Letter Re: Earthquake Resistant Residential Architecture

Hello James:
Attached is an e-mail I sent to my daughter.  Her boyfriend is from Honduras and she dreams of doing missionary work there.  I thought it may be of interest to some of your readership.  I left out a great deal of information on building site selection (her boyfriend already owns five acres) and foundations.  There seems to be differences in opinion regarding firmly anchored and sand-bed isolation between footings and walls.  Most of my information was gleaned from the book Technical Principles of Building for Safety (Building for Safety Series) by Coburn.

Dear X.:
I did a little bit of reading this weekend regarding safe house construction in earthquake and hurricane prone regions.  I thought of you since you might be spending significant amounts of time in that part of the world.  Some sobering pictures of what an earthquake can do to masonry structures (Italy) 

Key points for concrete block construction (very common in Honduras):
1. Don’t build the house out of masonry, use wood which is lightweight, strong and flexible…..but if you cannot…..
2. Single story construction (probably the single most important thing)
3. Use thick blocks (at least 8″ across).  Use good blocks (should ring when blocks are struck with hammer or another block, mortar should be mixed on-site, in small batches by somebody who knows his business.
4. Simple rectangular outline.  Long, skinny houses shake to pieces while those that are closer to square in outline stay together
5. Small rooms.  No room larger than 15′ by 15′ (5 meters by 5 meters)  (probably #2 in importance….especially for bedrooms)
6. Use concrete block for interior partition walls to tie exterior walls together.  See note below about corners.
7. Door and window openings small, minimal number and evenly spaced around the building.  It is advantageous to have the tops of the windows and doors at the same elevation (see note on ring-beams)
8. No window or door openings in walls within 3′ (one meter) of an outside wall or inside partition wall
9. The strength is in the corners (see points 4,5 and 7).  Reinforce the corners with steel wire, mesh or rod laid horizontally in mortar as the walls are built.
10. Build with two ring-beams.  One even with the tops (lintels) of the doors and windows, one along the very top of the wall.  Ring-beams can be cast of concrete/steel rod or constructed of wood.  This is a picture of a structure with FIVE wooden ring-beams
11. Use a light-weight roof that is well tied together (plywood sheathing is recommended) but steel is OK.  See picture from line above.
12. Roof should be relatively steep, 30-to-40 degrees is recommended.  Flatter roofs can act like airplane wings and lift off more easily in high winds.
13. Roofs should not extend more than 24″ past wall
14. Hip roofs tend to be most resistant to blowing off.  House with five ring-beams is also a hip roof house.
15. Put the bed in the middle of the room.
16. A decent article about how to make an existing house safer. 

 

Recipe of the Week:

Keri’s Whole Wheat Bread
1 ½  cups hot tap water
3 Tablespoons oil
¼ cup honey + molasses to equal 1/3 cup 
     (or about 1 ½ Tablespoons molasses)
½ Tablespoon salt
4 cups whole wheat flour
½ Tablespoon **active dry yeast

Put ingredients in the order your bread maker requires. Dry ingredients first or liquid ingredients first.  I use the dough setting and then bake in the oven.   When dough is ready to shape,  pour out dough and stretch into a rectangle.  It will be a little sticky.  On floured board, roll up loaf like you do for cinnamon rolls.  Pinch the ends.  Put in greased and floured loaf pan hiding the pinched ends at the bottom, let raise 30 minutes to an hour.  Don’t let the dough over raise or it will get a sour yeasty smell and taste and can deflate while baking.  The bread will raise a little as it bakes.

Bake 350 degrees for 35-45 minutes.  I have a big loaf pan, if you use a regular size pan, you may need to make 2 loaves and bake 25-35 minutes.  You will know when the bread is ready because it will smell done, and when you thump the bottom of the loaf it will sound hollow.

Kitchen blender directions:

Grind about 3 c. of wheat to make 4 c. whole wheat flour.  In 5-qt. mixer bowl, combine water, oil, honey, molasses and salt.  Mix. In a small bowl, mix 1 ½ c. flour with yeast.  Add to liquid.  Mix for 5 minutes on speed 3.  Change to dough hook.  Add remaining flour and mix on speed 2 for 5 minutes. Cover and let rise for 30 minutes to 1 hour, or until double in size.   Stretch dough into a rectangle.  Roll up loaf like you do for cinnamon rolls.  Pinch the ends.  Put in greased and floured loaf pan, let raise 45 minutes to 1 hour.  Bake 350°F for 45 minutes.  I have a big loaf pan, if you use a regular size pan, you may need to make 2 loaves and bake 30-40 minutes.  You will know when the bread is ready because it will smell done, and when you thump the bottom of the loaf it will sound hollow. 

By hand: 
In large bowl mix with a heavy spoon or hands: water, oil, honey, molasses and salt.  Stir in 1 cup flour and yeast.  When all ingredients are well combined add the rest of the flour stirring in one cup at a time (approximately 3 more cups).   Turn out onto a floured surface and knead for about 5-10 minutes. This step is very important to loaf quality and will make your arms and shoulders get very strong 🙂

Because you are using your hands to knead, the dough will be very sticky.  You may find that you are adding more flour to make the dough workable. This is normal, but add just enough flour to make a smooth and elastic dough.  Too much flour makes the finished loaf dry.  Try not to use more than 1/2 cup. 

** I use active dry yeast, instant dry yeast or compressed yeast.  It is different than the yeast our grandmas used.  It does not need to be proofed and mixed with the water beforehand.  It is added with the flour and works perfect every time.   It may not seem like 1/2 Tablespoon is enough, but it is.  

Chef’s Notes:

A little trick is to oil a liquid measuring cup before you measure the honey.  Pour 1/4 cup of honey in your measuring cup, then add the molasses until it measures 1/3 cup.  The honey mixture will pour right out.

Useful Recipe and Cooking Links:

Carla P. recommended: How To Smoke Meat on a Gas Grill

Shelf Reliance (one of our advertisers) publishes some handy recipes on their web site.

Do you have a favorite recipe that you have tested extensively? Then please e-mail it to us for posting. Thanks!

Odds ‘n Sods:

Several readers mentioned this over at Wired: 1 in 8 Chance of Catastrophic Solar Megastorm by 2020

Dr. Cynthia Koelker is leading a disaster medicine training conference March 29-31, 2012 in Akron, Ohio.  Tuition is $350 for three full days of hands-on training. The trainers will include Dr. Koelker, Tom from Midwest Native Skills Institute and Jim from Ohio Farm Museum. The training is oriented to training laymen that will be the only source of medical care available, without access to hospitals, doctors, or other health care professionals. Classes will include Clinical Procedures Without Electricity, Suturing and Minor Surgery Splinting and Casting, and Treating Infection and Illness. Wherever possible a hands-on approach is taken, including laboratory procedures, clinical skills, suturing, splinting, and casting. Lehman’s Hardware is less than an hour south of Akron and there’s an LDS Cannery half an hour north, so a person could make a week of it.  

