07:37 – If you ask preppers what they’re preparing for, most will have a primary or even a sole concern. Not that it really matters much, because if you’re prepared for one specific type of emergency you’re almost by definition prepared for other types of emergencies. The essentials are always the same: water, food, shelter, sanitation, medical, communications, and defense.
If someone asks me what I’m preparing for, my standard answer is a zombie apocalypse. Anyone who’s prepared for that is prepared for anything. So we stock water, food, and the other necessities, including of course anti-zombie guns.
But my real primary concern is the same as it has been for years: societal breakdown and violent civil unrest. Not all zombies are the walking dead. We have plenty of live zombies in Winston-Salem. They’re also known as underclass scum, and they’re at least as much threat as real zombies. More so, because they’re just as violent as and a lot faster than those shambling things in the TV shows. Fortunately, they’re not any smarter.
The so-called Black Lives Matter movement was serious enough. It’s resulted in rioting, looting, and arson in cities and towns across the country and a lot of ambush shootings of whites and cops. But it’s nothing compared to the calls from racist black demagogues for blacks to stalk and murder white people and cops. An unfortunately high number of young black men seem to be responding to that call. Predictably, LEOs nationwide are concerned about being ambushed, which of course makes them more likely to shoot first. Their attitude is increasingly better-safe-than-sorry, and who can blame them? Police recruiting is down by 50% or more in many departments, and many career cops are taking early retirement or simply resigning. Again, who can blame them? But it’s not a good omen for society to watch the people who are supposed to defend us instead giving up and looking for other means of earning a living. If the government can’t or won’t defend us, we’ll just have to defend ourselves.
Our relocation search is going much slower than we’d hoped, but we’re patient. We will get away from Winston-Salem to a small town, eventually. If we’re overtaken by events, we’ll just have to deal with it, come what may. If rioting, looting, and arson comes to Winston-Salem, we’ll be as ready for it as anyone can be.
Most of my time this week was devoted to working on science kit stuff, but here’s what I did to prep this week:
- I bought a hundred feet of paracord and a pack of ten snap-buckles, to be divided between our car emergency kits. I got the real made-in-the-US stuff, not that cheap and cheesy Chinese garbage they peddle at Home Depot, which isn’t even real paracord.
Otherwise, we’re in pretty good shape. I do intend to pick up more pasta on our next Costco run. It’s cheap, stores forever, and it’s useful to have a lot of it on hand.
So, what precisely did you do to prepare this week? Tell me about it in the comments.
As someone else on the Internet has said:
I’m the son of two college educated liberals. My life has generally been a journey of slowly unlearning my prejudices. President Obama has changed that.
When it comes to prepping I have been slowly doing stuff with my hobby money. I have gradually built two vehicle emergency kits and have started a stash of emergency food and water in the basement. This week I actually got $100 from the ATM and stashed it somewhere for an emergency. I will be adding to my stash of cash periodically.
I think it is time for my prepping activities to stop being a hobby and get more serious.
We now have a federal government of the underclass scum and corporations, by the underclass scum and corporations, and for underclass scum and corporations.
It seems to me that that gives us normal people two classes of targets, each as bad as the other.
I would extend RBT’s 08:43 remarks to say that the bankers and financiers are also a prime beneficiary of FedGov actions, and that this group holds an inordinate influence – due to their ability to direct political contributions – in the Congress.
In the executive branch at under Obama, the guide post seems to be Marxist-Leninist class warfare and they are doing their best to put the country into a pre-revolutionary state. Marx thought that the proper application of Communism would be to the advanced, middle class state – he had Germany in mind – not the peasants of Russia.
I was counting the banks among the corporations, but it’s more than just the banks.
Not that there aren’t a few good large corporations. Charles and David Koch come to mind.
I spent my young adulthood unlearning the prejudices of my father and now have relearned them. This time, I’m basing it on direct observed actions, and not received wisdom and unconscious programming. To do otherwise is both unfair and dangerous.
So, prepping. Keeping abreast of the news- a two edged sword. On the one hand, you need info to make informed choices. On the other, if you choose your sources badly, you will be misled into bad choices. Sources on both sides have their own agenda. I look at the ads and editorials to see who they think is their audience, and decide if that is me, or if I even WANT it to be me. I pay attention, and REMEMBER. Which sources are correct when they say something is important? Which sources are always wrong? Which sources emphasize things to distract and obscure? Like people with individual strengths and weaknesses, news sources often have strengths and weaknesses. And just like a good manager can use their employee’s strengths and avoid their weakness, so too I pick and choose among the news outlets. I find that even the one sided tool-of-the-oppressor sources will often tell the truth, in passing, or in a tiny article. They do this to CYA, so that later they can pull quote a line here and a line there, and say “look, we told you the truth!”
Per my self-analysis of my preps, I spent more time this week on stuff I like than stuff I don’t. I spent time messing around with computer and radio stuff. I bought some extra food and bottled some water. I did a very small amount of garden stuff, mainly planning for fall. I sold some stuff I purchased for resale which provides money and space, but there is a big pile waiting.
I failed to do any organizing. I still haven’t gotten the rest of my antennas up. I’m still not getting food from the garden (although I MIGHT get some carrots this weekend.)
I did start a class with my local police dept. I will learn more about policing from their side of things, learn some cool skills and play with some cool toys (shoot no-shoot sim, driving course, arrest procedures, active shooter doctrine, etc) and learn more about the people who work in my area. So far, the group seems to be full of LMI. About 80-90% have a CHL, there were a lot of knives clipped to pockets, some tactical pants, and one guy who is a ham, a CERT member, and a variety of other Emergency Management stuff too. In this coming world, who you know and who you are, will be as important, if not MORE important, that what you know. (at least until the die off)[assuming such a thing happens] Time to get started on the “who you know” and “who knows you” part.
My other prep this week is car servicing. About $700 worth of work today with registration, tune up, and repair of a problem on one truck. It’s very important to have a well maintained vehicle, and also to have one that won’t provide an opening for harassment (expired reg, non-working taillights, tint too dark, etc.) It will need shocks and tires when budget allows. The other needs springs and tires too. I’ve been lazy about this as I was spending the money elsewhere. Better to budget and plan, than to have an emergency though.
Got my hands full today, but there are two sales that look interesting. One has a bunch of electronic hobbyist stuff, although I don’t see any radios, and the other has guns and outdoor stuff. I’ll try not to buy any camp stoves or lanterns 🙂
keep stackin’ folks,
nick
@RBT
I don’t have a specific problem with corporations. Some of them are plainly just too big. As to banks, I don’t really care for the big ones, and have by and large decided not to do business with them. Only account still with a big bank is our mortgage which the small bank we opened it with sold to a larger bank.
I think the only two Internet providers in my area, Comcast and AT&T are too big for their own good.
To the list of not bad corporations, I would add HP when it was still run by Hewlett and Packard.
I don’t care for anything McDonalds serves after breakfast, and would never eat there after breakfast if not for a family member whose favorite fast food is a Crappy Meal. I should note that I find their food far superior to the food served by the cafeteria at the local children’s hospital. I think it’s really cool that said corporation supports the Ronald McDonald House. (Disclosure: I am saying these not completely unkind words because I have showered and eaten at a Ronald McDonald house.)
