Posted on 07/24/2009 3:37:21 AM PDT by nw_arizona_granny
Weekly Roundup - Living On Nothing Edition Category: Roundups | Comments(15)
Did you hear about the guy that lives on nothing? No seriously, he lives on zero dollars a day. Meet Daniel Suelo, who lives in a cave outside Moab, Utah. Suelo has no mortgage, no car payment, no debt of any kind. He also has no home, no car, no television, and absolutely no “creature comforts.” But he does have a lot of creatures, as in the mice and bugs that scurry about the cave floor he’s called home for the last three years.
To us, Suelo probably sounds a little extreme. Actually, he probably sounds very extreme. After all, I suspect most of you reading this are doing so under the protection of some sort of man-made shelter, and with some amount of money on your person, and probably a few needs for money, too. And who doesn’t need money unless they have completely unplugged from the grid? Still, it’s an amusing story about a guy who rejects all forms of consumerism as we know it.
The Frugal Roundup
How to Brew Your Own Beer and Maybe Save Some Money. A fantastic introduction to home brewing, something I’ve never done myself, but always been interested in trying. (@Generation X Finance)
Contentment: A Great Financial Principle. If I had to name one required emotion for living a frugal lifestyle it would be contentment. Once you are content with your belongings and your lot in life you can ignore forces attempting to separate you from your money. (@Personal Finance by the Book)
Use Energy Star Appliances to Save On Utility Costs. I enjoyed this post because it included actual numbers, and actual total savings, from someone who upgraded to new, energy star appliances. (@The Digerati Life)
Over-Saving for Retirement? Is it possible to “over-save” for retirement? Yes, I think so. At some point I like the idea of putting some money aside in taxable investments outside of retirement funds, to be accessed prior to traditional retirement age. (@The Simple Dollar)
40 Things to Teach My Kids Before They Leave Home. A great list of both practical and philosophical lessons to teach your kids before they reach the age where they know everything. I think that now happens around 13 years-old. (@My Supercharged Life)
Index Fund Investing Overview. If you are looking for a place to invest with high diversification and relatively low fees (for broader index funds with low turnover), index funds are a great place to start. (@Money Smart Life)
5 Reasons To Line Dry Your Laundry. My wife and I may soon be installing a clothesline in our backyard. In many neighborhoods they are frowned upon - one of the reasons I don’t like living in a neighborhood. I digress. One of our neighbors recently put up a clothesline, and we might just follow his lead. (@Simple Mom)
A Few Others I Enjoyed
* 4 Quick Tips for Getting Out of a Rut * Young and Cash Rich * Embracing Simple Style * First Trading Experience With OptionsHouse * The Exponential Power of Delayed Consumption * How Much Emergency Fund is Enough? * 50 Questions that Will Free Your Mind * Save Money On Car Insurance
Do you use a microwave?<<<
Yes!!!
For now, it and the hot plate are it, plus the crockpot.
My electric range died last year.
But then, I am no longer able to cook, so get by.
I enjoyed all your garden articles, thanks for digging them up.
There will be many folks taking up gardening of food this year, or so I am betting.
For we will see shortages, more terror threats and more contaminated foods.
If the prices keep going up, a lot of us will sure spend less time at the grocery store.
In going through Seed Savers Exchange website, I came across a very logical effective guide for assessing the quality of your storage conditions.....
“Store the seeds in an envelope or seed packet and place in a dry, cool location. You can assess the quality of your storage conditions by adding the room temperature in Fahrenheit plus relative humidity. Try to keep that number under 100; the lower the number the better the conditions for seed storage.”
http://blog.seedsavers.org/post/Saving-heirloom-tomato-seeds.aspx
<<<<
LOL, reminds me of the old ways and they are coming back, sure and simple ways to figure out things, imagine, with above method, one does not need to turn on the electric machines..............fingers and toes will do it.
I am excited with a new-found source:
<<<
I haven’t ordered from them, but have heard of them.
Yes, to ordering in bulk, it is always cheaper and usually fresher, than the product long loaded into a bottle or plastic bag.
Welcome to our thread.
Your ‘Chicken House’ looks wonderful, bigger and stronger than my old mobile, so I will move in at once.
Please, put a window on the west side, so I can watch the sun set.
As soon as you get this one done, you must start a “Chicken tractor”, so you can shift them to new weeds and bugs every day or so.
LOL, lovely plans here, makes me want chickens again:
Next, start the goat pens, will you fatten a beef or two, you should with all the extra goat milk.
Wonderful search results, has calf, rabbit, goat tractor plans:
Now you know why my husband fought for years to keep me off the never ending “Honey Do” list, that I enjoyed adding to.
