Sunday Reading - Who Knows What You WIll Need?

 

I must admit I find it a little hard to get truly motivated into the Sustainable Living theme these days. The reality is that except for a little more work on very long term water collection and storage there isn't a whole lot for me to put work and planning into if you discount more stored food preps. Well OK I still need to build a new forge area I could put a lot of work into that.

Over the years I have always placed more importance on experience and tools as far as Prepping and Sustainability goes, especially for those of us who still had to keep down full time jobs while doing so. A good example for me was bee keeping. I embraced it heavily, and I still keep hives but I had to move it lower on the back burner when my long term fencing projects proved necessary.  The same thing went for my excursions into reloading a couple thousand rounds each Winter for years right down to bullet casting and even a foray into black powder mixing. 

I still have all the tools, research and the experience, I could take up any of these endeavors again if needed. A few of them I have actually used more than a  few times since basically moving on to the next topic. I good example of this was the forging and metal shaping hobby I took on for a few years. Recently I had half my barn roof blown away in a storm and I even ended up hiring a local Amish-Escapee (another words he did not go back after his mandatory living away period) to help me fix it. Great Kid but even he was amazed at how I took the 100 year old center cap of that roof (which was mostly a low hardened and tempered steel than an alloy) and reshaped it back to new using only a ball hitch and a couple shaping hammers.  

I was out on the porch last night, just sitting with my hunting cat (this is my son's cat that is having a crisis all his own since my Son moved to Oregon and now will not leave my side) when three Deputy sheriff cars came screaming by with sirens blaring. I cannot even remember the last time I even heard one siren let alone three. A couple of locals have even been complaining about minor thefts and break ins recently. Do you know how much money I would have to spend to thief proof this place?

My real crisis hits me however when I sit and watch. I could close the place off and live  sealed up here for years at this point. I see the hysteria, stupid moves, Wars and bad decisions come down year after year with the same end result seeming the most likely. Attacks on our freedoms and way of life, more laws, more taxes, and it is obvious it is not going to end well.

But damn I am liable to have an exit ramp running over my house by the time things get so bad as to actually stop the stupidity. That maybe a bit of an over statement as I see very little in the way of government financed infra-structure around here but the population density is exploding and it leaves me wondering if the near future is not going to bring an entirely different set of problems than I used to think were likely and ultimately prepared for.

A dilemma I have not figured out yet.

 

Keep Prepping Everyone!!!!

 

Addendum -  A thought does occur to me as to what is going to happen when all these new residents in their quickly sold off lots and gravel or black top mini-subdivisions switch to county maintenance for all this. Or have to deal with the first major snow storm and find out it takes the county 2 or 3 days to actually plow out here.