Diary of a Survivalist
Yesterday, I went to Sam's Warehouse Club and bought about $250 worth of food, including 100 pounds of flour, 100 pounds of rice, 50 pounds of white sugar, 15 pounds of brown sugar. Today I went to Wal-Mart and purchased five 5-gallon plastic buckets and lids. They sell them in their paint department, and while they are not as good as the ones Captain Dave sells, they were immediately available.
I noticed that there were surprisingly low supplies of rice at the warehouse club. They usually have a pallet full of them, probably 1000 pounds. This time there were less than a dozen bags available. Interestingly enough, however there were six or eight 5000 kW generators.
There seemed to be plenty of flour, and I thought I was buying a lot, but the family after me took six 25-pound bags. As I as pushing my heavily laden cart down the aisle, trying to keep the brown sugar from slipping off, a young couple commented, "Gee, you must own a restaurant." I had prepared a cover story and said "No, my wife sells baked goods during the holidays. Do you need any cookies, cakes or pies?" I was glad they didn't comment on the rice, which was on the bottom, although I was prepared to tell them that Jill is famous for her rice pudding.
I also saw 50-pound bags of popcorn, which I have heard can be ground into cornmeal. I am thinking of testing this proposition out with our mill and perhaps buying 50 or 100 pounds. I also saw 50-pound bags of potatoes, which I may purchase as we get closer to the big day.
This afternoon, I packed away 50 pounds of flour, all the rice and all the white granulated sugar. I transferred everything from its packaging to large mylar bags until I had six buckets full (I had few empties from prior orders). Then I added oxygen absorbers and sealed them shut. The 25-pound bags of flour filled one bucket each. The 100 pounds of rice filled three buckets, and I figure about 40 pounds of sugar went into one bucket, leaving us some leftovers for use around the house.
Last time I did this, I worked with Captain Dave. I was on my own this time around and learned that I had obviously missed one point, which I will share with you now. I estimated the headspace correctly, but in two of the six buckets, I left too much air in the bags. When I tried to put the lids on, the bags were like balloons and would not let me seal the lid down without the danger of popping the bag. I figured I would wait a few days or the O2 absorbers to do their thing. If the air content is reduced by 20 percent due to the oxygen being absorbed, I should be able to get the lids closed.
In any case, I feel much better about our food supply. By the time we get to the point where we are living on rice and wheat, the garden should be giving us plenty of fresh vegetables. I personally will prefer living on a steady diet of rice and whatever to one of wheat and whatever. Speaking of whatever, I have also noted the location of four wild apple trees, so the sugar will come in useful if we make applesauce. There are also plenty of wild nut trees, although busting the nuts probably takes more calories than you get eating them. Still it would be an important source of fats in our diet. Even the acorns can be turned into flour if leached properly to reduce or eliminate the tannic acid.
I also picked up four spare bread pans. I figure that for efficiency, we will be able to bake multiple loaves of bread at one time. Now fresh backed bread does go stale faster than commercial stuff, but it will be better than nothing. Of course, you can back round or oval loaves without the use of bread pans. One trick we learned is to spray the outside of the bread with water while it is baking. This creates a thicker, crisper crust.
We have plenty of spices in stock, and lots of yeast. I have a large tub of baking powder. I think we could use more baking powder, whoever, as well as baking soda. And we need more vanilla flavoring, real or imitation. We have a sifter, but I will try to remember to purchase a second one. We already have multiple measuring cups, but after you bake bread for a while, you can pretty much estimate most of the ingredients without measuring.
Let me talk about the flour for a while. First of all, we do quite a bit of baking (OK, Jill does most of it). We make bread, pizza dough, dessert cakes, bread sticks, etc. We will undoubtedly do a lot of baking over the holidays and give baked goods to neighbors and friends. So the 50 pounds we did not stock away will be used by the end of the year. We go through 25 pounds of flour a month normally, so it may even be gone earlier than that.
