Note from JWR:

A reminder that the special 33%-off “Pre-Election” sale price on the “Rawles Gets You Ready” preparedness course ends at midnight on Tuesday, November 4th. (Election Day, in the US.)

Letter Re: Finding a Like-Minded Spouse

JWR –
I have read through all of your archives, and your Finding Like-Minded People in Your Area [static page]. From a recent personal experience, I thought maybe it might help to note that the site www.FarmersOnly.com is an online dating-type site that caters to:

“Farmers, Ranchers, Ag Students and all of Agriculture
Horse, Livestock Owners and all Animal Lovers
Cowboys, Cowgirls, Rodeo Fans and Country Wannabes”

I recently signed up and, unlike the mainstream sites, they give you a three day “try it before you buy it” period. Also, unlike the mainstream sites, their membership fees are reasonable for anyone who is just casually “looking” and can’t justify sacrificing their logistics budget on a $200+ per year subscription.
The really impressive part is that by the last day of my three-day trial period I had already met four women who were really into survival and survivalesque activities. One of them even reads SurvivalBlog on a regular basis! Apparently, this is a smaller, more niche-based online dating site, and it seems as though it is mostly compatible with the single survivalist.
I’m not affiliated with the site in any way besides just recently signing-up for the free trial. I just wanted to pass that along because it seems as though it is going to work out for me, and I figure some percentage of your readership may be in the lonely predicament similar to what I was. – Josh, Ohio

Letter Re: Machining–Making the Gears that Drive Industry, Agriculture, and Transport

Greetings Jim and the SurvivalBlog Family,
First of all, prayers sent for Memsahib’s recovery and your family’s well being.

At one point in my rather varied list of jobs to fill in while unemployed I found myself employed in a family owned machine shop. I reproduced drafted copies of gear drawings and specifications from previously made orders for the guys in the shop to manufacture the gear orders. I got a real education on just how gears and similar ‘small’ parts are made and I picked up a few skills that have helped me over the years in maintaining my own firearms and tools. This shop did not have any CNC machines but could make any, and I mean any, size gear from less than an inch in diameter to twelve to twenty foot diameter gears. In fact the larger gears, such as gears for elevators of all types, was what they built their reputation on. Can anyone think of any machine that does not have gears? They are like ball bearings and things don’t run unless the gears and ball bearings are present. Without those two elements a society will find itself in a pre-Industrial Revolution setting very quickly. Naturally the ‘stock up on ball bearings’ thought comes to mind. But the material heart of their shop was the type of machinery they used to manufacture the gears and the materials for their manufacture. I found out that material for gears are as varied as you could get and some material is down right surprising. Gears are made from steel, which comes to mind at once, but other materials have properties that will extend the life of the gear or of the equipment that it is used in. Gear materials range from the obligatory stainless steel to cast iron, bronze, brass, nylon (even large nylon gears), and some high tech polymers along with high tech alloys, aircraft grade aluminum, Bakelite (you’d be amazed just how hard and durable this ‘primitive’ plastic is and Masonite and compressed textile material. Each material type has it’s place as does the type of gear and usually if a Bakelite gear is replaced with nylon or soft steel that machine that uses the gear will have it’s life span greatly diminished. The exact gear type and the material it’s made from are critical. Depending on the application of the gear there may be some ‘wiggle room’ in material selection but that is the not the usual rule.

Now to the machinery used. Their shop was founded in the 1920s or so; I just don’t remember the exact year. But what I do remember is that the gear cutting machines were brought over from the USSR not long after the revolution! This equipment was being sold as surplus out of the USSR. The engineers were brought along as part of the contract and there was an interpreter to work with the owner and his shop crew to help set up and learn how to properly operate this specialized equipment. The interpreter was also the ‘political officer’ who was there to make sure that no one decided to defect. That produced a surreal atmosphere. A lot of the cast labels, etc. on the machines were in Russian and later plates with the English translation were installed after the machinery was installed and tested. The critical gauges were in numerals, which math is an international language. The process took a month or so to bring the shop online. Most of the machines had been belt driven, not electric motor driven and the pulleys, etc. had been removed and the electric motor attached when the equipment was setup. The shop retained the pulley systems in a warehouse. The dates of the machine’s manufacture in the USSR ranged from the middle to late 1800s, and had been refitted to original specs before being sold. The gear cutting equipment had been in shop maintained since being manufactured and never, ever, stopped. Some gears had to take a couple weeks to manufacture on these machines because of the size of the gear and or the hardness of the steel the gears had to be made from.

