Not Exactly “Survival”

by

But we did have a big (26″ diameter) tree go down in the yard of the house across the street from us.  Taking down power. Except across is 600-feet out here, street is single lane dirt and oil sand road, and we’ve been on backup systems since:

Went out and talked to the lineman who had “hunting chores” overnight.  Told him we were a co-gen site and while our power was automatically cut (feeding the grid) we nevertheless also pulled a physical disconnect to ensure no back-feeding. Crews appreciate that.

This was a partly rotten tree.  And while we were looking at the wire run that would need to go back up, there was an odd noise in the ice-covered trees.

“Yep, them old buzzards don’t like to be woke up like that….”

Another one for Ure’s adventure book:  Buzzard noises in the high forest canopy in an ice storm.  Hell yeah.

Dry runs for the End of the World are great. We have identified a couple of weaknesses in our systems.  For example, we will be upsizing the battery bank for the garden room from 35- amp-hours to one (and maybe a pair) of 100-amp-hour deep cycles.

In the meantime, the floating charger will get a line over from the shop building which (stilling having power) will ensure the garden room stays toasty at 60F.

The big BBQ will be lit up after sunrise and a pot of coffee will go on.  Followed by a cut up top sirloin with scrambled eggs for breakfast.

Like I said, not exactly “Survival conditions” but we are enjoying the backup 30,000 BTU propane backup heat system in the house.  Holding about 70F’ it’s 30F and sleeting outside.  I’d just finished a hot shower and the microwave beeped the tea done just as the “CEEE-rack” report from the tree falling was heard.  An EMP event won’t be so predictable or gentle, I expect.

Point is, it’s both coolish, and wettish, with a side order of slippish in East Texas today.

But the show – and the websites go on.

Peoplenomics has the ChartPack and a dandy longish report on back engineering a free energy device.  And we just got the new ADP Employment numbers.  Weaker than expected with only 106,000 jobs added.

While this would tank the market in normal times, the hypsters will profess the Fed can lower less than a 1/2 point today because the economy is in trouble.

We’ll watch from the sidelines till after the Fed, thanks.

Have fun waiting on that.  We’ll have fun waiting on the lights.

Write when you get rich,

George@Ure.net

21 thoughts on “Not Exactly “Survival””

  1. Stay warm young fella. Cold weather tips: double up!

    Maintain a stock of hand warmer packs (they make an amazing difference in pockets / EMTs put them at armpits for shocky cold patients). Every one hears layer-up but most neglect the extremities. Wear two pairs of gloves (silk liners are great, any thin inner glove works). The other extremities, your feet, will grouse at pulling on boots over double socks then luxuriate in comfy cushiness and relative warmth. If you don’t have a supply of stocking hats you aren’t paying attention. Heat wicks from your noggin. Hats and hoods together work great (and, we all have hat hair so machts nichts). A thermal vest inside winter coat is nice (and can be a car coat). If the core gets cold you’re a gonner.

    ATL (around the lake): it’s 8F as I type. Minor breeze. Lake went hard water last night except for a small puddle being patrolled by late migrating geese.

    Write when you get warm,
    Egor

  2. “The big BBQ will be lit up after sunrise and a pot of coffee will go on. Followed by a cut up top sirloin with scrambled eggs for breakfast.”

