The Jericho Television Series Returns With New Episodes

Airing of new episodes of the television series Jericho will resume on February 21st here in the States. (After some sort of “split season” break.) I’ve watched most of the episodes via the Internet, since we don’t own a television here at the Rawles Ranch. Here is my “$.02 worth” evaluation of the show, based on my own viewing and from comments that I’ve distilled from Internet discussion boards: Jericho severely stretches credulity for accurate portrayal of a post-nuclear America. Apparently all of the female characters must have been secret adherents of the Maybelline School of Survivalism and hence stocked up heavily on cosmetics in anticipation of WWIII. Viewers deduced this because none of the female characters show any signs of running out of lipstick or mascara, or for that matter the requisite time to apply them. And as for the men folk? Well, apparently hardly anyone in the town of Jericho owned a decent .308 semi-auto battle rifle, or if they did then they must be hiding them. Now that the proverbial Schumer has hit the oscillator and flown around copiously, nobody in Jericho feels the need to go about their daily business armed. That seems odd, since in a recent episode the town of Jericho was attacked by a large groups of rogue Blackwater-ish looking mercenaries bent on “requisitioning”” food and fuel. If the show were less politically correct and a bit more pragmatically honest, then they would portray the majority of the adult citizenry–both male and female–armed at all times when they are outside of their homes. It only stands to reason that they would do so, both for their individual and collective defense. My other problem with the show is that it trivializes the need for basic necessities like food and water. For example, there they are on dead-level Kansas terrain, yet they seem to have no problem obtaining drinking water, without benefit of grid power. Perhaps the script writers don’t want to bore the audience with mundane things like the struggle to obtain the bare necessities of life, or the fragility of our technological infrastructure. I realize that the producers are trying to appeal to a broad demographic, but the characters seem to spend an inordinate amount of time discussing relationships. Come on! America has just been nuked back to 19th Century technology and population levels, yet they seem oh-so concerned with who is dating who. Lastly, for a town that has had no 18-wheelers arriving with milk, Nutter Butter cookies, and Pop-Tarts for several weeks, the citizenry seems remarkably well-fed and law abiding. Given the fact that the average American home has less than a week’s supply of groceries on hand, I am dubious that Mr. Joe Sixpack would just quietly starve at home. In actuality, there would be a lot of burglary and siphoning going on. Lots of it. Oh well, perhaps I’m too critical and cynical. It may not be very realistic, but at least Jericho beats watching re-runs of situation comedies or the umpteen different geographical flavors of CSI forensics shows.

OBTW, I should mention that airing of the new Jericho episodes should reinvigorate the Jericho Discussion Group, which is moderated by Rourke. (Who you’ll probably recognize as a frequent SurvivalBlog content contributor.)

Letter Re Converting A Gasoline Engine Generator Set to Propane

Hi Jim,
A friend just sent this note to me and I thought I should pass it on to the SurvivalBlog readers:

I finished the generator conversion this weekend. I converted my generator from gasoline to propane. I had to order the big regulator (Garretson) from an online supplier.
These are a ‘demand’ [feed] regulator and will only deliver propane if something is pulling on it. Once the engine is shut off, it quits delivering gas. I started by removing the gas tank and fittings, then
stripped the carb down, removing everything that had anything to do with fuel delivery. I left the throttle and choke in place.
Using RTV/Silicone by Permatex, I plugged every hole and orifice in the carb except the main fuel delivery tube. Ace Hardware provided most of the brass fittings. The really tough fitting was the elbow that goes into the bottom of the carb. I managed to find an elbow with a heavy wall barb and just threaded the barb to match the threads in the carb. Everything else was ‘plug and play’.
Skagit Farm Supply was the source the tank regulator, 12 foot hose, and fittings to adapt the hose to the Garretson regulator. I elected to go with a tank regulator having about four times the flow capacity
of a barbeque grill regulator. I salvaged the propane tank fitting from an old barbecue grill and modified it by drilling out the passages and knocking out the check ball. This modification was done to assure
adequate gas flow in cold weather. I also took the needle valve apart and cleaned it, then applied a liberal dose of Crystolube 111 lubricant to the threads and “O” ring. Crystolube is an oxygen-safe
lubricant and is not affected by any petroleum product. I tightened the gland nut down to the point that the needle valve has enough drag/resistance so that it won’t move from vibration when the genset
is running.
The 1/4 inch fuel line (regulator to carb) was sourced from a Shuck’s Auto Supply store and the fuel line clamps were salvaged from the original gas tank. This really isn’t critical, as there is no positive pressure in this line.
I made the regulator bracket from a piece of 1/8″ x 3/4″ mild steel strap and installed it with fasteners I salvaged from the gas tank mounting.
Total cost of the conversion parts was in the neighborhood of $110 (perhaps a little less.)

