Heh..what did Captain Insano get me for Chrismahanakwanzakah?

This:

Although I got a bunch of cool gifties, Im only going to cover the ones that fit the genre of this particular LJ. (Although I did also get a cool electric knife for my cooking escapades!)

First off, something Ive been wanting for a while now:

Wilderness Instructor Belt (5-Stitch)

I’ve been wanting one of these for the last year or so and now I gots one. w00t!

further gifting commences:

This thing screws onto the lid of my Nalgene bottle and allows one-handed operation. Can be locked open/closed. Loop for carabiner. Sweeeeeeeeet.

Also a pair of Carharts pants, which are always good lovin’!

Mmmmmmm…prezzies!

Dammit, I should really wait till the end of the day and do all these posts….

Headed down to my local Albertson’s (“Oh god, its gonna be one of those posts again…”) ostensibly for a pound of ground beef and some Coke. Simple mission. Get in, get goods, get out.

And then….mission creep.

Ground beef..remaindered…$1.29/#. C’mon! A buck twentynine a pound! Youd have done the same thing as me…which was to aboutface and head back the the front of the store, grab a cart, and empty out the bin. Theyre in the freezer now, solidifying. Then its a visit to VacuumLand and then off to the cryo-nap. Total saved: $13.00. Thats like 10 pounds of meat for free!

Mmmmm…beef!

Infrastructure failure? Food shortages? I laugh!

Ah! Gifting!
I wanted one and, thanks to the ‘punitive gifting’ policy of my brother, I now have one:
Stabby goodness!

I don’t feel too compelled to say anything about the fella that got lost and stuck while driving his family through Oregon. Suffice to say that if youre reading this, you already know the mistakes this guy made and what would have prevented them.

The experience does point out that in winter you have to know your limitations, know what youre doing and, above all, be prepared for problems. So, your homework assignment is to think about what things would be needed to if you were stranded in your car for a week in the snow Middle O’ Nowhere….and then make sure that gear is in your vehicle.

Here endeth the lecture.
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So, to the surprise of pretty much no one, Hillary Clinton has said that, gosh, maybe she does want to take a shot at the big time in 2008. Is there anyone on this planet who hasn’t seen this coming? I welcome it. I embrace it. I encourage it. Why? Because Bush has left such a bad taste in so many peoples mouths that the only way a Republican is going to get elected in 2008 is for the Democrats to run someone so polarizing, someone so dividing, someone so you-either-love-her-or-you-hate-her, that voters will say “I’d rather vote for the Republican than that Clinton.”

And, even then, that might not be enough. So, dear friends, if you don’t spend 2007 socking away magazines and AR receivers youre not nearly as smart and cautious as I’d hoped my readership to be.
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Another fun use for my vacuum sealer, other than preserving bargain food for the big cryo-nap, has been to compact and protect surplus military wool blankets. One of the big hassles of keeping a blanket in the truck has been that they are bulky, get unfolded and wind up in a wad, get wet and dirty, and generally make their presence so annoying that youre more likely to just yank the damn thing from the truck and leave it behind which, if you ask any San Francisco Korean widow, might be a bad idea.

Thus, the benefit of the vacuum sealer. I roll up the blanket into a nice tight roll, stuff it in the bag, pull all the air out, seal it up and its now protected from dirt, moisture and all the other nasties. To be on the safe side I then wrap some duct tape around it from all sides. This helps to protect the plastic and if the plastic does lose its integrity from a puncture or other damage the rolled blanket will still stay in its compressed form. The truly clever will take this rolled and sealed blanket and put it into some sort of hardside container (even a stiff cardboard tube will work) to protect the plastic from punctures.

A buddy of mine uses a simpler, low-tech method. He finds a blanket he can fold small enough and stuffs it into a couple of the large Tyvek envelopes provided free at post offices for Priority and Express mail. Its worth pointing out they also provide cardboard boxes that are pretty close to the perfect size for a folded blanket.