To illustrate the durability of this 19th Century equipment, the gear machines were often set up to run 24/7 to cut the large-sized gears, which are slowly cut and often would be left cutting over weekends. The operator only had to come in to clear away the cuttings and fill the cutting fluid tanks to safe levels and make sure the cast metal didn’t have any voids in it which would compromise the integrity of the gear. Of course if a void showed, which from time to time happens, the process was stopped and a new gear blank replaced and cutting began anew. The initial construction of these gear cutters was the most amazing quality and durability I have ever seen. All the chassis, if that is the proper term, were huge castings, and then the rest was machined by even larger machinery. The cutting accuracy of the USSR-made industrial machines was only surpassed when computerized machinery became the standard. The designers and builders had a quality control that could rival any other country for the same type of equipment. To give a size comparison to the scope of the gear size this equipment could cut; the company was approached by the Department of Defense in the 1980s to manufacture the drive sprockets for the then-new M1 Abrams tank. There were only a handful of companies in the U.S. that had the capacity to be a subcontractor for the making of the drive sprockets and maintain a high level of quality control. And even though the company stood to make a lot of money, the owner declined the offer because he did not want the government to come in and tell him how things were to be done. Apparently their would have been a government bureaucrat hovering about and sticking his nose into every aspect of the operation of the company, even into areas not directly related to the drive sprocket manufacture. And since the contract would have been on a defense project the security would have been very restrictive on the movements of the employees. I thought it would have been a real irony to have the US main battle tank components manufactured not only on machinery from the late 19th Century but also from the Soviet Union!

Briefly about the talent that was in the shop, which is a critical component to the small machine shop. The owner and his sons were second and third generation owner/operators of the shop. The owner’s father built it up from nothing, and hand selected all the equipment. He had selected the Russian equipment because he had seen it in operation and knew the quality. I saw the owner and his sons take and look at the gear to be made and immediately know not only the type but also the thread pitch, among all the other particulars to what to make it from and how long it would take to make it. This skill can not be learned in a book or in a classroom. It takes years to master this type of trade. Some of the guys in the shop were nothing less and geniuses when it came to turning a gear blank into a perfect gear. Even the owner would double-check the specifications of the gear sample he examined, as well as the shop foreman and the craftsman who would run the particular machine that made the gear. On more than one occasion they would spot flaws in a gear from the customer whereby the customer thought they were correct on the specifications but in fact they were in error. They had purchased a gear from another company who said they made it according to the given specifications. But in fact it had been poorly manufactured and was out of specification and as a result the equipment it was installed on wore it out or broke the gear (along with others that meshed with it). The gears they got from the shop I worked at were flawless and the client got properly drafted drawings and specifications from our shop for their future reference. We got a lot of repeat orders. Computers can do some outstanding things, but in the situation that this blog addresses that kind of equipment may not be the better choice in the long run. The ‘old’ manual machinery can in the life span of a company or even a nation can have the greater value over ‘new’ computerized equipment in adverse circumstances.

I asked the owner why he and the company’s founder kept the belt drive systems of the equipment they got from the USSR. He said that his Dad fully expected that at some point after WWII we could face an armed conflict with Russia during the days of the Cold War and he kept it so that the equipment could be retrofitted and alternate power could keep most of the shop running. The generations that grew up during the Great Depression and the rationing of WWII had a totally different mindset than today’s generation. The Russians have traditionally followed a use and reuse policy. They mothballed earlier versions of equipment as new equipment replaced the old. Firearms collectors know of the thousands of capture German weapons were sent to arsenals for rework and along with Russia’s own weapons were stored for future use in case of armed conflict with NATO forces. And when that armed conflict did not happen, yet anyway, they took their ‘obsolete’ stockpile of small arms and sold it to generate funds when the USSR ‘collapsed’. It would serve us well to examine our current philosophy on use and ‘making do’ and modify it accordingly before we are slapped by forces beyond our control. The U.S. has lost so much of our heavy industry through waste and political correctness and political stupidity we can no longer cast the hulls of the Abrams tank. When the last one rolled off the assembly line the molds and other specialized equipment was scrapped. At the Patton Museum there is a tank the U.S. manufactured in the late 1940s that incorporates a solid cast turret and the tank was designed to go head to head against Russia’s heaviest main battle tank should a conflict with them break out in Europe. Today we can’t even manufacture that cast turret from a late 1940s tank.