Now flour is not highly recommended for storage because it will not store as long as wheat. White flour will actually store longer than whole wheat because it does not contain the bran, which is oily and contributes to a faster spoilage time. But if we do not need our white flour for Y2K, we will open it and start using it in March.
We stored flour because the switch from white bread to whole wheat can be a surprise to the palate and the bowel. We will grind our stored grain into flour and mix it with white flour, probably 50-50 at first. Then we will add more and more whole wheat until we have completed the transition to whole wheat bread. And I expect we will save some of the white flour for special items, like birthday cakes. Actually, I personally like whole wheat bread. When I make bread, I often add other grains, including oatmeal and buckwheat.
Today we saw the coldest weather yet of the season and to prepare we moved kindling and logs of several different sizes into the house so that they will be dry and ready for the first fire of the season. I also covered the woodpile with a tarp. During the summer, it seemed better to let the wood dry in the heat and sunlight, despite occasional rains. But now that it is colder and the drought is behind us, the tarp will keep it dry and ready to burn even in the snow. The firewood piles look to be a decent size, two cords, but when you move it inside and prepare to light the fire, it appears much less than may be necessary.
The frequent storms have caused quite a bit of branches to fall, and I have put the kids to work gathering much of this for potential fuel. Our wood stove is much smaller than the one my parents had when I was a child, so these small branches are idea for it. According to the stove store, stoves are much more efficient today and a smaller firebox can put out as much heat as a large one from yesteryear. Still, I would like to have some more firewood, and am thinking of either buying or cutting another cord or two. I remember my mother reading to us one of the Laura Ingles Wilder books in which they almost starved and froze in a winter full of blizzards, and I do not wish that to happen to us.
Being on a well-wooded lot, with other wooded land around us, I am sure we could have a burning fire all winter, but I do not wish to cut down any more trees than necessary. I have harvested most of the dead and fallen trees, but will look elsewhere for wood we can scavenge.
I wish there were some way to efficiently burn leaves in the stove. We have these by the bushel basket, and the trees are not even half done. It will be aver large raking job, and makes me wish I had purchased an automatic bagger for the mower.
Frankly, I do not mind winter. Each year, I hope that there are a few days in which the snow falls deep enough that we do not need to venture off to work and school. Some six years ago, we had about 20 inches over the course of two or three days, but that was the last really big snow. Of course, traffic around here snarls whether it is one inch or 10, so I say go for the full shot. In fact, people who were once used to driving in snow now act as if they haven't seen a flake for years. We have more sport utility vehicles, yet fewer people who can use the vehicles' capabilities to drive in the snow.
We have had a procession of warm winters with minimal snow. I hope that will change, although it may play havoc with many if Y2K is bad, a cold, snowy winter may also reduce the likelihood of people traipsing out of the city looking for food and shelter.
Today was MRE day. To test them and to get used to eating MREs, (we have 12 cases plus an assortment of entrees, side dishes and even desserts accumulated over the years) we opened Cheese Tortolini and Chicken Strips in Zesty Salsa sauce.
Generally, we agreed that they were pretty good. The tortolini was as good or better than Chef Boy R Dee in that it was firmer and not as mushy/soggy. The chicken was a bit hard, as in not tender, but very edible. If you served the chicken strips over rice, which we have a great deal of, it would easily serve two. The applesauce side dish was fine, just like from a jar. The kids liked the crackers and jam, although I felt the crackers were a bit towards the stale side. They drank the orange drink mix with no complaints and I had to fight for a share of the oatmeal cookie. I also like that each meal came with a pack of matches and I figure the cardboard box packaging will make good kindling.