Urban Dictionary: honey do’s
honey do’s - 2 definitions - Chores assigned by ones mate (usually wife). This list normally includes household chores or errands and typically are...
www.urbandictionary.com/define.php?term=honey%20do’s
I don’t understand why links to guns show up at the top of this page:
Home Improvement Safety - Tips for Home Improvement Safety
Nov 13, 2009 ... There seems to be an inverse relationship between my honey-do list and the amount of hair on my head — as the list grows the hair goes. ... Getting one of those giant six-inch-long redwood splinters in to your hand is a rite of passage when building ... Safety Tips To Avoid Youth Abduction Dangers ...
firstaid.about.com/od/.../08_Home_Improvement_Safety.htm
Are you done cussing yet?
Enjoy your chickens, for they will be happy in whatever home you give them and if they were Banties or Fighting Cocks, would prefer to roost in the trees.
I’m jealous! I want some chickens.....
Someday, when we move back east.
FReeper Jeff Head - in need of prayer - Cancer surgery<<<
Thanks for the alert and yes on the prayers, many of them will be needed to beat this one.
LOL! A chicken tractor - is that for real?
At last the world is accepting that the Goat is not some common animal.
Stumbled on this search by accident and I have to agree, Goats deserve a HOUSE, not a common pen.
LOL, might as well give them a swimming pool, for mine liked to swim, a friend started it when my Breeding Buck was a few months old, he took him to spend the summer with his grandkids, mostly in the swimming pool.........and continued for several years.
LOL! A chicken tractor - is that for real?<<<
Very real and very important for the birds health and your yard.
Take a look at the search in the above post, for it has several quick photos on the google page.
If you keep the chickens on the same spot of dirt year after year, they will soon be sick, nothing will grow and so no bugs will come to them, any lice etc, will be on the chickens and have no where to go.
A ‘Chicken Tractor’, is a moveable chicken run, that you move to a new part of the yard every few days, by doing this, they do not eat the plants to the bare soil, leave fertilizer to be watered into the dirt and grow healthy on the new plants and bugs.
In the winter, put them in the garden area, so they get the bugs out of the soil and plants.
They can be simple or very fancy.
Thanks for the welcome!
If anyone is curious about where to find the very best of advice on how to properly raise chickens in your back yard, then by all means visit
http://www.backyardchickens.com/
If they can’t answer your questions, nobody can. If your community allows chickens 9and many do) it really is a very fun hobby in addition to being a very self-sufficient thing you can do for yourself and your family.
Consider that eggs are one of the best sources of nutrition that exist, and that five hens can pretty much guarantee you at least three eggs a day, you can see the benefits, especially in a barter economy...
Our coop is anchored into the ground with concreted 4x4 posts. My two main design criteria were (1) high winds here from the Columbia River Gorge, and (2) the presence of numerous predators here in the ‘hood including a couple of urbanized coyotes and plenty of egg-loving ‘possoms. I don’t want anything digging under the coop so it is permanently mounted in place...in fact I pity to poor SOB who has to dismantle it in 100 years or so...
Cheers folks, and be well!!
Ok, I need a chicken tractor when I get my girls then;)
I am moving up in the world of survival preparedness - today I had my first experience with mylar.
I got a 2x4, layed it over a bucket with some ‘test’ mylar in it, and ironed a small corner of the mylar with my iron set to ‘wool’. I lived life on the edge by ironing directly on the mylar and didn’t use a piece of foil between the two like I was advised. Looks like it didn’t ruin my iron plus was easier than I thought. With all the warnings about wrinkles and getting it perfectly flat, I thought it would be difficult. The bags I have are so stiff that I think I’d have to work hard to get a wrinkle in it!
As usual with me, I overdid everything. I bought enough beans and rice for 6 buckets! I had to go back and buy two more buckets (I now have 4). I’ll be testing those bean recipes for a while now too! I also couldn’t decide whether to freeze the stuff or heat it to kill any critters. So I did both! Unintentionally, actually. After freezing it, I noticed ice crystals forming inside the bags. So, to get rid of the moisture, I baked them at 170 degrees for about an hour. I did buy dessicants at the dollar store, but couldn’t quite figure out how to use them - they’re in big containers, not little packets. Not being one to sew, I skipped using them altogether.
I put about 5 pounds of beans each in a gallon-sized Ziploc freezer bag and then put those in the mylar bags in the buckets. I already have several superpails of just pintos or just rice (prepacked from Emergency Essentials) and wanted to have some variety without having to open 5 or so buckets at one time. I probably could’ve packed more in the buckets by pouring the beans or rice directly into the mylar. Oh well. This works for me.