Even though I have digital calipers, I have never discarded my manual dial calipers; and never will. Old does not necessarily mean obsolete. – The Rabid One

Odds ‘n Sods:

David V. sent us the link to some commentary by Bob Chapman on the derivatives threat: The Quadrillion Dollar Powder Keg Waiting To Blow. David also sent us the link to this piece by Porter Stansberry: How AIG’s Collapse Began a Global Run on the Banks

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Several folks sent us this “must read” piece by Bill Bonner: The Next Crisis Will Be Over Food. It begins: “The United States is now a net importer of food, we read recently. If we understand that correctly, there is no longer enough food Made in the USA to feed Americans’ appetites”

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More Friday Evening Follies: Meridian Bank and Main Street Bank both bite the dust. (The FDIC makes a habit of announcing bank failures on Fridays, just after business hours.)

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There are just two days left in Safecastle’s 25%-off Mountain House sale. This sale price probably won’t be repeated for a year, so get your order in soon!

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Some news from England, courtesy of Jack B.: Credit crunch-hit Brits turn to bartering. Also, this grim news: Bodies of the dead not being buried in echo of Winter of Discontent as effects of credit crunch spread across Britain

Jim’s Quote of the Day:

“In one sense, what is happening is not the bankruptcy of America but the transfer of assets from the spendthrift imprudent to the frugal prudent. Is this a bad thing? I don’t think a “good/bad” statement has any meaning here; it is simply a market economy at work. Excesses get unwound, cash is always king, prudent investors tend to be rewarded and gamblers tend to lose all their money.” – Charles Hugh Smith

Letter Re: Getting Adult Family Members Home in Times of Crisis

Greetings, Mr. Rawles,

I need advice and I trust you implicitly in survival matters. Here’s my issue:

I live in the country north of Tampa, Florida. Good dirt, well water (and well bucket), dogs, garden, silver coins stashed away. We are ready for whatever happens.

My 27 year old daughter lives in Austin, Texas. We have discussed her bugging out to come home, or to her grandmother’s home in Southwestern Alabama. She is preparing her bugout pack today, and waiting to hear from me to tell her to come home.

My question is this: At what point do I tell her to head home? What will I see or read that will make me pull the trigger to put this girl on the road? How will I know when it’s time, and allow enough time for her to get as far as possible in her car?

I would really rather have her in Florida with me, but her grandmother is much closer, and also in the country. If I want my daughter here, with me, how much time….

I guess that’s my question – how much time do you think we have, it’s now Friday at 2:30, and the market is about to drop below 8,000. How much time before the meltdown? At what state of preparedness should I have my kid??

Please help. Thank you for your fabulous work. – Terri L.

 

JWR Replies: First let me say I expect this to be a slow slide. But also let me say that I am not a prophet. I am all too human. For example, like a lot of people I got a lot more motivated by Y2K than the situation warranted.

It is probably not yet the time to call your daughter home–not unless she would like to move back to Florida, anyway.You might want to discuss this with her at length. A lot of it might revolve around her work situation: Can she take a leave of absence from her work, and then return to Texas if things “blow over”? Does she have vacation on the books that she can “burn”?

Regardless, advise her to henceforth always keep her car’s tank at least 3/4 full whenever returning to her home at the end of the day.
She should probably now store some full five gallon gas cans, since the trip will require a couple of re-fills. Does she have a trailer for her vehicle? Perhaps she can store some gas with your relatives in Alabama, as a halfway re-fill point.

For now, just monitor the news closely. See: Mark 13:32, KJV. Pray fervently. Our nation needs it.

Note from JWR:

It will be interesting to see exactly what emerges from the G-20 meeting this weekend. At first blush, their “five point rescue plan” looks like: “Throw money at the problem, throw more money at the problem, repeat, repeat, fire for effect.” The Mother of All Bailouts (MOAB) has grown to multinational and unconstrained proportions. The MOAB will be so gargantuan that it will destroy the US dollar as a currency unit. Get ready for mass inflation–at least here in the States, and possibly across the Atlantic, as well.