MREs are very expensive on a per meal basis (compared to dried foods and grains), but they are also very convenient. The way I look at it is if you have to bug out, take a case or two along in your car. (I wouldn't want to carry a case in my bug out bag, but in a car, they don't really take up that much space and the weight is not an issue.) A case will feed you three meals for four days and you can stretch it to six days if you need to. $5 a meal is relatively expensive, but if you eat out at lunch, you will be hard pressed to spend less. Now, it will last a family of four only 1 day, or a day and a half at best, so this is where a box of pasta or a bag of rice will really extend your meal planning capability and reduce you cost.
Other huge benefit is that it is like a little bit of home. After a week of breakfasts of oatmeal or grits, lunches of pasta and dinners of reconstituted dehydrated foods, an MRE will be a feast, and the fact that it includes a cooking and crackers is an added bonus.
I think we will save many of our MREs for extended trips out of the house, but the other half we will eat on special occasions.
If we were thrown into an extended survival situation, I would plan each meal relatively carefully. But I think that once a week someone would get to pick whatever the wanted. For example, I know my oldest son would pick Dinty Moore Beef Stew. We have 48 19-ounce cans, and he licks his lips at the thought. He can't wait until we rotate them out. Also on birthdays or special occasions people could pick what they wanted.
Speaking of food, we are beginning to run out of space for my latest food acquisitions. I purchased 12 cans of tun for 44 cents each, seven more cans of vegetables (three peas & carrot and four just plain carrots), three more cans of fruit cocktail (an area we need to buy more items in), two cans of cat food, molasses and a gallon of vegetable oil.
I went to Odd Lots because new shipments come in on Tuesday, but it was a disappointing trip. I picked up only a few cans of fruit and some cans of beef tamales, something you rarely see in this neck of the woods. They did not have the volume of canned fruit and other food that they usually have. In its place, they seem to have a sea of junk food. At another store, I compromised and bought only 8 more pounds of pasta (instead of 20!) and another four pounds of beans. And I added three more cans of green beans and 6 cans of tuna just for the heck of it.
I have decided to buy another 200 pounds of wheat another 100 of rice, 50 of corn and stock up on sugar and probably 100 pounds of flour as well as other baking goods. I will order the wheat from Dave, but the rest I can pick up at the warehouse club and put in Mylar bags and buckets myself. I would also like to get more oatmeal, just to play it safe.
Now let me talk a bit about Jill and how her thoughts have changed of late. She has never been a very religious person, but lately, she is convinced that she has been given a sign from God that the year 2000 will be a very bad year. She is not worried specifically about the computer date problem, but more than 2000 will be a very bad year, a turning point in the struggle of good against evil. As a result, she has started taking a bit more interest in our preparations, especially relating to food. We have had several discussions about how long the food will last and what we would do if it started running out.
I find planning for the post-Y2K problems, whatever they may be, harder than planning to survive the actual emergency itself. We know what might happen in an emergency, whether it is a massive Y2K computer failure, millenium -inspired TEOTWAWKI, an ice storm, a hurricane, civil unrest, or whatnot. What we do not know is how the recovery will come about. Will we recover assets in banks and financial institutions? Will there be/have been massive inflation and/or a revaluation of the dollar? How many people will have died? Will the government still be around? Will electricity, phones and gasoline pumps work? Or will we fall back on an agrarian economy with small self-sufficient villages? Will any traditional jobs return?
"What will we do when the worst is over," Jill asks me. Garden, farm, hunt, trap and practice keeping my family and myself alive and well, I guess. I have many technological skills that will be useless, but some that may not be. People will need plumbing and electrical work. My carpenter skills are not polished, but I can cobble structures together. I am, I hope, a decent writer, but outside of keeping a diary, I do not know what worth that will have in the post-TEOTWAWKI economy. My hope is the ammunition will last much longer than the emergency, and certainly longer than the stored food. I also hope that my ammo and guns will provide a small measure of wealth and that the pre-64 silver and few gold coins will help us. While I do not have the hundreds of thousands of rounds they had in the book TEOTWAWKI, I hope my stash is more than I will need (their basement must have been incredibly large, but I guess that is the benefit of fiction). Certainly, I have more .22 long rifle than anything else. Enough to wear out the barrel of my guns, I am sure. (I picked up 1100 rounds of bulk federal .22LR at Wal-Mart a week or so ago. I have never shot this kind, but I thought I would give it a try.)
