What a day.

I got up this morning feeling woozy.  Apparently there is some kind of virus at my wife's school, and clearly she brought it home with her. Not the first time.

Not fun but it's not something like the flu.  Just makes you feel worn out and achy.

So, Tylenol, Coke, and light meals.


Half way through the day,  I went outside and one of the kittens was missing.

The catling had walked off the edge of the porch and fallen 15 feet down into some hay stored under it.  I went down there, searched everywhere.  Nothing.

I figured probably some animal got the cat.   But just to be sure, I went back up to the house and got Spike the Ferret.  Took him down there and let him root around.  He doesn't care anything about cats, having lived around them all his life, but he is curious and I knew if the kitten was there he'd root it out.

Sure enough, he started burrowing into the hay.  I carefully lifted a bale, and there was the kitten. At some point in the past, the chickens had dug a "dust pit" there.  Then I put the hay down over it and that made a kind of cave.  The kitten pushed in and got into that.

Ferrets have incredible noses. They can't see very well, but there's nothing they can't track down by smell.  Because they like to dig and to take dust soaks, they get nasty and have to be bathed frequently. Their bedding has to be washed and dried for the same reason. His bed is not always this dirty.

The internet has been out most of the day, just came back on tonight.  I was supposed to pay bills today, but no interent, no bill paying. I'll do it in the morning.

On the nitwits in action front:

Kerry signs U.N. small arms treaty.   Link

I have voted straight Republican since I was 18 and now I'm 63. But this time, I won't vote for hack politicians.

This is a satire, of course, but there's a lot of truth in it.  Warning: vulgar language.

The song that says it all. Sent by a friend.

Who's on First?

Remember the old Abbot and Costello routine, "Who's on First?"

That's how I feel with this storm.  Went into town yesterday, and it was like a festive occasion. Everybody and their dog was in there making last minute purchases. Talked to the guy at Home Depot I usually chat with when I'm in the store. He said it was "same ol', same ol'." Generators,  fuel containers, lanterns, etc just about wiped out.

Drove by Walmart, the parking lot was full.  Even at Ingles there was a crowd.  Everybody buying what they thought they might need if the storm was severe.

When I got home I did all the outside chores that needed doing.

After I came in the house, and cleaned up, I turned on the Weather Channel. The menu said there would be "continuous coverage" of Erika but when the program came on it was one of those sorry, idiotic shows the Weather Channel puts on to cut down costs.  They just kept running one lame show after the other. No weather.

Went on line and it was as if there had never been an Erika. No news, no predictions.

This morning, The Weather Channel is basically engrossed in talking about the weather in Africa, like I care a damn.  There is another weather service on the Direct TV line up, and they did have a little spiel about the remnants of Erika going up the coast, but it was no big deal. Except, in closing , they said North Georgia might get up to five inches of rain!  If they think that's no big deal then clearly they have never been in these mountains after a wet summer when something like that moves through.

New Shipment of Yugo SKS rifles arrives in country. Erika still boresighted for North Georgia.

 It's just sunrise.  The ferrets and I had coffee up at the table by the meadow. They scrounged around in the grass, but the light was adequate to keep an eye on them.  Cool breeze blowing and the creek is really roaring downslope. This has not been a particularly dry summer and it's running at about full capacity.

I made breakfast for the wife and myself.  Orange juice, sausage, biscuits and cheese. Not a banquet but good and satisfying.

Checked my email and there was a message from Southern Ohio Guns about the new SKS rifles from Yugoslavia. Many years ago, when the first of these arrived, I paid top dollar for an unissued gun, fearful they would all be gone before I got one.

One of the things I learned buying surplus was when something first hits the shelves, you buy all of it you want or can afford, right then. He who hesitates is lost.

The Yugo guns are top flight. Teak stocks, and a longer barrel than the standard SKS. They are a lot heavier, and it's not likely you'll need the fixed grenade launcher although these days, who knows? You might be going to Chattanooga or some place like that.

Surplus 7.62X39 is hard to find under the Regime of Barrack Hussein Osama Obama. I have a lot of it, both Norinco and even better Yugo , in the can, in the case, on stripper clips. I stocked up on that when an outfit called Zanders up in Illinois got some in back in the early 1990's.s  You can also buy Russian Tula or Wolf,  off the shelf, new production, from Walmart. If you go to Walmart. Which I don't.