    I hear ya.. I put a pot of coffee on the other day and water everywhere.. the coffee pot we had.. ( automatic coffee maker) has a boiler box they put a bake lite box around the heating elements the water goes in and it perks then comes out over the grounds.. well other than the mess it made.. ( hole burned into the heating element.) it was an inconvenience.. if you only knew how many pots of coffee is made in one day.. a two year run for that coffee maker is probably a lifetime for most people.. I wasn’t to thrilled it isn’t like I don’t have an extra pot around.. (I collect kitchen gadgets and probably have fifty coffee pots) so I used the old french press barista then went and bought a new coffee maker.. I kind of like this one.. it isn’t as good as the dang I can’t remember the name of the last one we had.. made excellent coffee and not as good as the one at the car dealership.. or as good as the one I got from work.. that one I worked and took care of that coffee maker for twenty years at work.. then when they went to this crappy instant maker.. they called me and asked me.. do you want your old coffee machine.. you betcha.. it lasted twenty years here at our house to.. great machine a bunn two burner.. at the end I couldn’t buy parts for it.. LOL this one is going to be ok though.. I debated about putting the four year extended warranty on it..( I would be getting a new one every two years LOL) its a Keurig.. duo.. nice what I like about it is it has a bigger resevoir than the last one.. which was a hamilton beach.. nice machine to.. and a good one it did make it two years in our home.. most cheap ones last three months..and I can get two cups out of a pod.. which is nice or make a pretty decent pot.. ( I like mine stronger than the boss) it has a button on top to make the dripp slower get more out of the grounds.. LOL
    when it lights up and we go stone age.. dam I will be making coffee all day long.. won’t be no punch a button and go.. probably have to use the Turkish coffee maker and the french press if we survive bidens war.. or maybe the nitro cold brew.. that is fun to make coffee like sun tea.. LOL.. just takes a long time..

  3. “Racial Strife at home: We will keep an eye on what is said at today’s funeral for a Black man killed by five Black police which is somehow “the system’s fault” is it?”

    “Ben Crump, will deliver a “call to action” during a funeral at the Mississippi Boulevard Christian Church in Nichols’ adopted hometown of Memphis.”

    Hmm so the poor neighborhoods of Memphis are going to be destroyed… targeting the poor and ethnic neighborhoods.. OR.. will they go after neighborhoods like the Hamptons, Marthas Vineyard and beverly hills where the people that make the laws actually live… through my psychic abilities.. those dang poor people are the ones to pay the price .. go get em boys… destroy rape pillage show them just how powerful we are.. and oh hey the guy with the wad of bills to donate to you to do these damages will be running around to give them some incentive to burn their neighbors house down.. what a crock of SHIIZT.. if you ask me.. and I have seen the cam’s why did they even pull him over anyway.. I heard he did something horrible and offensive like forgot to turn his blinker on when he made a turn on his way home…
    anyway sensless violence won’t solve this.. if they want to demonstrate they should pick the neighborhoods where the people that make the laws live not the poorest neighborhoods.. which is who they will target.. slap the poor boy around destroy his home and local businesses.. look maime and rape their neighbors wives and dauthers…. forget the ones that make the decisions.. does anyone besides me see just how stupid this is and sensless.. the five officers.. I seen one post that said up to ten officers are not only fired but going to spend a great deal of time as inmates..

    • Once you get more than 5-6 blocks away from “the strip” — that part of Beale Street and its immediate area from which the best Blues and barbecue in the world emanate, pretty much the whole rest of Memphis is poor. I don’t know if Graceland is in Memphis or not — It is on the south side and in a nice area. The times I was in Memphis, I hung out mostly between Beale Street and the north side, which is mostly poor, and mostly Black, and the people are the salt of the Earth — Good folks, who’re probably about to get a bad rep, thanks to this targeted murder giving license to an influx of outside agitators and TV cameras…

      • They’ve seen it before …

        https://time.com/3691383/woolworths-sit-in-history/

        Cameras, folks from all over coming in to protest the protest at Woolworths. Folks there didn’t take kindly to outsiders coming in to hurt their kids who were protesting. Quite a fight in the streets.

        This time, it isn’t racial but it does fit the Defund / Re-educate Police reform narrative. Special ops police team? Yeah, I’ll bet they are/were. – I’ve got questions about it, but I ain’t sayin a word.

        • It’s the “defund / re-educate” crowd that causes crap like this. This was not a training failure. It was an extension of the “All cops are bad” narrative.

