Continue reading“Recipe of the Week: Carrots in Dilled Wine Sauce, by J.M.”
Here are the latest items and commentary on current economics news, market trends, stocks, investing opportunities, and the precious metals markets. We also cover hedges, derivatives, and obscura. And it bears mention that most of these items are from the “tangibles heavy” contrarian perspective of JWR. (SurvivalBlog’s Founder and Senior Editor.) Today’s focus is on making a living with farmland. (See the Tangibles Investing section.)
Brevan Howard is first non-bank caught by margin rules, sources say. “Non-cleared exposures thought to exceed $1.5 trillion.”
o o o
Hedge funds turn to curve options for steepener trades
Next, at Wolf Street: Turkey’s Debt & Currency Crisis Morphs into Financial Crisis as Banks Face Funding Squeeze
o o o
Where the Right to Keep and Bear Arms Meets Freedom of Commerce: If Cody Wilson Won’t Be Allowed To Give Files Away, He’ll Just Sell Them
“Legalized abortion is a national holocaust; an affront to our national character; a contradiction of established principles subscribed to from the beginning of Western Civilization; an insult to the principles of our Declaration of Independence; a bane of our national spirit; and a stench in the nostrils of Almighty God.” – Pastor Chuck Baldwin
September 2, 1969 is the day that the first automatic teller machine (ATM) made its first public debut, dispensing cash to customers at Chemical Bank in Rockville Center, New York. While being as indispensable to most people as cell phones and e-mail, they have introduced a whole new set of issues. Consumers are faced with scams, skimmers, and robbers, and even fake ATMs have been discovered.
This week I finished up the AGI Gunsmithing course on Pistolsmithing. There were a few surprises.
I’m finding that the ten hours of video per week just isn’t going to be feasible for much of the course. If I’m dealing with firearms that I am already pretty familiar with, a single pass through the video is usually enough to get me going on the finer points. However, if the course is covering a firearm that I am not all that familiar with, and especially if I can’t find that model (or a similar model) of firearm to put my hands on, things slow down quite a bit. The Colt Python that was covered this week is a prime example.
While I own a S&W Model 686 and had access to several others, I could not obtain a Python. In order to fully understand the weapon, I had to watch and re-watch much of the video multiple times.
That is certainly sub-optimal, but I’m sure, at some point, I will come across one. When I do, I will probably take the video out and re-watch it yet again as I go over the firearm. In the meantime, the video is all I had to be able to answer the questions on the test.
Continue reading“Gunsmith Training: Pistolsmithing- Week Four, by R2“
SurvivalBlog presents another edition of The Survivalist’s Odds ‘n Sods— a collection of news bits and pieces that are relevant to the modern survivalist and prepper from “HJL”. The New Mexico fiasco over the terrorist compound just keeps getting worse.
Despite the twisted plans to teach children how to carry out school shootings along with the multiple counts of child abuse resulting in the death of a child, the New Mexico courts dismissed the charges against the defendants. The fault lies with the prosecutor for being completely irresponsible and missing the deadlines to file with the court. Thankfully, the FBI stepped in and had all five of the extremist Muslims arrested again, but on federal weapons charges. Shame on New Mexico for dropping the ball on that one. It’s also worth noting that no charges related to terrorism have been filed yet. Thanks to W.W. for the links.
Cody Wilson, of Defense Distributed, has flipped his middle finger at the progressive left yet again. Despite having a license from the State Department to distribute his CAD files, A federal judge in Seattle issued a controversial ruling that trampled all over the First and Second Amendment rights of Wilson, banning the free distribution of these files. Progressive leftists all over the U.S. celebrated this shady victory. Cody has been raising money for his legal defense through a fundraiser and has already made his initial goal of $200,000. He is within 15% of making the total goal of $400,000 on the final day of the fundraiser. (If you haven’t donated but want to – do it today!)
Now, the celebration of the SJWs is short lived. The federal injunction just keeps him from giving his files away. You can now visit his site and purchase the files (and the money will go towards his legal defense). There is no hard cost. The suggested donation is $10 per file, but you can set your own price. Stick that in your eye, you leftists!
“And he looked up, and saw the rich men casting their gifts into the treasury. And he saw also a certain poor widow casting in thither two mites. And he said, Of a truth I say unto you, that this poor widow hath cast in more than they all: for all these have of their abundance cast in unto the offerings of God: but she of her penury hath cast in all the living that she had.” – Luke 21:1-4 (KJV)
September is Kilted to Kick Cancer Month. It was a wise move, not picking January. (Brrrr!) September is also National Preparedness Month.
o o o
Ready Made Resources is having a sale on their white phosphor, autogated, 3rd-gen AN/PVS-14 night vision monocular/scope. Prices start at $2785 and come with all the normal accessories. They are also offering financing for the purchase.
o o o
This has been another entry for Round 78 of the SurvivalBlog non-fiction writing contest. The nearly $11,000 worth of prizes for this round include:
Round 78 ends on September 30th, so get busy writing and e-mail us your entry. Remember that there is a 1,500-word minimum, and that articles on practical “how to” skills for survival have an advantage in the judging.