Classic Arms did a video on their new Yugo guns.  In the video the narrator says they got all the shipment coming in, but he's mistaken, as at least SOG got some.  A few years ago, after the ban on Russian guns by Bill the Bastard, Classic got some Russian SKS rifles that had been in the warehouse of a surplus company which went broke. That was quite a coupe.  I doubt it will ever happen again.

I've got three of the Russian SKS rifles, although techically one of them belongs to one of my brothers but he can't have it because his summer house, where he keeps all his stuff, is in the Peoples Democratic Republic of Kalifornia, and it's illegal there.

The good thing about the SKS is that it holds ten rounds, it's not as "bulky" or heavy as an AK -47, and it's a nice looking rifle.

I keep an AK-47 hanging on a peg on the kitchen wall these days. That's so I can grab it up in a moment's notice if something or someone who is not welcome should unexpectedly materialize.

For actual fighting, the AK-47 is hard to beat. But the SKS is just a nicer feeling weapon. Kind of like the difference between a nice Jeep Wrangler and a pick up truck. They're both good vehicles, and serviceable in their way, but the Jeep is more fun.

From the Book of Armaments, first stashaway, 1.2
"And thou shalt lay in great quantities of ammo.
And when Anti-Christ in his evil and lust for power shall deprive the people of rifle fodder,
then shall thee be in a good place, and thou shalt slay the evil doers,
and thou shalt perforate the followers of Anti-Christ, 
that they shall resemble a swiss cheese, good riddance unto them.
yeah, verily, and pretty much so."

Erika is still heading our way.  That's not good news.  The 0600 local news broadcast from our one radio station is telling people to watch the storm, make sure they have plenty of feed on hand for the animals, enough water in containers for people and animals, and to make sure they have candles, lanterns, etc.  They also caution you should be checking out your generators, making sure you have two stroke oil and gasoline, and that the chain saw fires up.  Make sure you have your medications, enough to get you through at least a week. The standard BOHICA spiel that they put out every time a big snow storm, ice storm, or rain storm is headed our way.  I'm ahead of them on all this stuff, but we will probably still go into town this morning, while we still can.

Today I'll do "all of the above" and then I'll check all the gutters and get all the up slope drainage ditches cleaned out. After that, it's just a matter of waiting to see if the storm really comes here, and if it's a bad one.

The last thing we need up here right now.

Sunrise

The sun will be coming up in a few minutes.  It's already getting light outside.  Went out on the porch for my coffee. The kittens came out of their box, squalling for their breakfast. Momma cat is very small and thin. Even though she has been receiving extra "maternity" rations of canned cat food and milk, she's not able to feed all five babies so I have been feeding them with a bottle.  Thank God they are now starting to lap up their "powdered cat milk" and "kitten chow nuggets" from a pan. There are four white long haired and one tortoise shell. I got a laugh out of the old Tom who's the dad. He was laying on the porch grooming himself when the kittens all came running over and started climbing on him. The old guy put his ears back and growled but no one paid attention and he just sat there looking thoroughly annoyed.  I thought to myself, remembering all those nights walking the floor with a baby so my wife could get some sleep, that I could really sympathize with him.

Went to bed at one this morning and was awakened by something flying over the house at three twenty one. I have no idea what it was, as it didn't pass directly over and  I can only see the sky from the meadow this time of year. It was slow and it made a pulsing "thrumb, thrumb, thrumb" noise. Sounded like the Zeppelins sound in movies about World War I.  It took about three minutes to pass out of hearing so it wasn't a jet, might have been a helo of some sort.

The sky is overcast, and it's looking like rain.  Outside temperature is about 65.  The last two days have been nice, more like fall than summer. Walked out of the house, up towards the shop and found a dead chicken laying in the path.  Even chickens die of old age, I guess.

Never did get back to sleep.  I'll probably take a nap today in consequence.

As I told my son, be careful in your choices because women can get you into difficulties.

Last of the Mohicans was filmed in the Blue Ridge Mountains, some of the scenes were shot at a state park near where I live.

I always admired Magua .  That was a man who knew how to pay off old scores, with interest. Not that Chingachgook was ever a day late or a dollar short in settling accounts with someone who wronged him.