          When it becomes less attractive, popular, or financially-worthwhile to pursue any given vocation, money is increased. When that doesn’t get applicants through the door, standards and qualifications are lowered, to attract a wider variety of applicants.

          These police weren’t badly-trained, they were thugs.

          Also, Tyre Nichols was executed.

          When is the last time YOUR local SWAT or Street Crime unit made a traffic stop?

          Hint: NEVER!

          These guys stopped Nichols on purpose and intentionally beat him to death, because they were hired or coerced into doing it. Since he cried out for his mama, which jerks everybody’s heartstrings (mine included), no one will ever even ask, let alone discover the motivation for his murder, nor who ordered it. We will be force-fed the superfluous “bad, poorly-trained cops” narrative until it completely overwhelms any critical or intelligent analysis anyone could make.

        • Tale running around is that he was dating the baby mama of the child of one of the cops involved.

          Like with Floyd up in Minn., (the main cop involved knew Floyd) there is more to the story than is being talked about in the media.

          Sexual Jealousy is a major cause of violence everywhere, and with this type of event, with it’s clear INTENTIONAL beatdown, one needs to look at that as a potential underlying dynamic.

        • @Stephen 2

          “Like with Floyd up in Minn., there is more to the story than is being talked about in the media.

          What you already know about Floyd is more than 99.8% of all Americans. If you search my posts from that time period, you will know more than you do now — and BTW, THAT was also an execution…

    • The next one is the double amputee who was shot-up in CA when he made a ‘hop’ for it.

      That’s probably going to be $20,000,000.

  6. Buzzards? You still have buzzards around there? Better there than here. Usually they all head South when the cold sets in around here.
    We’ve got goat kids all over the place at the ranch and one in the back bedroom bathroom. I think the resident kid was a triplet an mom said “Look kid, I got 2 faucets and you the odd kid out. Tough luck.” We’re lucky there aren’t a half dozen in the bathroom with this weather. One of these days I need to build a warm shed in the back yard but that means I’ll have to go feed them in the cold … all day long and part of the night.

    But the buzzards are our top predator here as I’ve described before. They’ll hover around a nanny or sit next to one about to give birth and eat the kid as they pop out or very soon thereafter if I’m not there to ward them off with a shotgun. Protected status my achin’ back! I guess the cold is keeping them out of the area for now which lets the kids get a few days stronger to get away from the birds. Doesn’t matter, though, because when the Sun comes back Friday they’ll all be out in it sleeping like they’re dead and that’s when the birds pounce. They’re just as bad or worse than coyotes.

    • “One of these days I need to build a warm shed in the back yard but that means I’ll have to go feed them in the cold”

      Covered breezeway — essentially an aboveground tunnel. They used them in the Eastern snowbelt when folks in New Hampshire and Vermont got tired of digging tunnels through the snow, to their barns. Side panels can be made to be removable, and usually are, in the warm months.

  7. I haven’t put in a backup system for the greenhouse so I spent a half hour last evening bringing my newly sprouting exotic ($) chile pepper assortment into the house, just in case (They we’re on heating pads enclosed in their own mini greenhouses). Most the other plants are okay as the greenhouse should stay above freezing—the greenhouse has a door to the insulated garage which can passively bleed ‘warmer’ air.

  8. Your timing on getting the trees down from between your house /shop was cutting it close wrt the ice storm timing … but I’ll bet you are glad it was done when the ice started coating everything.

    We get serious winter weather at times here … but the times that power issues arise is when ice storms overload trees and branches and they come a tumbling, NOT when it is just super cold or super snowy.

    1/2″ of ice is really bad and around here northern drivers stay home when that happens, though they think 8″+ of snow is NO problem. Can’t believe southern drivers, who virtually never drive on ice or in the snow, who think they are so much better on the ice than northern drivers and go out and drive like it’s sunny, dry, and 70!! sheesh. If I lived in Dallas, Little Rock, or Memphis I would be hiding inside – not so much away from the ice but away from those crazy southern drivers!!

