went out - and back on - and out again 2 minutes later - and so on for about 10 minutes. 

Which is more or less what prepping and living independently is all about. Dealing with the vagaries of the environment (natural and human). 

I leaned the value of having a large sheet of water proof plastic at hand, and reading the local indicators.

What storms are out there on the horizon or overhead, that you might need shelter from? 

How suddenly can those storms hit? 

How will you know they are about to hit?

Is your shelter ready enough to keep you dry and safe?

Political, Social, Economic, fields are all areas with 'human storms, but they are still storms. Even if they only hit your house or if they hit the whole Globe they are storms. Shelter, and warning to take that shelter, are needed. 

The best shelter in the world is useless if you don't take it in time to avoid the worst of the storm. 

But at the same time you cant live you life huddling in a safe room in the bunker on an island. 

You have things to do - besides that bunk wont shelter you from every sort of storm (foreclosure anyone?). 

Reading the indicators for every sort of storm, and having a plan is at least as much a part of prepping as growing a garden or storing food or taking security measures. In fact it is more of a part of prepping than those sort of things. Reading the indicators in 1937 caused a lot of bright people to try and escape the Holocaust; where as, just moving to a farm in the country with a rifle would have not done them any good at all.  

Adapting allows one to Overcome. 

What do you do if your family isn't on board with your preparing or homesteading, etc.?

DO what you need to do. It is your life, your family and life partners have some vested interest, but in the final analysis you will have to live or die based on the choices you make and the things you do.

DO try and make your 'hobby' seem like a harmless occasional little thing, like buying twice the cans of soup you need, going a little further than the FEMA and American Red Cross recommendations, etc. It is just a little bit of extra insurance a little healthier greener lifestyle after all.

DO be creative in having the family assist you in what ever part of your preparations interests them (shooting and hunting with grandpa, putting up extra food with mom, crafting warm sturdy clothes with sister sue, gardening with the kids, what ever as their interests and inclinations recommend.) 

DON'T let them know the full extent- or any at all about it if they don't need to and if you can, but also see the final note below.  You do not need to go all sneaky or anything, just figure out where you can put things that they wont go investigate.

DO spend only your own money, and such free funds you had been spending on luxuries, on prep things instead. 

DON'T make the mistake of going towards a lot of firearms right away. A single firearm and hundred or thousand or so rounds (stored away safely) is more than enough until you have 7+ years worth of EVERYTHING else. 

But it really depends on your situation. If you are under 18 you cant buy junk land without parental permission, but if you are an adult, you certainly can incorporate an LLC (a couple hundred dollars) and purchase the junk land in that name, stop by it briefly every time you can find an excuse, improve it a little and store some stuff. Etc. Etc.

DON'T ask permission but DO compromise if they have any objections i.e.  

-Them :"You aren't spending enough time with the kids" 

-You :  " Okay, the kids and I will go out fly kits, and shoot sling shots at an empty lot (your junk land) that the owners wont mind us using."

-Them : "Quit spending money on stupid stuff" 

-You : " I guess we can both cut back from our hobbies and shop more conservatively, and work up a fair budget for both of us. " (trust me, you point out something they like to do to cut back on they will either blow up or back off, and spending money on something like food or water filters that you actually USE daily can be waved away as a cost SAVING measure).

And finally:

DON'T LIE- lying about what you are doing just makes them distrust you further. Being a homesteader, prepper, survivalist, doomer, etc. just make people distrust you because of all the bad press out there, out right lying about what you are doing will just make it worse when they finally figure it out. 

Family (and by this I mean the life time significant other too) is one of the most valuable things to have, pull them into your lifestyle without using any of the words the media uses to label things and give them a negative slant (prepper, survivalist, homesteader, off grid, etc.) and you have something to make the life you are living worth it.

Quote of the Decade:

Bailouts are never about enabling reform–they’re about preserving the Status Quo for the Elites and their vested interests. - The very Status Quo that was broken enough to require a bailout in the first place.

Reform cannot be triggered by borrowing more money–it can only be triggered by defaulting on existing debts that cannot be paid. 


