Like Minds

Just had a real good talk with my uncle, real and good because we hit on making plans and formulating contingencies for and towards bugging out.

It's nice to have all you folks out there to share ideas with, to glean knowledge from, and to generally help in not feeling alone in a world full of blind sheeple-- you know, the wackos that think we're wacko for gearing up.

Ken said this more succinctly than I will, but it's folks like him, and Catman, and Bullseye, and Mayberry and a plethora of others so numerous I haven't even started to tap... you are the ones to whom I refer.
[And KUDOS to all the ones already out there 'doing it', such as Treesong, I Drive My Tractor In Pearls, One Acre Homestead, Phelan, Wretha... we ain't alone, folks!! Lead On, Ladies!!!]

Anyhow, over the next few days the Hermit and I will pow-wow about various aspects of readiness. Our plans are to make a journey to one soon, both eventually, pieces of property (one desert 'junk land', one forested seclusion), to scout not only the lay of the land but also "practice what you preach". [Who was it recently posted on "practice camping trips"? Bison? Ah well...the idea was sound.] This will also serve to familiarize ourselves with routes to & fro.. kinda a recon mission.
Yeah; I like that word...

Also on the agenda is consolidation of goods-- not so much to share them, as share their ideas: "Oh! i aint thought of that!" and/or "I needs one of them..." kinda thinking.

We're also going to plan for two different scenarios, one wherein we are capable of teaming up for the inevitable pulling out of the hell that is Houston, and one where two is not an option...

Above all, our plan is to KEEP PLANNING. Keep a low profile, don't scare the non-understanding fambly ones, and generally keep on keepin' on, 'till...

Wish i could get more family to at least think about it all; thinking along non-standard routes is, in and of itself, a preparation-- imagining any and every thing and how one would react to said. Works the mind, readies it for adaptiveness-- which we're all going to count as our strongest survival tool before it's all said and done. If more family -- or even sheeple-- would THINK... well, United we could stand stronger. Divide us, and all I know is I AIN'T GONNA FALL. Not from lack of common sense, anyhow. [Hold yer comments, peanut gallery...]

Well, I s'pose I've rambled long enough. And I could hope and pray that this Coming holds off all the longer, because couldn't we all use more prep time.
But by the same token, we ARE prepared. We'll never feel we fully are, and each and everyone of us is guaranteed to forget something... yet we're so much further along because we have been thinking, and watching and gearing up. And practicing.

Think I'll go fishing this weekend... I could stand to knock the cobwebs off..

Thanks, Hermit...

Cygnus

My Piece Of The Pie

Dang I hate when I type a title and hit enter instead of tab! Publish a blank post...(probably a relief from some I've posted hehe.)

Aw well, it don't matter. Not today. Not much of anything gonna wipe the grin off my mug...

I've been holding back on mentioning this until the money was gone and the papers signed.

My checking account is down to three digits-- including the ones after the decimal point.
I go tomorrow to a notary with the papers.

And become the happy 'owner' (albeit an indebted one, hence the quotes) of 2.1 acres in the Ozarks.

I"M GOIN' TO THE BOONIES, ME FRIENDS!!!

Granted, I won't be headin' there menana; gotta race the rats for a few more. More WHAT-- months, or years-- will be determined by desire, drive, and a smattering of good ol' luck. I aint so sure we have the years. I've not been idle to this point; important to me, though, that if TS does HTF a little sooner than mayhap I envision, I have a retreat far, far away from Houston (or any other metro-polis (police? word origins; gotta love 'em)).

I say I've not been idle; in the last calendar year I have greened (greenered ain't a word...) my thumb by starting no less than two gardens from seed. Still have some seeds (Heirloom/open pollinated varieties) and the lighting equip for the startup. Last february while still laboring in Austin, with my brother's kind loan of a 7' x 14' slightly raised bed and some small tools (I was less than 30 days in front of no longer being a ward of the fine state of Tx.; DIRT-POOR, literaly! ha! i kill myself...), we ordered seeds from Seed Savers Exchange. Took an old heater pad from a not-so-watertight waterbed, a small shoplight, a grow bulb to fit said, and some peat seed-starting thingies (technical, I know; try to follow, class...). Slapped 'em all together on a workbench in the garage...

Voila! Jardin.

Not long after, the landscape company that was rapin... um, that I was laboring for, expanded their operating yard by 66.6%. They were kind enough to let me garner an ~8' x 8' space. By this time I had a few "spare" (read: too many) seedlings from the garage project. Also, it was a little further along on Sol's journey northward; I direct-seeded for complimentary variety to the bro's backyard garden growfest.

Sadly, both plots were left behind when, in a storm of changes (ironically coinciding with the two Tx coastal storms, Gustav and Ike) I vacated the Austin area. But the experience was valuable-- always been green of dexterous digit, but proved to myself I could grow edibles, from seed, in addition to beautiful houseplants.

After a few months of itenerant work (storm clean-up variety, mostly) I have moved to the Big H. On the plus side, I'm in an abode which has a small but dedicated garden area-- so i'll be right back at it when the silverbeet seed arrives! Another advantage is, I can race rats until such time as the races are cancelled and the running turns from festive pursuit of green paper to the run-for-your-life variety.

When it does that... no, hopefully long before, folks. Or at least sometime before--as I say, I ain't convinced we got too "long"...
But whether when or before, my run will be towards them thar hills...

Where there is Magic, I hear :)

Other preps have commenced as well, most notably building up of foodstores to help the wait of fruit tree production (those'll go in the ground this fall up property way) and seed planting fruition. My ideal would be to be stocked enough food shelter and essentials-wise to have the latter-- the Ozark garden-- in the ground spring 2010.

Sounds like a long ways away, huh?

Folks, in another day it'll be aught&9!

Stay tuned to see how dedicated the MacMeister is to the timeline...

Thanks for stoppin' by...

Cygnus