    Stay warm … and DO NOT go out driving, sheesh even limit one’s walking outside, until the ice is gone.

  10. 2022 Biggest Year Ever For Crypto Hacking with $3.8 Billion Stolen, Primarily from DeFi Protocols and by North Korea-linked Attackers
    https://blog.chainalysis.com/reports/2022-biggest-year-ever-for-crypto-hacking/

    Hacking activity ebbed and flowed throughout the year, with huge spikes in March and October, the latter of which became the biggest single month ever for cryptocurrency hacking, as $775.7 million was stolen in 32 separate attacks.

    Below, we’ll dive into what kinds of platforms were most affected by hacks, and take a look at the role of North Korea-linked hackers, who drove much of 2022’s crypto hacking activity and shattered their own yearly record for most cryptocurrency stolen.

    DeFi protocols by far the biggest victims of cryptocurrency hacks
    In last year’s Crypto Crime Report, we wrote about how decentralized finance (DeFi) protocols in 2021 became the primary target of crypto hackers. That trend intensified in 2022.
    …
    North Korea-linked hackers such as those in cybercriminal syndicate Lazarus Group have been by far the most prolific cryptocurrency hackers over the last few years. In 2022, they shattered their own records for theft, stealing an estimated $1.7 billion worth of cryptocurrency across several hacks we’ve attributed to them. For context, North Korea’s total exports in 2020 totalled $142 million worth of goods, so it isn’t a stretch to say that cryptocurrency hacking is a sizable chunk of the nation’s economy. Most experts agree the North Korean government is using these stolen to fund its nuclear weapons programs.

    Keep fillin’ those rice bowls BCN! The poor starving people on the other side of the World need nourishment.

  11. After days of overcast and rain, the sun came out this morning and it will hit 80F here today. Yard work day. Sorry for your ice storm. I remember those. Stay safe.

  12. As mentioned before, we have a single butane stove called Plana (there are others out there). When the electric grid is down, we use that to cook on, and use a stainless steel drip coffee maker for coffee.

    Just offering it again for versatility, and a stay-in-doors solution to cooking food and making coffee.

    Although a jolt of fresh cold air is good for the spirits.

    Hope your power comes up soonly.

    • For “trunk camping” I switched from a traditional two burner Coleman stove (white gas/unleaded) to a single burner butane stove. Even simpler to use than a propane cylinder (1# bottle) stove.

      Simple as pie to use, lights and works just like a single burner on a gas stove. Just turn the fuel on like on a gas stove and twist the sparker, and voila it is lit. The fuel canisters are held inside so it is a nice small little thing. OH … and they come inside a nice carrying case with handle. ($20+- on sale, $30+- normally)

      For buying additional butane cannisters CHEAP … visit your local Asian Grocery Store. Asians love em … so the Asian Supermarkets stock them in 6 and 12 packs. About 1/3 to 1/2 the price of Wal-Mart’s butane cannisters.

      Did I say it is just like cooking on a single burner gas stove? LOL

      Get a fold up “OVEN” gizmo’s to put on top and you can even BAKE stuff with them (or with a Coleman Stove). About the interior dimensions of one of the pint size microwave’s.

      Baked many things in mine when camping … just don’t trust their built in thermostat to be accurate, get a stand alone one that you can set on the rack inside to see what the temperature in the oven really is. (Coleman makes them, and I am sure a few others now too).

      A few years back Coleman came out with the “Serious Trunk Camper” cooking stove … a propane 2 burner stove with a large oven underneath. Sam’s Club carried them, and they were a super poor seller so Coleman only sold them for one year. I snagged two at season close out for $75 each (were originally about $250+-ish) but effectively it is a full kitchen stove system that runs on propane and is portable. Too heavy for me to take camping, but would be perfect for an occasional use cabin setup. Might find one on Ebay used if you are interested. Nicely made too!!

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