I’m your audience, not your customer

Im old. I know this.  I’ve been on the internet a long time.  I used to access usenet and irc II and email with PINE via a unix shell account.  I owned a 1200 baud modem.  My first “real” computer was an XT.   I pre-date the World Wide Web.  I suffered through AOL hometown and geocities (I did not have sites there; I was a snob ;)) and an epidemic of Comic Sans. Then came frontpage and even more heinous crimes against our eyes and ears.  When the first real blogging sites came along, they were mostly about people sharing opinions, providing information, connecting with others out there.  Open up a site and there it was.  The worst thing you’d get loading a page was some stupid music player. (I hate hate hated those sites.  No matter how much I enjoyed the content, if they put on a music player, off my visit list it went.)

I long for the days where the only annoyance and interference to page loading was a damn music player.  People just pile their pages with ads now.  Everyone apparently wants to generate income with thier sites.  This is not subtle.  Every Tom, dick, and harry seems to think thier opinions, recipes, advice, and what not is worth ads on both sides, in the middle of their content, covering the page and making you scroll, pop ups, multiple widgets directing you to all thier social media sites.  Links to Amazon stores, affiliate links, sales of digital content, pop ups to subscribe to thier email lists, banner ads that cover bits of the site, no matter how I resize the screen.  Selling site memberships.  Asking for by the video donations.  And the more we ignore them and because blind to them, when these digital billboards aren’t enough to get our attention, they ramp it up again.

This (I blurred, im not trying to shame anyone specific) isn’t even near a worst offender, I mean gosh, why isn’t there a cpc banner down both sides?!? —

img_0635

I’d already dismissed a hovering redundant social media link bar and a pop up to subscribe.  As you scroll down, there are ads every 3-4 lines.  It takes for freaking ever to load these pages.  It used to be we were grateful to have an audience, and you could make connections, actually have conversations via comments and develop friendships.

Now it’s all about duping us and selling to us and at the very least, making us pay with our time just to pull up a damn site.

Shoots in a week or two?

I didn’t get process pictures. Oops.  But we did our next step in growing pea shoot microgreens today.  Daughter filled the half tray with our growing medium and dampened it well.  Then she rinsed the peas that have been soaking the last 24 hours and spread them out.  Here’s where it gets iffy. 3/4 cup looked like too much to me after soaking when you spread them out.  They are supposed to be sown close together, but a lot of these are touching and even maybe slightly overlapped.

img_1378

I’ve watched several videos and read a number of pages but nothing is very specific aside from the 1 1/2 cups for 20×10 tray that one YouTube video estimated.  Anyway, I set it where I think it will get the best light in a bay window-y area.  But while it’s sprouting, it is supposed to NOT get sun, so we flipped over a second 10×10 tray over the top.  I will go even out the peas a little bit when EllieBean is away; I didn’t want to diminish her sense of ownership in the project by tidying it in front of her

img_1379

Now we just need to mist it every day and wait for the magic to happen. 🙂

Peas – don’t shoot, I’m unarmed!

One reason I have been working to get my preparedness binder in shape is that otherwise I get distracted with side projects. Take sprouting, for instance.  I was reading about food storage and clicked off on one link or another and was reading about sprouts.  A lot of nutrition, a good way to have something fresh and green with your food storage meals.  Apparently pretty easy to add sprouting items to your preps.

I remember a couple of my Mom’s friends who I suppose looking back, were homesteaders. They raised rabbit for food, had gardens, chickens and compost piles.  I don’t think we called it that, they were hippies. When I was there, meal time was very strange to me. I seem to recall everything had wheat germ in it. Anyway, 35-40 years ago were those times, and that’s the last time I ever really had “sprouts”.

So, reading about sprouts, picked up a kindle unlimited book to read and found learning about growing sprouts are often paired with learning about microgreens.  Well, I pay a fortune for pea shoots whenever they are available at my local New Seasons.   I can grow those?!  In my house?