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Stories of survival emerge from tornado victims. Any family in tornado or hurricane country that doesn’t have a storm shelter ins unprepared.

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A reminder reminder that Ready Made Resources’ sale on Mountain House canned freeze dried foods ends on March 14th, so order soon. You’ll get a 25% discount and free shipping on case lots.

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Alan W. mentioned a great article in Backwoods Home magazine: Affordable Firearms, by Massad Ayoob

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Matt Bracken’s first novel Enemies Foreign and Domestic is now available as an e-book in Amazon Kindle’s free library, but probably just for one more day. Download your copy, ASAP. And by the way, if you don’t own a Kindle device , keep in mind that free Kindle Reader software is available for both PCs and Macs. (With my aging eyes, I prefer a 15″ screen, anyway.)

Note From JWR:

Today we present another entry for Round 39 of the SurvivalBlog non-fiction writing contest. The prizes for this round include:

First Prize: A.) A gift certificate worth $1,000, courtesy of Spec Ops Brand, B.) A course certificate from onPoint Tactical. This certificate will be for the prize winner’s choice of three-day civilian courses. (Excluding those restricted for military or government teams.) Three day onPoint courses normally cost $795, and C.) Two cases of Mountain House freeze dried assorted entrees in #10 cans, courtesy of Ready Made Resources. (A $350 value.) D.) A 9-Tray Excalibur Food Dehydrator from Safecastle.com (a $275 value), and E.) A $250 gift certificate from Sunflower Ammo.

Second Prize: A.) A Glock form factor SIRT laser training pistol. It is a $439 value courtesy of Next Level Training. B.) A FloJak F-50 hand well pump (a $349 value), courtesy of FloJak.com. C.) A “grab bag” of preparedness gear and books from Jim’s Amazing Secret Bunker of Redundant Redundancy (JASBORR) with a retail value of at least $300, D.) A $250 gift card from Emergency Essentials, and E.) two cases of Meals, Ready to Eat (MREs), courtesy of CampingSurvival.com (a $180 value) and F.) A Tactical Trauma Bag #3 from JRH Enterprises (a $200 value).

Third Prize: A.) A Royal Berkey water filter, courtesy of Directive 21. (This filter system is a $275 value.), B.) Expanded sets of both washable feminine pads and liners, donated by Naturally Cozy. This is a $185 retail value, C.) A Commence Fire! emergency stove with three tinder refill kits. (A $160 value.), and D.) Two Super Survival Pack seed collections, a $150 value, courtesy of Seed for Security.

Round 39 ends on March 31st, so get busy writing and e-mail us your entry. Remember that there is a 1,500-word minimum, and articles that relate practical “how to” skills for survival have an advantage in the judging.

Generational Preparedness, by S.D.

Articles written as personal memoirs always have a special way of reinforcing why preparedness is so important to me. They inspire me to continue learning, and make me proud to call myself a prepper. Hopefully my story of growing up to live among the modern generation of preppers can do the same for you.

I remember my high school shop teacher, and the day he wheeled a television into our room and turned it on. His face was flushed as he changed the channel to a news station, and we watched as thick smoke rolled out of the World Trade Center. Then, on live television, a second plane hit the towers. Everyone but me was convinced it was a terrorist attack. That’s me…the eternal optimist. I get that from my father, which is probably why I remember the most about that day what he said to me. “Watch. The world will never be the same for you, from here on out.” He is the one who planted the seeds of “prepping” in me and told me to always listen to my inner voice, which has saved my life on more than one occasion and my sanity on many more.

Now I am married to a US Marine and have three small children and struggle to understand the changes I see in the world around me. I also remember the ridicule the Y2K preppers were subject to in the media and not understanding why someone would get ready for such an event. (To be fair, I also struggle to understand individuals or groups who prepare for a single event without accounting for anything else.) Why would people stockpile food, water, ammunition for something that would only impact computers? Needless to say, I understand now, but many people don’t.

Sometimes I wonder if the modern prepping movement is simply our way of seeking a more substantial way of life; sustainable roots in a world where we are busy with unfulfilling jobs and spend free time wasting away in front of television programs. Or on a more personal level, my way of motivating myself out of depression and the redundancies of raising a family, moving, setting down roots and keeping my possessions in manageable order.

I’ve come a long way in a few short years from my road trip to meet my then-fiancé after a deployment with a trunk full of everything I owned, cooking food from a can (more on that later) and living paycheck to paycheck. Now I’m a mother, a wife, a member of whatever community I happen to belong to at the moment and someone who chooses to “prep” with a positive and realistic attitude.

Living in coastal North Carolina, the biggest concern was hurricanes. My husband (eventually we did get married) and I grew up in New England in wood-stove heated homes, so the idea of being fairly self-sufficient wasn’t entirely new to us. But our home wasn’t made for even the smallest hurricane, so I tried my best to do what I could with a limited budget. I had supplies in the house for us and a sort of “bug-out list”, because I simply could not afford a separate cache of supplies I would need in an emergency and ones I used on a daily basis. I still do this today, everything I might need written in a notepad in a special place. I have two “levels” on my list, one for a half hour evacuation and one for a two hour evacuation.

In Okinawa, I began to relax a little bit. Living on an overseas base, you cannot have a firearm. I began to have the attitude that my family and I were at the mercy of our government and enjoy the island. Then, we were hit with a magnitude 7.0 earthquake, and it changed me forever. Nothing broke. No one was injured. We did not even lose power. But there is something about the earth moving in such a momentous way under your feet and your children’s feet that can change you. And I know I was not the only one. So once again, I began preparing.

I made friends and even worked out in town, learned as much of the language and culture as I could, and even brought food to the homeless and learned where they went at night to be “safe”. On such a small and populated island, such information could be priceless. The experience there enriched my life, but I still tried to approach much of what I did in a twofold way. I left friends but also the promise of employment.

My preparations there were not in complete vain. My husband and I decided to renew our vows on one of the many subtropical beaches after life handed us some tough cards, and I went with my children early to get ready for our friends. Suddenly, a man in uniform knocked on my hotel room door and told me I had less than ten minutes to evacuate. A massive earthquake (the massive earthquake) had just struck mainland Japan and we were under a tsunami warning. I had to walk on foot alone to the designated waiting area, and I had my bug out bag and supplies packed in my car. It took me less than ten minutes to get up that hill and my children and I were comfortable during our wait, which lasted over five hours. We were even able to give some things to others to help them. In that time, I realized how different I looked at things than most people. The first thing I thought when we got up the hill was “Hmm, I wonder where all of these people are going to go to the bathroom?” No one else seemed content with anything other than to pace or complain. My kids were happy and protected from bugs, hunger, thirst, etc. For a short time, anyway.

