Notes for Thursday – August 18, 2016

The 18th of September is Chilean Independence Day. On this day, in 1810, Chile declared independence from Spain. o o o Today, we present another entry for Round 66 of the SurvivalBlog non-fiction writing contest. The nearly $12,000 worth of prizes for this round include: First Prize: A Tactical Self-Contained 2-Series Solar Power Generator system from Always Empowered. This compact starter power system is packaged in a wheeled O.D. green EMP-shielded Pelican hard case (a $1,700 value), A Gunsite Academy Three Day Course Certificate that is good for any one, two, or three day course (a $1,195 value), A course …




The Development and Maintenance of the First Weapon- Part 1, by B.C.

“You can’t make people smarter. You can expose them to information, but your responsibility stops there.” -Mark Rippetoe, Strength Coach and Texan Two-thirds, one-third, and one-tenth. Those are the stats on how many Americans are overweight, obese, and have diabetes, respectively. Let that sink in for a minute. One in ten Americans would be dead within weeks, should their insulin supply be cut short by any kind of major incident. (Insulin is only guaranteed to be good for 28 days.) There would be roughly 30 million bodies in the first two or three months. The remaining folks who are obese …




Two Letters Re: Urban Trash

Hugh, This article is a good start to a problem solving dilemma. It definitely requires a mindset change, but that’s achievable for everyone. The best book I ever read, back in the late 80s, on this subject is Re/Uses: 2133 Ways to Recycle and Reuse the Things You Ordinarily Throw Away by Carolyn Jabs, published in 1985. – T.S. o o o Hugh, When I have plenty of scraps, I do just as the author suggests (and as Julia Child had suggested in her book!) and make soup stock with them, canning them for later use. It makes for wonderful, …




Economics and Investing:

World seeing ‘greatest monetary policy experiment in history’. Excerpt: “The six months under review have seen central bankers continuing what is surely the greatest experiment in monetary policy in the history of the world. We are therefore in uncharted waters and it is impossible to predict the unintended consequences of very low interest rates, with some 30 percent of global government debt at negative yields, combined with quantitative easing on a massive scale,” – Link sent in by P.S. o o o Silver Takes A Dip On Hawkish Fed Meeting Minutes o o o Is The Oil Production Efficiency Boom …




Odds ‘n Sods:

Claire Wolfe recommended this insightful essay by Vin Suprynowicz: ‘Tolerance’ sounds great. But is there no limit to what we can wisely ‘tolerate’? o o o Authorities believe frat boy found eating victim’s face may have been on “zombie” drug. Are you prepared for more of this as society crumbles around you? o o o SurvivalBlog Reader RBS wrote in about yesterday’s Top Note: I have heard it said that in the Klondike Rush an egg was worth its weight in gold. One can only imagine that transaction taking place. Here is an interesting side note to history that is …