So, how does it run? Perfectly. I should have removed the choke and will the next time I have the carb off. The choke is unnecessary, as the Garretson regulator has a ‘prime’ button it to give the carb a
shot of propane. The engine starts on the first pull and the mixture was very easy to adjust.

[My generator set is a] 4000/4400 Watt genset with Subaru Robin 9 h.p. engine. It should run about 12 hours on a ‘grill size’ tank of propane. I will eventually be plumbing this into the house propane system so I don’t have to mess with the little tanks.

I am impressed with the little Subaru Robin engine. It is an overhead cam / overhead valve engine and is beautifully made. It also runs at less than half the noise level of the last genset I had. I would say
this engine is equal to or better than a same-sized Honda engine, and having heard a Honda genset run, the Subaru is quieter. I would not hesitate to do this again.

Hope this can be beneficial to you and your readers. God Bless! – Steve, Still in Seattle

Odds ‘n Sods:

A scary video on binary explosives. I can now see why US and UK transportation officials recently got so anxious about allowing any cigarette lighters and any liquids aboard commercial airline flights.

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For those of you considering a “blue water” or “brown water” bug out, Bob at Ready Made Resources mentioned that he has in stock just one high capacity PUR-Katadyn Model 35 MROD-type desalinator that has been freshly factory reconditioned. It produces 1.5 gallons of fresh water per hour. These are normally around $1,500 each. Ready Made Resources is selling this one for the bargain price of just $895 and it comes with four bottles of biocide, which are otherwise $35 each.

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James K. tells us: “This video [titled “Old Friends'”] over at YouTube.com has been making the rounds, and I thought it would be of interest to your readers. It depicts a semi-prepared family trying to hunker down, and survive a pandemic of bird flu. Sadly, the video shows that half-way measures only get half-way results. [JWR Adds: Warning. Graphic violence!]

Jim’s Quote of the Day:

"There are only two things we should fight for. One is the defense of our homes, and the other is the Bill of Rights." – Major General Smedley Butler, US Marine Corps 1930

Notes from JWR:

Today is the last day in the big “Container load sale” at Survival Enterprises. Many of the storage food items have sold out. This is your last chance to stock up at these prices. (Their prices are less than half of retail!)

Today is also the last day of bidding in the SurvivalBlog benefit auction for a pair of MURS band handheld transceivers, with extended range flex antennas. The high bid is still at $175. These radios were kindly donated by Rob at $49 MURS Radios.

And today we present another article submitted for Round 9 of the SurvivalBlog non-fiction writing contest. The writer of the best non-fiction article will win a valuable four day “gray” transferable Front Sight course certificate. (Worth up to $1,600.) Second prize is a copy of my “Rawles Gets You Ready” preparedness course, generously donated by Jake Stafford of Arbogast Publishing. I will again be sending out a few complimentary copies of my novel “Patriots” as “honorable mention” awards. If you want a chance to win the contest, start writing and e-mail us your article. Round 9 will end on March 31st. Remember that the articles that relate practical “how to” skills for survival will have an advantage in the judging.

Active Preparedness Planning: Identifying and Mitigating Threats, by Paul C.