Attribute http://www.dancortes.com/failures-of-fiscal-discipline-the-swiss-exit-and-the-failure-of-the-euro/

some minor modifications made for better quote-ability.

Update.
Dancortes.com is no longer the original site, as it has gone missing and I cant find anything else on the internet about him or his writings.

Tools

You can never have too many high quality tools that you can use.

You can easily get suckered into thinking that you have the right tool for the job only to find yourself with a real lemon that takes more maintenance time than it saves by using it.

You can occasionally luck into a tool that is more useful and time and labor saving than you ever thought possible.

I still haven't found a good way to tell a good tool from a bad one when you have had little or no prior experience with it.

Older tools that are simple and in good repair seem to often a good idea, and usually work out well for the price spent, the problem is knowing how good of repair they are in as they get more complicated.
Tools designed to do lots of things are often less reliable at all the jobs and more expensive than just getting each type of tool separately.

New tools often work adequately at first but prove they don't have much staying power.
My 1973 'John Deere' garden tractor has required just as much maintenance as my 2013 'Property Master' snow blower/brush mower.  And the cheap-ish regular mower for grass works almost as effectively as both of those combined for clearing the land of brush. What is up with that?!?!

If you don't have previous experience with performing a task, before running off and buying a new tool to perform that task, ask those with experience HOW to do the task, and what tool they would use before asking WHAT to look for in a tool. Heck, they might have a spare they would be willing to part with for a pittance, or know a common 'gotcha' that you might run into.

Back to the tractor, brush mower, and standard mower.
When I asked a couple people who have had experience what I should be using to clear the land they both recommended a whole different tool entirely- a gas powered heavy duty weed whacker (with add on metal blades). The three other tools that I was trying to use set me back between them almost $5000, PLUS maintenance costs. The weed whacker plus metal blades should run about $600 based on the window shopping I did after getting the recommendation. Also since the weed whacker isn't supported on wheels I wont break it by having it fall into brush hidden holes like I almost have with the other tools...

Learn from my mistakes, take it slow, make certain you are getting the right tool for the job (ask those who do to know for sure), and choose simple single purpose tools that will make the task easiest on you. Don't be afraid to pay a little more for quality but don't assume brand name or price necessarily means quality.

Just heard on the news a snip of our USA presidents speech about the shooting in S.C.
he said something to the extent "this sort of thing doesn't happen in other first world nations."

He might have had a real argument had he added "... as much" but he didn't. In fact in France, and the Netherlands have both had some HUGE mass shootings in just the past few years. The one in the Netherlands killed DOZENS of children. Obviously these things DO happen in other first world nations.
He is, once again, trying to make an argument for outlawing guns.
Once again, like any politician, he is lying through his teeth to try and get to his goals.

A single armed parishioner of the S.C. church could have potentially stopped this headline crime, but gun control started in the south, specificly to keep people with certain skin colors from being able to defend themselves. Well, that gives what we got. White boy able to shoot a whole church full of  (mostly) innocent black folks.

ARRGGHHHHH!!!!!
At least the ties to the drugs the shooter was taken are being talked about more openly by the press this time.

My advice and experience on starting your own homestead / retiring on a tight budget.

 Think about it.

 

If you had a house that provided most of its own energy (including heating, lighting, and cooling). Provided you much of the water and food you needed. And had low to no maintenance costs, how much money would you save every month? now if that same house cost you nothing per month to live in, no mortgage, no rent, how much would you save? Do you think you can tough it out by "camping" for a summer or two to save up for buying the house that does all that? And once you are living in that house what would you do with the extra money you make?

Living "off grid" is a lifestyle for good health and a retirement plan that isn't effected by the economy or inflation. 

 

Quit paying rent (or mortgage).  

If you are on the west coast - “Go east young man!”

 

Seriously, the prairie and desert are the places for an average person’s sort of budget, the I-5 corridor is a rich yuppie stronghold. IMHO anything too close to a major interstate or town over 50k population is probably too much $ and regulations.

But, for only $3k cash you can get a parcel of more remote desert or prairie easily enough.