With the idea that we might have to make our food last longer, we decided to stock up on hand garden tools. We have three shovels, but could use another pick and probably rakes and hoes. I figure we would practice gardening full time if it hit the fan. Of course, if it all falls a part in August, too late to get a crop in, we will have to stretch our food to at least 10 months and raise what little we can indoors.
Let's hope those deer I keep seeing stick around.
I had a conversation with my wife last night, which I will relate more about later, and as a result, I called my favorite gun dealer to ask them to order me the Bushmaster version of an AR-15. I was planning on getting the standard 20-inch barrel "target" model, but he said "Hey, I have a 16-inch 'shorty' model in stock, so come out and get it if you want." I did, and I consider myself lucky to have it. After tax and tags, so to speak, it was under $800. A lot of money, but I think a wise expenditure.
I bought it in part because I figure it is a good investment and will not be likely to drop in price. But really, that's just a way to justify the expense. I also bought it because I am worried about gun grabbers and about companies stopping production and sales of guns, as Colt recently did (Shame on you, Colt. Springfield makes a better 1911 anyhow, but your actions are an insult to your historic name.) And since I already had an AR-15 and magazines, I thought the common ammo and parts interchangeability was a good thing.
But mostly I bought it because I think we may need it. And that is a bit of a scary thought.
I have always felt I was ready to shoot someone who posed a threat to my family and me. But my scenarios were usually facing down a burglar or a single person or small "gang" who was clearly threatening me, Jill or one of the boys with death or serious bodily harm. But now I am seriously contemplating the idea of shooting at a group of people who act threateningly during a time of civil unrest. And I find it less noble than the one-on-one showdown in which I save my family from a crazed, drugged-out scumbag with a police record dating back to his preadolescent years. Will I still do it? Sure, distasteful or not, I will shoot if I think they pose a serious danger. I may break my personal rule and use a warning shot, but it will depend on the number of people, what they are doing, how aggressive the appear/act, if they are armed, etc.
So now the long guns in the house outnumber the inhabitants. But I fully expect we will have enough people on hand to man them all, plus the shotguns.
If I was a movie producer and I had to envision a post-Y2K disaster scenario for a movie, it would be littered with bodies. There would be mass dying as cities burn and the survivors try to escape. There would be rapes and pillaging that would make Kosovo and Bosnia look tame. It would be desolate and depressing. Neighborhoods would be protected by fully armed neighborhood watches and families would have banded together for safety. Like the Romans, dead people would be displayed along the roadside to warn trespassers not to proceed. Is this a likely scenario? I hope not. It definitely is a "worst case" one, but whether or not we come anywhere close to it, I feel better having a second AR-15.
Maybe another reason for the purchase is that I have also started to re-read "TEOTWAWKI" which I mentioned in the last entry. Not only is this putting me back in the survivalist frame of mind, it is reminding me of all the things they did like man an observation post/listening post, remaining armed at all times with a side arm and long arm, and never leave the camp unless two people went together in full gear. Conduct scouting missions into the surrounding area, etc.
It has also made me realize that while I feel fully prepared for Y2K or a similar disaster that lasts three to six months, a multi-year breakdown is another situation and one for which I am nowhere close to being ready. They had 1100 days worth of food, for example, and 40 acres with outbuildings in Idaho. My situation, while being better than many others, is nowhere near that. And as Jill says, our family can eat like crazy. My shelves are groaning with canned goods, but I want to run out and buy more. I finally vacuum-sealed the rest of the pasta, but at 39 cents a pound, I want to go buy another 10 or 20 pounds worth - just in case!