The final fight scene was the best part of the picture.  I'm not a "mano a mano" aficionado myself, but you have to admit in those days, they got right down to it. I have some tomahawks but I think I'd wing them at a maleficent whilst I went for a rifle, rather than slugging  it out at a foot apart.

Walmart bows to the pressures of political correctness once again. The "Black Lives Matter" people pronounce themselves pleased.

  I was glad when Walmart came to my county. We have very little in the way of shopping facilities, and the one's that existed mercilessly hosed everyone on price. They knew you had to pay their prices, or drive to another county.

So I didn't feel any sympathy for the local chain stores like Ingles, and still don't.

But Walmart succumbed to pressure from the 13% during the great "Black Lives Matter" pogrom against white Southerners. No more, said Walmart piously, would they sell anything with the racially oppressive word "Dixie" on it. Nor would they sell any merchandise with the Confederate flag on it.

There are no 13% people living in this county. But they were able to control an aspect of our lives because Walmart and the little coterie of black ties and white shirts that run it lack cojones.


I haven't set foot in the place since, and don't plan to do so.

Now Walmart has announced that they will no longer sell semi-automatic firearms in any of their stores. This is not connected to the concerted effort by 13% churches to force them to do so, according to a Walmart spokesman.  The black churches say too many black men are killed with AR-15 style rifles (they don't mention it's other black men wielding them) and they have been going after Walmart with nuisance suits and penny  packet "demonstrations."  But Walmart says there is no connection between the announcement last week that 13% churches were going to stage a big protest, and Walmart's sudden announcement that the guns have to go.  It's just a coincidence, related to normal marketing, and they neglected to make the announcement when the decision was made months ago. That's all.

This is the same ploy they used when the Brady Bunch went after them and they decided to stop selling hand guns. They undoubtedly think people are stupid, and they are largely correct in this assumption, but not everyone buys their facile announcements.

I don't care myself, they can quit selling everything as far as I am concerned. But if anyone is in the market for an AR-15 they are clearing out the inventory and it might be a good time to buy. Even if a Bushmaster came from Walmart, it's still a Bushmaster.

Once upon an evening dreary, as I pondered, weak and weary.

There are some high, scudding clouds tonight but the moon is still working through.  The forest is lit up by it.  Sometimes, when it's this bright, I turn out all the security lights, but tonight I've left them on. The dogs are uneasy and I feel the same way. We are all getting old together, I guess.

I'm trying to be more forward looking.  I read somewhere, a long time ago, that if you look to the past more than you do to the future, then old age has truly grasped you in it's clutches.  I have a lot to remember, though, and other than planning what can you really do with the future?

My attitude has slipped some too. Recently an old friend wrote me a communication suggesting that I make some changes in my tactical situation up here.  He and I go back to the old Hermit blog, and I can't remember how long ago that was.  I think only Stephen, Matt,  Kymber and J, Commander Zero, Senior Chief, Glock Mom and Ryan are still around from that period.

As I said, his suggestions were good but I sent back a querulous response saying that I was "too tired" do keep plugging away like I used to do.  I feel like I've settled into a neutral phase where I'm doing well if I can keep my preparedness level up to what it was.  The truth, I think, is that I haven't actually done that and I'm not in as good a position as I was, say, five years ago.

   I have been trying to figure this out.  Part of it definitely is being older, but 63 is not as ancient as it used to be.

    I wonder if it's being retired. Maybe working, however odious my job was, kept me sharp.  Staying up here for days at a time may not be conducive to being energetically active. It's easy to lose track of the date, or the day of the week. Time just flows by and there is no sense of urgency.

 I do know that the deteriorating situation in the outside world tends to be depressing.  However isolated you are, events out there are going to have a ripple effect and eventually the ripple will reach us all. There's no way to just live placidly on without having to deal with the world.

 Least anyone think I'm getting maudlin,  I've seen this same process of introspection going on over at other blogs, written by people much younger than me and in different circumstances. It's not just a matter of one older man feeling gloomy.    David Fortier, well known in the gun community as a writer who's generally optimistic, said this in the latest edition of  Get Ready.

"As I write this, the United States seems more troubled and divided than it has been in decades. The flames of racial tensions have been continually fanned and the country is headed for a racial transformation. With an ever increasing tempo of bad news being continually broadcast, many of you are worried about keeping your loved ones safe. It's a worry I share."