I was fortunate. When I was five, I noticed a copy of Atlas Shrugged lying on the coffee table. By that time, I was reading well enough to get through it, with help from a dictionary and my mother. (My dad was a Democrat/socialist; my mom was a conservative/libertarian. My dad later came around to our point of view.)
What she wrote made sense to me. I ended up an anarchist/libertarian and an atheist while I was still in kindergarten. And I’ve been a prepper since I was in elementary school in the early 60’s. Duck and cover made quite an impression on me, as did my dad stocking up the basement as an expedient shelter. So I guess I haven’t changed much in the last 50+ years.
Child prodigy.
Got another load of canned goods and general staples to the cellar; I’m gonna have to assemble shelving down there ASAP. Also got several hundred feet of genuine paracord, now that I think of it. Extra power cord adapters for one of the laptops and the Radio Shack scanner. Continued maintenance on the raised beds; we’re getting a good number of nice tomatoes and herbs, and the pumpkins are coming along nicely, but my peppers have yet to bear fruit or grow much beyond eight or nine inches in their pots. It’s very obvious that we couldn’t possibly generate enough food from our garden to survive, even if we utilized every conceivable space and went vertical and did “square-foot” gardening, too. I supposed we could chop down several trees and the brush but it still wouldn’t be enough. Several immediate neighbors have much more yard space out in the sunshine than we do but they’ve done nothing in the way of vegetable gardening. Several others a little further out have, but I can see that even those wouldn’t be enough. No, in a SHTF scenario, we’d have to organize a bit and try to use some of the wide-open, flat and fertile farmland owned by farmers just outside the village here. Which reminds me to get stocked up on seeds.
Also putting together sidearm-based bail-out-bags for the vehicles and one rifle-based bag. These include mag and radio pouches, small first-aid kits including tourniquet and major wound clotting bandages, small but powerful FLASHLIGHTS, Lifestraws, firestarters, maps and compasses, Bowfungs w/extended whip antennas and small coils of longwire, rain ponchos, and Cliff bars. I have my own on-body EDC all the time anyway, which includes a tactical folder, Leatherman Micra, regular large Leatherman on the belt, space pen, another small but powerful FLASHLIGHT, Zippo lighter, keys, wallet with spiffy plastic origami-type knife and lockpick set, and of course the firearm w/extra mag. And my new iPhone 6-Plus. (if things really get bad and I’m doing all kinds of nifty clandestine stuff, I’d have burners and be operating in tightly controlled gray-man mode.) Otherwise, everything is aboveboard and out in the open here, with a Windows 8.1 machine and a low-key, low-impact presence in the area. I take reasonable IT security steps and meanwhile also been setting up an OpenBSD laptop with various security layers for learning and experimentation. A ThinkPad laptop is running Andy’s Ham Radio Linux and I’ve been goofing around with SDR dongles on it.
On the humint front, I’ve talked my next-younger brother into doing more prep stuff down there in the Belly of the Beast and gotten him a couple of firearms in the meantime; he has some experience with them and has worked in the fairly recent past as an auxiliary LEO. Other siblings couldn’t care less about this stuff; everything is wunnerful, except for that nasty Obummer person.
Mrs. OFD and I will be having a discussion this coming week after she gets back tomorrow, supposedly, from NB, concerning these matters and some other issues.
Haven’t done much, thanks to ongoing house and yard responsibilities and multiple VA appointments this week, with two more coming up this afternoon.
You read Atlas Shrugged, at five years of age? You’ve got to be kidding. I thought I was doing well with the Dick and Jane books. (remember those?). My road to Damascus moment was when I read ‘Why I am not a Christian’, by Bertrand Russell, at about 10 or so. I was an atheist from then on.
My parents were seriously concerned that I was what we used to call back then retarded. I mostly just sat around staring at things. I didn’t speak other than mama and dada until I was three years old. My first real words were at the kitchen table, and started with, “Oh, grandma, I forgot to tell you…” The rest is lost to history because all of the adults present were flabbergasted. I actually remember that event, although not in detail. I remember that both of my parents, my baby brother, both grandmothers, and I think my parents’ best friends Walt and Betty Conover were there, but that’s about it. I couldn’t figure out why all the adults started whooping and laughing and crying. I’ve never shut up since.
I was, of course, what nowadays would be diagnosed as Asperger’s.
@Randy Giedrycz
Yeah, I was reading everything I could get my hands on. I lost interest in kid’s books by the time I was four. My parents were delighted until I found a copy of Candy in my parents’ bedroom and started asking questions. 😉 I couldn’t figure out why they were so upset.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Candy_%28Southern_and_Hoffenberg_novel%29
A long-wire antenna on a Pofung is a great idea, if only so that you could run a comm center with outlying GMRS stations. Any kind of elevation should buy you a mile or more of reliable range, and possibly several miles.
“Any kind of elevation should buy you a mile or more of reliable range, and possibly several miles.”
Exactly. While our immediate AO is flat lakefront terrain and farmland, we sit below a long ridge above the interstate and there are a couple of hills over in the “city” area, both within an hour’s hike on foot.
I’m also researching low-power and stealth ham radio gear and operations and looking at ways to maximize antenna capabilities at the house here. I forgot to mention I also have a couple of small Ramsey ham radio kits that I need to build using a soldering iron, 40- and 20-meter.
There are a ton of guides online and u tube for making a cheap, simple, rollup j pole antenna from old (or new) 300 ohm twin lead antenna wire.
This is the flat antenna wire from your youth.
An example:
http://www.lowra.com/antenna/flexjpole/twinlead.pdf
Haven’t gotten around to actually building one, or two, but I did pick up the 300ohm.
nick
A “tiger tail” or counter poise will help with hand helds too (according to the gurus) and is simple and cheap.
Google it.
nick
When I was almost two, my grandmother was trying to tell my mom that I had pointed to a box of Rice Krispies and said cookie. My mom thought my grandma was senile until later that day when someone gave me something to eat and I said thank you.
What makes “real paracord” real? When I go into the musty smelling army navy surplus store what selection criteria should I use?
As long as you get attitude from the sales staff, you’re good to go 😉
nick
A tiger tail is certainly much better than the helical dummy load they call an antenna on those units, and it’s easy enough to improvise one. But I prefer whips on my portable units and a high long-wire antenna on base stations, even if the base happens to be an HT.
By “real” I meant mil-spec paracord. The junk they sell at HD is just one solid length of cord inside some kind of sheath. The sheath and cord are obviously different materials and have different melting points/rates. In general, good paracord is made in the US. I haven’t seen anything made in China that I’d trust. Instead of a 550-pound or better rating, that stuff is so weak it won’t even hold my weight.
Just saw on the news gas in NJ for $1.99. National average $2.42. Yesterday here in California I paid $3.19.
They want to add another $.12 to the gas excise tax and increase vehical registration in The Golden State. Gold for who?
(Reminds me of an old bumper sticker here, ‘Keep California Green and Golden – Prevent Forest Fires”. Wasn’t long before someone made one that replaced the fire prevention with “Bring Money”)
Paid $1.87 a gallon yesterday in East TN.
Reminder: ALWAYS round prices instead of truncating. To do otherwise is to fall for the deception.