When we were reunited with my husband and our guests (who were forced to wait on low ground immediately outside the base gate during this time-do not trust the military to even take care of their own if TSHTF), we turned on the television and watched the footage of the tsunami effecting the mainland. It has almost been a year, and my experience has cemented in me something I don’t believe will ever leave me. I am a prepper now.

Now, our family lives in the Midwest. I learned about the unique natural disasters our region might face and have reaped one of the benefits of the area- guns again! I am learning how to balance a stockpile of food and healthy eating with the need to move on short notice.

I also learning how to maintain a positive outlook on things even when I wait for my “supplies” for two months in an empty house, and how to teach my children what they need to learn in today’s world and the own unique world they occupy as military children. And, maybe someday, adults in a world even I won’t be able to recognize, one way or another.

I am reading, reading, reading. I read anything and everything I can that seems realistic about prepping. Even when I might feel that the skills I can give my children are scarce, I am reminded through books that we can learn new things together. We are currently awaiting a couple of books about clouds and identifying weather. Fun and practical.

One thing about military wives that is definitely true is our ability to network and get stuff done (GSD). We talk, we do what needs to be done, we support one another, and many times we shake our heads at the complaints of “regular people” together. We can become family when needed, provide support to one another in ways friends generally wouldn’t on short notice, and learn from each other. This can be good or bad. I have a friend who subscribes to the prepper mentality also, for different reasons than me, and who was a “disaster buddy” while we were overseas. (In the event of a natural disaster or military event, we couldn’t count on our husbands to be there). She stockpiled, but was not neat about it. As much as I hate to admit it, I contribute the recent loss of her entire shipment of household goods to not keeping the house clean. Mold. You can bet that I keep my house and possessions clean and in good order.

I see people lose friends, spouses, their pets, their things…have spent over 6 months in hotel rooms with my kids, have lived in airports for days with them in strange places, have traveled the world alone with them in the back of cargo jets, have slept on empty floors in empty houses for more months than I care to remember, have learned very quickly how to set out feelers in a new community and what my resources are, and have learned from the mistakes of those on my path. My kids are being raised to know the world does not revolve around them. And through it all, I am learning that the world really is changing. It really isn’t the same world as it was the day I went to school on September 11. And, on however small a scale, I have been ready for something I never expected to happen that did.

Being a prepper chose me, much like the lifestyle did as soon as I fell in love with a Marine. But I wouldn’t have it any other way.

A few special considerations I have dealt with:

-Healthy eating and prepping. I prefer to eat whole, fresh foods and use them for cooking. To me, there doesn’t seem anything wrong with continuing to eat this way, especially because it lends itself to advancing skills in cooking and preparing food anyway. Even if I might not make homemade bread or soup with the same ingredients WTSHTF, after years of cooking you learn that soup is just a bunch of stuff that tastes good together thrown into a pot and bread can be made with all sorts of things. Either way, I like to keep a large stock of some canned items, but like to add diversity in dehydrated and freeze-dried foods. There are usually no preservatives in these items and they can replace something you might have spent unnecessary money for at the grocery store in everyday cooking, like chives or even powdered milk to make bread, on a day to day basis.

-Children are the basis for many survival articles, but besides their material needs, they can actually be assets in a survival situation. I only know this from having survived with them inside empty houses, airports, and hotel rooms. Seriously though, everything you do can serve a dual purpose, and the way you raise and interact with your children is no exception. If your kids cannot go without television or their toys for a day, they will struggle in a survival scenario that much more. Boredom begets creativity. Force yourself to find ways to do everyday things without what you usually have to do them and the ideas will flow. Your kids will also adjust accordingly. Above all else, maintain a positive attitude.

-Go through your calendar at the end of the year and save it. Look at how many times you’ve gone to the doctor and what for, the dentist and what for, how many times you’ve eaten out, etc. If you have been to the dentist for fillings a couple times in a year, chances are an emergency dental kit would be a smart investment. If you are taking your child to the doctor for eczema often, maybe you need to stock up more on his or her supplies and anything else you’d need to deal with that in an unexpected environment, like clothes that can cover their skin or hold in moisture. Sometimes we can’t see what is right in front of us, but if you are like me and write down everything on your calendar, it can be right in front of you.

-Don’t burn bridges. There really is nothing wrong with acquaintances. You don’t have to be best friends with everyone, but if there is one thing being a military wife has taught me, its that it doesn’t always matter. Sometimes you will need someone, and they will need you, and you have to be willing to get over the petty things and work together. In Okinawa, I was stuck on the hill during the tsunami warning with my next door neighbors. They were the worst neighbors we’ve ever had and we’ve had some bad ones, and that includes roommates. You never know who fate might stick you with…it can be a small world (or in my case, a small island).

-If you can diversify nothing else, diversify your learning. I love reading. Luckily for me, my kids like listening to me and learning about pretty much anything. It might be too expensive for most people to become hardcore preppers, but buying or lending a book about tying knots and using your shoelaces to practice can be free. The more you learn, the more creative you get, and the more you realize how important your mind is. Don’t neglect it- it might be all you have someday.

Letter Re: Cap and Ball Revolver Options

James,
There are many states and cities where people are not allowed to have modern pistols, without massive red tape by state and local governments. But replicas of old frontier pistols of the cap and ball type slip under most restrictions and can still be ordered through the mail, and no BATF paperwork is required. (Be sure to check you state and local law before ordering one!) But what most people don’t realize is the fact that most of these good quality reproductions of the old cap and ball revolvers of the mid-1800s are very accurate and potentially as deadly as any modern cartridge revolver, once you learn how to use and maintain them.
 
I’m the first to admit, their a real pain in the rear to load and maintain, but once you learn the basics of loading and cleaning the old style revolvers, you have a very good defense weapon, living where options are limited. There are many types and styles that were developed from 1836 into the 1870s, many of the later cap and balls were later converted to cartridge revolvers to speed up the loading process, and allow the pistolero to keep the feel of the original revolver.
 
Colt was one of the first to build a reliable cap and ball revolver, starting with the Patterson, it was a 5 shot, in .36 caliber, With no attached loading lever, took forever to load, but was quite an advantage over the single shot pistols of prior use and production. But most of Patterson’s shortcomings were corrected with the Walker Colt. Which had a 60 grain chamber, in .44 caliber, making it the forerunner of the .44 Magnum in power. Then came Colt’s Dragoons first, second, and third model, a scaled down version of the Walker, but still more of a saddle pistol than a hip pistol but maintained the large chamber capacity. Then came the baby Dragoon in 1849, a .31 caliber with about 10 grain chamber capacity, that was very popular in the gold fields of California, because of it’s smaller size. Then in 1851, Colt finally got it right with the .36 Navy and the .44 Army.
 