My 40acres cost me @<$8k in a state auction- the minimum bid because NO one else bid on it, too small for the corporate farmers and ranchers, --- it is on a county road, has clear line of sight to cell phone towers (at least from the top of its hills), has at least seasonal water, and power lines running though part of it. I had to fence it off from the neighbor’s property (they have over 40000 acres). The fence cost me about another $1,500 in costs but I paid incrementally as I could afford it / needed it. Oddly enough parcels smaller than @ 20 acres seem to go up in price per acre pretty quickly almost everywhere in the western USA. So it is a tradeoff and if you have the cash it is probably better to buy larger. (Also zoning on 20+ acres is a lot more lenient than on smaller parcels most places)

Current taxes, for the land unimproved, are @$200/year – the minimum the county will bill for any land. Even if improving the land causes a 1000% increase it will still be no more than 4 months’ rent.

We had to give up hope of having much in the way of trees, but we also live where there are no building codes/enforcement for private dwellings so hiding the extent of improvements shouldn’t be too hard- if we had to pay for permits/planning it could get expensive quick.

Be 100% SURE you find out what code enforcement and HOA rules are before you buy any piece of land. Some parts of NV will allow owner built with only a single permit declaiming all responsibility on the government’s part. On the other hand, some HOAs will only allow a McMansion built by a contractor who happens to be the brother in-law to the association’s president...

MT and WY are the best I found when I researched for statewide building codes but many other states are good in some counties and sucky in others.

Make certain you have access to a 4 wheel drive vehicle to haul building supplies to your parcel.

If it isn't already, you will want to fence off your parcel to some extent, at least marking the corners with a 'T' pole- they only run a few bucks each usually.

You will want to see your land over a period of at least a year (at least weekly visits) before building anything permanent to figure out which way the sun, wind, rain, and local animals come to your land, before you build anything permanent or make too big of changes. You could park a camper or tent there for that year. Me? the wife insists on four solid walls, a laptop computer and source of heat that keeps water liquid so we rent a house in town while building (costing nearly a third of our take home pay) so we visit almost every weekend during the spring, summer, and fall.

Winter showed us that at least part of the winter we need a snow plow for the 4x4.

Spring showed us we need to clear the brush well back from where we transit and poison the bugs even further (ticks are a LITERAL pain).

Summer showed us that 2x4's could be moved by just wind power, Much less big canvas structures like the canvas “carports” you can buy cheaply.

Fall showed us that putting clear no hunting signs up was barely sufficient and hunters - even old coots (from back east?) who should know better - don't have the best gun safety practices (loading a shotgun pointed in the general direction of our vehicle).

 Looking at where we left our truck. that is our valley there and our view - we aren't master of all we survey because we can survey so dang FAR!

Add caption

Now I have to tame the land (clear the brush to help get rid of pests, dig a better drainage pattern, plant a garden, etc.) with 40 acres you either need machinery or lots of time and labor. 20 acres would be easier, and flatter ground would help too. There are brush hidden holes big enough to sink a semi-truck tire in, dead partially grown trees, thorn bushes where we want paths, cacti where we want gardens, and a lot of fire danger in a severe drought year.

We are ready to start taming the land and get building, and have picked out the best building spot(s). It will cost us $1k to $3k to get the excavation we want done if our ancient little garden tractor can’t handle that.

It will cost @ $2k to $3k for the exterior walls in building supplies on our large (@1000+sq ft. interior) house design - that includes insulation and thermal mass to make it very cozy.  The roof system is still up in the air price wise as I scrounge for metal to use for roofing (instead of putting plastic and soil on it, we want to collect rainfall for water so a fire resistant metal roof is probably called for).

We already have most of our windows and exterior doors (used salvage and free dump picks, cost us @ $500 total). 

The heating systems will probably run us another $5k but that is because of lots of different systems (4 heat sources) and the intense cold we get (-40) and we can put it in piecemeal using what we already have (a portable propane heater) and upgrading as we can.

Water systems, electric systems, etc., will probably run us several thousand more as we buy them piecemeal- but buying them piecemeal will be a lot easier when we don't have to pay rent.