I haven't felt this uneasy since Y2K was about to roll over.  That amounted to nothing. Maybe these times will be the same, but I tell you in all honesty, I think not.

Sent by a friend.   To the Bitter End!

The Good, the Bad, and the Ugly. Classic Firearms reviews the new shipment of Mosin Nagant M1891-30 rifles just received in their warehouse.

Do you know who made this song famous in World War 2?

This song was sung by American, German, British and who knows what other troops.  One particular woman made it a world wide phenomenon.

When I was at UNM in Albuquerque during the early 1970's, there was a pizza/beer joint at Bataan park, near the campus. It was popular with Navy and Marine reservists from the area, Air Force people from Kirtland AFB, and with soldiers from Sandia Army Post.  This song was on the juke box, and I can remember the place being packed after drill days, with the pitchers of beer passing around and people roaring out this song through the cigarette smoke.

There were a lot of military drinking songs on that machine, but this one always stuck in  my mind.







This is one of my favorite Vera Lynn songs. She had so many beautiful songs it's hard to pick favorites. "There'll Always be an England" is a good one too, but I think this is my favorite.





Kymber is completely right.  Lili Marlene was Marlene Dietrich's song.

U.S. Concealed Carry Association

I mentioned this outfit offhand in a previous post.  I remembered tonight that someone asked me for more information about the insurance they offer.  It's pretty good insurance. I bought the low end of the spectrum and I pay about $14.00 a month for it. I don't remember the particulars, but if you have to winnow the gene pool, it will pay for bail, get you an attorney, pay for civil damages, things like that. The higher the level of insurance you buy, the more it pays. Their web page has a break down of different plans.

After my little interlude with the black avengers of all that is white and evil in Chattanooga, having the insurance seems like a better idea than it did before. 

About all I can say is that I get magazines and once in awhile something like a ball cap, that kind of thing, from them.  I've never had to use the insurance, but it's nice knowing I have it and fourteen bucks won't buy you a hamburger, coke and fries at my favorite restaurant anymore.

Here's a link to their web site:

U.S. Concealed Carry

They put out some books and CD's on the subject, and they have the magazine as well.

"May you live in interesting times." Old Chinese curse.

  

I watched a PBS special on the Fukushima reactor disaster which took place during the Tohoku earthquake (magnitude 9.0!) that occurred on Friday, March 16 2011.  Between the earthquake, aftershocks, and the massive tsunami that hit the two nuclear power installations on the coast (Numbers 1 and 2), both plants lost power and suffered melt downs.

Until I watched this program, I never realize that there was a distinct possibility that Tokyo and it's environs might have had to be abandoned, and the population evacuated northwards.  The only thing that prevented it was incredible courage and self sacrifice on the part of the crews manning the two control rooms , because they and their coworkers stayed and minimized the damage, although they all accepted that they personally were going to die.  In the end, outright deaths were minimal but they were exposed to excessive radiation and  the end result will be cancer deaths.

When I moved up here, I knew all about Three Mile Island, Chernobyl, and the movie "The China syndrome."  One of the things on our check list was no nuclear power plants with us down wind. There weren't any, so I crossed that off and forgot about it.

Years later my brother told me that after I moved here, they built two big nuclear power plants near Chattanooga. Most of our weather comes from that direction, due to the prevailing winds. They are less than 90 miles away straight line distance  from the house.

I keep a Civil Defense radiation detector here.    I bought it years ago, when I first learned those plants were in Tennessee. When you buy one of these things, you have to pay to have it calibrated. As far as I know, this is the best of the few calibration services that will work with older equipment and with individuals.

 Radiation meter calibration.

So, you buy the radiation detector, and you have it calibrated. That relieves you from the kind of tension that shows up in a lot of  post apocalyptic fiction, such as the Deep Winter series. People know from the radio that there might be fallout, but they have no way of telling if there is. I can tell if there is, but what I'm prepared to do about it is marginal.  I suppose the animals and  the people here would have to shelter in the lowest level of the house. It's two thirds build into the mountainside and has two stories above it.  Not the best , but the best option I have.