The 1851 model is one of the most natural pointing handguns I ever picked up, And was the life long favorite of James Butler (Wild Bill) Hickock, in .36 Navy model. They have a 30 grain chamber capacity, same as the .44 Army, which is essentially the same revolver with bigger cylinder holes. Then In 1858, Remington came out with their cap and ball revolver in the same calibers as the Colt’s, and about the time of the Civil War, Colt came out with the 1860 model, which has the same size cylinder, but a longer grip for the people with bigger hands. I don’t feel the 1860 has near the good feel of the 1851 models, but they are good shooters. At one time or another I’ve owned each one of the above mentioned reproduction revolvers with the exception of the Patterson.
 
I have one rule about a pistol before I’ll carry it, it has to be accurate enough to hit a rattlesnake in the head out to 25 feet, and each one of these revolvers I’ve had were well capable of this requirement! Now if you consider going this option, I’d stay away from the brass frame copies, as prolonged shooting will loosen the rod the cylinder rotates around. They make good wall hangers, but I don’t feel they are near the quality of the steel frame copies.

And one suggestion I’d make, due to the long time involved in loading these old timers, it’s best to buy a pair, if you can afford it. There was good reasoning for the old timer packing two cap and ball revolvers. And if you see the movie, “The Outlaw Josey Wales” Clint Eastwood was packing 4 or 5 of these revolvers. I’ve got several books on Orrin Porter Rockwell, a frontier marshal in the Utah Territory, according to these books Port carried a pair of 3rd model Dragoon 44s in saddle holsters, a pair of 1851 short barreled .44s on his hips, and a couple Derringers, along with a bowie knife, skinning knife and a rifle in a scabbard on his horse, and there was mention of a 10 gauge shotgun he took along on his buggy trips and wagon, when he was hauling freight and the mail from Missouri to the Utah Territory. Porter was another frontiersman who packed the 1851 models until he died in the 1870s of natural causes. Well, enough history! Lets get to the fun part.
 
If you buy a cap and ball revolver, you’ll also need a nipple wrench, a powder flask, a straight line capper, a good set of gun screwdrivers, a small brass hammer or rawhide mallet. You’ll notice there is no back strap on the Colts, the barrel and loading ram are held on the gun with a wedge through the lower portion of the barrel. This wedge is also what keep the gun tight, as it’s tapered and  too hard a tap will make the gun too tight for the cylinder to turn. It takes a few times to get the feel of the right wedge position. I’m looking at the copy of the 1851 .36 right now, so that’s what I’ll use for an example.
 
The chamber holes are tapered towards the nipples. Most of the Colt style flasks come with a 30 grain spout on top, to throw a powder charge, you put your finger over the end on the spout, turn the flask up side down, open the lever on the side, filling the spout with powder, then release the lever, turn the flask right side up and the spout should be full of powder. The tighter you press the ball into the cylinder on the wad and powder charge, the better the explosion, remember the chamber holes are tapered. Before I learned about the Bore Butter soaked wads, about 18 shots was all I could get out of a pistol, the powder fouling would get so bad, it was hard to cock the hammer. But the wad serves two purposes, keep the fouling down, and prevents cross fire, I’ll get into that one later.
 
At this point let me inject that I file the spout down to where it throws a 22 grain charge for .36 and 25 grain charge for .44 caliber, as I use a felt wad soaked on T-C Bore Butter over the powder, then ram the ball down on top. Then after all six chambers are loaded, use the straight line capper to install the cap on the nipple.  Never put the cap on the nipple first, as you ram the ball home, the flash hole acts as a vent hole to allow the air out of the chamber hole when loading. Then on the back of the cylinder you’ll notice there are little pins on the islands between the nipples, and notice a small groove in the bottom of the hammer where it strikes the cap. Set the hammer down on one of these pins, a very good safety feature, and it can be carried safely with all six chamber holes loaded, and doesn’t have to have an empty chamber to set the hammer on, as with the Colt SAA .45.

You’ll notice there isn’t too much for sights on these revolvers, a post similar to a shotgun bead for the front sight, and a notch in the top of the hammer for rear sight. Most of the frontiersman that used these pistols were point shooters, shooting half way between the hip and shoulder, but unconsciously sighting down the barrel. Then If you have seen any of the old western movies made back in the 1930’s, you may have noticed most of the old cowboys threw the pistol back over their shoulder to cock it, then looked like they were throwing lead! Well, by cocking the gun back over the shoulder the spent percussion would fall off the nipple and down behind you, and not fall off down into the action and lock up the action!
 
I had an uncle that shot pistol this way, “throwing lead” I’d throw a marble out and he’d shoot it just as it hit the ground, he tried to teach this method to me, but I never could get the hang of it! But he never aimed and never missed a marble! But this way of shooting originated from the cap and ball days.
 
Now the dirty part… Cleaning these pistols isn’t easy, make sure all chamber holes are empty, then take the mallet or brass hammer, and tap the wedge out to the left, the wedge should have a little spring retainer that has to be depressed to completely take it out, but it will come out far enough to remove the barrel forward and off, you might use the loading lever to press the barrel off if it’s tight, just turn the cylinder to where the lever in on the wall between the holes.  Sometime the fouling makes this come off with difficulty! Then slip the cylinder off.
 
Take the nipple wrench and remove all 6 nipples, I usually take the nipples and drop them into a cup of hot soapy water and swirl it around. (Incidentally, I take the nipples and chuck them up in a drill and take a file or fine emery paper and sand the nipple to where the cap will slip on without cracking and can be slipped off with a fingernail), Then take a black powder solvent Hoppes #9 Plus or TC #13 and swab the barrel out, then swab the chamber holes out, wipe the rest of the gun down with the solvent. I’ve always use Hoppes #9 but any solvent you prefer will work. Make sure you dry the holes in the cylinder really well, light solvent then wipe dry.
 
Now take the nipples out of the hot soapy water wipe them down good with solvent. Blow through each one making sure the flash hole is dry and open, then I take a small drop of Hoppes and drip it on the nipple threads, careful not to get it into the flash hole, then screw them back into the cylinder snug but not tight, and once again holding the cylinder up to the light and make sure all flash holes are clear then reinstall the cylinder in the center rod and snap the barrel back in place and tap the wedge back in place, and your ready to load it again! About every  5th or 6th shooting, I disassemble the whole pistol and put all the parts except the grips, into hot soapy water and clean them all as above mentioned! Then put it all back together, without any extra parts left over, don’t laugh, it happens sometimes!
 
Note: Some Italian copies have #10 nipples and some have #11 nipples, be sure if you get two pistols they both have the same size nipples. I’ve had some that the nipples were very crude, and half way between sizes, these are the one I sand down to fit the cap properly then coat them with cold blue to prevent rusting.
 