1.999 = 2
1.99 = 2
1.91 = 2
Once, long ago, I said $2.00 to a cashier for something that was actually priced $1.99. When she corrected me, I asked if she would take $2.00 and keep the extra penny. She said that was unfair, because of the sales tax. Different thing, same result.
Wow, the shots of crimmigrants fleeing to Germany are scary. I hope Mr. Chuck didn’t immigrate to Germany. It’s gonna suck there in a couple of years.
http://www.nytimes.com/2015/09/05/world/europe/migrant-crisis-hungary.html
Prepping done this week: went to Harbor Freight (about an hour away, was in the neighborhood for another task) and picked up some cheap 7 LED flashlights (3-AAA) (2 for $2.99), some one-LED headlamps (with 2 AA batteries, $3.99), and a couple of surge protectors (four-outlet, $3.99).
The flashlights (with Kirkland batteries) will be ‘seeded’ around the house and in a central storage place. Two of the headlamps in each car, one spare in the central storage spot.
Saw some solar battery chargers, but they didn’t look very powerful. More research on those needed. They have generators there, but that will take a bit more fiscal planning.
Next project: garage shelves for storage/organization; trip to Costco next week for canned goods and some more water.
I bought a hundred feet of paracord and a pack of ten snap-buckles, to be divided between our car emergency kits. I got the real made-in-the-US stuff, not that cheap and cheesy Chinese garbage they peddle at Home Depot, which isn’t even real paracord.
URL?
Our relocation search is going much slower than we’d hoped, but we’re patient. We will get away from Winston-Salem to a small town, eventually. If we’re overtaken by events, we’ll just have to deal with it, come what may. If rioting, looting, and arson comes to Winston-Salem, we’ll be as ready for it as anyone can be.
Bummer, so the house that you made the 25% less offer on did not pan out. I do not know about construction costs in your area but around here they are running $125/ft2 to $175/ft2 for new construction. Plus land preparation. $200/ft2 around here to do an home addition using brick and any kind of plumbing.
BTW, if I was going to build a house, I would make the kitchen pantry into a 400 ft2 safe room with a enclosed bathroom and some sort of non-obvious entrance.
“…I would make the kitchen pantry into a 400 ft2 safe room with a enclosed bathroom and some sort of non-obvious entrance.”
Excellent idea!
In the Ongoing Situation here in the U.S. of Amnesia:
“White guilt over black failure has reached a zenith, but even in the most out-there version of the narrative it’s three to six. Can we stop now?”
http://takimag.com/article/enough_dead_cops_gavin_mcinnes/print#axzz3kniEDW2x
Wow, the shots of crimmigrants fleeing to Germany are scary. I hope Mr. Chuck didn’t immigrate to Germany. It’s gonna suck there in a couple of years.
http://www.nytimes.com/2015/09/05/world/europe/migrant-crisis-hungary.html
As a Christian, my heart goes out to them. As a realist, this cannot go on for long without conflict as the newcomers overwhelm the people already there. The Goths are not known for their ability to handle aliens for long.
And this may sound familiar to many of us:
“But I no longer expect sociopolitical improvements in my lifetime. I don’t expect the electoral process to produce anything but further shams that assist the power elite in retaining its grip. I certainly don’t have any powerful new ideas for combating it.”
http://bastionofliberty.blogspot.com/2015/09/sitting-back-is-not-giving-up.html
I’d go a bit further in my own dotage and say that we have a duty to toss a banana peel or monkey wrench out there whenever we can and to resist on each and every front that we can.
“As a Christian, my heart goes out to them.”
Mine sort of, for the defenseless and vulnerable women and children, maybe, but also realizing that many of them, if not most of them, would gladly tear my Christian heart from my chest given the chance and laugh while doing it, and over here in our wunnerful MSM there would be….crickets….
Re: paracord
http://smile.amazon.com/gp/product/B007Z1I9Z0
“As a Christian, my heart goes out to them.”
As an atheist, I have no sympathy at all for muslims, who would enslave or kill us all. As a Viking-American, I say: Kill them all, Thor will sort them out.
“Kill them all, Thor will sort them out.”
While Loki laughs his ass off, having tricked the buggers first.
One of the other nooz items today was that a bunch of the hadjis are converting to Christianity so they can then acquire asylum from religious persecution….
Earlier I said have stashed $100 in cash for emergencies. This is no longer accurate.
“This is no longer accurate.”
In a good way, one hopes, but one suspects not.
@OFD
It is no longer accurate in a good way. We now have $200 stashed for emergencies.
Earlier I said have stashed $100 in cash for emergencies. This is no longer accurate.
Either this was a violation of OPSEC or an emergency happened. Hope it was OPSEC.
http://smile.amazon.com/gp/product/B007Z1I9Z0
Thanks, I bought some of that back on March 16, 2015. I love how Amazon tells you when you have purchased an item before. That helps to jog my memory and decide if the previous purchase was worthwhile or just plain trash.
As an atheist, I have no sympathy at all for muslims, who would enslave or kill us all. As a Viking-American, I say: Kill them all, Thor will sort them out.
I suspect that the Goths will do this. The refugees do not know that they are entering the buzz saw.
“We now have $200 stashed for emergencies.”
Working on the same level here, cash-stash, hidden. Plus a tiny bit of “junk” silver. And I’m guessing probably around three months of food stash for Mrs. OFD and me now. Working on six months and then a year. Next storage priorities involve wotta, charcoal, and pet food. Also gotta organize the emergency lighting situation, which will involve FLASHLIGHTS as well as old-timey lamps, lanterns, wicks, oil, candles and matches.
Among our coming discussions this week will be physical security priorities, before putting up nice privacy fencing and chit like that. So, lockable storm doors front and rear, plus good deadbolts, and REMEMBERING to lock up, and also exercise better security procedures with the vehicles. Plus decent emergency kits for both vehicles and both of them up to date with maintenance, basic tools, bulbs, fuses, etc.
Gotta get her up to the range, too.
Here’s an item you might consider.
http://smile.amazon.com/gp/product/B006E0QAFY
I don’t care for anything McDonalds serves after breakfast, and would never eat there after breakfast if not for a family member whose favorite fast food is a Crappy Meal.
Good news! McBarnyard’s Golden Starches(1) will be selling breakfast all day on October 6 in the US.
I confess to being partial to Jack in the Crack. A quick lunch of 2 tacos and a breakfast Jack has kept me going while in the middle of all the craziness here with my Mom’s health issues.
(1) bonus points if you get this reference.
Here’s an item you might consider.
http://smile.amazon.com/gp/product/B006E0QAFY
I have tried one before. I prefer this el cheapo $10 flashlight:
http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B00IEMUOWU/
I bet that I have bought 40 of these and given out at least 20 of them for Christmas. Wait, Christmas is just around the corner!
Good news! McBarnyard’s Golden Starches(1) will be selling breakfast all day on October 6 in the US.
Note to self, short Denny’s and IHOP stock.
Plus a tiny bit of “junk” silver.
Why? Why not silver dollars? The average person does not know and does not care that the USA stopped putting silver in coins sometime between 1960 and 1970.
