Blogs from the wet country

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Learning from other people’s experiences is the cheat code to being squared away. There is no reason to reinvent the wheel when Grogg and Thol did it for you a few thousand years ago. As a result, any time there is a disaster or other time-to-use-your-preps event, I always read the blogs of people who were there and ‘saw the elephant’, as it were. Why should I learn stuff the hard way when someone else already paid for the course?

Was flipping around the internet and found this worthy read – Big Country Expat

These After Action Reports (AAR) are almost always worth reading. Did they do things right? Learn from it. Did they completely drop the ball? Learn from it. You learn from other peoples failures just as much as you learn from their successes.

Another AAR: https://bayourenaissanceman.blogspot.com/2024/10/detailed-after-action-report-from-north.html

One of the common threads in these and other blog posts I’ve seen lately has been the undeniable certainty that once the ATM’s and electronic payment systems are disrupted, cash becomes the only form of payment. The lesson learned: keep a big wad of cash in your safe and don’t touch it.

I know you guys have been following other blogs that are reporting back on the situation out there in hurricane country. Share some linkage and let’s learn from other people’s experiences so we can save ourselves the pain.

Article – Through Hurricanes Helene and Milton, Amateur Radio Triumphs When All Else Fails

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Amateur radio is definitely one of those things I’ve neglected over the years and need to dig into.

Like the tens of thousands of other North Carolina residents, the power to Witherspoon’s neighborhood was completely out. It was impossible to communicate with the house down the road, let alone anyone several miles away. Unable to send text messages or make phone calls, radio became the one form of communication left in rural North Carolina. After fixing what he could on his own property, Witherspoon, a lifelong amateur radio enthusiast, began distributing handheld radios to his neighbors.

No doubt being able to communicate with people outside the affected area is important, but being able to communicate with people within the affected area is absolutely critical. From what I’ve been reading, despite the disdain for them as the Hi-Points of radios, the Baofeng radios have been heavily represented in this episode.

I have some handheld radios that I keep on the charger, with spare batteries, specifically for contact with close-by people. If I’m roaming around the neighborhood checking on the situation it’s nice to know that the people back at the house can contact me, and vice versa, if something needs to be communicated.

One thing I’ve been absolutely dragging my feet on is getting the antennae set up for the Icom 7300 I picked up last year. I need to get off my butt, climb up on the roof, and get something up there. I probably should start investigating the local amateur radio scene and see if I can find that particular brand of boffin…the radio nerd who is also a survivalist…to help me get things set up.

In fact, really, I should probably do some sort of communications audit and see what exactly I have, and what I need, in regards to this sort of thing.

What to power a house with

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Let’s say that you find that perfect chunk of dirt and you decide to build your modest dwelling there. It’s pretty much an ‘off grid’ situation so you’re on your own for power. The way I see it there are things that you’ll need to run:

  • Generator
  • Well Pump
  • Lights
  • Fridge/freezer
  • Heat/Water heater
  • Stove
  • Assorted small devices (phone charging, table lamps, laptop, etc.
    (Not a complete list, I know)

So now, you’ve got a choice about how to run things..you can go with propane, gasoline, diesel,  or electric (from generator, hydro, PV, wind, etc.)

And, of course, you could do some combination of the various fuels/ systems….you could run your lights and accessories offa PV system, your well pump off a generator, and your generator, heat, water heater, etc. off propane.

Or you could try to do one fuel to cover all those needs…something like everything being electric and running off a generator.

So, my question is…how would you set things up? To my way of thinking, propane would cover all systems…propane to run the generator, freezer/fridge, heat, water heater, stove, and the electrical would have its needs met from the propane generator. Although, most likely, I’d just wire for DC and use 12v LED light fixtures and lamps. Laptops already charge from DC. Use propane for everything else.

There’s also nothing that says a household can’t be a multi-fuel affair. I’m thinking that for my anticipated needs, some sort of PV battery system (unless I’ve got running water for a turbine, or perhaps a windmill) to run the low-draw electric like lights, radios, etc, and then propane to do the heavy lifting of generator-driven electric well pump, propane stove, water heater, fridge/freezer, and furnace.