Now for the cross fire. This is when the ball isn’t seated tight enough, or the sprue from a cast ball, isn’t seated straight up when rammed in with the loading lever, or too much gap between cap and nipple. One old collector told me it was common for the originals to have hairline cracks between chambers, from improper cleaning over the years, causing crossfire’s when fired! But it’s when two or more chambers go off at once! I have never experienced this mishap, but have talked to people who have, and it’s very scary, especially when all 6 go off!  back in the 1960s when I first started shooting cap and ball revolvers, my buddies told me to put Crisco over the end of the holes after you seat the ball to prevent crossfire’s. Well out shooting on a hot summer day, I had Crisco running out of the holster, down my pant leg down into my boot. So rather than put up with this mess, I went to a .454″ diameter ball mold instead of the regular .451″ diameter, shearing off a lead ring from every ball seated. This was a real bugger to seat, as I put the bottom of the grip on my thigh when I ram the balls home, and by the end of the day, I always had a bruise on my leg! Then when I started going to the Mountain Man rendezvous events, I learned about the felt wads preventing crossfire’s, then learned about the Bore Butter cutting down the fouling. Ahh, back to the .451″ ball and no more bruises on the leg!
 
I had to get a pair of 1851 Navy .36 calibers just to see what Hickock’s fascination was with this model. Less recoil right off, and just as accurate as the .44s, a real pleasure to shoot. Plus I can buy .375″ Balls instead of having to cast them. You can also buy the .451″ balls, but I have always cast my own. I can see that some of the shots Hickock was supposed to have made with these guns were very possible.
 
One word of warning, all these replicas are made strictly for black powder, or Pyrodex, never, ever use anything but black powder, as they will not take any nitrocellulose powders, the pressure is much too great. Black powder comes in 4 granularities, FG which is Cannon or large bore musket grade, FFG, which is rifle grade, FFFG which is pistol grade and small caliber rifles, And FFFFG which is the finest grade priming powder for flintlocks. I just buy FFFG and use it in everything from .58 caliber rifles down to the .31 Colt pocket pistol, and use it in some cartridge rifles and pistols. Cuts down on confusion, and with reasonable charges, works well in all calibers.
 
Now don’t get the impression that I’m strictly a cap and ball pistolero. I bought my first Colt 1911A1 .45 automatic when I was 16, and have never been without one since! Also love the S&W line of revolvers. But knowing what cap and ball revolvers are capable of, this might be a good alternative for the peppers who live in the non-gun zones, as these guns seem to slip through the cracks in the liberal laws. And they are inexpensive to shoot, for the price of a box of .45 ammo today, you can get a couple hundred shots for the same price with a cap and ball.

I recommend only buying the top of the line models. Though I haven’t bought from them, I see Cabela’s sells quite a few of these models. I get most of my supplies from Dixie Gun Works in Union City, Tennessee. There are several mail order houses that handle cap and ball revolvers, just judge the quality by the price. I have also picked up good quality cap and ball revolvers at a good price at pawn shops.

This might be a good alternative for some. And of course they are a lot of fun to shoot, if you are allowed to shoot at all in your locale. – J.M.

Odds ‘n Sods:

Jim S. sent this to file under: First Amendment, Goodbye, Kiss: House Passes Bill That Will Make Protesting Illegal at Secret Service Covered Events

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This interactive map might prove useful in your search for a retreat locale: Mapping the 2010 Census.

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A bit of Dr. Strangelove, in real life: the Mertvaya Ruka automated launch response system. (Thanks to Troy H. for the link.)

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Cheryl N. recommended this by “Selco”: Living With Snipers: The Reality Of Collapse

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Bob G. suggested a useful aggregation of educational pieces at Lifehacker: MacGyver, Survivalist, or Stockpiler: The Urban Survival Skills Everyone Should Know

Jim’s Quote of the Day:

“Or do you not know that your body is a temple of the Holy Spirit within you, whom you have from God? You are not your own, for you were bought with a price. So glorify God in your body.” – 1 Corinthians 6:19-20 (KJV)

Note From JWR:

Today we present another entry for Round 39 of the SurvivalBlog non-fiction writing contest. The prizes for this round include:

First Prize: A.) A gift certificate worth $1,000, courtesy of Spec Ops Brand, B.) A course certificate from onPoint Tactical. This certificate will be for the prize winner’s choice of three-day civilian courses. (Excluding those restricted for military or government teams.) Three day onPoint courses normally cost $795, and C.) Two cases of Mountain House freeze dried assorted entrees in #10 cans, courtesy of Ready Made Resources. (A $350 value.) D.) A 9-Tray Excalibur Food Dehydrator from Safecastle.com (a $275 value), and E.) A $250 gift certificate from Sunflower Ammo.

Second Prize: A.) A Glock form factor SIRT laser training pistol. It is a $439 value courtesy of Next Level Training. B.) A FloJak F-50 hand well pump (a $349 value), courtesy of FloJak.com. C.) A “grab bag” of preparedness gear and books from Jim’s Amazing Secret Bunker of Redundant Redundancy (JASBORR) with a retail value of at least $300, D.) A $250 gift card from Emergency Essentials, and E.) two cases of Meals, Ready to Eat (MREs), courtesy of CampingSurvival.com (a $180 value) and F.) A Tactical Trauma Bag #3 from JRH Enterprises (a $200 value).

Third Prize: A.) A Royal Berkey water filter, courtesy of Directive 21. (This filter system is a $275 value.), B.) Expanded sets of both washable feminine pads and liners, donated by Naturally Cozy. This is a $185 retail value, C.) A Commence Fire! emergency stove with three tinder refill kits. (A $160 value.), and D.) Two Super Survival Pack seed collections, a $150 value, courtesy of Seed for Security.

Round 39 ends on March 31st, so get busy writing and e-mail us your entry. Remember that there is a 1,500-word minimum, and articles that relate practical “how to” skills for survival have an advantage in the judging.

Your Earthquake Audit, by M.B.S.

We are survivalists who live on a hobby farm within The American Redoubt. In the 23 years we have lived in this region I have yet to feel the ground shake beneath my feet. That’s welcome news speaking as a former Californian who has been through two “big ones”. Yet, for whatever reason (the Holy Spirit, possibly) I began thinking about earthquakes two months ago. Because of this mind set, when three earthquakes, southeast of us, occurred in Utah around the 13th of February and the next day a magnitude 6.0 quake hit off the coast of Oregon. That got my attention.
 
The Oregon coastal quake had Seattle news outlets airing special segments about the possibility of a “big one” along the “ring of fire” that could cause substantial damage to cities like Seattle, Portland Oregon, Vancouver B.C., etc. They asked one seismologist about this prospect and his answer was, “the good news is that large scale earthquakes on this fault over the last 10,000 years have occurred on average about every 300 years”. “The bad news?” The reporter asked. “The last ‘big one’ on this fault was 329 years ago.” Oh, that’s reassuring.
 
But we don’t live in earthquake country, we are hundreds (thousands?) of miles and a couple of large mountain ranges between us and “the ring of fire” so no worries right? No, I don’t think that is correct. We have never experienced TEOTWAWKI but we are preparing for that. I lived through an epic ice storm in an area not know for such things also. In fact, portions of the region were without power for 13 weeks from that ice storm. We also had a “fire storm” where none had ever occurred previously.
 