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-3222405/How-six-wealthiest-Gulf-Nations-refused-single-Syrian-refugee.html
I don’t recall them taking in any palestinians either.
“entering the buzzsaw” — not likely What would the do, concentration camps? No, they’ll be taken in, put in a ghetto, and 20 years from now, their kids will be burning down the towns and lighting cars on fire because they still live in the ghetto.
Once they’re in, they’re in. How would you even deport them? Put them on a plane and no one will let the plane land. Same with busses.
What is HILARIOUS is watching the euro bastards, who are in general WAY more racist than Americans, FINALLY screaming about illegals. It’s horrible when WE complain about those poor brown people, who just want a better life for their kids, whaaaaa. Now let’s watch them scream and scream while we say “told you so.”
nick
”
Note to self, short Denny’s and IHOP stock.”
Nope, different markets. They are trying to compete with Jack in the Box and Carls, not sit down. Their 1030 sharp cutoff pisses people off every single day.
The JiB menu is SO much better than McDs for breakfast. In fact, all their food is better. And Chik fil a is eating their lunch. (ha!)
We’ve got some regional chains moving in too, like Raising Canes.
At the upper end, Five Guys, In-n-Out, Buffalo, etc are coming on strong.
I might have had 2 or 3 meals at McD’s in the last 20 YEARS.
nick
”Note to self, short Denny’s and IHOP stock.”
Nope, different markets. They are trying to compete with Jack in the Box and Carls, not sit down.
Sorry, that was a joke.
Their 1030 sharp cutoff pisses people off every single day.
Man, does it ever. I just hope that Chikfila does not follow the trend. I can eat their chicken biscuits all day. I usually eat the cobb salad or grilled nuggets / fruit cup at chikfila now. Swapping to chicken biscuits would be bad, very bad.
Raising Canes
Mmmm! We got the 50 piece finger tailgater last month when relatives were visiting. I love their sauce, too.
JBox blows McD away. I love Sonic, too. Alas, the diet allows eating at these places once a quarter these days.
“Here’s an item you might consider.”
Yo, Ima get me a buncha those muthas…
“Why? Why not silver dollars? The average person does not know and does not care that the USA stopped putting silver in coins sometime between 1960 and 1970.”
Good point, so long as they’re the real McCoy silver dollars with the right amount of silver in them, currently running about 18 bucks a pop…maybe….
“I don’t recall them taking in any palestinians either.”
Yo, that’s right; and not only that, but several Arab nations murdered a whole bunch of them in their countries back in the day…other Arabs consider them trash…as do the Israelis…
” Now let’s watch them scream and scream while we say “told you so.”
There it is; now the proverbial shoe is on the other foot. It’s a lovely thing, mates, to see the libturds and the Revolution eating themselves…
“I might have had 2 or 3 meals at McD’s in the last 20 YEARS.”
Ditto. Or any fast-food joint other than pizzas.
We buy and cook our own food here mainly; wife even does so on the road at all the AirBnB places she stays.
Rarely eat fast food any more, but I will eat JiB if I’m away from home working, and Chikfila has school nights, where they donate a portion of the till from that night to your school. So a bunch of kids and parents come in that night to bump up the totals.
I pretty much stopped eating McD’s when I realized that the quarter pounder with cheese smells exactly like a sweaty @ss.
nick
“….when I realized that the quarter pounder with cheese smells exactly like a sweaty @ss.”
But how would anyone know something like that….?
Have I mentioned lately that my wife is Chinese? That is not disagreement with your assertion.
I don’t like to talk about it. -shuffles off, head down-
“….when I realized that the quarter pounder with cheese smells exactly like a sweaty @ss.”
But how would anyone know something like that….?
Same smell as the guys locker room after a football or baseball game. Takes a while for the smell to go away, it sticks to stuff.
And, um, while ladies may glisten instead of sweat, they do have ah, assets…
nick
https://westernrifleshooters.files.wordpress.com/2015/09/1429835751901.png
Yeah, OK, homes. We’ll be seein’ ya….
And….long-winded, but some gems amid the rest…
http://www.radixjournal.com/journal/2015/4/23/why-do-they-hate-us?rq=why%20they%20hate%20us
More stuff here:
“That it is only the Balkan nations and Russia which are keenly aware of U.S. plans is a tragedy an irresponsible and compromised Western media has advanced. To appreciate just how unprepared Europe is for the facts, a Russian Insider article from yesterday reporting on prominent German pundits’ call for more bombs and more intervention in the Middle East in order to “solve” the refugee crisis reveals the sad truth of Europe’s ongoing suicide at the behest of their American overlord.”
https://www.lewrockwell.com/2015/09/anne-williamson/mass-migration-madness/
I’ve decided that lots of cheapo flashlights are better than none, and work just as well for most purposes. I grabbed a half-dozen of these from Harbor Freight: http://www.harborfreight.com/2-piece-3-12-in-9-led-mini-flashlight-69065.html ; 2-pack = $2.99. And you can get a free one of these http://www.harborfreight.com/27-led-portable-worklightflashlight-69567-8869.html ; check out the coupon on their home page. Plus a 20%-off-one-thing coupon to celebrate the Labor Day Weekend.
Those flashlights worked just fine during the last power outage. I have a couple more powerful LED flashlights, but the 7-LED ones are Good Enough. Cheap enough that if they get lost, not a big problem.
Same sorta economic logic applies to what we wanna have as “trunk guns,” given the recent series of posts on another WP site the last few days. With many saying they have cheapo firearms for their vehicles so if they get lost or stolen, no big deal. Some of them go real cheap, like ancient Mosins or M1 carbines they got at gun shows or were lying around the garage.
I opined that for the time being, my EDC sidearm with extra mags and the bail-out bag would suffice, while in the event of major SHTF stuff, I’d upgrade to the rifle and associated bag.
I’d go with the cheap FLASHLIGHTS for the majority of our needs here and in the vehicles with one really good Mr. Ray-Approved device in each location.
So for some actual preps,
I cycled the food in my truck bag and replaced it in the truck.
I built another trauma bag and put it in my pickup. I already have 3 other first aid kits in that truck but one is a boo boo kit, one is an OSHA worksite kit, and the other has some trauma stuff but is way short on treatment for gunshot or serious MVA. So now that’s taken care of.
Hit my 2 sales today. The first was supposed to have guns, gun stuff, and hunting stuff but was overpriced and picked over. ONE can of solvent for an hour drive. Bah. The second sale had tons of vintage electronic stuff in the photos, but no radios listed. Took a chance anyway. DIDN’T buy either of the 2 old Ward’s CB radios. No value in a 23 channel Ward’s radio. And I didn’t buy the vintage Marine radio either. What is the world coming to? I did get a couple of WWII era radio and radar manuals, one air force and one Navy. I also scored a classic reference book for radio engineering. At $2, it’s about 50c/pound. An antenna, some spools of magnet wire (for winding inductors), come coax, and a spool of black test lead wire, to go with the spool of red I already have, round out the purchases. All in all, not a productive day.
On the other hand, my WIFE is making laundry soap. This is a classic prepper activity, akin to raising chickens. Little does she know 🙂
And my strategy of laying the prepper groundwork continues, as my daughter is now starting on “Little Town on the Prairie” as a bedtime ‘chapter book.’ She’s listened to all the others and loves them. The amount of work the kids do, and their extreme poverty is a good lesson too. Good books.