Letter Re: Selecting and Storing Bargain Barter Items

As Mr. Haney (Pat Buttram) from the television show Green Acres would say, “Have I got a deal for you!” In the spirit of Mr. Haney, I’ve come up with some good barter items. To make the list, the items have to be fairly light, extremely useful, practical, and cheap to buy, now! The items have to fit, and be able to be stored in six gallon plastic pails with a water proof seal. The items also must be available in large quantities now, to get the most for my money and be easily accessible now, at a low cost – yet become very valuable when the Schumer hits the fan. Few barter items can fit Mr. Haney’s criteria, but some items will pass the test.

#1 Matches. Most boxes [of paper matches] contain 50 books with 20 matches per booklet, at about 200 per box. That’s 1,000 lights, right? Wrong! It’s actually double that at 2,000 because with a little care, each match can be split in two. It takes about 4-5 seconds to split a paper match, and I haven’t ruined any in my scores of attempts. During the war in Bosnia, matches were on the list of things that disappeared first. One six gallon pail holds 24 boxes, if left in packages. That’s 48,000 lights!

#2 Seeds. I would fill the second pail with seeds. The type of seeds is a personal preference, but heirlooms seeds are preferred, though more costly. You can give your customer 2 choices: some seeds in packets that are heirloom seeds, and some that are from any store. Over a million seeds can fit in a six gallon pail, and seeds may very well become just as valuable as ammo, but are a lot lighter with a higher quantity able to fit in the same size pail.

#3 Sugar. For your own stock, just pour 25 pound bags into six gallon buckets. For [incremental] barter though, large wholesale food stores like COSTCO have sugar packets with a quantity of 2,000 per box. A six gallon pail holds more than two boxes; and sugar keeps a long, long time. That’s approximately 5,000 individual servings that are pre-packaged, and will last a very long time.

#4 Magnifying glasses. Magnifying glasses are very cheap if you shop around. They are easy to store and are a great reading tool for fine print or serial numbers, can be used as a fire starter and can be used for medical purposes and close examination such as, to aid in splinter removal or to see a mote in someone’s eye. When buying in quantity, you should pay between $1 and $1.50 per pair. This barter item will be excellent in the worse case scenario.

$5 Can Openers. A can-opener will come in very handy for those who can no longer use their electricity. Using a knife as a substitute is not worth the risk of injury to group members which can create another problem (stitches, infections, etc.). Can openers are cheap and can be purchased for as low as .39 cents for a military P-38 style, or $1.99 for a more elaborate one.
There are many other items one could focus on to establish the beginning of your trading post. But Mr. Haney’s five items listed above will wind up being the most popular and meeting some very important needs for his friends and community. The items I’ve listed are light, cheap, easy to store, easily obtainable now in large quantities and will be in high demand later. I’ve left out ammo on purpose because it is more expensive and heavier, and most likely (hopefully) you should already have ammo as a priority.

Letter Re: Pre-Paying Utility Companies in Anticipation of Worsening Banking Disruptions?

Dear Mr. and Mrs. Rawles,
Thank you for your excellent blog. My husband and I are benefiting tremendously from the hard work you have put in to this valuable resource.

My question: With banking integrity a growing uncertainty, would it be prudent to devote our rather limited capital to build up a credit balance with our utility providers (water, electric and natural gas) in anticipation of possible interruptions in bank transactions? We do have modest contingency back-up systems for all three supplies but as long as the grid holds up we will use the utilities.
Sincerely, – Mrs. T. from Idaho

JWR Replies: I do not recommend pre-paying utilities, at least not under the current circumstances. By pre-paying the utilities, you are effectively giving them an interest-free loan. For the sake of flexibility, you are far better off setting aside an equivalent amount in greenback cash. This is what is commonly called “mattress money”. (But you’ll need a much safer place for it. (See my “Through the Looking Glass” wall cache post from August, 2007 for detailed recommendations on constructing hidden caches in your home.)