Oil is below $40.00 a barrel.  That's good for the consumer, but bad for the oil companies. Oil is a boom and bust business. When prices are up, they drill, they hire lots of people.  When prices are down, they let the rigs go idle and lay off masses of workers.  The lay offs negatively effect the economy, and the idle oil production causes oil to go up, and more of it to be imported. Both the price raise and the additional trade imbalance are bad for us.

Our entire society is built on petroleum products.

Most of us live a long way from work, and in places where there is no public transportation.

We have to buy gasoline to get where we are going, regardless. When it reaches a price we can't pay, either we change jobs, or move closer to work.

The arrogant Yankee, Professor Kunstler, who wrote The Long Emergency among other books, predicted the see-saw of oil prices on a documentary I once saw. He said there would be wild fluctuations in the price of a barrel of oil, coupled with dislocation in the stock market. In conjunction with droughts and other climate induced difficulties, he predicted massive migrations of people from the Third World to the developed countries.

Today I watched a report on Al Jazeera concerning the huge numbers of  Third World people pouring into Europe.  Since last April, Germany estimates that 750,000 immigrants have entered the country illegally.  The German people are seeing the negative results in terms of outbreaks of diseases previously eradicated in Europe, in a swelling crime rate, in the cost of providing housing and cash, medical care and education, to these hordes. As a result, bands of Germans are attacking the refuge relocation centers, in an attempt to force the illegals back into other European countries. Al Jezeera estimates that another 800,000 illegals have entered the other countries of Europe in the same time frame.  The politicians who originally lauded the arrival of these mobs are now squalling for help. Austria has called for a unified plan to send them back to their points of origination.  But we know, from our own experience, that once they get into a country, illegal immigrants never leave. There may be as many as 3 million people headed toward Europe, now coming in via the Balkans as well as over the Med. The video on the Al Jazeera news showed thousands of people walking down dirt roads through Serbia, headed for Macedonia, and from there into Greece. Once into Greece, they can go anywhere in the E.U. It looked like the Cecil B. Demile production of Exodus. All they needed was Charlton Heston with his shepherd's staff.  Instead of trying to hold back the hordes, the European countries are beating the flower drums and bleating about "the rights of immigrants" while surreptitiously fobbing off the new comers by helping them get on down the line and go be someone else's problem.

Germany has long had serious problems with Turkish moslems, who came to Germany in the 1960's and 1970's, under a guest worker program. They were supposed to leave, but they didn't. France imported vast numbers of Algerians after the Algerian revolution, when the French withdrew from the country. Those immigrants have repaid France in such charming ways as the summer ritual of rioting, looting, and setting hundreds of cars alight. France has large "no go" zones around the major cities that operate under local Imams and espouse Sharia Law.

Most of the rest of Europe , especially Scandinavia, has similar problems and is suffering dramatically as a result.

The stock market is taking a pounding.  It's being called a "correction" and maybe it is. That's what they said in 1929 though, and that "correction" wound up leading the world into the Great Depression.
People starved to death by the side of the road in America. Whole populations uprooted from the dust bowl states and went to California to survive, hoping for work. If you've never read Steinbeck's The Grapes of Wrath, you honestly should. History repeats itself.

We do live in Interesting Times.

I wonder where it's leading us ?


At least with everything else that's happening, we can forget about Hurricane Danny.

This is the final National Hurricane Center report on Danny.

Sunday as it's supposed to be.

Yesterday was my son's birthday. He was working an evening shift, so he didn't get home from work til after eleven.  My daughter had planned a birthday party for him, with "buffalo burghers", a cake, presents and some of their friends from work.  I called to wish him a happy birthday but we didn't get to talk long as it would have been rude for him to abandon their guests.

About one in the morning a big cold front passed through, with an intense lightning display and much rain and thunder. I went out on the porch and watched it for about half an hour. I took the flood light and shined it into the rain, which created a very strange effect. Within the tunnel of the light you could see the woods, but it was like boring a hole through a black stone.  You couldn't see anything outside that cone of light unless the lightning lit things up.

At around three, both dogs started to howl.  They almost never do that.  I went out again. The dogs and cats were all clustered around one end of the porch, staring intently into the woods. The dogs were bristled up and the cats were fluffed up. Whatever was out there, was apparently not welcomed by the resident animals. I can't really understand the howling. Barking would have been the more normal reaction.