 

Imagine yourself too, free of the rent trap. What are you willing to do to get there? Every day you delay getting started is another day of freedom lost. Land, labor, and a bit of money miserly parted with (but a lot less than you might think) and some planning, can free you from the rent trap. Mortgage is just another form of rent slavery just with a built in end (just in time for you to no longer be able to enjoy it).



.

When preparing for the future, ours and our children and grandchildren's, one of the things that would be nice to pass on would be sustainable, low maintenance, low cost, multi-generational  housing and shelter. The purpose of a shelter is to keep people dry, warm, and cool and comfortable, and allow them a place to sleep, work, recreate, relax and be safe. This blog article will address the warm and cool aspects. Later ones will address some of the other features. 

When designing and building a house- or even an emergency shelter - there are four things to consider for thermal efficiency and comfort. And the wider your comfort range the better (winter= sweaters and thermals, summer= shorts and t shirts and all seasons = adapting your comfort range to closer to the temperatures outside)

1) Insulation - you hear this one yelled to the heavens and argued about this type or that vs this situation or that. The point is however totally moot if any of the other three considerations are screwed up. Yes insulate, As much as you can afford, but work it in line with the other three considerations. Solid sheets of Styrofoam type material works great for many purposes and are a great use of our Oil Age industry. Solid, well compacted straw-bales (not hay), kept dry and away from cellulose consuming insects (i.e.: termites and wood ants) are also decent and sustainable. Fiberglass is well known, easily obtained, and works well with common popular building techniques- not so well with alternative techniques and can have long term problems if not installed properly (but that can be true of most techniques).

2) Heating/cooling source(s) - you need more than one heat source. Sure a wood stove is nice. But does it fit in your enclosure appropriately? I knew of several homes growing up that had nice big super 'efficient' wood stoves. But when running properly the owners had to open windows because the stove overheated the room it was in.  Human and pet bodies, lighting, cooking, water heating, and solar are all sources of heat. You can also get propane/natural gas, or (ugh) electric heating. If you allow yourself and your home to acclimate appropriately to the environmental temperature (say letting it be cooler inside in the winter, and warmer in the summer) you need less heating and cooling, which means you save energy. Even without insulation. Obviously for long term you want sources that are not grid dependent that can keep you at least somewhat bearably warm/cool. All sources of heat and cooling should be properly sized, bigger is NOT better. Don’t forget to figure out how you are going to get this heat around the home to all the rooms appropriately. If you have the Lucre this last part is what ‘radiant in floor heating’ is for – NOT for the heat source itself, but for getting the heating/cooling around the house to where it is needed.

3) Ventilation and air flow control - If you don't want to breathe your own breath and mold spores you need clean dry airflow through your structure. Ideally the air will be near the temperature you want to keep the structure. Breathing, Cooking, Bathing, Cleaning, etc., all put moisture in the air, if you don't force this moist air out of the home you will get condensation and mold/mildew. So incoming air (conditioned to near the temperature you want it) and outgoing air (taking out the moisture and stink of your living). Fans and the ability to completely close off or open wide up these vents will make for a far more comfortable home. Where I live now has a nice big fan next to the kitchen stove- but it vents straight through the wall and cannot be closed- so when it is negative 40 degrees out the heater pumps heat right out that hole. We covered it ASAP but the jury rigged solution is nowhere near as efficient as a proper closing vent would have been. Earth tubes with solar powered fans may work in some environments if properly designed. Supposedly 100' of PVC pipe buried well below frost line, sloped to daylight for drainage, surrounded by gravel or sand and topped with a bit of insulation can moderate the incoming air to @50 -55 degrees. A solar powered fan to blow air in (that you can turn on and off) and the ability to close either or both ends of the tube makes this well worth looking into. But it won’t work right if you don't control the air infiltration/venting of your home (as much air or more needs to leave through controlled vents as comes in the earth tube, supposedly you can use an outgoing near parallel tube to further moderate the temperatures and control outgoing air. Also note to include removable cleanable screening to all your vents to keep out pests, the last thing you want is a wasp nest in your main vent.

So far Items 1), 2), 3), call for spending some money, labor, and thought on the design. Item 4) however can be the cheapest and most brain dead option.