With greenback cash on hand, you will still be able to make payments directly at the utility offices, or of course simply mail them money orders. Even in the event of a major banking crisis (complete with bank closures or perhaps even a national “banking holiday”), money orders will likely still be available from the US Postal Service and from drugs stores or convenience stores, and will still be accepted in payment.

If the economic situation deteriorates–for example if inflation jumps to double digits (or more), and the postal service becomes unreliable, then that is the time to consider pre-paying your utility bills and perhaps even pre-paying your property taxes.

Letter Re: Life Imitates Art–Moscow, Idaho Style

Dear Mr. Rawles,
When the President announced the first $700 Billion bailout I had the pleasure of being in Chicago at a business conference. The next day I flew home into Moscow/Pullman regional airport and couldn’t help but think about the first chapter of “Patriots: Surviving the Coming Collapse”. The timing was a little ironic.

Thank you for all the work you do. Regards, – The Hellion of Troy

Odds ‘n Sods:

KAF sent us this: World’s First Nuclear Bunker Turned Zero-Star Hotel Opens in Switzerland

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In a recent e-mail, SF in Hawaii mentioned: “I do not think that the bank rating agencies will adjust their ratings fast enough to tell when you should get your money out of a bank. Instead, watch the bank’s stock price.” That is good advice.

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Whenever someone wants to advertise a book on SurvivalBlog, I insist on reading it before I accept the ad. Most recently, this gave me the opportunity to read Jerry Robinson’s new book “Surviving Financial Chaos“. It as excellent. I think that this is the ideal book to put in the hands of your friends, neighbors and relatives that are not convinced that they need to prepare. Robinson’s book does a great job of both explaining te background of our nations economic predicament and describing what families need to do, to prepare.

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Jean sent us this Daily Mail headline:: ‘We must stand together’: Bush warns countries not to turn against each other as they battle to ease the financial crisis

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Here is the latest economic gloomage from Cheryl: IMF Warns Of Global Financial Meltdown — Panic Selling Wipes $5 Trillion Off World Shares — Morgan Stanley and Goldman Dive On Downgrade Fear — Morgan Stanley Loses Another $20 Billion — Fannie/Freddie To Buy $40 Billion A Month Of Troubled Assets —White House Says Markets Will Not Be Shut Down — GM/Chrysler In Merger Talks — What The Financial Crisis Means For You

Jim’s Quote of the Day:

“O eternal and everlasting God, I presume to present myself this morning before thy Divine majesty, beseeching thee to accept of my humble and hearty thanks, that it hath pleased thy great goodness to keep and preserve me the night past from all the dangers poor mortals are subject to, and has given me sweet and pleasant sleep, whereby I find my body refreshed and comforted for performing the duties of this day, in which I beseech thee to defend me from all perils of body and soul….
Increase my faith in the sweet promises of the gospel; give me repentance from dead works; pardon my wanderings, and direct my thoughts unto thyself, the God of my salvation; teach me how to live in thy fear, labor in thy service, and ever to run in the ways of thy commandments; make me always watchful over my heart, that neither the terrors of conscience, the loathing of holy duties, the love of sin, nor an unwillingness to depart this life, may cast me into a spiritual slumber, but daily frame me more and more into the likeness of thy son Jesus Christ, that living in thy fear, and dying in thy favor, I may in thy appointed time attain the resurrection of the just unto eternal life bless my family, friends, and kindred.” – George Washington (Undated prayer from Washington’s prayer journal, Mount Vernon)

Notes from JWR:

The high bid in the SurvivalBlog Benefit Auction is now at $770. The auction for a large mixed lot that includes: A Special Mixed Vegetable Case-Six #10 Dehydrated Food Cans (Retail Price $105.95) This special Mixed Vegetable Case contains six #10 (96-ounce) cans–one can of each of the following: Mixed Vegetable Blend, Green Beans, Sweet Garden Peas, Mixed Peppers, Potato Dices, and Sweet Potatoes and a EZ-Towels 10 Pack Combo (10 bags of 50 towels. Retail value: $99.95). These items were donated by Jan at Healthy Harvest Foods. An assortment of world class loose leaf teas, and a box of Bellagio hot chocolate (25 individual packs), with a combined value of approximately $100. These items were courtesy of Charlie at CMEBrew.com. A NukAlert radiation detector (a $160 value), donated by at KI4U.com. And, a Katadyn VARIO water filter, donated by Ready Made Resources. (An $89 retail value.) The auction ends on Monday October 15, 2008. Please e-mail us your bid.