Got up around one this afternoon, and made myself a good breakfast (brunch, lunch?) of fried potatoes and garlic sausage. I set off both smoke detectors in the kitchen but that's part of the price for walking away from the frying pan and letting the oil get too hot. When you live in a log house, you are never far from a smoke detector.

 Outside it's cool and the air is much drier.  There's a light wind blowing.

The only sound coming out of the woods is the occassional Blue Jay, Wood Pecker, Crow, or the ever droning cicadas.

There was some shooting last night, way off in the distance but I have no idea what it was.  Given that it was taking place in the forest in the wee hours of the morning, I doubt it was target practice.

The rest of the day I will spend listening to the radio.  Sunday is a good day for talk radio on our sole local station. I like listening to the talk radio programs because they tend to focus on one issue each broadcast, and you can learn a lot more about a specific topic than you can by listening to a 30 second sound bite on television. Later in the day they play music from the 1940's, and I try to listen to that program every Sunday.

All is quiet in the ether, most people who's blogs I read are not writing just now.  Taking the weekend off doing something else, no doubt.  I am still not sure if I lost any comments when that post collapsed blogger on my head earlier in the week.  Since no one has written to say their comment didn't post, I may not have.   I hope everyone knows that I wouldn't fail to publish a comment written by my friends.

No room in the Inn, or , the trouble with impromptu road trips.

My wife and I wanted to go up to a lake near the South Carolina border, and spend the night.  It's in a county that's fairly isolated. There are no four lane roads going in there , and it's a tough drive, winding and twisting through the mountains.  We used to spend a lot of weekends at this lake years ago.

So, we headed out.  It was a really hot day, and humid, but the drive is beautiful if you aren't in a hurry. Traffic was light, because people don't like going through those mountains. Lots of them get car sick with all the twists and turns.

 You can rent little cabins along the lake shore.  No frills or amenities like television or internet, but comfortable.

They are air conditioned and that's really all you need this time of year. In the fall, you need reservations to get a cabin, and in winter you can't really get in or out very easily. But this late in the summer I didn't anticipate any trouble getting a cabin.

I didn't take into account, however, that they would be having a car show up there.  Apparently the car aficionados started arriving Friday night, and are staying through Saturday, leaving on Sunday afternoon.  Not only were there a lot of people who came to display their 1916-1980 period autos, but a huge crowd came to buy, photograph, or just enjoy looking.

My wife and I couldn't find any cabin rental place that had a vacancy. We might could have stayed in the one motel in town, but that wasn't what I wanted. I was looking forward to sitting by the water, smoking my pipe, and watching the boats go by.

All of these paintings are of that particular lake, so you can have some idea of how scenic and tranquil it is.  It was disappointing that we had to come back tonight, but we both agreed that we had a fun time today.

There's a very good military surplus store just down the road from this town. The old fashioned kind that sells military equipment at reasonable prices. I enjoyed plundering around in there and found some good gear that was affordable.  They also had an excellent magazine rack in the local grocery store, and I got some great magazines I'd been looking for.  My wife got a nice necklace from a local craftsman who has a shop there in town.  We had a really good meal, at a modest cost, and all in all things went very well.

I went to a pet store and got several tubes of ferret paste at about half what I normally pay. Also found a bag of ferret food that has no grains in it, and is all comprised of meat. I dare not tell what I paid for it, because everyone would be shocked at such profligacy, but the truth is nothing is too good for my ferrets.

Here are the magazines I was able to get today. Because I haven't been going into town much, the magazines have been getting snapped up before I get in to the store. I was beginning to think I'd have to order them from the publishers as back issues ,even though some of them have only just been released. I don't know why the grocery store only orders 200 copies, they could sell many more and they don't get billed for any they don't sell.  The manager is a nice guy but he's something of a dolt, as well. The way they've been doing things is always good enough for him.

Be Ready is a Shotgun News Publication, only about a year old.  It's largely oriented towards firearms. You'd expect that though, since firearms and accessories are what Shotgun News is all about

Be Ready is more oriented towards women than most survival magazines. I suppose that makes sense because there are a huge number of women in the community now. Many of them are single moms, with kids. That puts a lot of pressure on a woman because she has no husband to help with all the things that have to be done, and sometimes it means she may not have much disposable income. But it's a big market, and since women like Survival Mom have gained such a following, Shotgun News is trying to tap into that market with Be Ready.  I enjoy reading it because some of the articles are original, about unusual subjects, and that's hard to find in survivalist magazines. Be Ready runs $8.98 plus sales tax.