Without water, survival is impossible, even if you have a storage facility filled with bullets, bandaids, beans, and batteries. My family and I prep in the desert southwest and have taken action so that we won’t find ourselves thirsty in the event of a crisis.
In parts 2 and 3 of this article series, I thoroughly covered both professional drilled and hand dug wells. But once you have access to the water, you need to be sure it is safe to drink. So, in Part 4, we began looking at methods for survival water filtration, purification, and disinfection. We looked at boiling, building your own distillery, and two water filter systems– the Sawyer Mini and Web-Tex in-line filters. Today, we will wrap up this article series with more options for filtering, purifying, and disinfecting water in a survival situation.
The LifeStraw is perhaps more well known than the Sawyer Mini and Web-Tex. However, it doesn’t necessarily have any more advantageous features over the other two. The LifeStraw is primarily meant to be used to suck water directly from water sources, but some models can be set up to gravity filter water using a water bladder. It weighs two ounces and is almost nine inches long, which is significantly larger than the Sawyer Mini and slightly longer than the Web-Tex.
The LifeStraw is rated to filter roughly 264 gallons and uses a hollow membrane filter to remove bacteria and protozoa. This is the same as the Sawyer Mini filter.
Continue reading“Thirsty Are Those Who Do Not Prep- Part 5, by The Grumpy Gunfighter”
To be prepared for a crisis, every Prepper must establish goals and make long-term and short-term plans. Steadily, we work on meeting our prepping goals. In this column, the SurvivalBlog editors review their week’s prep activities. They also often share their planned prep activities for the coming week. These range from healthcare and gear purchases to gardening, property improvements, and food storage. This is something akin to our Retreat Owner Profiles, but written incrementally and in detail, throughout the year. We always welcome you to share your own successes and wisdom in the Comments. Let’s keep busy and be ready!
Dear SurvivalBlog Readers:
Our winter supply of firewood is now all safely under cover, but this past week I spent some more time splitting and boxing fire kindling wood. (I prefer to keep our kindling in plastic tote bins, for subsequent ease of handling.) My preferred kindling wood is western red cedar. I usually cut small rounds to just 9 or 10 inch length. I do a lot of the kindling splitting with a shingle froe and a 30-ounce mallet. I find that at least with straight-grained wood and a froe, I have better control. More control means that I spend less time chasing pieces of kindling. (Which is the norm whenever I use a mine axe or large hatchet to split it.)
Avalanche Lily Reports:
This week at the Rawles Ranch, we butchered two Turkeys that have reached butcher weight. They are beginning to eat us out of house and home. We roasted one, and have de-boned the breast meat, froze it and boiled the rest of the carcass for the meat and broth. We have quite a few more Turkeys and chickens that we’ll be gradually butchering over the next few weeks. We are lacking enough freezer space, maybe not so bad if I’d do some rearranging. So we might be canning some. I’m not a big on canning. And we will be giving a few away to friends and family.
This week we started our homeschooling year. We have a high school senior and a sophomore still at home. Both are taking a class or two through HSLDA and CLRC. This is to get them used to on-line classroom formats and to understand what a college course will be like–as well as to lessen my teaching load. It’s time to let them be accountable to someone else for part of their learning. I am teaching them the subjects that I most enjoy, such as a foreign language, Essay writing, Literature, History, Current Events, Bible and Biblical subjects such as: Apologetics, Discernment, Prophecy, Jewish and Christian History and Philosophy. I find it interesting that even though I was a science major in College, teaching science and mathematics are what I’m least interested in, in teaching my children. Go figure.
This year between the two of them, we will conquer (Lord willing): Chemistry, Biology, Algebra II and an overview class of Geometry, Basic Math Review/Pre-Algebra, US History, together, Music Theory (Younger), Essay Writing together with IEW: Institute for Excellence in Writing: Andrew Pudewa), Advanced Communications (IEW), Advanced Spelling (IEW). Older daughter is taking after Jim and wants to be a writer, so she’ll take a Novel Writing class through (IEW). Both are studying Biblical and Modern Hebrew. Both play piano and have received regular lessons, for years now. Both will study Literature for their respective years. Older daughter will be reading literature that involves apologetics, a history of philosophy, “The Consequences of ideas: Understanding the Concepts that Shaped our World” by R.C. Sproul and other books similar to what has shaped our western thinking and the “development of man” through history. Younger child is finishing up American Literature and will be moving into English literature.
I’m trying very hard to keep things very simple and straightforward this year. It is very difficult to run a ranch and businesses, and to homeschool well. We need to work on being very disciplined with our time and motivations to complete what we must and to keep distractions at bay until we finish what we must. I’m hoping to get the rest of the main garden harvested, soon. But all is good out there if we don’t have an early frost.