I did get a few carrots from the garden. About 10, mostly fat, but shorter than a finger. They are a short fat variety, so that’s ok. One meal’s worth. Tasty but not a raging success. Have to decide if I want to totally redo the beds, adding soil, or let some of the stuff like broccoli continue into the cooler months and see if it takes off, then redo in the spring.
Rain today is topping up my collection system. Still have some tweaking and installing to do before I feel like that is totally dialed in… maybe now that the heat seems to have broken I’ll be able to get some outdoor work done.
nick
still don’t know what the total will be on the truck. gah.
As if we didn’t have enough to worry about:
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/sciencetech/article-3222177/Mystery-killed-60-000-antelope-four-DAYS-solved-Normally-harmless-bacteria-appear-turned-endangered-animals.html
”
60,000 saiga antelope perished in just four days at the peak of the die-off
Toxins from normally harmless Pasteurella bacteria found in the animals
This caused the antelopes’ organs to suffer massive internal bleeding
However what caused the bacteria to become so deadly is still a mystery”
So a bacteria normally present in the animals ‘changed’ somehow and was universally fatal. And not just ONE bacteria, but TWO different ones.
nick
“Ebola, don’t eat the meat. Ebola, don’t eat the meat” – refrain from african pop song
“I did get a few carrots from the garden. About 10, mostly fat, but shorter than a finger. They are a short fat variety, so that’s ok.”
Look up photoperiodism. Some species and varieties are long-day, which means they grow best at latitudes of 40 to 45 degrees and higher. Others are short-day, which makes them appropriate for the southern US. Also, carrots really don’t like densely packed soil.
http://garden.menoyot.com/assets/blogAssets/garden/how_much_sunlight_is_needed.pdf
Add to this week’s prepping activity:
Added loratadine tablets and 4X4 gauze banadages to first aid kits for vehicle emergency kits. Those kits will have to do until I fill out other sections of the vehicle emergency kit. It’s all I can fit in a quart zip top bag. When I expand the first aid kits, I’ll use a gallon zip top bag.
As far as prepping TV shows go, I will go out on a limb and nominate MacGyver as my favorite prepping TV show on Netflix. I admit it has an anti-gun message and it isn’t really about prepping. But it is a good example of the first and most important rule in prepping: Don’t limit yourself to the intended use of a thing.
My next emergency kit purchase is going to be some plain white mens tube socks. While having a pair of dry socks can save your toes if not your life in the cold, they can do other things. In a pinch they make thumbless mittens. On a cold wet night I’d feel really stupid walking home with a trash bag as a poncho and socks and grocery bags on my hands. But it’s nowhere near as stupid as I would feel in an emergency room being treated for exposure and frostbite. Also, if someone is bleeding enough that a gauze square is too light, I can always use a folded sock and apply direct pressure. Yes, in that case a clean towel or bedsheet would probably work better. But my emergency kit doesn’t have either of those items.
IMHO, the folks fleeing Syria, Iran, etc. are not people of value. The Radical Muslims have long since killed all the educated, farmers, and business folks and those that are not Muslim enough, what is left is the illiterate bottom of the barrel (or pick your favorite euphemism). Gee, didn’t I read that this has happened before, many times, in history. As others have said, these folks have no desire to assimilate into any society and their real destination is the USofA. /conspiracy theory on/ There is already talk of Hungary, Germany, France, and the UK arranging transport to South America with transfer to a boxcar roof on a train heading North. /conspiracy theory off/
My prepping, like me, is just slow but steady progress.
An event this week pointed out something that should be considered in your prepping activities, that is your teeth. The root and bone around my tooth #6 (right upper cuspid) which had a root canal and a crown has been slowly reabsorbing to the point where on Monday the tooth cracked when I bit into a piece of toast. Fortunately my Dentist was able to get me in right away, extracted the tooth and packed in some antibiotic and a bone graft. If I had not had access to a competent Dentist this could have become a life threatening problem.
Rain, real measurable rain last night. Good news for all the forest fires around here and a clear sunrise for the first time in about a month.
Good points, Mr. Dave.
I never watched the MacGyver series but the ‘unintended use’ of things happens all the time here. Food dishes, and cooking pots, get used for various paint exercises that Mrs. OFD has going, and various kitchen knives and forks seem to end up in the garden (we have the tools, implements and containers for those capers…)
An “Israeli bandage” is worth having in every kit. It is your gunshot, serious trauma, etc bandage, and it has built in ties. If you are alone, the ties could be the difference between life and death.
nick
http://www.amazon.com/Israeli-Battle-Bandages-Dressing/dp/B00RP3TRGS/ref=sr_1_2?ie=UTF8&qid=1441468036&sr=8-2&keywords=israeli+bandage
They are well packaged, and about the size of a small deck of cards.
I will be heading back over to Sam’s Club on Sunday to refill our water and batteries. My goal is 50 cases of 35 bottle 1/2 liter Ozarks and we drink about three cases per week right now. Plus I had to open another box of AA batteries (48 per) for my Fenix E21 flashlight that I use to walk with each night. I get two walks per two batteries. Definitely worth its while as we have a lot of water moccasins and copperheads out here at night and I sure do not want to step on one.
That’s a lot of batteries you’re burning through. Have you considered NiMH rechargeables?
That’s a lot of batteries you’re burning through. Have you considered NiMH rechargeables?
My previous experience with NiMH batteries was not good so I just buy new batteries. Of course, if Sam’s Club fails to open someday then I am hosed after I work through my 400 AA batteries in my storage.
Was your experience with the earlier generations that self-discharged quickly? The newer Eneloop-technology NiMH cells retain their charge very well. Not that it sounds like you give them much chance to self-discharge.
Yes, they would not hold a charge after a few cycles. BTW, the only downside to using the Fenix E21 flashlight is that it burns through the AA batteries in about two hours. Looks like that model has been replaced with a Fenix E25. I wonder if it is more efficient as the E21 gets very warm while I am using it for an hour at a time.
http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B00H2GFLBS/
BTW, I am reading that “Lights Out” book now. I am 16 chapters in and liking it.
http://www.amazon.com/Lights-Out-David-Crawford/dp/0615427359/
At 2.1 lbs, the book itself can be used as a weapon.
“… we have a lot of water moccasins and copperheads out here at night and I sure do not want to step on one.”
Let’s see here…two more reasons not to move to Texas…venomous snakes…gators….coyotes in packs…hordes of crimmigrants….heat…hurricane zone…no trees….
You’re at least packing heat on them nocturnal walks of yours, aintcha?
You’re at least packing heat on them nocturnal walks of yours, aintcha?
Yes, it is still hot (and muggy) down here next to the biggest hot tub in the world. I look forward to October when the cold fronts come through fairly regularly. We had a cool front last week that brought the night time temperatures down into the upper 60s, now that was nice.
We may well get snow in October here, which is fine with us. The lake wotta will stay warm for quite a while yet, though. Nice breeze today off the bay, sunny with blue skies and Mrs. OFD is home for a WEEK!