 This odd magazine was on the rack so I bought a copy. I've never heard of it before, so perhaps this is the first edition or maybe it's a one off.

It has an article about the bizarre show Naked and Afraid, which almost kept me from buying it. But I have a lot of time for reading, and you never know what you'll pick up from the strangest sources.

I've thumbed through it, and on the face of things it doesn't look very good.  However, I saved a lot of money on the cabin I didn't get to rent, so I figured I'd bring it home and give it a second lookover.

It costs $8.98.








Gear Guide is put out by American Survival Guide.

It comes out quarterly, and is basically a sort of Consumers Report for Survivalists.  Much of the equipment, probably the majority of it, is designed for use in the outdoors. I know some people who buy this magazine not for any self sufficiency reasons but because they are hikers, bikers, or in one case, a rock climber.

I can't say I've ever gone out and purchased anything because I saw it in this magazine. But I enjoy looking at all the new technology, and I have seen things that gave me new ideas. Then I went out and bought military surplus gear on line that filled the same function but was much less expensive.

If I had an unlimited budget, I'd buy some of this equipment. As it is, the $8.99 for the magazine is about all I can swing.




 Off Grid is published by the editors of Recoil.

Both are excellent magazines, and if they are a bit more expensive at $9.99 a copy, I think they're both worth it.

Off Grid has a different editorial style and the photography and art work is really good .  They publish writers who are not commonly known in the vastly expanded genre of survival magazines, so it's fresh and different.

They also tend to focus on one particular threat in each magazine, and that makes Off Grid a good addition to your library at home.  Granted, it's largely oriented towards the more active 20 to 30's age group, who are more apt to be bugging out when the SHTF.  But the older, sedentary crowd who are forting up can always find something useful in it.


I know I have talked about these magazines before, but I get emails asking specifics about them so I thought I might fill in some of the gaps in my earlier post.

 
All things being equal, it's been a good day.  Did a lot of shopping in the kinds of places I enjoy, and on the way home we hit the Grocery Outlet and really stocked up on cheese, canned sausage, canned vegetables, meat, soup, and a host of good things.  We accomplished a lot, we got out of the area for a bit, had a good time, and I got my magazines.  I'm satisfied with that. When Fall comes we'll make reservations at the lake and stay a weekend then.

I almost forgot. Here's the latest on Hurricane Danny, may it stay away from North Georgia!

Friday Morning

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Called my daughter last night.  Good thing I pay for a land line up there, because she says her pet squirrel chewed up her $157.00 smart phone. She says she left it on the bed, and the squirrel came along and chewed it to pieces. 

I am trying to buy her another one on line, but dealing with AT&T is impossible. There may be another cell phone outfit in the world where one of the hiring parameters is a complete inability to speak English ,but I doubt it.  You call AT&T, you get Indians. They try, but you are wasting your breath. 

I haven't been to bed yet, and it's eight in the morning. So I am going to bed now. Maybe I won't wake up til tomorrow. That suits me.  I don't expect to be back on this weekend, see you all Monday.

At least when bears come to my place, they only tear up the old trash bin.

Hurricane Danny. The sun was out when I started writing this. Pouring now.

Hurricane Danny is the first of the season.  The weather channel says it will cause some issues in the Caribbean but will weaken and be a non event by the time it reaches the continental U.S.

If it does at all.   You can track it through this link:  National Hurricane Center


When I sat down to write this, I had just come in off the porch and the sun was out.  Before I even finished the title, I heard rain on the roof and it's flooding now.  Twenty years ago, this was normal for summer. There would be a thunderstorm every afternoon, then the sun would come out. I'm not used to it anymore though.

At least I got into town and back before the rain.  Living Ready had a new magazine out.

I've never seen anything from Living Ready in a grocery store before. I have always purchased their infrequent magazines by going on line.  Actually, it's been so long since they published a magazine I thought they'd decided to get out of the business. They seem to be primarily oriented towards on line sales of equipment and supplies. I keep up with them because they strike me as being more as a group of like minded people than they do as a "business."