Here is my approach to actively preparing for disasters:
1. Identify potential threats.
2. Gather quantitative and qualitative information on impact.
3. Identify which threats are the most likely.
4. Identify critical needs for survival.
5. Estimate outage time that can be tolerated.
6. Compile resource requirements.
7. Identify alternatives.

1. Identify potential threats.
Threats will come from two main areas: man-made or natural. Man-made threats include labor strikes, riots, fires, chemical spills, terrorism, and vandals. A labor strike might mean that garbage collection or that public transportation stops. Urban riots have hit cities like Los Angeles, Seattle, Miami, and Cleveland in recent years. Wildfires are the number one disaster threat in much of the south. Industrial areas have large amounts of chemicals hauled in and out by the trainload, these tracks run the length and width of the nation. Terrorism might have a direct or in-direct impact upon you. Finally vandals might come upon your second home and destroy it and its contents.
Natural threats are things like tornados, snow storm/blizzards, hurricanes, floods, and earthquakes. These tend to be even more destructive than man-made threats. Much of the center of the nation is covered in tornado alley. Tornados do massive amounts of damage where they strike and little can resist their forces. Snow storms and blizzards affect the northern states and can stop all but the most determined from traveling. Hurricanes are no stranger to those states on the Gulf of Mexico and along the southern Atlantic coast. These huge storms are able to do massive damage to wide areas and will often hit the public rescue and support infrastructure just as hard as the public. Flooding can happen nearly anywhere within the United States where homes are built within flood zones. California is famous for earthquakes but the central Mississippi valley is also a large earthquake zone. Earthquakes are like hurricanes in that their damage is widespread and can prevent public services from reaching the needy.

2. Gather quantitative and qualitative information on impact.
Quantitative information are those things that one can put a number on. For each identified threat what is the likelihood of that threat occurring and just how bad that the affect likely be. How often does that threat occur over time? Looking back over the history of your location can help as well as looking at other areas similar to yours. Aircraft crash all around the United States each year but if you live under the take-off path of a busy airport in an area prone to bad flying conditions that risk is greater than if you didn’t live there. An area might be prone to flooding and you can normally pull the 100-year flood plan to see if the particular plot of land that you’re living on falls within that flood plain.

3. Identify which threats are the most likely.
Using your quantitative and qualitative assessment rank which threats are most likely and which are least likely to occur in your area. Raw numbers can not always provide the answer. Sometimes there is a gut feeling or rough judgment that has to be made.
If you remember the Star Trek television program from the 1960s Kirk and Spock went about solving the monster attack of the week differently. Spock would use the facts, figures, and history available to him to make a quantitative judgment … “Captain, there’s an 87% chance that if I adjust the ships’ phasers …” where on the other hand Kirk would make judgment calls … “Spock just do it this way because it feels right”. Both characters work their way toward the answer from different sides of the logic/gut feeling equation.
Two people living side-by-side might be given the same data and come up with different solutions to the same threats. They both ought to have that threat on their list but their solutions aren’t right or wrong because they don’t match. This is Captain Kirk’s judgment call based on what feels right. Spock can’t analyze everything to come to a 100% logical conclusion so some rough judgment needs to be made if something is ever to get done toward a solution.

4. Identify critical needs for survival.
Again this seems simple enough but what is needed by some families might not be needed by another. We all can agree on the basics like food, water, shelter, and a method of defense but a family with an infant that is bottle feeding is going to have different requirements than one with adults, as an example. Look at you and your family and identify what is needed for their survival. Special requirements like medicines have to be kept in supply. Water might be available in your area but a massive chemical spill might render it contaminated, do you have the ability to purify it with a filter? Winter storms can be a killer in Minnesota and North Dakota or a nuisance in Phoenix or San Antonio. Your requirements are going to differ both based on the make up your family and your location.