The drawback to propane is that you cant just walk down the road, borrow some from a neighbor, and carry it back to your home in a bucket like you could with diesel or gasoline. And theres the matter of getting a truck out to your location to refill your tank. I’m not sure of the regulations regarding transporting a large propane tank to get it refilled, but I wonder if a 250- or 500-gallon tank, permanently mounted to a trailer, hauled into town once a year to be filled, and then returned home and reconnected to the house system would work.

Yes, I’m sure I could live in a cabin with a woodstove that heats the place up and makes my hot water but I like to think that in a pre-apocalypse world I would strive for a bit more comfort and convenience than that.

So…if it were you…and you had to provide for lighting, heat, hot water, well pump. and device charging, what would be your fuel of choice? Keep in mind, we’re trying to keep as low a profile as possible…so a tanker truck of some flavor coming by twice a year is not optimum.

Augason Farms Cheese Powder

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As I mentioned earlier, the local WinCo had restocked on Augason Farms food storage. One of the things that was there that I had not seen previously was the cheese sauce. Off the top of my head, the thing that would benefit mostly from this would be the simple meal of macaroni-and-cheese.

The LDS cannery people offer #10 cans full of elbow macaroni, and that stuff keeps quite a while. A case of that, a can of this cheese blend, and you can feed a lot of people without too much fuss. Nutritional value? Probably sketchy. But macaroni-and-cheese will fill up the entire church basement full of refugees without too much fuss. Bonus is that the kids are probably already used to it. Its a no muss, no fuss meal.

So…lets crank a can open and see what we have:

A can of … orange powder. What a shock. Theres a lot in there. There’s also a handful of oxy absorbers hidden in there too. I’m guessing this stuff is pretty hygroscopic, so get what you need and then seal that can back up. The can says to use a 2:1 ratio of water:mix. I followed the instructions and did exactly that.

The instructions say to bring the water to a boil and whisk in the mix, stirring for a couple minutes until it thickens. The thickening part seemed to take a while. My suggestion would be to use some of the starch-loaded pasta water to help thicken this stuff. I guess we better make some elbow macaroni to go with this.

Elbow macaroni is kind of a staple in many storage food pantries. Any interesting shaped pasta should work for this purpose…shells, penne, ziti, orrecchiette, orzo, etc. So, cook up some elbow macaroni until it is al dente, drain, and mix with sauce.

And…thumbs up. It was pretty good. It did need to be a bit thicker but thats easy enough to do. I might throw in a little butter, and perhaps use milk instead of water next time. But, overall…….good product. A little goes a long way, by the way.

Definitely good for mac and cheese. Theres a recipe on the can for making a queso dip. Im told that sprinkling this on popcorn would have some appeal as well. For me, it seems like an excellent choice for feeding a buncha people in a hurry with something everyone will like and that doesn’t require a lot of effort. So, yeah…I’ll pick up a couple cans this weekend and tuck ’em away with the LDS cans of elbow mac.

Go. Buy with confidence.

Last Blogger Standing II

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First off, for context, let me link to a five year old post: Last Blogger Standing

I’ve gotten a couple messages in the last few days from people noting that it seems like the number of preparedness blogs (or related material) seem to be dwindling.

Off the top of my head, I can think of a handful that are no longer around. The most sorely missed, by me anyway, was Self Sufficient Mountain Living which was my favorite. Claire Wolf has stepped back and semi-retired from her blog, Dakin shuffled off the non-corporeal plane as did a couple other folks. And some folks just up and disappeared, leaving their blog up with their last post being years ago.

At this point, and please feel free to correct me if I’m wrong, I think the longevity title is between me and ,Rawles. As I’ve said before, I am most definitely not in this for the money, its more of a passion/vanity project for me. A little Amazon affiliate money shows up once in a while, and Patreon kicks in a few bucks a month, but other than that….nada. And that’s fine. I will say, however, that if you ever do think “Dang, he really nailed it on the head with that last post” please feel free to send me something in the mail or Patreon. I;ve even had people email me gift cards in the past. I’m not proud, I’ll happily take whatever renumeration you want to give.