While I was in town, I bought $100 worth of groceries.  It amounted to four plastic bags, and that's it.

When a pack of beef hot dogs is $6.00,  I guess I shouldn't be surprised.  I did pick up some ferret food and dog food and that's expensive too.  Diesel is down, going for $2.43 and gasoline is just above the $2.20 mark.  When I was in Tennessee last week they had regular for $1.99.

Last night I did something I almost never do.  I cooked a meal.  Made myself chili and rice, and a big pan of cornbread. It's really too much trouble , especially cleaning up, but every once in awhile I take the time. I've got all this cast iron cookware, I feel like I should use it sometime.

Not much else to report from the top of the mountain. For all those who watch "Alone" (even my mom and my brothers little boy get together at Grandma's to watch it), the show has been renewed and they will soon be looking for the cast.  Anybody want to give it try. No whiners, wimps, guys in touch with their female side, or plain old Chicken S--ts will get in this time, I hope.

Night Rain.

夜雨

It rained all night here.  Not hard, but steady.   It's raining now.  Once the sun is up, I'm going to town.  Getting back up here may be interesting.  I'll be driving the truck, and all the muck on the jeep trail will be soaking wet.  Throwing some firewood in the back will help get over the steepest parts of the trail.  I'll go ahead and put the ax and the chain saw in the cab, because there are certain to be at branches on the trail, and if I'm just really lucky, there will be trees across it.

No parent is ever "off the hook" when it comes to their kids.

My 27 year old daughter is being "stalked" by an ex boyfriend. I never liked the guy, though I am not allowed to say so now as my wife and daughter both find this fact irrelevant.

With all the decent young men coming back from the wars in sand land,  I had hoped she'd find someone of that nature. Instead, her last two boy friends have looked like someone out of Breaking Bad or the Hell's Angels.

The last one turned out to be psychotic, and his psychiatrist says he is "bi polar" , which explains his bizarre behavior.  I don't know about that.  She's had to block him on her email, change her cell phone number, and get a restraining order. Fat lot of good any of that does. The last time she had a jerk boyfriend causing problems, I had to explain things to him personally to resolve it.  My daughter doesn't want me to do that this time, so I don't know what I can do about all this.

I ordered some mace for her.  Her Georgia concealed carry permit has expired, and in the state she lives in you have to go through all this B.S. designed to make the process for getting a permit so onerous that no one will go through it.  She doesn't carry a purse, and she very slim, so I don't know what good a CCL would do anyway.

She talked to management at work, so now one of the male workers walks her out to her car after work.  I told her to pull up right in front of her apartment. She will either be with her brother, who works at the same business, or he can come out to meet her.  She works evenings and nights, and leaving work then getting home is probably the most dangerous time.

Both she and her brother progressed far in martial arts, but I don't put a lot of faith in that. A few years ago, a young woman walking on the Appalachian Trail  up here was abducted and murdered by a serial killer. She had a black belt in karate, but he had a police truncheon.  Small women can't fight off hulking men in most circumstances. All that nonsense in the movies is so much B.S. and a sop to the feminists, none of whom ever won a medal for not being delusional.

Well.  No point in dwelling on negative aspects of life. We've done what we can within the law, and at this point that's as far as my wife and daughter want to go.

On a more positive note, I walked down the mountain and got the mail yesterday. Took a plastic bag for the mail and wore my trusty Swiss Army rain poncho. Keeps the rain off your head and shoulders but your trouser legs and boots still get soaked.

This was in the mailbox. It's a new idea for Sportsmans Guide. They usually put out little mini catalogs, but for the first time they have published a master catalog. I've looked through it briefly at this point, and there are lots of good things in there.

If you were dropped in the middle of the Amazon Basin, but could equip yourself with whatever you wanted from Sportsmans Guide, you'd be ok. Provided you weren't one of the contestants from "Alone".

Sportsman's Guide even sell guns now.

How can you not like an outfit that sells guns, ammo and field equipment?


In closing, if you want to feel depressed and angry at the same time, read this post I've linked at the bottom of the page.  Sheeple deserve everything they get. Those who can't or won't defend themselves are always going to be prey for the criminals. But it's tough on the dependents who are relying on them for protection.

In a Perfect World