5. Estimate outage time that can be tolerated.
For each of your critical needs how long can you do without them? Some might call electrical power a critical need. If that electrical power is required for a medical device that loss could be tolerated a whole lot less than one who requires that same power for communication purposes. Living without heat in Miami is easy as is without an air conditioner in Duluth. If you have a clean running source of water close-by the loss of city water utility service will be easier. What is the likelihood of an outage of a given length of time occurring based on past experience and history? The likelihood of electrical power going out during a hurricane is high but based on experience does the power remain out for a day, a few days, a week, or several weeks? [JWR Adds: For those of you that live in a “four season climate”, the acceptable length of outages will also vary greatly, depending on the season–e.g.: you’ll probably have a lower tolerance for a power failure in mid-winter.]

6. Compile resource requirements.
Now based on your focused threat assessment and your now identified needs across the estimated outage time, make a list of items. Make sure that you look for interdependencies. If grandpa needs his medicine for a three week service outage you might need to refrigerate it meaning you’re going to need a power source like solar power or a backup generator. If you have a generator you’re going to need fuel, a fuel storage area, fuel conditioner, a maintenance plan for the generator and possibly more. Having a bunch of firearms without the ammo, skills, and training in tactics to use than is a half baked plan. Communications equipment requires power, training in operation, and often a license. Start to gather your items over time until you’ve completed your list. No one expects to run out one weekend and run their credit up to the limit prepping. A sustained effort over time will make better sense. Keep an eye out for alternatives to paying full price like finding an item at a yard sale, buying one used at an on-line auction, or pick one up during an off season sale.
Gathering your supplies together for rapid use or deployment (see alternatives below) helps keep things organized and accounted for. Location depending you may need to store things inside and out for best life span of the materials.
Once you’ve completed your list do a second analysis to see if you want to lay in some more of one item or another possibly even for barter or to help a needy neighbor. Often the material in your supplies will have an expiration life span so keep a list of expiration dates for future purchases. Routinely do a visual inspection of your gear and supplies to ensure that things are rusting away quietly or that rodents haven’t found your emergency food supplies.

7. Identify alternatives.
Sometimes staying put through a disaster doesn’t make sense or is impossible. You can’t hold back the flood waters and it makes sense to move to higher ground. Always have a plan “B” and I would recommend that plan “C” be not too far off either. There are people who don’t have the good sense to leave when it’s time to leave. These people are held in place by emotion. A plan “B” would give them an out and likely they’d come out better than doggedly sticking with plan “A” as it fails.
Leaving the home is never easy. Hopefully you make the decision to leave in time to save yourself but also before everyone else in the area does too or else you’ll find yourself stuck in traffic. Depending on your location and the distance to safety from the disaster area you may need anything from a good pair of boots and a backpack, to a well supplied 4×4 SUV, to a boat. Often you lessen the severity of a disaster with each step you take from it. You might not make it to complete safety but you can make it to survival. Bugging out to a work location or a public area might work where bugging out of state might not. Good enough sometimes works.
Having a plan “B” means that from time-to-time you’re going to need to practice it. In the military that’s called a training exercise and can involve anything from a sit down around a table and looking over plan “B” to a full-scale run through.[JWR Adds: One crucial thing to test is your loading plan. You won’t know what will fit in your vehicle(s) until you actually try it. I predict that most of you will find that you grossly overestimated the available cargo volume versus the volume of your “to go” pile. Based on this “test load”, you can much better evaluate the list of items that you need to pre-position at your intended retreat.]
Conclusion
It’s been said that if you don’t focus on the target you’ll miss it every time. This brief primer isn’t meant to cover all aspects of disaster survival but it is meant to get you to start thinking in a focused manner on your plans. Over time things change and both the primary and secondary plans to be reviewed to ensure that they are current. A key point becomes when to actually activate the plans and it’s often better to error your judgment to the safety side rather than the less safe side of a non-qualitative judgment. You can analyze yourself into danger and sometimes the gut feeling is the one that you have to listen to.- Paul C. in Southern California

Jim’s Quote of the Day:

"Liberty is lost through complacency and a subservient mindset. When we accept or even welcome automobile checkpoints, random searches, mandatory identification cards, and paramilitary police in our streets, we have lost a vital part of our American heritage. America was born of protest, revolution, and mistrust of government. Subservient societies neither maintain nor deserve freedom for long." – Congressman Ron Paul, August 9, 2004