Pea shoots are amazing. Tons of vitamins, far more than the actual peas that they would eventually produce.  Pea Shoots are a nutritious leaf with high levels of vitamin C and vitamin A. A 50g portion (about 2/3 a cereal bowl full) of these tasty greens offers more than half of the RDA for vitamin C, a quarter of the RDA for vitamin A and significant amounts of folic acid.   They aren’t a significant source of calories (only 9 for those 50g), but for nutrition and for varying your diet and preventing food fatigue, And just because I love them and they are expensive to buy, this sounds like something I “need”.

I tried to figure out online why kind of yield I could expect from a pound of pea seeds.  One site selling organic seeds suggested it’s only 1 pound per pound of seeds. The OSU extension office had far different yields. However, I think that was geared towards large scale growing with multiple harvests from each seed rather than indoor 20″x10″ planting trays, harvesting at the base when they reach a few inches.

So never mind I have a lot more important items to acquire first, I decide that I just have to test it myself. A few days pass.  Ding dong!  My box from sprout people arrived!

img_0362

(In addition to my pea shoot experiment, I also got a pound of a seed blend for traditional sprouting.) So 1 lb. of this particular pea seed was about 2 1/2 cups, and to do half the tray (as you can see, I got a split tray; that way I can stagger the plantings) should take about 3/4 cup.  So my daughter is excited about this experiment too.  She measured out the seeds and set them to soaking so tomorrow we can “plant” them.

img_0366

Of course, there is no way she will eat these. Probably. She might tolerate them in her salad; she does love a salad.  Time will tell 🙂

I blinked, and the day is over.

I did pretty much nothing productive today. I had intentions to finally get my pantry emptied and tidied and re-organized when the kids were in school, but that didn’t happen.

img_0349

img_0350

Here is where it stands right now. You can see how much space is wasted on non food items.

I am still not sure what I’m going to do about all the lunch making and bento supplies. When they are all binned up, it fills 8-10 of the large ones.  I’ve spent a lot of time and money collecting all these items. And when my son was in kinder through 4th grade, I used it every day. He appreciated fun shaped foods and cheese carving and character meals. Then he grew out of that, and while my daughter was starting kinder when my son started 5th grade, it quickly became obvious it was a waste of time to spend 30 minutes or more on artfully constructed lunches. She barely eats any lunch in general, and refused to eat a cute sammie with a face drawn with food safe markers.  She’s very picky and only eats a few vegetables, so what’s the point of making radish mushrooms or chain link cucumber when she MIGHT eat 2 baby carrots, a strawberry or two and half a jelly sandwich?  She won’t eat eggs or cheese or cured meats in her lunch. She doesn’t like grapes or kiwi or any exotic fruits. She doesn’t eat nuts or dried fruits of any kind. If I line her box with curly lettuce, she won’t eat anything it touched. She won’t eat my sons favorite brunch for lunch with mini pancakes or waffles because they aren’t hot off the griddle/maker. I can’t even make her sandwiches on different types of breads. No rolls or croissants or wraps – even if the filling is the same.

In short, she is challenging to feed.  She doesn’t even like traditional kids foods.  The things I don’t want to make anyway, but have tried out of desperation – no corn dogs, no chicken nuggets.  Only plain cheese pizza.  Even foods she will eat one way, she won’t even try if presented in a slightly different way.   This is not all just pickiness.  She has some genuine issues with food that stem from sensory issues and “overexcitabilities” that are part of her giftedness.  She has a lot of anxieties about new and different things, not just about food.  She is very sensitive to flavors and textures.  Everything seems more intense for her. I don’t short order cook though, or let her limited diet influence my meal plan too much.  I try to include one item that I know she will eat (a lot of the time that is a salad with ranch dressing).  And after seeing a food 2-3 dozen times, she will often finally take a nibble or two.

Well, that got a bit off topic, sorry.  This may give you a bit of insight into how challenging stocking food storage may be for me though!