I guess it is well and truly said that you are never completely prepared, but I feel you should always be better prepared than you were a month earlier. I am planning to use the next 80-days to good advantage. I hope those of you that are following along intend to do so as well.
As a brief continuation of yesterday's entries, let me tell you what we have told people who are coming to our house for the Y2K weekend and possibly beyond.
First, they need to preposition food, clothing and ammo here. If they are bring a special skill (doctor, archer/deer hunter, mechanic, etc.) then they should also preposition anything they need to practice that skill. If they have useful preparedness tools, such as a rototiller or reloading dies for a caliber I do not have, those should be here well before the date change.
Second, when the day to bug out comes, they should bring their guns (assuming they have some) and remaining ammo, any remaining fresh and pantry foods including canned goods, warm outdoor clothing and sleeping bags/blankets, toilet paper, gasoline containers (full), books and games for entertainment, stuff to cut firewood (extra mauls, sledges, wedges, bow saws, axes and hatchets), radios and communications devices, and whatever personal belongings and other items they think they will need.
We have given everyone a primary responsibility. It could be to oversee the health and wellbeing of our temporary enclave as the doctor. It could be cooking and preparing food. It could be babysitting the children and keeping them occupied. It could be defending the camp. It could be hunting or trapping. It could be communications. It could be inventorying and tracking supplies. But in any case, it is important that everyone have something they are supposed to do. People also have secondary responsibilities and if things last a long time, we will rotate and cross train to ensure people do not get bored and also learn new skills. Some things, everyone may at sometime or another be counted on to do. This includes gardening and helping to defend the property. I remember in the Outlaw Josie Wales when Grandma was reloading rifles for everyone else, and this is exactly the attitude we want. If you want to read more about how this works in a survival situation, read TEOTWAWKI by John Wesley, Rawles, now published under the title Patriots, Surviving the Coming Collapse.
Several people at work have asked me what they should do to prepare for Y2K, so perhaps a quick review of the minimum preparedness is in order. These are my personal suggestions and are not necessarily those of Captain Dave Inc. Since everyone's situation is different, you need to modify these based on the weather in your area, number of people in your party, shelter options, job requirements, etc. This is based on my somewhat northern location, where it is not unusual to have snow and below freezing temperatures from December through March.
Although food and water are critical, I think where you will be spending New Year's evening is the most important. First, don't go to a party unless you want to stay there. Don't drive on New Year's day. The police will be out looking for drunks and probably have a show of force to forestall any early Y2K mischief. I highly recommend being out of the city and not in an apartment building. A stand-alone house with some land provides a buffer and a few resources you may not have in the city. There is also something to be said for a low density of population. Ideally, your selected shelter -- it could be your house, that of a friend or family member -- should have a source of heat that is not dependent on utilities, especially gas or electricity. (And let's face it, even gas furnaces and oil heaters depend on electricity.) So this means a wood stove, fireplace or kerosene heater and plenty of fuel. If you do not have a house, a cabin or even mobile home is a nice fallback option.
As part of shelter, you should have a warm sleeping bag or plenty of blankets and comforters for each member of your party. Warm clothing is also a must and can include coats, sweatshirts, sweaters, long underwear, wool socks and comfortable, durable work boots or hiking boots.
After shelter, I recommend stocking a minimum of three to four weeks of food. This is actually easier than it sounds and makes far more sense than stocking three or four days of food as many government and other "official" web sites recommend. You could do this with breakfast cereal, pasta, peanut butter, crackers, peanuts, raisins, pancake mix and canned goods. Hardboiled eggs will last a few weeks without refrigeration. Potatoes and squash will keep a long time if stored properly. In this second priority category I also include diapers and formula for people with babies and medicines for the elderly or anyone who needs to rely on a prescription on a daily basis.