Note from JWR:

Tomorrow is the last day of bidding in the SurvivalBlog benefit auction for a pair of MURS band handheld transceivers, with extended range flex antennas. The high bid is still at $175. These radios were kindly donated by Rob at $49 MURS Radios. Check out his products. What Rob sells are a lot of radio for the money. I’ve heard nothing but rave reviews from the SurvivalBlog readers that have bought these. As previously mentioned in the blog, Kenwood 2 watt MURS handhelds have far better range than FRS radios, they require no license, and can be custom programmed for, MURS, 2 Meter Band frequencies and/or weather warning (WX, receive only) channels, and they are also compatible with alert message frequencies for Dakota Alert intrusion detection systems. (A license is required if using 2 Meter Band frequencies.) I strongly endorse these hand-helds! If you don’t already own a pair, look into getting some.

State and Federal Lands–Poor Choices for Short Term Retreat Locales

I often have people ask me if state or Federally-managed forest land or BLM land would be a viable place to take temporary or long term shelter in the event of of a societal collapse. There might be exceptions, but my blanket assertion is no, that is a bad idea for even a temporary retreat locale. Here is my rationale:

Access: Access is a huge issue. Public lands are intended for visits, not residence.Odds are that if you make camp on state or Federal land, men with badges and guns will arrive within a couple of weeks and forcibly send you packing. In bad times, the local land owners will not want any perceived “riff raff” residing in the nearby public lands. The “we/they paradigm” dictates that the locals will lump all newcomers and assorted straphangers–good and bad–together into the category of “undesirables.” So assume that the locals will make the call to report any new forest land interlopers. In extremis, they might even take matters in their own hands.

There is also no guarantee that once you get in to public lands that you can get out. Many roads inside forest lands are not maintained in winter. Depending on the latitude and elevation, this could mean getting truly “snowed in” for the winter. And, depending on the depth of your larder and your available fuel for heating, you might not have chances any better than the ill-fated Donner Party. (But by the same token, if you have a lot of food and fuel, then getting snowed it would be a good thing . (Snow-blocked roads will insure your privacy.)

Shallow larder: It goes without saying that if your family arrives with only what it can carry in a couple of vehicles, then you won’t have a long term food supply. One of the greatest advantages of a fixed-site retreat is the “deep larder.” A deep larder can make up for a bad season of gardening, or a bad season of hunting. But a shallow larder leaves no margin for error. I’ve often said that the last category that you want to be in when the Schumer Hits the Fan is “refugee.” If you are traveling light, then you are just one step away from homeless/unprovisioned/refugee status.

Hunting pressure: In the event of a full scale economic collapse or a major natural disaster, there will suddenly be a lot of people trying to subsist on wild game, year round. The hunting pressure on the wild game flocks and herds will be tremendous. I anticipate that in most states in CONUS–except perhaps for parts of Idaho and Montana–the game will get both heavily thinned and badly spooked. After just a few months it will probably be difficult to hunt with any reliable chance of success. Furthermore, hunting on public lands may become a dangerous proposition. It is not too difficult to envision that in TEOTWAWKI, someone that is really desperate might see bagging you as their opportunity to return to their camp with both meat and a nice new rifle.

Security: This is the biggest risk. A cluster of tents or vehicles is almost impossible to effectively defend against attack by determined looters. It takes mass to stop bullets. (I presume that if someone had the money that it would take to buy a couple of military surplus APCs, then they would also have the budget for a nice cozy retreat property. Hence, anyone camping on public lands probably isn’t going to be in an up-armored conveyance.) Here is the basic problem: Since you cannot legally build any structures or even fell any trees on public land (except with a firewood cutting permit), you will have no substantive ballistic protection. The alternative of camouflaging yourself by hiking in to camp a remote area might have some merit. But then, away from your vehicles, your larder would by necessity be even shallower. It is also difficult to avoid the smoke from campfires being spotted from a long distance. Yes, you could “cold camp”, but that would be even less comfortable. If you try to go totally “low profile” out in public forest lands then you will fare no better than those using the “Batman in the Boondocks” approach that I previously discussed (and dismissed) in both SurvivalBlog and in my non-fiction book Rawles on Retreats and Relocation.