I put in 5 300cc oxygen absorbers and then tackled the mylar sealing job. I folded the top of the mylar bag over onto a 2x4 and ironed about a 3 inch swath shut, leaving the last corner still open. I then pressed the mylar bag down to remove as much air as possible. I now have to take back my cockiness in the beginning of this narrative – the last corner wasn’t that easy to iron. Have no clue why. But those dreaded vertical wrinkles appeared! I ironed over them, flattening them pretty good, so I hope all is well. After letting it cool, I tested the seam by trying to open it back up from the bottom. It held.
After a short time, the mylar bag seemed to suck in around the bags of beans. Which is good. But I expected it to shrink in even more with time and it didn’t. The only thing I can figure is 1) something went wrong or 2) air is 78% nitrogen and the absorbers only took care of the 21% that was oxygen. That still leaves quite a bit of nitrogen gas in the bags. I hope that’s the case! I’m going to wait a while before putting the lids on, checking to see if the bags do shrink down a bit more.
>>>(2) the presence of numerous predators here in the ‘hood including a couple of urbanized coyotes and plenty of egg-loving ‘possoms.<<<
We just ‘trapped’ one of those pesky opossums last week...
I have a 12 X 12 shed attached to the North side of my chicken coop where we keep feed and misc. garden tools. I use barrels for feed storage with plywood lids - well, anyway when one of the barrels was empty, Christi didn’t put the lid back on squarely and the ‘possum ventured across the top, trying to find a way into the coop, the lid tipped and dumped him into the empty barrel which was too deep for him to get out of.
Next morning, Christi picked up the lid and screamed - came running to me saying that there was this great big (holding her hands about 3’ apart) animal in there - and said it’s head was big as a basketball..... Of course it was only about a 5-6 pound ‘possum....
After giving the full homeschool education section on the lowly opossum, including how they raise their young, how they play dead as a defense (where the playing ‘possum came from), and how they emit a dead meat odor as a defense since most predators won’t eat dead rotten meat - it didn’t seem right to shoot it, so it is now a resident of a wildlife refuge about 6 miles away... A couple of ponds and a major 4 lane highway to cross to get back here.....
Anyway, class taught, chickens safer and Mr. ‘possum has a new lease on life and a new home.....
A few years ago, one of the neighbors called the heat and air conditioning guy in because the furnace wasn’t working right. The fan was running, but half of their house had no air.
Sure enough, a ‘possom (and many family members) had moved in under the house, and shredded the flexible ducting in the crawlspace to nest in. It cost them thousands of dollars to get that repaired, along with replacing most of the insulation under the house that the critters had torn up too. Very destructive critters if you let them get a foothold...
>>>Very destructive critters if you let them get a foothold...<<<
They sure can be - not only ‘possums but squirrels and ‘coons too...
During the 3 seasons that are frost free, I now use a motion detection sprinkler around the chickens - works great. I am even thinking of trying it in the garden to see if it will work on the deer, raccoons and rabbits - particularly on the more vulnerable plants. It was a race last year with the deer - I think they got two watermelon for every one I got, and they got 3-4 cantaloupe for every one I got LOL. If the SHTF, they can count on being on the table instead of in the garden... ;9)
Haaretz
Last update - 12:35 05/01/2010
IDF to blanket Israel with gas masks
By Amos Harel
http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/1140016.html
The Home Front Command is planning to begin distribution of individual
protection kits, i.e. gas masks, to every citizen starting in late
February, according to a cabinet decision taken last week.
Originally, just over 60 percent of the population were to receive kits,
but a decision to extend that protection to the whole country means the
production of the necessary equipment has been stepped-up, and another
billion shekels is needed to fund to the endeavor.
The plan is to distribute protective kits to each of the nearly eight
million citizens (in line with a population estimate for 2013), over a
period of three years.
Advertisement
Debate over how to appropriately defend against chemical and biological
warfare has been ongoing at both the political and professional levels
for more than a decade. Both the defense establishment and the Israel
Defense Forces have been involved in discussions.
Individual protection kits, in the form of gas masks, were used during
the first Gulf War in 1991.
continues..............
http://www.backyardchickens.com/
That is an excellent site.
I don’t have the possoms here, but do have coyote and wild dogs.
They can go through a flock in days and will take the chickens and cats, until the last one is gone.
I do have your wind and building for a 100 years is a good idea, for much of what was built here has blown away.
I am moving up in the world of survival preparedness - today I had my first experience with mylar.<<<
Sounds like an experience, lots of work.
In the past, when ironing plastic or other things that might mess up an iron, I/we used brown paper bags over it to offer protection.
They would be easier to work with, than tinfoil, I think.
We just ‘trapped’ one of those pesky opossums last week...<<<
If you listen to the San Diego Police Scanner, you will hear the police answer opossum calls.
One night there was a call, “someone is attempting to enter a home, via the second floor window”.
When the Officer arrived, he saw a 40 pound opossum clinging to the wall, attempting to open the window.
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