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Post by graynomad on Jan 3, 2015 19:52:46 GMT 10
Yes I think so. As I understand it this info is not current because they haven't been in touch for some time, and the reason for that is that they could no longer afford to use the internet. I do not know how long ago we are talking about though.
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Post by graynomad on Jan 3, 2015 7:30:30 GMT 10
Interesting aside, I've been staying with friends who have a contact in Russia, these people are professionals (physicist and uni lecturer IIRC) but things are so dire they have been living on...you guessed it, potatoes.
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Post by graynomad on Dec 29, 2014 8:49:56 GMT 10
I have a very low opinion of the college/university path in life. I never finished school and my wife left at 14, yet we retired at 45 after working in professional careers (photographer/electronics engineer for me, nurse/system administrator for her). The nearest I ever got to uni was designing a building control system for the ANU Like so many things in this world education has got out of hand and too far removed from reality. Sure we need surgeons and I think it's fair to say we want them to be properly educated. We don't need more MBAs (I'm not even sure that we need any), we don't need professors with lifetime tenure studying the use of the letter A in Mesopotamian middle class during the 4th century, we don't need so-called artists with a Batchelor of Arts creating installation art with toilet paper in the Aus National Gallery for morons to "interpret". Sure if things are ticking along well and everyone is safe and well fed maybe we can indulge in some of this crap. But that ain't how things are. We do need people who can do useful stuff, and to a large extent that means trades, many of which can be learned on the job, or at most a couple of years at TAFE. As for the iPod generation, I think the "i" says it all. I'm a techo type and like a new toy as much as most people, but let's keep it real. Unfortunately the entire western system is based on people needing the next great thing, even if that's the same thing just in a different colour. I don't see that changing without a reset. Not sure when it will happen of course, but I am sure it will happen.
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Post by graynomad on Dec 28, 2014 7:49:41 GMT 10
Thanks very much for the info guys. I have a particular interest in spuds because I don't eat any veggies except them. I keep trying to get keen about a veggie garden but when you don't eat the results it's hard to get motivated. Now with spuds I not only like them but it seems they are really easy to grow. So while it seems it's not really practical to "to live off it alone" it also seems that you almost could, throw in a few other things and you could survive quite well. I can see a spud garden in my future
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Post by graynomad on Dec 27, 2014 20:53:18 GMT 10
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Post by graynomad on Dec 27, 2014 19:53:39 GMT 10
I agree that a tray is way more practical, mostly because you have access on 3 sides. I had slide-out cookers and fridges, access to dual batteries etc etc all easy by just dropping the side boards. On one side the side board was used as a table. Also the whole thing is dead square, that makes it easier to build stuff into it. One possible down side is that it's all higher because it's over the wheels, not between them. As to colour, both my current 4x4s are white and yes that makes them cooler and more visible. And it's this visibility that is a problem IMO. Of course it's good on the road, but when in the bush I can climb up on a hill, look in the direction of my camp, and the tiny Jimny sticks out like dog's nuts, the 12-tonne truck parked right next to it is hard to see. I'm about to fit out my Cruiser as a camping vehicle and I plan to paint it either mid grey or some form of beige or desert tan, even now we tend to "commando camp", I do not want my camp to be visible from the road or wherever. Post SHTF (should that ever happen) it will be more important. Yes the colour will make it hotter, but when you add a tropical roof (roof rack, solar panels, etc) a large part of that is mitigated, and you tend to camp under the trees anyway. It's different in town in day to day life parking in car parks etc. But that's not something I do that often and it will be even less frequent soon. Joey, why a dual cab? Do you have family that needs to be seated? If not it's a total waste of space. If you do then of course you need it. Morgo, have you seen those fantastic camper backs for them, almost enough to make me buy a Jeep
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Post by graynomad on Dec 27, 2014 17:20:45 GMT 10
It was on the Internet so I don't know how reliable it is. But there was a study done that says you can live your whole life on just beer and potatoes... Well if if it's on the internet it must be true, I don't really care though, I'm perfectly willing to give it a try. Please God make it be true.
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Post by graynomad on Dec 27, 2014 8:33:05 GMT 10
I'll start with an article I found on Quora (link: www.quora.com/Irish-Potato-Famine/Why-did-so-many-people-starve-to-death-during-the-Irish-potato-famine), dunno where the "physics" comes into it but whatever. Irish Potato Famine: Why did so many people starve to death during the Irish potato famine?Couldn't they fish, hunt, trap birds, or eat wild greens?It comes down to a simple intersection of physics (well, chemistry but bear with me) and politics. Imagine if you were a parent of a family of say seven kids. Seven kids, two parents, 9 mouths to feed. You are doing ok, fine-ish, not rich, but not saving capital. Then tomorrow morning, all your reserves and all your bulwark against the future, not only a month from now, but that evening is wiped out. Are you going to learn to fish in that time if you didn't already do it? Trap birds? Really? How are you going to go about that? Do you, reading this, actually know how to "trap birds"? One in a thousand of you does. One in ten knows how to fish - IF - you are allowed access to the rivers and lakes (which we were not). How many reading this know how to fish in the sea? Navigate a boat on the ocean? One in twenty. Recognise an oak tree (for acorns)? One in three. But you don't have the leisure time to learn. Your food for tonight is rotten and so is your food for tomorrow and the day after and the weeks after that. In fact, the sprouting potatoes you were counting for the next crop are blighted in the ground. And the kids are crying hungry now. But you should have learnt all those crafts mentioned in the question. Yes. We should have. But who has time for a hobby when you have kids to feed. Rich people. Irish people in 1847 were not rich. And who has time to put something aside when the - often Irish - rack-rent landlords kept people poor and small-holders small? For reference, when I say "small holder", I mean "talamh dhá bhó" - room, lit., for two cows. The simple truth is that those who had those skills referred to in the question did indeed survive by those means. For those who did not already have the skills (or the access to protein - don't forget it was a capital offense to poach the "Queen's Deer" etc.), they expended more calories trying to learn how to get food then they got back from eating whatever they scavenged.