Humid hot and rainy in my microclimate. So no outdoor work today. I started, but got rained out after driving one ground rod for my HF antenna. It’s grounded and has a lightning trap, but not something I want to be standing next to in a storm.
I was really hoping to get at least one more, and maybe 2 more antennas up this weekend. I’d like to move the SDR- RTL to a real discone, put up the 2 meter for that part of my desk radio, and move the dual band antenna to the 70cm part of my desk radio or to my mobile, which is sitting on the desk at the moment.
I did get a security strike plate installed on the last door that didn’t have one already. It’s been sitting here, and now it’s finally done.
I ordered a small replacement antenna for one of the marine HTs I got last week. It’s a great little radio, has RX only on commercial am&fm, Airband and NOAA, plus FRS and marine VHF TX and RX. In theory it doesn’t have a replaceable antenna, due to the FRS channels, but—- undo a couple of allen set screws hidden under a rubber ring, and it takes a normal SMA-M antenna. Bonus if the antenna has rubber coming past the connector to make a seal, exactly like my yaesu FT-60R antenna. So that’s what I ordered, a replacement yaesu antenna. Will give me a great little marine handheld, and some redundancy for the main HT. Moral of the story is don’t take their word for it, look yourself.
I know, you’re all thinking “I thought he was gonna work on the things he likes least, and leave off the fun radio stuff for a while.”
Well, it’s easy to do some of the radio stuff indoors, and the organizing and inventorying needs room in the driveway to move stuff out of the way. So, excuses….
nick
Am at nrg stadium in the inner city. Gonna watch my aggies beat up on asu. Bloody hot here.
ASU is one of my alma maters….
never saw a game
nick
nice stadium tho
Good to see all the love for Jack here!
On the Israeli bandages: do these have coagulant on them?
The israeli bandage doesn’t have a clotting agent. It does have a “pressure bar” that helps to apply pressure when used with the attached tie strip. Also, they are well packaged in a vacuum sealed pack. Very compact.
Here are a couple of reviews:
nick
How to use the israeli pressure dressing:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wNR8rRFgwNk
nick
@nick
Like I was saying. I’ll be done with the first iteration of the first aid portion of our vehicle emergency kits just as soon as I add an Israeli bandage and maybe some quik clot.
Some ERs don’t like quikclot or other clotting agents. Recommendation is to try direct pressure first. ‘course, if it’s huge and I’m far from help, it’s gonna get quikclot.
nick
If the body injury is large at all then I am dead if I cannot get to an ER since I am on blood thinners. I need to have a pint of whole blood to get my blood to start clotting.
I am on warfarin (coumadin), the old reliable (rat poison). I used to be on Pradaxa which takes three days to get out of your system with no known counteragent. My electrocardiologist got me off that about two years ago.
@lynn: I haven’t been on warfarin, but I’ve heard the side effects can be unpleasant, depending on your personal reaction. FWIW I’m on xarelto, with little in the way of side effects – I tend to get tired in the evening, earlier than I used to (but that could also just be age).
@lynn: I haven’t been on warfarin, but I’ve heard the side effects can be unpleasant, depending on your personal reaction.
Uh, I am tired when I wake up? I am not sure about any side effects of warfarin other than the fact that you have to get your INR tested each month. Oh yes, if you take too much, your organs turn to mush.
I am also on Rythmol to fight my afib and tachycardia. The afib does not bother me but the tachycardia sure does. It usually strikes in the middle of the night and I wake up in full fight or flight mode, very disoriented. That is why I do not keep loaded guns in the house.
@Mr. Lynn, and others in the same boat;
Have you or do you stockpile your meds?
We gotta do something for Mrs. OFD here, as two weeks without hers and she’s DOA. I’m only on BP meds and I can do OK without them.
Stockpiling meds:I’m going to use the transition from on prescription to the next to double-fill, which will give me a 90 day reserve. I’ll build that up over time.
“Have you or do you stockpile your meds?”
Yes, I stockpile my meds.
I take meds for Diabetes (no insulin, once you get stuck on that you are dead), blood pressure (ace inhibitors and a water pill), rotate through the NSAIDs, hydrocodone, and a Parkinson’s Disease drug to control my restless leg syndrome.
First off I have a doctor who understands people who want to be prepared. He has worked out a plan, that we regular review, on what of my meds I can taper off and what other things I can do to replace certain ones. He is of the mindset that Big Pharma’s purpose is to keep us on drugs rather than to cure us.
I get my drugs in 90-day doses, I can reorder drugs 65-days after the last fill (except for the hydrocodone that I can only get a 30-day supply every 23-days). By keeping a reminder log and refilling as soon as I can I have built up a current stockpile of over a year on most and I continue to build that stockpile.
Key is having a competent doctor with whom you have had a long-term relationship and using the same pharmacy again that you have built a relationship with.
Have you or do you stockpile your meds?
It is fairly difficult to stockpile your meds if you are like me and lose them anyway. I lost an almost full bottle of metaprolol (beta blocker for BP) last year. Knowing me, I probably threw it away thinking I was holding something else. You would have thought that I had murdered a nun! I had to sign paperwork stating that I was a good XXXX bad boy and pay for the replacement prescription myself ($20, who cares!).
I figure in the chance of a sudden apocalyptic moment that is short of the rapture, I’ll grab my mini-14, my large wheel gun, and my semi XDM, and go visit my Walgreens and take all the metaprolol and rythmol they have. I know that they do not keep much rythmol on hand as that is $500/month retail and they have had to order it for me before.
In case of the rapture, my actions will be dependent on whether I am caught up in the clouds or left behind. I am figuring on an even chance of either since I am going to Heaven on the grace wagon. Of course, left behind is going to suck real bad and one might want to stroke out quick.
“…go visit my Walgreens and take all…”
You and the FSA. Bring extra mags.
“…I am going to Heaven on the grace wagon.”
Good to be optimistic and have a positive outlook.
“…left behind is going to suck real bad…”
Some might opine that we were Left Behind when Adam and Eve were ejected from the Garden, leaving Uriel to stand post above the gate with his flaming sword…
I take Cartia (100mg Asprin) as a blood thinner. I sometimes get sleepy in the early evening but don’t know if that is the cause. I don’t have to take it, I was just told that it may reduce my chances of having a stoke, although the Blood Bank people didn’t like it as it made my blood less useful to them.
Have heard of warfarin, but never taken it. My doc hasn’t suggested it to me.
You’re going to stock up on Rohypnol, Lynn? What is that, a do-it-yourself rapture?
Are you confusing Rythmol with Rohypnol? Rythmol is a drug for desensitizing all the long muscles in your body. Including your heart muscle so it ignore specious electrical signals, probably from your pulmonary veins which contain some electrical tisssue for some weird reason. Makes one feel like they are constantly walking in water. Without the exercise.
http://www.rxlist.com/rythmol-drug.htm
Some might opine that we were Left Behind when Adam and Eve were ejected from the Garden, leaving Uriel to stand post above the gate with his flaming sword…
My Sunday school teacher opined yesterday that after the rapture, we will be allowed to eat from the Tree of Life again. He also opined that while Adam and Eve lived in the Garden of Eden, they ate from the Tree of Life for an extremely long time. Maybe several millennia. That should be interesting.
“…I am going to Heaven on the grace wagon.”