All of the foregoing does totally not rule out some hardy soul finding a way to make camping on public lands viable. With sufficient planning it could be done in a truly remote area. Yes, you could conceivably cache a large quantity of food, smokeless fuel (such as propane), tools, tentage, and supplies. But to be ready for a “one trip bugout” in a WTSHTF situation, this would only be practicable if you cached all of that gear well in advance. And that brings up a while ‘nother set of problems, including curious bears, persistent wood rats, and some serious legal issues. (Caching any private property anywhere on public land, is to the best of my knowledge illegal and not advised!)

Nor does the foregoing rule out buying a small parcel of land that adjoins state forest land, BLM land, or national forest land. This a great way to have a “big backyard” both for hunting and to provide a buffer from population. For example, here at the Rawles Ranch, we have contiguous public land on two sides, giving us far more privacy, wood cutting, and hunting opportunities than we could otherwise afford. Here in The Unnamed Western State (TUWS), a one firewood cutting permit from the forest service still costs just $5 per cord. (Actually, you have to buy a minimum of a four cord permit, for $20. The maximum that the forest service will sell is a 10 cord permit.)

The bottom line: Using state or national forest lands just isn’t a viable alternative for 99% of us. If you can’t afford to buy a retreat of your own, then you should team up with an existing retreat group, or form a new group, and pool your resources. The only other decent alternatives that I can see are “bugging in” (which has serious drawbacks in a full scale societal collapse), or depending on the good graces of some country cousins.

Letter Re: Observations on the Recent Missouri Ice Storm

Mr. Rawles,
I live in Southwestern Missouri. Did you followed the ice storm that buried the Midwest? We got hit pretty hard. We get hit hard every four or five years. Which brings me to my point. I have never seen so many unprepared people in all my life.

After day two of the ice storm power was out (for a month in a lot of places like Springfield). There were no gas cans to be found at any store. Batteries, disposable propane bottles, flashlights, milk, and meat were missing from the shelves of every store. Even Wally World [Wal-Mart] was bare. Kerosene shot up to as much as six dollars a gallon just before the pumps went dry. And generators? Forget it. Blood sucking companies were trucking in generators in 18 wheelers then selling them in parking lots for outrageously inflated prices.

I work part time at a nation wide auto parts store so I got to see some ground level action. Folks were buying seven dollar flashlights just for the two D cell batteries in them. I watched a guy buy a twenty dollar torch kit just for the three dollar bottle of propane it came with. I know we’re not talking about TEOTWAWKI or WTSHTF. We’re just talking about a relatively short period of time without any utilities and day to day comforts.

It was business as usual at my place. We had plenty of food, warmth, and lights.

I have several ceiling mounted light fixtures in my house with 12 volt/75 watt bulbs in them. Two batteries in the garage power them. I used my fireplace for heat. I have Plenty of stored water. I keep lots of those disposable propane bottles around for my lantern and cook stoves. A gas stove and a gas hot water heater are a must. I would never own a home with an electric kitchen. A few number 10 cans of bulk food, a few MREs, and even some frozen meats and foods took care of our meals. My scanner and my Wife’s small palm sized TV kept us informed of the weather and police activity in our area.

We never missed work, we never missed any meals, we never missed a hot shower, and we never got cold. All because of a few simple things I did years ago. What I did wasn’t expensive, hard, or complicated. Any one can do it.

[Odds are that] in another four or five years we will be hit by another devastating ice storm. I hope that the folks around here have learned something. – Bob F. in Missouri

Letter Re: Supporting SurvivalBlog

Jim,
I’d just like to exhort readers to invest whatever modest sum they can in helping to keep SurvivalBlog up and running–stepping up to the Ten Cent Challenge or whatever other means of providing support they feel up to.