In the remainder of this essay I will:
 
1) Describe what an earthquake audit is
 
2) Review some of the findings of our earthquake audit
 
3) Review some of the mitigation steps we took to resolve our “audit deficiencies”
 
4) Share an analogy that I think is fitting
 
 
1) What is an Earthquake Audit?
 
I believe I coined the phrase “earthquake audit”. My version of an earthquake audit was to take a clip board, note pad and marking pen and go room by room; house, shop, outbuildings, everyplace. Using my experience being in quakes plus video’s I have seen of them and trying to visualize what would happen; what would go flying and what would be okay in a modest earthquake. My main focuses were looking “up” to identify things that could fall down with force and looking with an eye to the protection of mission critical items versus lesser important assets. For example having your AN/PVS-14 and Night Vision compatible EO-Tech sight go flying would be much worse than if that large pile of firewood gets scattered. This is mostly common sense it’s just a matter of actually doing it. I made a list of things that I observed to be problematic and then prioritized that list into actionable items.
 
2) What were the results of our own Earthquake Audit?
 
Frankly, we failed miserably. Here are three examples among dozens.
 
Our preparations are extremely organized and inventoried. We have eight of the Gorilla Rack shelving units to store items. I could not believe my eyes (although I should have because I am the one who put them there) when I looked up on the top shelf of one of the shelving units and saw all three of our pressure canners sitting side by side, not in boxes, resting nearly seven feet off the ground on an unsecured shelving unit.
 
The next “finding” was when I went into a food storage location (with a cement floor) and again could not believe my eyes. We purchase raw local honey from a vendor who sells them in half gallon glass mason jars. We love it as the honey is excellent and you get a half gallon jar to use when you’re done. Also the jars are temperature stabilized in case you need to heat the honey to liquefy it. There on the shelf at eye level was 18 half gallon glass jars of honey on an unsecured shelving unit with the jars right up the very edge of the shelf.
 
With even a minor rumble in addition to having no honey could you imagine the mess of nine gallons of honey and 18 broken half gallon glass mason jars in one big pile on the cement floor?
 
The last example was when I walked into the fuel shed. This was an accident waiting to happen. The fuel shed building is built over the top of an underground gas tank. The riser off the tank, 12 volt pump, filters and filler hose are inside the shed. Also inside the shed are shelves and items stacked on the gravel floor. There are metal gas cans, metal 5 gallon kerosene cans, plastic diesel containers a couple of metal 55 gallon drums and a dozen or so propane cylinders. The riser coming up off the underground tank was not protected at all and things were staked up all around it. It wouldn’t have taken much for things to have fallen on the riser likely breaking it. Wouldn’t it have been lovely to have gas cans and propane cylinders flopping about inside a metal walled shed with a severed riser attached to a large gas tank!
 
3) Mitigation Steps
 
All of these “deficiencies” had to be fixed. The pressure canners got put in boxes and moved into cupboards with locking doors. For the honey, I secured the shelving unit to the wall and purchased nice plastic totes with locking lids that would hold six half gallon jars each. A couple of layers of bubble wrap on the bottom of the tote then each jar individually wrapped in bubble wrap that was taped in place. The jars were placed in the tote and then shipping “popcorn” was put between the jars. Two layers of bubble wrap on the top then the lid of the tote was securely attached. The totes then were “strapped in” to the secured shelving unit.
 
The fuel shed got gutted and redone. The fuel tank riser and pump are now completely protected and everything in the shed is strapped down. This was done with 3/8ths x 4” eye bolts and six foot locking tie down straps.
 
This clearly isn’t rocket science its just taking the time to get it done. Generally speaking; Shelving units need to be secured to something. If not an adjacent wall, look up, is there something above to secure to? On one occasion I had two shelving units at a 90 degree angle to one another. One of the units could be secured to the wall but not the other. So, what I did was attach the units to one another where they met. At the opposite ends I ran a tie down strap to create a triangle from the end of one unit to the end of the other unit, this gave some good strength.
 
Watch for items that could fall on your head while you are in bed. And some items, there is not much you can do but pray. For example we have a river rock chimney that runs up 25 feet from the main floor through the ceiling of the second floor. I have not idea how strong it is but there is not much that can be done other than building some kind of cradle for it. So if it comes down in a quake it comes down. I guess that’s why you have wood stoves in the shop, master bedroom and back patio as backups. Guns and especially ones with optics need to be protected. My main battle rifle and main defensive shotgun are in metal hard shell cases strapped to something solid. Cushioning inside gun safes are a good idea. Are there items that could fall down behind a closed inward-opening door and block it closed?
 
4) One way to think about this.
 
The analogy to this line of thinking is nautical: Sooner or later we are all going to take a journey. Hopefully your journey will be on the good ship “Faithful Survivalist”. We don’t know when we will be leaving on that journey, where it will take us and what the conditions are going to be like along the way. Our sense is though that we are probably going to be leaving sooner rather than later and with the storm clouds we see developing off on the horizon we are not expecting “smooth sailing”. As with any wise captain heading off on a journey of unknown conditions, lets be sure that everything is lashed down; “Everything has a place and every place has a thing”. Because, if the going gets rough we don’t want important items sliding around on deck or falling overboard. Batten down the hatches, mates!
 
I don’t have a crystal ball and don’t pretend to know the future. I do know that the Holy Spirit put it on my heart to look at our survival stores with a new set of eyes and it was eye opening. I hope you do also and I hope this was helpful.

Five Simple Steps to Prepare for TEOTWAWKI, Today, by S.B.

I have recently been introduced to survivalism, preparedness, and TEOTWAWKI – The End Of The World As We Know It.  It was my father who first got me interested in the subject (although I had stumbled upon a survivalism web site years ago when web searching, of all things, how to cook and eat giant salamander – more on that later, possibly).  I have, over the past couple months, picked up lots of cool skills.  For example, I can now cook food that didn’t come in a box! That is a big deal.

I have also learned to shoot the paper that the target is on (most of the time) and I have begun taming the deer that live in the nearby woods.  It pays to plan ahead.
That said, I realized that I do have one thing going for me that, sadly, most Americans don’t.  From 2007 to 2011 I worked at an athletic club.  During my time there, I learned everything from the correct way to pick up a treadmill with one hand and vacuum under it (yes, that IS possible) to how to make a positively sinful chocolate ganache that is also low-calorie, and, with a little stretching of the truth, you can even claim it is healthy.  All of which, mind you, is my very elaborate introduction to my survival advice: fitness

I know that working out is hard.  It can be boring.  Probably, if you are anything like me, you are literally thinking “I don’t wanna!”  Well, you don’t have to be a muscle man to be fit. Me?  I’m 5’9″, and weigh around 145 pounds and, BTW, I’m a girl.  That said, I’m more than halfway to my goal of 50 consecutive, standard push-ups!  When I started working toward my goal I could do… yes, I’ll admit it: 3.  Three push-ups.  That lands right up there in the healthy range for a toddler. So what did I do?  What should you do?