4) Thermal Mass. Most modern homes completely neglect this cheap option in favor of more expensive industrial options. Earth sheltered homes don't perform well because the earth is a good insulator, Earth isn't a good insulator (even if kept dry, it takes many feet of earth to equal 6 inches of properly installed insulation). BUT the thermal fly wheel effect of a thermal mass such as surrounding earth, (and  minimally because of improved ease in controlling air flow) can be useful. Basements are always at a more stable temperature than the houses sitting on top of them, because the earth absorb and releases the heat slowly over time. The best thermal mass is plain water, (controlled it can be a good thing, uncontrolled flowing past your heated house, it can be very bad) followed by metals (if you are a rich yuppie prepper this means you should make an interior wall of solid gold - lol) Followed by solid masonry and earth. Adobe houses in the SW can be fairly comfortable with their foot thick earth walls because the walls absorb the heat of the day and release it back when the nights get cold. Better still is to insulate the earth or masonry from the harshest exterior temperatures (and flowing water that will carry away the heat) and slowly add a little heat or cooling to the thermal mass over a long time period from the interior of your structure when it is cheapest and easiest to add. Utilizing this flywheel effect and proper ventilation means you have to add far less heating and cooling to the structure during exterior temperature extremes. So your home will eventually remain close to the temperature you set the thermal mass to, for as long as the size of the thermal mass allows. And since the thermal mass can be literally dirt cheap you can use as much of it as you want, the more the better. Imagine every interior wall of your home being foot thick rammed earth - that is a LOT of mass all near a comfortable interior temperature and providing good sound and ballistic protection . If somehow you find that you have too much thermal mass (I can’t imagine how) you just throw some out to make a raised bed for your garden.

The nice thing is all four concepts can be included in new structures, or added to existing ones with a little thought.  Thermal mass is the cheapest concept to implement or retrofit. Build a nice rock or brick wall inside, or indoor planter or hot tub if you want luxury ;-) , or just bags full of compressed subsoil and sand. Plastic and caulking WITH proper controlled vents for air flow costs a little more but done properly has big possible payoffs – be careful when retrofitting, old buildings are used to ‘breathing’ easily, some can have problems if you cut that off.  Insulation with industrial oil age products is one of the best new things ever, get it while you can afford it, and install it with care and it will allow you to minimize your heat sources, and could last generations.

It seems absurd to me how for the past centuries the emphasis has been almost exclusively on improved heat sources, and only for the past few decades has insulation and ventilation control climbed into general awareness. Thermal Mass is still considered an alternative and 'odd' idea, probably because it is so cheap and easy to do that there is really no money incentive for the tax authorities or building companies to embrace it .  

Here is a story of what might be to come a couple hundred years from now if the human race has not achieved transcendence or extinction.
This is my own work.
You may not copy, steal, fold, spindle, or mutilate it without my prior written permission.
Thank you.

 

Glass Houses After Peak Oil-

Saul Greenman sighed.

That was it.

The last whole pane of glass was broken into too many pieces to patch and remain clear enough for what little was left of the greenhouse.

 The greenhouse passed down for more generations than he could think of offhand, and the namesake of his family, was now ruined beyond further practical use.  He remember when his grandfather talked about how his great-great to the tenth grandfather had gone out to the abandoned homes and ancient vehicles of all the nearby  towns and scavenged as much whole and large pieces of glass as possible.  He remembered how they had been carefully saved for the past generations.

Hoarded and buried for when the “Deptys” came round looking for valuables to tax or just seize.

Every pane patched and covered every way possible. But weather and accident over the many many generations had taken their toll.

Saul still had the remains of many of the panes. But it would not be enough clear translucencies to provide year round food as it had in the past. Maybe he could still use the greenhouses warmth to start seedlings, but the harsh winters would be less pleasant without the greens he could once sell to the few who stayed on for the northern prairie’s winters.

The Cowboys and Deptys would be back next spring expecting Saul to sell them the fruits of his labors.

 

Saul dismally used the clay mix to patch the glass as carefully as he could to prevent the heat loss that was already causing the even the hearty winter greenhouse crops to wilt. Only the sun, compost, and ancient buried insulation heated the greenhouse.  The northern prairies, even with the foresight of the Greenman forefathers, was too fuel scarce for Saul to heat with fire for more than a winter or two. Always the sun through glass in the day and careful insulation at night had been enough.