There’s nothing else of this type and quality out there on the web, and if folks think that anyone can live on the paltry ad fees you collect for the site, then they are obviously not aware of the details.

It’s to all of our benefit that you have given this your best shot–committing your full attention to making sure your readers get the best advice in survival available. I know well what it must take for you–I am, in similar fashion, trying to keep Safecastle LLC moving forward. It’s a load and a half, and if you don’t have a similarly dedicated and understanding client/reader base to help you with your vision, then ultimately, it can all disappear.

Yes, I’m an advertiser here. You could say I have my own reasons for wanting SurvivalBlog to succeed. But that would be a bit too cynical. My own view is that all of us with a mind to help others prepare are on the same team. There’s a lot of work to do out there, and none of us can make a dent in it by ourselves.
Stay strong and on the path! – Vic at Safecastle

Odds ‘n Sods:

I don’t know how I overlooked it for so long, but I should have mentioned that there is a great web resource on post-Peak Oil living at Life After the Oil Crash (LATOC), hosted by California attorney Matt Savinar. They also have their own Forums, which are quite active. See: The LATOC Forums.

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Mike F. sent this article link: Mystery Ailment Strikes U.S. Honeybees. Apiary expert “The Bee Man, Jr.” tells SurvivalBlog: “The CCD (Colony Collapse Disorder) is a real and devastating threat to our nation’s food supply and economy. At this time, there are few indicators what actually CCD is. We know the result of the infection. There seems to be signs of fungal, bacterial and viral infections found during dissection. As of this moment, the vector is unknown. Most small Beekeepers are doing everything possible to save their hives from using essential oils to massive doses of antibiotics.” He also mentioned: “The pollination of human food, Ethanol-based fuels and animal feed (this includes wildlife feed) is in jeopardy. The only thing I can recommend at this time is to pray a “cure” is found and stock up on a good supply of “raw” honey. It’ll keep for a long time!

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“The Werewolf”–our correspondent in Brazil–sent us this link: RioBodyCount.com.br. His comment: “It´s sad, but the turmoil in Rio de Janeiro has become so ugly that an NGO created a counter. The counter only shows the results of gun fights (bad guys, good guys, policemen, children…) For those that don’t speak Portuguese: “Fevereiro” = February”, “Mortos” = Dead, and “Feridos” = Wounded.

Jim’s Quote of the Day:

"The monastic communities for survival will be located in high places, because in dangerous times it is heights that are easiest to defend. They enable the advance of hostile hordes to be seen from a distance and prepared for; and they favor the traditional counter- attacks that are helped by force of gravity — the rolling down of rocks and stones against assailants. Further, hilltops are naturally protected against floods; they are also very likely to be left alone by the large masses of people on the move, since migrant hordes are inclined to go after easy prey rather than undertake an arduous siege of doubtful outcome." – Roberto Vacca, The Coming Dark Age

Note from JWR:

I’m continuing my special “support our troops:” sale on copies of the new expanded 33 chapter edition my novel “Patriots” through the end of the month. If you place an order directly with me, and you have us mail it to an APO or FPO address, then the price is just $12 per copy, plus $3 postage. (That is $10.99 off of the cover price–right near my cost.) OBTW, speaking of supporting our troops, be sure to visit the AnySoldier.com web site, and “do your bit.” As previously mentioned, some young enlisted troops that are deployed in Iraq and Afghanistan get no mail from home, so anything that you can send them–even just a postcard–is appreciated. I now offer a couple of additional payment options for book orders: both AlertPay and GearPay. (I prefer AlertPay or GearPay because they don’t share PayPal’s anti-gun political agenda.) In my experience, AlertPay has a frustratingly labyrinthine account set-up procedure, but GearPay seems much quicker and easier to set up.
Our AlertPay address is: rawles@usa.net
Our GearPay address is: rawles@usa.net
Our PayPal address is: rawles@earthlink.net