May you all have a very blessed week.
Many Blessings to All, – Jim Rawles and Avalanche Lily, Rawles
SurvivalBlog presents another edition of The Survivalist’s Odds ‘n Sods— a collection of news bits and pieces that are relevant to the modern survivalist and prepper from “HJL”. Did you know that pistols can kill you? And I’m not talking about the bullets either.
The Democrat candidate who won New York’s 23rd Congressional District primary election supported a national gun registry during the campaign. Of course, you would expect that. The left is fully on board with the Marxist, socialist policies that include major gun control. There is no surprise there. However, now that the primaries are over and the campaign is shifting towards the main election, this candidate has suddenly dropped support for the national gun registry, claiming that it was not her “official” position. Uh, yeah. Right. I’d like to talk to you about a bridge in Manhattan that you might be interested in buying too. I have to wonder sometimes just how stupid these politicians think we are?
According to this article sent in by G.P., the Army Criminal Investigation Command is reporting that it is investigating a serious equipment and ammunition theft from the U.S. Army’s Fort Hood base. Apparently, a significant quantity of ammunition along with Chemical, Biological, Radological and Nuclear equipment has been taken. Note that NBC equipment is personal protection and detection gear, not weapons. The overall cost is relatively small with 61 M50 masks ($150 each) and three AN-UDR-13 radiation detectors ($700 ea), but it’s obvious the military is struggling with the same loss of moral compass that the general population is.
“In the year that king Uzziah died I saw also the Lord sitting upon a throne, high and lifted up, and his train filled the temple. Above it stood the seraphims: each one had six wings; with twain he covered his face, and with twain he covered his feet, and with twain he did fly.
And one cried unto another, and said,
Holy, holy, holy, is the Lord of hosts:
the whole earth is full of his glory.
And the posts of the door moved at the voice of him that cried, and the house was filled with smoke.” – Isaiah 6:1-4 (KJV)
August 31st, 1992 is the day that Randy Weaver surrendered to the Federal Authorities, ending the 10 day siege on Ruby Ridge. This is the incident that preceded the Waco siege and is known for the unconstitutional rules of engagement and overzealous actions by the jack booted thugs of the federal authorities that resulted in the death of two innocent people– Sammy and Vicki Weaver, Randy’s son and wife. It is notable that Randy was acquitted of all charges except missing a court date and violating bail conditions on an ATF sting operation where it is suspected that Mr. Weaver did nothing wrong but that the ATF informant altered the shotguns sold to him by Weaver resulting in Weaver’s arrest. In addition, the missed court date was due to clerical errors on behalf of the court. All involved Federal agencies were publicly reprimanded, and the state of Idaho attempted to press charges against some individuals for their actions but were stymied due to federal interference.
o o o
This has been another entry for Round 78 of the SurvivalBlog non-fiction writing contest. The nearly $11,000 worth of prizes for this round include:
Round 78 ends on September 30th, so get busy writing and e-mail us your entry. Remember that there is a 1,500-word minimum, and that articles on practical “how to” skills for survival have an advantage in the judging.
Without water, survival is impossible, even if you have a storage facility filled with bullets, bandaids, beans, and batteries. My family and I prep in the desert southwest and have taken action so that we won’t find ourselves thirsty in the event of a crisis.
In parts 2 and 3 of this article series, I thoroughly covered both professional drilled and hand dug wells. But once you have access to the water, you need to be sure it is safe to drink. So, let’s look at methods for survival water filtration, purification, and disinfection.
There are a variety of ways to filter, purify, and disinfect water. We will look a several of these and compare them.
At a very basic level, boiling is a simple way to sterilize water. Bringing water to a rolling boil for one minute will kill most bacteria, protozoa, and viruses; however, boiling water will not remove chemicals, such as herbicides, pesticides, and solvents from the water. Additionally, boiling will not remove any heavy metals from the water.
Continue reading“Thirsty Are Those Who Do Not Prep- Part 4, by The Grumpy Gunfighter”
Here are the latest items and commentary on current economics news, market trends, stocks, investing opportunities, and the precious metals markets. We also cover hedges, derivatives, and obscura. And it bears mention that most of these items are from the “tangibles heavy” contrarian perspective of JWR. (SurvivalBlog’s Founder and Senior Editor.) Today’s focus is on Mint Error Coins. (See the Tangibles Investing section.)
Gary Christenson: Inflation Is A Policy Decision
o o o
Video, over at Kitco: Jim Rogers: “Before This Is Over, Gold Might Turn Into A Bubble”
Tesla Motors (TSLA) appears to have had a le empereur sans culottes moment.
o o o
For any readers still in stocks: Watch the upcoming earnings reports very carefully. If any companies that you hold stock in are showing weakness, then get out of them, soon!