Many people think water should be the first priority, and in a normal survival situation, this is true. I think water will be secondary and a lack of electricity will probably cause more harm and danger than a lack of water. But be prepared with some stored water and a way to purify more, whether it is chemical purification (yech!) boiling or filtering. Also, make sure everyone has a sports bottle or a similar water container that they can carry with them. You don't want to risk drinking unsafe water if you get thirsty.
A way to make light is the next priority, both due to safety and emotional well being. Flashlights cannot be beat for convenience, volume of light and easy on and off. When you need to run downstairs to check on something in the dark, a flashlight beat the heck out of a candle. But since batteries will be worth their weight in silver, if not gold, oil lamps and lanterns are a much better option for lighting a single room. Candles are a good fallback, but are a greater concern because their open flame presents a fire hazard. Also, oil lanterns are much more powerful and brighter.
Lots of people ask about whether or not they should have money on hand. Earlier in the year, conservative folks were recommending "enough for a long weekend" while others were saying a month or two. Today, some governmental bodies are recommending against having cash on hand. Frankly, if you have enough food and other supplies to be self-sufficient and contained for a few weeks to a month, you may not need cash. But in the even that you need to buy that one thing you left our (yeast, an antibiotic, more kerosene, etc.), you should have enough cash available to pay an inflated price.
Finally, we come to guns and other means of self-defense. As covered yesterday, the danger exists that because there is an expectation that you have extra cash on hand, people may kick down your door and try to take it. If 911 is down, or the emergency services are swamped, you may not be able to look for support outside your self and your neighbors. I personally think that a gun or two in the hands of people that know how to use them is a strong deterrent and a good way to put a quick stop to the individual or small group intent on intimidating you and terrorizing your household until they can take everything of value that is easily transportable.
In our home, if someone knocks on the door on January 2, you can bet there will be a well armed person (possibly wearing body armor) to open the door, covered by two other adults in hardened positions armed with a rifle and shotgun. And that's if we decide to let them get close enough to the house to knock.
After these options, follow all the common sense things like keeping records, filling your car's gas tank, having phone numbers of friends and family, etc. But just don't wander into the new yar expecting nothing to happen. And if Y2K sees only minor disruptions, be glad. But please, don't start eating all your survival supplies until Leap day is behind us.
OK, so we have under 90 days to go to Y2K and in general, people don't seem very alarmed. Dave tells me that sales are rising, but not to the level they reached a year ago. On the other hand, I have read plenty of articles that gun sales are increasing and some types of ammo are getting scarce. In fact, when I went to buy 1,000 round of .223 from my regular dealer, they would only sell me 500 because their stock was so low. Usually they have a pile of .50 caliber ammo case filled with 1000 rounds of ammo. Now they were down to a few .30 caliber cans with only 500 rounds each. Said they couldn't get any more from their regular supplier.
This is troubling to me because it means that more people are stocking up on guns and ammo than are buying food. OK, having guns and plenty of ammo on hand is not a bad thing. I recommend it. But not at the expense of food.
Here's what I figure is happening:
- Anyone familiar with Y2K on the Internet has probably heard the one about some fellow who didn't need to prepare because he was just going to go rob someone else who has all the food and survival gear. So perhaps all the folks who already bought food last year or earlier this year are stocking up guns and ammo defensively.
- People are afraid of civil unrest and general lawlessness that might accompany Y2K and rightly figure a gun or two will increase their chances of surviving. After all, if 911 is out of service, you need to rely on yourself. And guns have long been the great equalizer, and Korean merchants proved their worth in the LA Riots.
- People are worried that Congress will pass more anti-gun legislation, so they are going out and buying guns and ammo to stock away for a day in which they may not be able to buy them.
Now I fully support the right for individuals to keep and bear arms. I have more than a few locked in my gun safe. I have a lot of ammunition and more reloading supplies. I even stock common calibers for guns I do not own, but someone else may show up with, such as 30/30. But I just hope that new gun owners are practicing and training. Because if they do not know how to handle a gun safely, Y2K could bring a host of gun accidents. And if the hospitals are suffering from Y2K disruptions, or are overcrowded because of civil unrest, your chances of getting life-saving treatment are reduced.