Good to be optimistic and have a positive outlook.
Only way that I am making it in. I am a dedicated sinner…
“That should be interesting.”
Your Sunday School teacher sounds like a very interesting person with whom I’d like to chat sometime.
“I am a dedicated sinner…”
As are most of us.
I am reckoning on mercy as much as judgement.
Orrrrr… I could have been joking. You need to lay off the meds, Lynn, if you haven’t noticed that I can, will, and do joke about everything.
” He also opined that while Adam and Eve lived in the Garden of Eden, they ate from the Tree of Life for an extremely long time.”
Nah, they weren’t allowed to eat of that tree because then they’d live forever…
” He also opined that while Adam and Eve lived in the Garden of Eden, they ate from the Tree of Life for an extremely long time.”
Nah, they weren’t allowed to eat of that tree because then they’d live forever…
Adam and Even were only forbidden from eating of the Tree of Knowledge of Good and Evil. They were not forbidden from eating of the Tree of Life until they ate of the other tree.
The book of Revelation talks about the Tree of Life blooming once per month and that the inhabitants of Heaven will eat its fruit. So, did Adam and Eve eat of the Tree of Life each month?
Actually, I don’t think that these stories in Genesis happened as written. I suspect that the real story will freak us out, greatly.
But both of them took bites of it.
But both of them took bites of it.
Being a man, still, I can categorically state that men are stupid.
“….I can categorically state that men are stupid.”
Republican men only.
The woman was deceived, the man sinned willfully.
So wimin are stupid and men are evil.
The woman allowed herself to be deceived by the Serpent despite the clear warning from You Know Who. And the man, out of the goodness of his haht, that he might share in the blame and punishment of his helpmate, also ate of the tree. And he’s been taking it in the neck ever since. Now THAT was stupid.
My Sunday school teacher opined yesterday that after the rapture, we will be allowed to eat from the Tree of Life again.
A pre-tribulation rapture is pretty much a modern American invention. But in any case, why would we need to eat from the Tree of Life, since we’ll be in Heaven and not on Earth?
Science says the Adam & Eve myth is just that. The smallest population bottleneck ever experienced by H. sapiens was several thousand individuals.
“…why would we need to eat from the Tree of Life, since we’ll be in Heaven and not on Earth?”
Because the fruit tastes nice?
“A pre-tribulation rapture is pretty much a modern American invention.”
Even if it is recent that doesn’t make it false. I think a good case can be made for it.
Just because we don’t know something doesn’t mean you get to make shit up.
Particularly when science tells us the whole thing is bogus.
You’re going to Hell, Dr. Bob. In your case, oblivion, but Hell none the less. The rest of us will get to suffer for all eternity. Shit, you win again.
I’d rather laugh with the sinners than cry with the saints.
The sinners are much more fun…
“The smallest population bottleneck ever experienced by H. sapiens was several thousand individuals.”
Sure, this is what the scientists tell us TODAY. Ten years from now or fifty, they may have a different story; IIRC, they were, not long ago, touting that we all came from a Zinjanthropus-type “Eve” in Afrika, just one person.
In any case a lot of the stuff in the Bible is poetry and metaphor, but I suspect that even some of the wilder parts are turning out, through archaeology and other scientific fields, to have some basis in fact.
“Just because we don’t know something doesn’t mean you get to make shit up.”
Yeah but it’s great practice for going into politics, finance or college teaching.
Just because the traditional interpretation appears to be wrong doesn’t mean that there isn’t an interpretation that is both right and consistent with science.
Science says the Adam & Eve myth is just that. The smallest population bottleneck ever experienced by H. sapiens was several thousand individuals.
So you are saying that several thousand amoeba evolved into several thousand human beings?
“… doesn’t mean that there isn’t an interpretation that is both right and consistent with science.”
Exactly what several recent popes have said. But the media would much rather take some isolated, off-the-cuff remark and spin it into something completely different and then tell us it’s Holy Writ and Dogma Writ Large, which it isn’t, not by any stretch. So if the current Holy Father says, for instance, “Let’s be decent to gay people and not so judgmental,” and I’m paraphrasing here, the media report it as “Pope Francis Will Marry Gays!” Or he says “Building weapons of death is not a good thing and it saddens me,” the MSM spews “Pope Comes Out Strong For Gun Control.” (when he was mainly talking about international arms merchants and trafficking…)
So I’m on a gun blog a while back trying to straighten out the latter b.s. and boy oh boy, the vermin came crawling out from under their damp and mossy logs and screaming all kinds of hateful anti-Catholic bigotry, as though from the 19th-C newspaper cartoons and the Jack Chick comic strips.
I generally don’t bother anymore trying to reason with these lunatics but every once in a while I feel I gotta say sumthin.
Genesis is a whole other situation; a wandering tribe of desert nomads came up with those books and how are they going to explain their conception of Creation and their theology to common peasant folks? Through poetry and metaphor, an oral tradition at first, like the Iliad and Odyssey, from around the same historical period. Did the Red Sea part and drown Pharaoh’s army? Did Jesus call Lazarus forth alive from his tomb? Somebody saw and heard something and tried to write it down. And what grew from it as a system of belief, in parallel with science and technology, sure beats the other belief systems we’ve seen in the world during the last 3,000 years.
That’s not a serious question, I take it. If it is, then, yes, our remotest ancestors were single-cell organisms. But individual organisms, human or otherwise, do not evolve. Populations evolve as mutations arise that are better adapted to their environment than other members of the same population.
Did we evolve from monkeys or apes? No, they are our cousins, not our ancestors. We and they both evolved from a common ancestor. Apes are closer cousins than monkeys, because the common ancestor for humans and monkeys is more distant than the common ancestor for humans and apes. Similarly, all three of those are closer cousins than any of them are to, say, dogs or horses, because those species diverged even longer ago.
But I’m not going to argue about this, because religion has zero arguments for its belief system. Anyone who does not believe that evolution is reality or even that humans are somehow outside the pathways of evolution, is either abysmally ignorant or incapable of understanding the science. Either way, there’s no point to arguing.
If you really believe the religious fairy tales about human origins, we’d simply be talking past each other.
Genesis is a whole other situation; a wandering tribe of desert nomads came up with those books and how are they going to explain their conception of Creation and their theology to common peasant folks? Through poetry and metaphor, an oral tradition at first, like the Iliad and Odyssey, from around the same historical period. Did the Red Sea part and drown Pharaoh’s army? Did Jesus call Lazarus forth alive from his tomb? Somebody saw and heard something and tried to write it down. And what grew from it as a system of belief, in parallel with science and technology, sure beats the other belief systems we’ve seen in the world during the last 3,000 years.
+1,000,000
The main thing that amazes me today is that a carpenter born in an isolated area, started a new religion, Christianity, that has spread to the entire world. He never traveled more than 100 miles away from his home, yet his apostles spread the good word throughout the world in less than 100 years. And not just the known world as there have been Christians in India for 2,000 years.
If you really believe the religious fairy tales about human origins, we’d simply be talking past each other.
Yup, I believe. I have my doubts at times but I believe. I am hook, line and sinker in for Christianity. And, Mr. OFD, the wordsmith, has it right, those tails in the Bible were for nomadic tribesmen to understand and are very allegorical.