 

Saul wasn’t going to starve. Not this year or next for certain.  The Sherf might even hire him as a scribe as Saul was well lettered and highly numerate knowing more of the oil age knowing than most.  But working for the Sherf would mean an end to his courtship of the Sweetwells eldest girl.  They didn’t care much for the Sherf or Cowboys nomadic ways.  And to work for the Sherf you had to travel with his squad.

 

“Mama?” Saul called out as he entered the family home. Earth sheltered and as insulated as the greenhouse, it seemed warm but dim to Saul.

“What’s wrong ‘hun?” the tired voice of the young man’s remaining aging parent.

“The last good pane broke” his voice caught “pretty bad too.”

His mother’s sigh echoed his own.  

“How’s the light levels?”

“Dim, probably too dim to produce as much as even last year.” The last year had been another bad one with more clouds and less precipitation than most winters.

The hard-worn woman looked even older than her four decades as her head bowed under the weight of the news.

“Do you think the early spring traders might have some glass to sell this year?” Saul inquired with a forlorn optimism even as his mother shook her head.

“I’ve asked every year for the past six. That was it. That was the last pane anyone had from the oil ages.”

“But the books said that glass came before oil- why isn’t anyone making it?”

“I don’t know son, I just don’t know.”

“The Cowboys say the Fed army makes powder for their cannons, surely someone can make some glass?”

“I don’t know son”  her voice was tired and sad.

 

The next few weeks passed with Saul fighting his frustration and despair, and as Saul struggled with his emotions the greenhouse plants struggled with insufficient sun.

 

Saul dreamt one night about struggling harder and harder to push the sun into his family greenhouse and how as his hands burned the patched glass turned to water sprinkled his plants into lush green growth.

 

As Saul awoke his mind mulled over the dream, something was bothering him about it.

Some sort of fact that he knew from his schooling.  His family had always been careful to have few children, and to amass as many books of every sort as possible, and to school their children at home with those same books. His hands cramped in memory of copying a dozen whole books on to the pressed linen as his last schooling task.

“Mama I need to look at the library.”

“Go ahead son, but be careful when you are reading it to take care with those older books. Now that the glass is gone, only those and the old seed varieties can be given as your inheritance.”

 

Over the days to come the encyclopedias and science books were devoured by Sauls inquisitive mind.

The fact that most were poorly written copies of older works that were falling to pieces deep in the hidden library of the Greenman family didn’t matter to Saul. He found enough clues. Making glass took fire. A HOT fire, pure sand OR crushed older glass, a ‘blowing’ pipe of some sort, and additives such as zinc, lead, or copper.  Although his fuel was limited he knew how to make charcoal for a hot fire, and had what he thought was enough of the old glass to try experiment on. He couldn’t make the oil age large smooth and even sheets but perhaps, with trial he could make something usable.

 

Soon the dimmest corner of the ancient greenhouse played host to his ‘stove’ as he called it and he experimented. He got burned a lot, and was called a fool and the butt of many jokes when he went to town on his few errands there.

But when he paid the Sherf’s tax with a glass goblet he blew himself, and presented to Clara Sweetwell a mostly matched set of glass drinking mugs the humor dried up.  

 

Three years later Saul and his wife Clara and their newborn babe loaded up the last of the parcels into the wagon, they were setting forth toward the city on the banks of the Misippy that was the seat of the Fed army, where Saul hoped to usher in an era of profitable glassmaking.

 

Sauls mother and two brothers-in-law were putting into place the last pane of lattice window that the greenhouse needed to be restored to its former glory, and they paused their labors to wave farewell to the departing family.

So here we go.

The absurd in politics and firearms is getting more extreme.

One politician who knows nothing about firearms has weighed in about a debate about banning rifle ammo saying " Deer aren't out there wearing body armor " as though hunting deer was the only use of a rifle ammo. That bear, bison, elk, etc., aren't huge tough animals requiring powerful ammo to bring down quickly humanely and safely. That brush, etc., cant interfere with a shot. And that the Second Amendment is somehow about just hunting.

