Odds ‘n Sods:

Steve McC. mentioned: Earth Must Be Ready for Next Big Solar Storm    o o o Anyone who places over $150 with Ready Made Resources in the month of July will get a free copy of the excellent Urban Danger DVD. This is a great tool for people to wake others up to the dangers we face and solutions available.    o o o Steven M. mentioned a different approach to bike tire protection: Seat Belt Bike Tire Hack    o o o K.A.F. sent this: A rural life is better: Living in a concrete jungle is stressful and make …



Notes from JWR:

My sincere thanks to the 11 readers who are daily donating their computer’s background processing power to mine Bitcoins for the Ten Cent Challenge. This a Java applet that is NOT installed on your PC or Mac. It simply runs within a web browser session. Please keep this Bitcoin mining web page bookmarked and running while you are web browsing. No registration or set-up is needed. All you have to do is click on “Start Generating” each day. It’s that simple. This project is currently earning us about .015 BTC per day. (But if more SurvivalBloggers used it, obviously we …


Aircraft and Aviation, Post-TEOTWAWKI, by G.R. in Texas

I read JWR’s books “Patriots“ and“How to Survive the End of the World as We Know It” with interest and have been thinking and acting on them since. In particular, I was struck by the concept of using aircraft post-TEOTWAWKI for various purposes as illustrated in Patriots. I’d like to submit the following for your review, and for posting on Survivalblog if you feel it worthy. Background  I’ve been a commercial pilot (not airline) for about six years and have amassed flight time in aircraft as light and simple as a Van’s RV-7 (experimental) up to Beechcraft King Air-sized airplanes in …


Letter Re: The Easy Storage Survival Harvest

I have minor additions to Minnesota Rose’s excellent post on which storable foods have the most nutrition and food value.  In looking for which plants have the most protein, the HealthAliciousNess web site has very good information on the highest protein fruits (dried apricots, I was happy to see), vegetables (sun dried tomatoes, surprisingly), and beans and legumes.  The protein content of beans and legumes varies from a low of 11 percent for pigeon peas to a high of 28 percent for soybeans.  These are cooked percentages, which are much lower than dry percentages because of the additional water; i.e. …


Economics and Investing:

Pimco Predicts Greece Will Default. JWR’s Comment: Prepare for a further succession of dominos to topple. Spain and Portugal will probably be next. And I regret to say that the domino at the end of the queue is at: 38°53’23.28″N, 77° 0’31.01″W Jason Hommel: Silver: From $30/oz to over $500 by 2020 (And from $500 to $5000 by 2030!) Democrats push for jobs package in debt deal. JWR’s Comment: More “stimulus”? They must be insane. Someday, they’ll finally admit that we are a bankrupt nation living on borrowed time. The U.S. Postal Service, facing insolvency without approval to delay a $5.5 …


Odds ‘n Sods:

Marie K. found the Cookit! web site, that offers a “History Cookbook” which is categorized by time periods (such as Prehistoric, Romano-British, Saxons & Vikings, etc.) Within each time period, videos of individuals costumed for the era demonstrate how different recipes were prepared. They show how to make Girdle Bread over the fire (Medieval recipe) or Beancakes (Saxon/Viking recipe) or Roman Lentil Casserole also known as Pottage (a Romano-British recipe).    o o o Fred Z. suggested this piece from NASA’s news arm: Getting Ready for the Next Big Solar Storm    o o o The ARRL‘s annual national Field Day …



Notes from JWR:

I’m sad to report that Ron Hood (of “Hood’s Woods” fame and editor of Survival Quarterly) passed away on Wednesday, June 22, 2011, after battling prostate cancer. Through Ron is gone, his videos and writings will be a lasting legacy. He was a consummate outdoorsman who used his teaching skills (a Bachelors in History, A Master of Science in recreation management and an Ed.D. in Institutional Management) to relate them to others in a unique way. The great thing about Ron is that he was an absolute expert in many things, yet he wasn’t at all puffed up or a …


Resourcefulness: How to Survive Without Supplies, by L.W.

Be prepared. This is the core logic of the survivalist movement. We work to be prepared for a variety of situations, from the common natural disaster to outbreaks of disease to TEOTWAWKI. We conduct thorough research, create organized lists and plans, shop while scrutinizing the fine print, test the products we buy, and then carefully store it all away for possible use in the future. A great deal of control and independence is involved. These steps we take to prepare, at a minimum, provide us with a sense of comfort and security. They can also save lives in an emergency. …


Letter Re: Off-Grid Laptops

Dear Editor: I recently came across the announcement for a new upcoming product. With Intel creating Atom processors with lower and lower power consumption, Samsung was able to design a netbook with integrated solar panels. It immediately occurred to me that this would be an ideal solution for off-grid computing. You can archive thousands of books and references on a single hard drive, have some instructional videos, maps, and more. You may even run lightweight CAD programs that would give any aspiring designer a significant advantage in a recovering economy where no one else has access to any computational power. …


Letter Re: Morality and the Prepper Movement

James Wesley; I came into the prepper movement (without being aware there was any such movement) by degrees, through religion, a few years ago.  As an old “Latin Mass” traditionalist Catholic, there is a tendency amongst our ilk to look with suspicion upon that which is trumpeted as “progressive” or “liberal” or even “modern.”  Not that we are against real progress in some area, or resist modernity for its own sake, but because a real Catholic ought to be a spiritual man, who rejects much of what the modern world tells him is “good,” since these same things so often …


JWR’s Product Review: The Vest Guy Magazine Pouches

I recently bought a number of magazines pouches made in Utah by The Vest Guy. I was very impressed with their quality. Great materials, expert stitching, and dimensionally correct. The particular pouches that I bought are for the Saiga 12 shotgun (both box and drum magazines) in MultiCam camouflage. But the company also makes a very wide variety of load bearing vests, duffles, drag bags, packs, and umpteen varieties of magazine pouches. Some of these appear unique. For instance, I noticed that they offer some X-Series .308 drum magazine pouches and FN PS90 pouch varieties that I haven’t seen from …


Economics and Investing:

This McAlvany podcast interview is a must: Bill King Interview:  Europe is the Detonator – The U.S. is the Bomb. King points to the collapse of socialism in western countries as the core of the collapse that started in 2009, and derivatives as the biggest risk. Reader Stephen M. mentioned that The Economic Collapse blog posted a good summary of the US national debt situation. Here is a key quote: “If we do raise the debt ceiling, that will ‘kick the can down the road’ a little bit farther. However, world financial markets will still crash eventually and our eventual …


Odds ‘n Sods:

Finally! Wisconsin may soon adopt nondiscretionary concealed carry permits. (Thanks to Phil T. for the link.)    o o o W.J. sent us some more good legislative news, from Pennsylvania: Deadly force expansion passes Pennsylvania Senate.    o o o Reader K.K. mentioned the WWII irregular scout unit Castner’s Cutthroats in Alaska. K.K. notes: “They lived off the land, and out of a backpack when deployed.” Readers should refer to Wikipedia as a starting point for researching the unit’s modus operandi.    o o o More than 30 readers sent me the link to a recent hatchet piece by leftist …