Anyway, I was super bummed because I was quite invested in my adorable lunches. Aside from the occasional cute food pick or small container for dressing, all those supplies go unused. And it’s been that way for 3 years.  So I am going to have to be emotionally strong and pack that stuff up. Trying to look at the bright side – think of how much more food and supplies will fit after I do it!

So at school time, I stayed to volunteer a bit in the classroom. After that I came home with intentions of attacking the pantry – instead I had a long nap :0

Im So Giddy!

I was checking out Cragislist, sorta looking for food grade barrels and / or gamma lids, more to get an idea of availability and cost versus buying them new when I was browsing around and came across a listing for canning jars.  There’s lots of overpriced vintage jar ads, but this was different – clearly from a family who are no longer canning, not some re-saler looking to make a profit.  50-some 1/2 pint, 50-some pint, 40-some quart and a handful of 1/2 gallon jars, for a total of 152 jars, all stored in 4 Rubbermaid roughneck totes for only 25$ !!  The totes alone, if I purchased them new would cost more than that!

041

I emailed them right away, and they got back to me today.  They wanted to make sure the jars were going to someone that actually wanted to can with them, and I assured them that this is a skill I really do want to become proficient in.  I rushed right over to get them. They even threw in a bag of rings and unopened boxes of lids! A 12 pack of quart jars, new, I haven’t seen for less than 30$ and I’ve see them for 50$ or more on amazon.  Half-Pints and Pints are a bit better at 10-15$ a dozen (but about half my half pints are the decorative cut glass looking ones).

The wife, who had been the canner, looking a little frail and very sweet, said she went through and recycled any jars that had chips or seemed unsafe.  I still will check them of course, but even if a few were unusable for actual canning, I can find a use for it.  (I love me some mason jar crafts)

Unless Santa brings me a Pressure Canner, I probably won’t get any use from my jars until next year, but I am absolutely giddy with excitement to have these supplies that I can fill with food to build the pantry.

Do you trust the news media?

These days, Americans trust in news sources is lower than its ever been.  (Assuming I can believe the American press institute and the Pew Research Center ;)). Ratings thru fear mongering and appealing to the lowest of intellect, watering down real news, reporting fluff instead of hard hitting news stories, obvious political bias’.  Why is it so hard to find an outlet you can rely on to provide fair, balanced, accurate and complete news?

With a thousand (thousands? 10s of thousands?) different “news” sources on the internet all slanting it to support their pet political beliefs or moral imperatives, social media spreading anything like a fact (just check snopes before reposting, would you, please?), the most well known media outlets viewed with skepticism – how can anyone really be informed and be certain the thoughts and feelings and beliefs they develop from their news sources are really substantiated and are worth defending?  And then it’s just fact that most people will believe the “news” that supports the opinions they already hold.

I have avoided news for a while.  I don’t trust much of anything I read or hear from any of the major 3 letter networks. Even CNN, who I once felt was an unimpeachable news source has lost my confidence.      It depresses me, both to see the lack of journalistic integrity, and the content that is reported. Another killing, more deaths, disasters, countries approaching war, more evidence that refutes the idea that people are all basically good.

But I don’t like being uninformed.  I don’t like reading this blog or that blog and wondering if that person is as conspiracy nutcase-y as they seem, or do they have a better source of accurate intel.  I’m tentatively news seeking at the Economist, BBC and NPR.  Those are the sources I most trust when researching something specific.

So where do you get your news? Do you trust it?

“Real” Preppers — Click Away Now

So I have some things to say, which “real” preppers won’t appreciate.  I’ll just say that this is what I believe.  I’m an intelligent, well-read and moderately educated mid 40’s woman.  I’ve done my own research, seeking out non-profit, non-partisan, and scientific sources.  Of course pretty much everything and anything on the internet is suspect (like every second prepper site quoting Franklin as saying “if you fail to plan, you are planning to fail” – He didn’t.  That isn’t even language aligned with the time period.  see franklinpapers.org) because people spew “facts” they read somewhere else, and the next thing you know, its everywhere.  Like a red pen in a load of whites.