So if any of you are reading this are first time gun owners, try to get someone who is experienced to show you how to shoot. Then practice loading and unlading in a safe manner. Decide in advance how you will keep the gun (unloaded, loaded, loaded without a round in the chamber, cocked and locked, etc.) so that you are not confused. And Practice several times. Even those of you who are experienced gun owners should practice to make sure the gun still works, the scope is still sighted in, etc.
And please remember the three basic rules of safety (this is my version of them):
- Treat every gun as if it was loaded until you have personally checked and double-checked.
- Keep your finger out of the trigger guard until on target and ready to shoot.
- Do not point your gun at anything you would not want to see destroyed.
Let's just hope that most of that guns and ammo is going to good, upstanding citizens and not the criminals who will prey on those who are unprepared.
OK, I think September was a lost month. I kind of took a break from being a survivalist and vegetated. I spent more time watching TV than I have for a year, and it wasn't just because football season or new prime time shows started. I probably gained a few pounds, as I didn't work out much. I was planning to take the first week off because Captain Dave was traveling, but it was so nice to relax, I just took a longer break than expected. I didn't even reload.
And it's funny, because I had a whole bunch of stuff I was planning to write about, and now I can't even think of what it was. So call September the month of lost diary entries.
I was tired. Burnt out. I've been preparing for a long time, and I think preparing for bad things to happen can bring you down emotionally. I think the rest of the country is also in a malaise regarding Y2K. It seems that there are less and less reasons to prepare and fewer and fewer people worried about Y2K. Is this all in vain? In a way, I hope it is, so there are no disruptions. But a small part of me hopes it hits the fan so those of us who believe can have a few moments of satisfaction. (OK, not a very charitable thought, I admit).
I also think there is a romantic side that enjoys thinking about the "simpler life" and how it used to be when we did not rely on society and technology to survive. We raised or hunted our food, made or traded for whatever we needed and survived on our own with little or no outside support. We suffered in the bad years and prospered in the good. We died earlier, married earlier and lost way more children in childbirth. But somehow, we were freer. And I think we harbor a vague notion that Y2K could bring us the best of both worlds: the advances of technology without the burdens of our current society. Imagine for example, if only a tenth of the population was alive a year from now.
But no mater what Y2K brings from a computer glitch perspective, there are plenty of biblical and other prophecies that are foreboding. 2000 could still be an interesting one. I look at the climate change we experienced here with the drought in the NorthEast this summer, and I have to wonder what is in store for us. We did not have to dig another well, but several neighbors did when theirs went dry.
I think it is funny that we had the flood of the millennium in places like North Carolina and New Jersey and two or three hurricanes, but people aren't worried. I got to wonder what will happen in Y2K when there is no neighboring state to send aid, no trucks to carry bottled water and no shelters. Will we see an increase of natural disasters?
But back to my September. The month wasn't a total waste. I cut and split some more firewood. And I added some more canned goods to our spare pantry. I even picked up some more pasta and barley, but I haven't vacuum packed it yet. I bought some conduit for the generator (more on this in the future).
Another thing I did was to update our wills and create a living will and directions for whom should be guardians for the kids if anything should happen to Jill and I. I think this is a good idea for anyone with kids and even a small estate to do at any time. But with the unknown of Y2K, you never know.
I was interested to note that in the last week the market has suffered a bit, and is, in fact, not doing real right now. And taking my money out of the 401(k) plan hasn't been terrible. The best investment I have in there has been the fixed account, which is earning 6.5 percent. Even the stuff that did 20 percent last year is down this year. It will take a HUGE 4th quarter to recover, and I do not think we will see it.
To those who missed these entries, I apologize for my absence. Your notes to captain Dave, which he faithfully forwards, are the main reason I am back online. We've got less than 90 days to go, so let's start the countdown.