Today we present another entry for Round 19 of the SurvivalBlog non-fiction writing contest. The contest prizes include:

First Prize: The writer of the best contributed article in the next 60 days will be awarded two transferable Front Sight  “Gray” Four Day Training Course Certificates. This is an up to $4,000 value!
Second Prize: A three day course certificate from OnPoint Tactical. This certificate will be for the prize winner’s choice of three-day civilian courses.
Third Prize: A copy of my “Rawles Gets You Ready” preparedness course, from Arbogast Publishing

Round 19 ends on November 30th, so get busy writing and e-mail us your entries. Remember that articles that relate practical “how to” skills for survival will have an advantage in the judging.

Prepping: A Labor of Love, by Sparky

My preparedness journey began when my mother in law was dying, and we had to get out of the house for a while. At a flea market, on the bottom shelf, was a book titled “Making the Best of Basics”. The cover caught my attention, and before we went home that night, I had read and re-read the book. I am a union electrician, subject to layoffs, and my husband is a self-employed painter. The idea that I needed to prepare came easy for me. I thought I had done well, always buying extra for the pantry. But water? Oops. I hadn’t thought about that one. So, I started doing the things in the book, and my mind was always going, and the lists got longer.

When I started to realize that I had a lot to do, I shared my thoughts with my best friend. Instead of laughing, she got on board. We discussed my home as the retreat. Although it doesn’t fit every need, it has a lot to offer. We are on a gravel, lightly populated road, about 20 minutes from a medium city. We have a well, and two acres. Our home has a basement, where we are working to get things organized. We know most of our neighbors, and have a community here. One neighbor plows our drive when it snows, and has for two years now. We treat him to his favorite brew on occasion to thank him, and I have even taken him a bowl of hot soup when he arrives.

Worst case scenario, we could have as many as 30 family members here, with varied skills, but it is a momentous task to try to prepare for that many people.
Last spring, my friend and I built raised garden beds that are still producing. We used recycled bleachers for the boxes, old shelving and other “trash” for the trellises. An old hog waterer with the waterer cut out, set in the ground at the proper angle, with a double pane window on it, became a cold frame. We also have the supplies to expand the garden next year. It is actually a very pretty garden!
I have dried tomatoes, onions, cabbage, apples, mushrooms, eggs, plums; canned anything that I had time to, and jellied, with new recipes for dandelion jelly, zucchini jam, and cantaloupe jam. My three garage sale dehydrators run most of the time. I have studied new and old methods of drying. I keep sodium metabisulfite, but also use the older method of using salt and vinegar rinses to preserve color. I have learned a lot, and my family is scrounging for jars for me. The supply is dried up here, mostly due to the awakening of some of the sheeple.

After consideration of a generator, it was decided that the best route for us was to just ready ourselves to be off grid. Second-hand shops have provided hank crank blenders, food processors, meat grinders, and other kitchen helpers. A friend helped build an Amish [summer canning] kitchen from some table legs, wood, and a Freecycled propane cooktop. One plus to this that we didn’t consider—the stove is lower in height, which is helpful when working with canners. One thing that we did consider—a hundred gallons of propane will work this stove, or the propane stove in the kitchen, for a year and a half. A couple of extra tanks are on the list to obtain! By putting the cooktop outside, we don’t heat the house up, which now helps the air conditioning bill, and will definitely help later, when it is just hot, and there is no air conditioning. We can also use it in the barn or basement if the weather necessitates. We also have propane heaters, and for emergencies, canned heat. (The latter is a 1-quart steel paint can, with a roll of toilet paper with cardboard liner removed, 16 ounces of alcohol. Directions for making these can be found on the LDS preparedness sites [such as www.ProvidentLiving.org.].)

We have been learning to save our own seeds, and I have been studying some animal husbandry, expecting to get some small livestock. We also have laid in a supply of sprouting seeds, and use them.
I now store water, and using the PACE system means that we have several means of getting more. For now the well is primary, the hand pump is alternate, the stored water is contingent, and the rain water, pond water, etc. would be the emergency. However, we also have our eyes on a pump that would be inline, and pressurize the tank. This will happen soon if things hold out a while! Although I store drinking water, I also started saving detergent bottles for non-potable water. I don’t even rinse them. When we are without water, and have dishes or laundry to do, those bottles will work perfectly, even offering up the remnants of the soaps in them.