I don’t expect to convince anyone who believes differently from me to change their minds, but maybe they will be a little more open to new ideas and actually try to find answers — and not from other conspiracy theory slinging, doomsday ringing folks who already think as they do.  A girl can dream.

cons

Fukuskima – Sure, the radiation is still traveling the ocean and washing up on our shores.  That is true.  But the level recorded is so small (11 bequerels) that a single dental x-ray exposes you to 1000 times more radiation than swimming in the “contaminated” water for a year.

Fluoride in your water is safe.  Even desirable.  It doesn’t have the effect of Prozac.  Really.  Prozac does not contain fluoride.  It contains Fluoxetine, which is formed of multiple (5 I believe) different elements, including fluoride.  Chemical bonds being what they are and the way compounds are formed — well, can you breath underwater since it contains O (oxygen)?  You aren’t being drugged into submission via fluoride in your water.  That’s just crazy.

RFID chips do not cause cancer.  Neither do cell phone towers.  Maybe if you spent a lot of time CLOSE to it and PARALLEL to it, your risk of cancer might be greater.  But even directly under it, you are exposed to more radiation from your cell phone in your pocket than the cell tower above you which does not scatter down.

Vaccinations are safe.  They do not cause autism or make you sick.  If you don’t vaccinate, you are endangering the lives of others.  Please don’t come around me or my family.  Thanks.

GMOs.  sigh.  So many educated people I know even rail against them.  We’ve been practicing “genetic modification” of our food for as long as gardeners have been trying to cross-breed and keep meticulous records to breed hardiness in food, to make it more resistant to bugs, etc.  Farmers have been doing it, trying to remove aggression in certain breeds, or improve the texture of their wools, and so on.  Just because it took many generations to get it done doesn’t change what was happening at the cellular and genetic level.   OK, so now scientists can go in and gene-splice and get those results in an instant.  So what?  Doesn’t make them DANGEROUS.  Other issues with Monsanto and their ilk?  Squeezing out the small farmer?  Making seeds infertile so you have to buy a new bunch every time?  Cramming too much processed, unhealthy crap on the shelves? Possibly.  But there’s really no evidence that eating the actual crop of their GMOs causes any harm.

Amero?  really?  I can’t even.

There might be a polar shift.  The geologic record shows that hundreds of pole reversals have occurred throughout Earth’s history; they happen when patches of iron atoms in Earth’s liquid outer core become reverse-aligned, and eventually they overwhelm the original iron atoms. But the landscape won’t shift.  There will not be disaster as continents leap to the opposite side of the globe.  Our compasses would point in a different direction.  And can you feel the geomagnetic field now?  No?  That’s right, so why would you feel it if it were the other direction?  During a transition, its possible that the magnetic field that protects us from excessive solar radiation could weaken.  IF there were a massive solar event (CME) at that  time, and it was aimed right at us, MAYBE we could see some EMP like effects.  Given the length of time that would likely take, it’s not impossible. But even if the field becomes very weak, at the Earth’s surface we are shielded from radiation by the atmosphere.  The fact is, we most likely would not notice any significant change from such a reversal.

Obama is not evil.  And the world doesn’t view him as a terrible leader and look down on American because of it.  Independent polls, conducted by non-profit, non-partisan groups indicate that some really like him (India), some don’t like him at all (Russia), but for the most part, they just don’t have strong feelings one way or the other.  The slight majority feel that he is an effective leader.  And that’s pretty much like any other president we have had.

Alien Invasion?  Never say never, its a great big world out there, but the odds of encountering alien life overwhelmingly suggest we would find something more like bacteria before we ever found another form evolved into high intelligence.

Zombie Apocalypse?  Haha

There may be world threatening dangers out there.  Cyber attacks on our infrastructure, terrorism, EMP resulting from nuclear detonation or enormous CME.  I could be facing the Big One (earthquake) as I live in the Cascadia Subduction Zone.  Peak Oil Energy could happen in my lifetime.   The research is ongoing and the Jury is still out for me.