There were a lot of political reasons for the famine as well it seems, but that is irrelevant, it's the end result that counts, a SHTF event. I think there are a couple of take aways for us. 1) When the SHTF it's too late to learn any required skills. You might have a $1000 compound bow and figure you'll just go bush and shoot a camel. That won't happen unless you've already been shooting camels for some time. Same with growing food, learning a skill that might get you accepted into a safe community etc etc. Whatever it is you think will be important post SHTF, learn it now. 2) Some tasks use more energy than they return. There is little point spending all day wandering around in the bush in 40-degree heat and returning with a single mushroom. So foraging won't help most people unless they know what to look for and of course there is something worth finding in the area. 3) Have a plan B. One problem they had was monoculture, ie they relied entirely on potatoes. Translated to our situation, if you intend to bug in also have a backup plan to bug out, and vice-versa because if you live in an inner city location maybe you won't be able to bug out. My plan A is to sit right where I am, but I have 4 BOVs as well, all very different and appropriate for different scenarios. Anyway I'm preaching to the chior here I think, but I thought it was interesting. A heck of a lot of people with no reserves (ie non-preppers) died in the famine, not their fault because for many reasons they didn't have the option to prep, we do. And now something else.In one of the comments on that link someone said that the potatoes is the only vegetable that provides enough nutrients to be able to live off it alone, and there's this as well So my question is, can one live entirely (or even mostly) off potatoes?
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Post by graynomad on Dec 23, 2014 18:20:18 GMT 10
Good stuff Paul. Welcome to the solar set.
If you plan to add panels and batteries bear that in mind when you run the wires, I've seen installs where the wires coming down from the roof were sized for say 20A but then the owner doubled the number of panels and that's a fire hazard. Best to just use wires that are well oversized if you plan to add stuff later.
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Post by graynomad on Dec 20, 2014 12:47:25 GMT 10
graynomad being a notable exception, based on the photos and comments provided to date... Thanks Pete, but it's all front, I'm really a Prius-driving telephone sanitiser.
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Post by graynomad on Dec 20, 2014 12:44:00 GMT 10
A couple of things on that list I like but nothing I wouldn't get over losing in about 3 hours
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Post by graynomad on Dec 20, 2014 12:39:02 GMT 10
Thanks, they are still phone listed at #15 according to one web site but these things are often well out of date, I was there about 20 years ago, they had moved up the hill from the old farm even then, Mr & Mrs Minns were pretty old then and as I said the daughters will have long moved out and changed surnames. No matter, maybe they'll search for me one day, I'm easy to find on the web.
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Post by graynomad on Dec 20, 2014 7:27:03 GMT 10
...I've not decided on an inverter yet... Sinergex make good and simple true sine wave inverters. I've used a few over the years and just bought an new one (1000w) for a small solar system I have installed in the containers. ...your caloric expenditure means more food required, so a net loss of calories. Good point. Generating electricity like this might be fun and good exercise if you have nothing else to do and plenty of food, but in a survival situation your energy is better spent on more productive pastimes I think.
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Post by graynomad on Dec 20, 2014 7:20:45 GMT 10
Yeah, ol' Vlad is a worry that's for sure.
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Post by graynomad on Dec 19, 2014 7:17:25 GMT 10
Bloody heck.
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Post by graynomad on Dec 18, 2014 22:24:19 GMT 10
A wood-fired stove/heater AFAIK.
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Post by graynomad on Dec 18, 2014 19:51:58 GMT 10
Food, ammo, fuel, tools, in that order I think. Too late to buy more guns.
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Post by graynomad on Dec 18, 2014 19:49:27 GMT 10
We should be treating this as a warning to what could happen here. Buying more beans is good but if you have say $100k to spare that's a lot of beans. OTOH a car might be good if this is a short term thing, almost useless of it's a long term SHTF event.
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Post by graynomad on Dec 18, 2014 6:19:24 GMT 10
OK, pretty sure I found it, 15 Seaview Rd Tyabb, man has that changed in 55 years Our farm is now a stack of houses. It seems they no longer live there and as all their kids were girls who have probably changed names I think I'm out of luck. I actually found their phone # on the web but it must be old, the current holders of that # have no idea.
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Post by graynomad on Dec 17, 2014 22:47:44 GMT 10
If it has to happen I'm good with (late) 2016.
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