Anyone who knows anything about firearms knows most rifles and rifle ammo can cut through police level body armor like a hot knife through butter. (oh, and by the way this debate is about a rather anemic round that most deer hunters would prefer something with more oomph, instead).


So the ATF and Presidential Administration - in direct contrast to the written laws - wants to ban ONE of the specific styles of specific calibers of rifle ammunition.  "to protect the police from armor piercing cop killer rounds".

Wow!

Cops must be dropping left and right from this round right?

Nope.

Not one documented case.

Aha- but that round can be used in a concealable pistol! says the ATF - uh-huh. The pistol is new on the market, AND the ATF are the ones that permitted the pistol to be sold (and is hardly concealable anyways - closer to a carbine than a derringer in size). (And its not like any plumbing supply house couldn't provide the tools necessary to make ANY ammo fire-able through a concealable device, or that a person couldn't hand make their own custom armor piercing ammo- DUH!).

Of course this has caused a rush on this and most other rifle ammo. (who didn't see that coming?).

Of course the NRA and most Republicans are pushing back against this proposal- with much hue and cry. But they are putting so much energy into fighting this absurdity they aren't pressing forward with other more practical attempts to further grow our gun rights, instead fighting this disposable decoy with so much vigor it almost seems like a real issue to the populace.

This is the absurdity of a shadow puppet fight hiding the congruence and real intent of the figures behind the screen.

New year New predictions New resolutions.

So here we are.
2015

When I was a child I thought 2015 would be a grad year of a shining future- spaceships and aircars and personal servant robots.

When I was a teen I thought it would be full of adventures and gritty noir.

When I finally was an adult and impartially assessed the future from every point of view I could find, especially with an eye to the long term historical perspective, I doubted our civilization would be able to get to that year without major alterations.

I was at least partially right on all counts.

'Robot servants' and 'Space ship liners' are no longer on the drawing board but actually in production for those with enough money to afford them.

Their is plenty of 'adventure' if you want to behave dishonorably and risk death while selling poisons on the corners of ghettos slum neighborhoods.

And our civilization has had a major transformation from enshrining personal freedom to attempting to ensure communal security.

The whole edifice of our global society has been altered beyond belief in so many ways by so many competing interests that predictions for the future can only paint the broadest outlines.

For this year--- I don't see any major unexpected black swans about to land on our heads.

Our civilization is going to keep on going the way it has - an incremental worsening of conditions for most and shiny improvements for a few.

I doubt OPEC will be able to keep oil (and thus energy) prices depressed much beyond 2016, but they will try to keep them down for as long as possible to punish those nations and companies that might try to compete with them.

I expect that in spite of (or perhaps because of) the reduced energy prices, the employment picture will not get much better for much of the USA and the world.

Countries already suffering civil disorder will slid into all out revolution and civil war,  countries merely suffering protests will begin suffering civil disorder, etc, etc. At least for the most part. Places will burn out and settle on a new normal in a few of the places (the Ukraine perhaps?)

Ebola and other diseases will erupt to new levels of fatality world wide but not enough so to cause the gears of civilization to completely stop (not in 2015 at least).

I am expecting the prices of many key components of life, thanks to the OPEC price war, to not ratchet up too much faster than they have been, but I don't expect very many falls in prices either, anything of the sort will be countered by US printing presses trying to get the real rate of inflation into the 5-9% range.

I expect that, personally, I will be getting more exercise (by working toward my off grid home) and eating a healthier diet (partially from price issues and partially by choice).
I am hoping to put off my bankruptcy until 2016. We will see.
I am also hoping to get in a rain fed cistern, an excavation for a pond, a culvert and ditches for the drive way, and the excavating of  the building site of phase 1 of our hobbit hut done. We will see about that too.

I don't expect to be buying any robot or taking even an airline flight, much less a space flight, any time soon. I expect that any 'adventures' I have will be more suffered through than enjoyed, and I expect, at least locally the collapse of western civilization will continue to seem a lot farther off (even though it is hurtling toward us all like an express train).  

Buckle up, remember to enjoy the ride and laugh at the absurdity of it all.