Solar and human generated power are ideas that I am investigating, and if time permits, we should have minimal power, with minimal outlay. I hope that my electrical abilities will help here! Several years ago I installed some solar powered flood lights on my parents’ home, and now plan to put some both on and in my home. I do understand that during the probable turmoil, their use would be limited to avoid the target on our backs. However, eventually things will settle, and they would be of great use. By eliminating the motion sensor and photo-eye, and direct-wiring a switch, these lights could work in the house as well, and would need only a path for the solar cell wire, i.e. through a window. This would be fine as a temporary fix until more permanent work could be done.
I was able to find a supplier locally for wheat, where I am the only customer. Not only do I grind flour, making our own breads when time permits, but we sprout it for both us and our dogs. Incidentally, our older dog was having some health issues, and I started adding sprouts to the dog food. Within a couple of weeks, he was acting like a puppy, and his chronic halitosis had vanished.
I also found a neighbor who grows corn, who took my order for about 10 bushel, when the moisture content is down and we can store it. Guess some cornbread with all those beans would be a welcome thought.

I found an article for a vacuum pump, which is worth sharing. I had seen build-it-yourself pumps, but with all the preps, building one was not in the time allotment. However, you can go to your local auto store, and get a brake bleeder, with a gauge and several attachments, very reasonably. I obtained the mason jar sealers, and now seal all my dehydrated foods with vacuum on them. Just put the conical end on the bleeder, press it into the jar attachment, and pump away. When you remove the pump, the jar seals. A mason jar will hold 20 inches (Hg) of vacuum, which, by the way, will collapse a five gallon bucket. Don’t ask me how I know. Seal your buckets with a little less vacuum!

My friend and her mom got on board early, and are both also prepping. We are in the process of getting a community inventory, so we know what we all need to work on. My mother was supportive, but not overly helpful until this month. Along with jars, tins, and the usual things on my list from garage sales, she has started getting winter clothes, socks, etc. She also gave me a nice check to help with whatever we need, and pledged to give more. My husband has become more supportive as the economy teeters, and is also now actively engaged in the OPSEC end of our needs.

Our children are like most kids, struggling to survive. However, they also pick up an extra bag of rice or can of beans when they can, and send it. I have given them ideas on putting things away when you can barely afford to eat. Every week, get at least one item. Even on a bad week, you can afford a box of salt, rice, beans, pudding, or a can of milk. They also know (thanks to SurvivalBlog) what they need to look for, and when to get headed home.

If you had told me 10 months ago how very many hours I could find in a day, week, or month, to do all these things, I would have laughed. Now I look at the garden, and see not only hours spent with my best friend, laughing as she learned to use a drill, but the many meals we ate, and will still eat, from our bleacher boxes. I walk to the basement, and see the supplies there. I see the full jars of home processed foods, and enjoy just looking at the fruits of my labor. I see the first aid box, and the many other medical supplies, and feel some peace. I look in the closet in my office, and find sleeping bags, blankets, and other items to help out family when they are forced here.

I don’t throw anything out any more, without asking myself if it has another purpose. My family has lists of things that they are to watch for, and I often come home from visits with the car full of goodies.
Remember, having all your supplies means nothing if you don’t know how to use them. Eat wheat, sprout seeds, grow a garden, learn to use the canners, and lay in a supply of jars and lids. Learn to cook with your essentials, stay warm with less heat, and amuse yourself without television.

Are we ready? Not by a long shot! The more I know, the more I know that I don’t know! But knowledge is power, and I do know that when things happen, I am much more prepared that most, and we have a plan. Your blog site has been invaluable, and as times become more unpredictable, you are the first thing I check when I log on. Although I struggle with the fears of not having enough done, I know that we will not panic. What we have begun is a new way of life that takes what we have today, and builds on it for tomorrow. Lists will be filled, and peace grows. God is good, and gives us much. It is our responsibility to use it wisely. He can only guide our steps if we start walking. Then we have to count on Him to take care of the things we can’t. Thanks again for what you do! Sparky