1) Start Small.
No matter what your goal is (and having a goal is a great idea) you need to start small.  Do something easy.  Put 1 less teaspoon sugar in your coffee or tea.  Stop buttering your toast.  Circle your couch once before you sit on it.  I’m not kidding.  The little stuff makes a big difference.
I started by not putting sugar in my tea.  I lost 5 pounds in less than a month.  That is literally the only thing I changed that month.  Not kidding.  Of course, I was a 3 teaspoons of sugar girl, so it made a big difference.  I cut out butter on my toast – which sucked because toast is so dry without butter.  I ended up not even eating toast.  Suddenly, 10 pounds of body weight was gone. 
I used to eat a lot of toast. 

Choose a specific plate, or bowl, to be yours.  You can label it if you want.  Put all the food you want on it once per meal, and then leave a little on the plate when you “finish” eating. 

You care about your health, right?  Eat three meals a day.  No more, no less. If you skip a meal you teach your body that you are literally starving to death.  Then, anything you eat gets magically turned into fat.  Fat, technically, is like canned goods for your body.  Unfortunately, your body has lost its can opener, which means before it figures out how to use all that fat, it is going to eat (not joking) your muscles to stay alive.  So, no skipping meals.

Start switching foods you only kind of like (or foods you like) that are bad for you with good foods.  Anything you eat that contains sugar can be replaced by a fruit.  Fruits are awesome.  Guess what?  Fruit is a natural food.  That makes it healthy.

Replace any carbohydrates you eat with vegetables.  My favorite vegetables are potatoes, because they are also a carbohydrate!  (Wait a minute…) 
Onions are yummy if you cook them.  Garlic is good, too.  There are all sorts of health benefits for onions and garlic, but I like them for the taste.  Celery is one of the few foods that burns more calories to eat than it contains. 

One more tip for starting small:  eat meat. I know animals are cute and most of them are furry and they generally have eyes that stare at you (what else would they use them for?) but – meat is the ultimate food.  It contains protein, which makes muscles and bones, and, yes, it even feeds your brain.  You brain is pretty much the most important part of your body.  You will die without it.
Protein is most easily accessed by eating meat.  Yes, you can find protein in other places, like legumes (beans) gluten (wheat) and, tofu (soy) but get this: meat is the only source of complete protein.

Beans, grains, and nuts contain partial proteins.  Think of it as puzzle pieces.  If you get all of the pieces, maybe your body can flip them around and put them together.  Possibly.  If you only get some, though, your body just throws it away. Meat has complete proteins.  The full puzzle, already put together.  Unless you carefully pair incomplete proteins, they are nutritionally incomplete, and your body cannot utilize them. Fortunately, meat is delicious.

Oh, and in case I forget to bring this up later: quit eating so many grains. I know bread is awesome.  I love carbohydrates too, but they will make you fat.  We use grains to fatten livestock like cows, sheep, chickens, and all those other tasty animals.  It works just the same when we eat it.  Unless you want to get fat (which, I suppose, is one way of preparing for food shortages…) you should stop eating grains. Instead, eat fruits and vegetables which taste good and contain vitamins.  If you’re anything like me, you will be much happier getting vitamins from food than taking them in pills.

2) No Slacking Off
You need to make a commitment to yourself, to your health, and to your body.  That means no slacking off when you “don’t feel like it”.  (Okay, fine, you can skip working out Sundays.)  Make your health choices into a habit.  Every morning, every evening, or every whenever-you-have-time-during-the day, you need to get in a little something extra.
I started out with a few push-ups, crunches, a little jump-roping and a whole lot of asking myself why I was doing this.  I have skipped a total of 5 days.  (That is approximately one out of every ten days, and then an extra because honestly I just didn’t feel like it today so I am writing about it instead.  That counts, right?)
Even if you don’t have time to do your full routine, do something.

I mentioned rope jumping before.  This is important.  Jump ropes are cheap, and people give them to thrift stores regularly.  Buy one, now. The ideal jump rope is long enough that you can stand on it and the handles will come up to your arm pits.  If it is a little long you can tie knots in the end.  If it is a little short, well, that’s harder but you can deal with it. 

Jump ropes take up little space (about as much space as one shoe) and you can use them almost anywhere.  I bring mine along when I travel, and get out of the car to jump every time we stop for gas.  You can jump indoors (unless you have annoying neighbors who complain about the noise) or on pavement, or on grass.  You can jump any time.  There are also jump rope tricks.  I watched little kids do a major jump rope performance that involved flips in the air, multiple people per rope, multiple ropes per person, jumping rope while doing push-ups and, of course, gratuitous amounts of 1980s era rock music.  For the first time in my life, I was jealous of third graders. So, jump ropes are a great investment in your health, and if you keep at it you can astound people will your abilities.  (There is probably a way to convert your jump rope into a weapon for TEOTWAWKI, too, but I haven’t learned that yet.)

By the way – you don’t have to do an “exercise” to work out.  Anything that uses your muscles counts as strength training.  That means when you haul wood, or carry things upstairs, you can count it as your workout.  Anything that works your heart and lungs is aerobics.  So, running, walking the dog, etc. 
Plus, you can always do a little of what my dad calls “Rambo Skills.”  This is anything that you can picture needing to do in a survival situation.  So, like, climbing trees (presumably to survey the land) or punching a punching bag or karate (or pseudo karate). 

Practice presenting the pistol from several different positions. You know, those guys in the cowboy movies make it look easy, but it’s tough.  That gun gets heavy fast.

Use an unloaded gun that you’ve disabled.  [JWR Adds: Do you own a Glock? Then buy a training barrel. That is very inexpensive insurance for 100% safe practice. You can also buy a special dry fire training trigger from Southwest Shooting Authority. These eliminate the need to cycle the slide each time between dry fire presses. The same company also does some great grip reduction work.]

Pick a target with a safe backstop. Practice drawing from the holster, bringing the gun up, and lining up the sights. 

Just like the push-ups, you need to train your body.  You are working on coordination, yes, but you are also training your muscles for strength and endurance.  The goal is that you will be able to automatically bring your gun up (through kinesthetic memory) to aim at the target you are looking at.  Look.  Raise the gun.  Aimed. 
Practice this with open sights, and with a scope.  Yes, you can do this with a scope.  The magnification doesn’t change how you hold the gun, it just changes how far you can see when you hold the gun.