In the last few years, I feel like my motivation has changed when it comes to this blog. More and more, I feel like my mission, such as it is, is to encourage and motivate the people who think like me, and to help bring people over to ‘my side’. Sort of a combination of morale officer and recruitment officer. To make sure that you know you’re not being ‘crazy’ or ‘weird’ when you buy three cases of TP at CostCo, bury a 10/22 in the woods, or map out ‘bug out routes’ from your AO. The world is on fire and people are telling you everything is fine. Anyone who doesn’t increase their resilience in the face of what we see on the news today is the crazy one.

I’ve no intention of leaving the blogosphere any time soon. Especially how, year after year, it seems we are getting into those ‘interesting times’. Why would I?

Of course, some things are out of my hands. I could get hit by a bus tomorrow, have a widowmaker heart attack tonight, or die in another home invasion….who can say? Maybe one day I’ll wake up and just want to re-invent my whole life and that’ll include leaving the blog behind. Could happen. But, for now, I’m not planning on going anywhere.

So, yes…it does seem like the number of preparedness blogs is going down. But one other reason for that, and this might be a good thing, is that perparedness is becoming more mainstream and less niche…therefore it doesn’t need the ‘underground’ of blogs and websites (or, gong back really far,BBS’s and Usenet groups) that supported it back in the day.

Perhaps preparedness/survivalism is finally ‘out of the closet’ enough that the need for a handful of standard-bearers has passed. Certainly, it seems like its less fringe and more mainstream these days.

Regardless, I agree…it does seem that the presence of active preparedness blogs (that aren’t just shills for ad revenue) seems to be on the downward trend. But, your buddy Zero is here for now.

Building the wall

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I finally received all the parts for putting together the gunwall I ordered up from Gallowtech.I spent most of today putting it together and getting it set up the way I wanted.

Normally, I’d share pictures but, unfortunately, this is a PerSec issue so I can’t really show the pictures. However, I can say that it does a very nice job of helping me get the gunclutter problem under control.

It actually looks not too much different than this. Just….more of it.

It wasn’t cheap, but it really does make a difference in terms of getting most of the stray boomtoys rounded up and secured. It’s definitely one of those things that will not convey if I ever sell this place….that sucker is going with me to the new place.

The modularity is what really make it worth the money, for me. As my acquisitions change or evolve, I can adjust my storage system to match. That’s pretty much the reason I didn’t just sit down with a buncha lumber, some deck screws, a chop saw, and make my own.

And, honestly, it looks pretty cool too.

Not every survivalist ‘needs’ this many guns. Tappan’s “Survival Guns” is considered by many to be a bit over-the-top in terms of guns he recommend that the savvy survivalist own. I don’t recall the exact number, but once you got past defensive pistols, working pistols, pocket pistols, hunting pistols, etc, Tappan was advocating something like 15 handguns. Contrast this with the fact that most people will not own fifteen different handguns over an entire lifetime. Heck, we all know that one old guy who owns something like two or three handguns and he’s had them ever since he got out of the Army after Korea. My ownership numbers definitely trend towards the far side of that bell curve.

My way of thinking has always been to assume that what I have now is all I’ll ever be able to have, therefore I need to have enough to last me against all the possible futures that could occur in the next 25 years. So…a little gun heavy. Guns seldom go down in value, so even if no legislative changes occur to preclude future purchase, I’m still ahead of the game by beating inflation..

But, overall, I like the Gallowtech product. It seems well made, is modular, looks good, and has enough accessories and ways to arrange them that I think it should fit my needs for now. But, most importantly, I am very glad to have all these dang guns out from underfoot.

WinCo is at it again

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The cheese powder is new…might have to get some to try out for post-apocalyptic mac-n-cheese. Not the price on freeze dried strawberries….$3 per ounce, or $48 per pound. Let me crunch some numbers while you go  look at these pictures…..


Strawberries appear to be $3.49/#, or .22/ounce locally. Quick Googling shows that freeze drying strawberries reduces their weight (not volume) by about 88%. So, to get one ounce of freeze dried strawberries you need to start with about 8.33 ounces..or, in other words, a ratio of 8.33:1.

If strawberries are $3.49/#, then 8.33 ounces (52% of a pound) of strawberries would cost $1.81.

So, the can of Augason FD sstrawberries, at 6.4 ounces, contains 3.33 pounds of strawberries before FD processing.