I just wish that more people would stop hearing what they want to believe, and do independent research before they spew more nonsense into the ether.  But I guess someone out there might feel that way about my post right now, so who am I to judge?

Dr. K is in the house

The next part of my binder has to do with medical preps.

1. Medical / Dental Supply Inventory
2. Kits to build
3. Quick Reference Pages
4. Location of additional reference materials

I have basic first aid kits in the house and car, but they are far from the best. You know, 500 pieces, and 400 are band-aids.   My first step is to go through the many comprehensive lists of supplies and create a personalized list for our inventory.  Then I need to build (or purchase) better kits for “immediate” use.  Finally, I can focus on building supplies and equipment for potential long term needs.

Breathe, breathe, breathe

So this is what the binder breakdown looks so far.  Yes, I am feeling overwhelmed.  Even taking it step by step, when you step back and look at the big picture and try to figure out where exactly to start; it’s too much!

  1. Emergency Contacts & Plans
    1. Emergency Contacts
    2. Personal Information
    3. Financial & Legal
    4. Home Inventory
    5. Medical Information
    6. Emergency Plans
    7. Resources
  2. Self
    1. Self-Reflection / Mental Preparedness
    2. Health
    3. Fitness
    4. Frugality / Debt Freedom
    5. Cultivating a Community
    6. Skills / Training
  3. Water
    1. Water Storage
    2. Rain Water Reclamation
    3. Wells / Pumps
    4. Natural Sources
    5. Filtering / Making Water Safe to Drink
  4. Food Supplies
    1. Food Storage Inventory
    2. Food Storage Calculations
    3. Storage Methods
    4. Storage Containers & Organizers
    5. Sustainable Stored Food (gardening, canning, livestock, etc) – See Skill Acquisition / Homesteading & Gardening Notebooks
  5. Food Preparation off the grid
    1. Off The Grid Supplies (Can openers, etc)
    2. Off the Grid Cooking Methods
    3. Food Storage Recipes
  6. Medical Supplies
  7. Medical Knowledge
  8. Sanitation & Hygiene
  9. Backup Power
  10. Keeping Warm
  11. Lighting
  12. Self-Defense & Security
  13. Financial Security
  14. Emergency Communications
  15. Create Survival Library
    1. Maps / Atlas
    2. First Aid & Medical Books
  16. Homeschooling & Education
  17. Skill Acquisition
    1. Gardening
    2. Composting
    3. Fishing
    4. Foraging
    5. Hunting
    6. Livestock
    7. Cheesemaking
    8. Food Preserving
    9. Homebrewing
    10. Soapmaking
    11. Candlemaking
    12. Herbal Healing & First Aid
    13. Sewing, Quilting
    14. Knitting, Crocheting
    15. Woodworking & Carpentry
    16. Handyman & DIY
    17. Outdoors Survival Skills – knots, shelters, walking sticks, etc
    18. Homemade Self & Home Care Products
  18. Prepper Projects
  19. Bugging Out

Eating when the SHTF

Photo of dried pasta in jars on a shelf in a domestic kitchen. Very shallow depth of field focusing on the middle jar.

Next up in my Binder – Food.  I divided the two food sections thusly:

Food Supplies

    1. Food Storage Inventory
    2. Food Storage Calculations & Acquisition Plan
    3. Storage Methods
    4. Storage Containers & Organizers
    5. Sustainable Food

Food Preparation Off the Grid

    1. Off The Grid Supplies
    2. Off the Grid Cooking Methods
    3. Food Storage Recipes

Sustainable Food will probably be supported by a separate notebook, as well as information in the Skill Acquisition section – gardening, food preservation, sprouting, and so on.  I plan to keep a gardening journal.

At the moment, there are no plans to add any livestock of any kind.  We’ve got no land for anything larger than a few chickens or possibly rabbits.  Hubby isn’t on board with either, and realistically with the coyotes in the green space adjacent to my property and the size of the yard and the closeness of the neighbors – neither is very practical either.