My dad can bring it up and have it aimed exactly.  I can’t, yet, but if I practice enough, just like with the push-ups, I can.
Plus, just from the little practice I’ve done, I know it works your deltoids (shoulder.  Ladies!  You want this) and pectorals (chest.  Men!  This is for you) and that one along the side of your ribs that I can never remember the name of (everyone wants to work that muscle). 
BTW – look at your target, not your gun.  Move the gun so that the sights line up with the target without shifting your gaze.  You need to be able to trust your aim, and aim quickly.  That 6-point buck isn’t gonna wait all day.  Neither are the zombies.  Just saying.

3) Build On It
I started with 3 push-ups.  I did some crunches and jump roping too, but push-ups were my weakness, so that’s what I focused on.  On Day One I did three standard push-ups.  Then I collapsed on the floor for a while, and then I did a couple one-knee push-ups,  a few both-knee push-ups.
Now, Day Forty-Two, I can do 30 standard push-ups consecutively!  That means no breaks.

Add a little more each week or so, and you can reach your goal too.
A bit of advice about building up: your body doesn’t understand math.  This is pretty cool, actually.
You know those light bulbs that are 50, 100, and 150 watts?  When you go from low-level to middle, it seems like a quite perceptible difference, but when you go from middle to high, it’s like “Meh, so what?”  Ever wonder why that is? This is why:  Your body sees 50 watts.  Okay.  So far so good.  Then, you see 100 watts and that is twice as much! Then 150 watts is only half-again as much, which seems marginal.
When you up your reps (repetitions) you need to factor this in.  Going from 4 push-ups to 5 push-ups is going to seem the same, to your body, as going from 20 push-ups to 25 push-ups.  Both times you are increasing by the same percentage.  Your brain knows that 1 more push-up is much different from 5 more push-ups, but you muscles don’t!  Remember that.

Once you decide that your workout is easy enough to amp it up a little (when you start to feel bored while counting your reps) take the time to do a little math.  Pick a percentage that feels safe (like 10%) and figure out how many reps that is.  The next time you are working out, add that many. Re-do your math calculation each time you increase your reps.  That way you can trick your body into doing more for you.

Oh, and if push-ups are too boring, then stand up between each one.  This is what Uncle Sam does to train Navy Seals. It works, too.  Stand up nice and tall, then get down on the ground.  Flat on the ground.  Then get up, and stand up nice and tall.  I wanna hear your back crack.

4) Find Yourself Some Awesome Music
Because, believe me, if you listen to fun stuff when you work out, you feel happier, and less bored.  The optimum music choice is between 100 and 150 beats per minute.  “Stayin’ Alive” by the Bee Gees is 100 beats.  It is also the theme song for CPR so it should definitely be on your workout tunes list.

5) Don’t Let Go
I’ll admit it, sometimes I just don’t want to work out.  I figure, I can do 30 push-ups, so I deserve a break, right?  Wrong.  If I let myself skip a day, or two days, or maybe, you know, like, just a week… next thing you know I’ll be back down to three push-ups.  It’s tempting to slack off, but you have to be tough on yourself.  Someday this work is gonna pay off.  Trust me.

Letter Re: Upgrading Your House Window and Door Security

James,
In response to this posting, while something is better than nothing, I am not a fan of putting up anything on windows or better screws or latches for doors or a covering for windows unless it really adds to equation and the cost is reasonable for the return on expenditure.   As an example, a neighbor added a steel frame with mesh, its costs was about $6,000, it is very pretty with double sided keyed deadbolt and heavy latch/striker plate.  Their security factor went way up, sadly the burglars decided to enter from the side yard and wrapped a concrete block into a thick padded moving blanket and heaved it thru the glass sliding door.  As a matter of security the whole house has to be considered when planning and making upgrades, like the old saying “A chain is only as strong as its weakest link”.
 
I have been planning on security improvements on at least a dozen homestead that I have lived at in the last 40 plus years.  What is the best method for what I am trying to accomplish do.  Am I trying to keep people in, keep people out, trying to stop home invasion, or random burglary, or create an image of a deserted homestead, or keep from outside views lighting in the home, or who/what is in the home.  
 
I decided I wanted to have coverings for the windows/patio sliders that would stop or at least be resistant to thrown objects or easy access to the home by busting out glass, and also enough strength on doors to resist a handheld ram or sledge hammer.   One thing is to read articles, which is great for a start, but unless money is no object we have to at the end of the day use money available as the most important factor for choosing our solutions.
 
On regular entrance doors a metal security door is a start, but they can be pried open with a standard crow bar pretty fast (watch law enforcement shows to see how easy they get thru them).  My doors will have a pre cut two 5/8 or 3/4 sheets of plywood which I store in the garage, if needed I simply stand the plywood on the inside up against the existing door, they are held in place by two 4x4s which end fits into a fitted piece on the plywood 2/3 of the way up, and the other end of the 4×4 has a 4″ long 1/2 inch diameter steel rod that slips into holes in the concrete floor, thus giving you a re enforced door that is many times stronger than a latch plate located on a weak door frame or hinges that are their weak sister on the other side.  I repeated this process for the french double doors.  I also drilled in the plywood panel a hole that matches up to the peep hole in the regular door.
 
For the windows, through out the home, Please understand I have the newer type windows the upper portion of the window slide down and the upper portion slide up, so first I put both panel in the center position that gives you about a 1′ opening at the top and bottom of the window.  I cut two pieces of plywood to fit the entire opening, putting those in place and in order to hold them there I cut two 2x 4 pieces that overlap the window opening on the inside of the house by about 6″   each 2×4 has a 6″ long 1×2 ” diameter in the center of the 2×4 that allows you to screw into the double sheet of plywood.  So when installed on the window from the inside you have one 2×4 at the top (side to side) and another at the bottom, because the glass panel are open at the top and bottom.   This method allows me to put each window covering in place or remove in less than a minute.
 
Now, we still have the garage doors to deal with, these are weakest link (my estimation) my solution was you guessed it more plywood sheets cut to with about 4″ wider and taller than the door by attaching 2×4 runners to the top and sides, this is done so that the sheets of plywood will touch the frames on the panel and the 2×4 will touch the garage wall around the door.   I put the panels in place, than I have 4×6  that slip over the plywood across the bottom about 20″ off the floor and the second 4×6 about 40″ from the bottom and about halfway up.  In order to make this one solid mass, I would roll my vehicles up against the 4×6 giving the whole door a very solid feel.   You would have to measure your bumpers on the car in order to determine the heights for the 4×6 placement. 
 
Please understand I am trying to deter and delay a forced entry, you cannot not eliminate one ever, so this gives me a warning and time to respond to a potential threat.  As with all security prevention making a window bullet resistant is great in theory, but meaningless if you have a stick built homes as most of us do that is for the most part useless to stop bullets.  I have had friends tell me that they have adopted this method and that from the outside the home gives an appearance to potential threats that maybe they want to look at other pickings.   
 
I hope that this serves to help others who are needing a idea in order to provide maybe the means to give you an edge.
 
God Bless us and the U.S. – John in Arizona