Augason is $3.00/oz for FD strawberries. You can make them yourself for $1.81/oz. You would save $1.19 per oz. At $1600 you would need to make 884 ounces (55#) of FD strawberries for the machine to pay for itself. That would be the equivalent of 138 cans of strawberries.

Obviously the margins, and therefore the returns, on more expensive things like meat would result in ‘paying off’ the purchase of the machine faster.

Something to think about.

CostCo freeze dryer

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Ok, that caught me completely by surprise:

$2295 from the manufacturers website

I know from what I’ve seen on the internet that the oil pump system is annoying, messy, and kind of a pain. The optional non-oil pump system is rather expensive but if you offset it with the savings from getting this at CostCo….well, that might make it worthwhile.

But…heres the other thing: CostCo has a very generous return policy. So, perhaps after a while you may decide this product isn’t for you. Head back to CostCo, hand it back, and get your money back.

Hmmm…I have a large amount of freeze drieds already, but this would be interesting to experiment with. And I know enough local LMI that perhaps we could ‘group buy’ it and shuttle it around to our respective locations for use.

Also, how big could the market for this really be at CostCo? Perhaps if I’m patient I’ll see it marked down l50%~ like the LifeStraws. Maybe get it for under $1000 in a couple months.

Hmmmmm.

Rangetime with the FN

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Took the FN TAC3 out for a spin yesterday. I had held off on going to the range with it because I was waiting for the optic to arrive. And…it arrived yesterday.

Its an Eotech XPS2. I had been looking at various ‘dot scopes’ and wanted to give the Eotech a try. They have a reputation for durability, and I’m looking for end-of-the-world resilience. I have a dot on my MP5A2 clone, a Sig Romeo XT Pro and I like it a lot…strong recommend. I’m rapidly becoming a fan of these types of optics, but I am making sure not to like them at the expense of my iron sights. Even as durable as these things are purported to be, with battery life measured in years, I still make sure every gun has a set of sighted-in iron sights. Because.

Anyway…. Took it to the range, sighted in, and started shooting the steel plates. The FN has a military trigger but it’s got a smooth travel and good break. Actually a very nice trigger. Accuracy was also quite good, even with the 1x of the optic. I might have to get a magnifier just because. I only put about sixty rounds through it since it was getting late and I was doing this right after work…and darkness is coming earlier.

Overall, I really like this AR. I need to really sit down with it, solidly rest it, and see what it can do but so far I’m really pleased. I’ll be swapping the muzzle device for something conducive to a suppressor, drop a light on it, and that’ll be that. I really look forward to shooting this thing some more.

Do I like it better than my Colt? Well…yes, but thats because the Colt is in ‘classic’ M4 attire with front sight tower and round handguards. A capable and good rig, no doubt…but it doesn’t lend itself as easily to what I’m wanting to do. But…still a nice gun.

 

 

Hurricane aftermath

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I live in a region that, barring some wild geological experience, will never see a hurricane. I’ve been in some though, back when I lived on he east coast.

I’m watching the news out of the affected areas and I still don’t understand how, when you have several days of advance warning, you havent either A) followed the first rule of surviving a disaster (Answer: Don’ be there) or B) prepared themselves.

I’d mentioned that all these people complaining about their local governments not providing drinking water could have had several cases of the stuff from WalMart all for the price of a couple beers and packs of Marlboros. Someone opined that I was being harsh because perhaps these people were forced out of their houses and had to leave their supplies behind.

Not sure I agree with that. If youre savvy enough to lay in supplies then youre savvy enough to have some packed up for when you need to go go go. And if you’re really that on top of things then you probably have your act together enough to have left the area with your gear to begin with.

But, setting that aside, I am just unable to comprehend how many people didn’t read the blindingly obvious writing on the wall and either beat feet or stockpile supplies.

I am not entirely unsympathetic. Even Burt Gummer wound up basically a refugee when his bunker was compromised and destroyed. But Burt didn’t bitch about the .gov not helping him, and he kept on going. A fictional character, yes…but not a fictional attitude.

But…it’s easy to armchair quarterback things when I’m not the one watching my house float away, but still…where are the stories of the squared away people with their generators and supplies sitting on their porches casually performing overwatch against looters?