But, I have severe disbelief about there always being at least a couple of thousand Homo Sapiens. I thought that the current evolutionary hypothesis is “Mitochondrial Eve” and “Y-chromosomal Adam”, a mated pair of Homo Sapiens?
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mitochondrial_Eve
“In human genetics, Mitochondrial Eve is the matrilineal most recent common ancestor (MRCA), in a direct, unbroken, maternal line, of all currently living humans, who is estimated to have lived approximately 100,000–200,000 years ago. This is the most recent woman from whom all living humans today descend, in an unbroken line, on their mother’s side, and through the mothers of those mothers, and so on, back until all lines converge on one person.”
BTW, I am also not a “young earther”. The earth is way older than 6,500 years. Way, way, way older. I believe that we have lost more of our kids over the mistaken belief in a young earth than anything else.
But someone could say roughly the same thing about Islam, some guy out in the desert comes up with some stuff and then exhorts a band of warriors to follow him and 2,000 years later, bingo, over a billion muslims, too. The difference being that the carpenter, or possibly a mason, did not spread the faith via the sword. Another difference is that Mohammed didn’t come back from the dead.
“…Anyone who does not believe that evolution is reality or even that humans are somehow outside the pathways of evolution…”
Oh, I believe that evolutionary theory is real and DEVELOPING, and that it is not necessarily incompatible with Christian belief. If one believes in an omniscient, omnipotent deity, He can certainly influence evolution or any other natural process anytime He wants. So somewhere back in the mists of time there was a common ancestor to us and apes and monkeys, and then at some point along the way, homo sapiens sapiens came about, and then again at some point more recent that, HSS seems to have suddenly developed the capacities for language, tool making and settled agriculture, with ACCOMPANYING religious beliefs. IIRC, this was about 50,000 years ago, although the cave paintings are much older than that.
“…Mitochondrial Eve…”
Yeah, that’s what I was referring to; a single female ancestor for us all in an unbroken line.
But next year, or ten years from now, the scientists, having done even more research and study, and having made more discoveries, are very likely to have a different theory.
” I am hook, line and sinker in for Christianity.”
Ditto, in its Roman Catholic version, which goes back in another unbroken line 2,000 years.
Oh, I believe that evolutionary theory is real and DEVELOPING, and that it is not necessarily incompatible with Christian belief. If one believes in an omniscient, omnipotent deity, He can certainly influence evolution or any other natural process anytime He wants.
OFD, we are brothers in thought here!
” I am hook, line and sinker in for Christianity.”
Ditto, in its Roman Catholic version, which goes back in another unbroken line 2,000 years.
One of our elders just taught us a 16??? week course on the history of Christianity. Was incredibly interesting, including his 10+ lb second edition KJV Bible in the plastic case that he would not let touch. He believes there to be over 1,000 Christian denominations now. He used the timeline on this webpage:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Christian_denominations_by_number_of_members
I am Church of Christ which is a branch off the Restoration movement.
I suggest you read at least the Wikipedia entry on MRCA. It’s not as straightforward as you seem to think.
“The MRCA of everyone alive could have co-existed with a large human population, each of whom either has no living descendants or is an ancestor of only some of the people alive today. Therefore, the existence of an MRCA does not imply the existence of a population bottleneck, let alone a “first couple”.”
The human MRCA probably lived 2,000 to 5,000 years ago, and almost certainly within the last 10,000 years.
Incidentally, it’s very possible that all of the regular commenters on this board share someone from, say, the time of the Caesars or perhaps even Charlemagne.
There’s also a misconception that people are genetically related to their ancestors. That’s true for recent ancestors, of course, but it takes surprisingly few generations for genetic relationships to disappear. Read up on meiosis.
Finally, you’re assuming something for which there is zero evidence: the historicity of jesus. There’s no evidence that he ever existed, and there are good reasons to believe he did not. For Barabbas, for example, the original Roman fingerprint cards and booking photos remain. for jesus, nothing. If he did exist, I still say the most likely explanation is that Mary was knocked up by a passing camel salesman, and had to come up with some explanation. Mother Mary, indeed.
It surprises me that intelligent, well-educated people can take these fairy tales any more seriously than they would any other legends passed down by primitive people, and do so not just in the absence of evidence but in situations where there is a great deal of credible, rational evidence that flat-out contradicts the fair tales.
“…for which there is zero evidence: the historicity of jesus. There’s no evidence that he ever existed, and there are good reasons to believe he did not.”
So you’re claiming that the authors of the four Gospels, the Epistles and Revelation were all producing fiction, and one would also have to believe that either some of them got together to write it up or simply plagiarized earlier texts. Along with the mentions of Him by Josephus and Tacitus. Thirty years ago our Episcopal rector did a sabbatical with the late Bishop John A.T. Robinson in England, who’d just written “Redating the New Testament,” and it places the various epistles and the gospel texts much closer to the actual time of Jesus than had otherwise been supposed. He came back and gave a class on it with us for a few weeks and it was fascinating. It reads much more like, if not eyewitness testimony, at least testimony only second- or third-hand. One must also believe that the countless martyrs who died horrible deaths from the earliest times of the Church must have done so in a deluded state of mind and for nothing, yea unto the present day in the old Soviet Union and now in the Middle East.
As for the mug shots and fingerprint cards on Barabbas, he was already in the Roman penal system; Jesus was not, and had been turned over to the Jerusalem mob.
“…it’s very possible that all of the regular commenters on this board share someone from, say, the time of the Caesars or perhaps even Charlemagne.”
With me that would be Cicero and Carolus Magnus himself, of course.
OFD wrote:
“Ditto, in its Roman Catholic version, which goes back in another unbroken line 2,000 years.”
Sorry to say Dave, but the RC church diverged from true Christianity (i.e. Protestantism) after a few hundred years when some guy in a white dressing gown in Rome started making stuff up that wasn’t in the Bible.
Cicero is my great great great… grandfather. Unfortunately I didn’t inherit his rhetorical abilities… 🙁
If averyone alive today has a MRCA going back 2000-5000 years ago then how does one prove that there was no other CA further back. Wouldn’t the MRCA destroy evidence of all previous CAs, including Adam and Eve?
Even as a non-religous type, I always figured that Jesus did exist. A charismatic reformer who had a huge influence on the people of his day. Some people (the Jews) left it at that, others (Jews->Christians) believed that such a charismatic type had to the the person fortold in their prophecies.
In either case, as OFD says, there are enough written references to this person that he almost certainly existed in some form. The writings from centuries later will have embellished things to support some particular point of view, but it is unlikely that they are (all) invented from nothing.
Kind of like Robin Hood.
Robin Hood, like King Arthur, is undoubtedly a composite of several historical characters.
As may be you-know-who.
All of the accounts are from someone who knew someone who knew someone who knew someone who said …
Despite the attempts of religious apologists to make those accounts seem first-person or at least contemporaneous, I’ve seen no convincing evidence that any of them were written less than a century after the supposed events occurred, and more likely two or three centuries.
I don’t care what you choose to believe, as long as you don’t attempt to force your beliefs on me.
“I don’t care what you choose to believe, as long as you don’t attempt to force your beliefs on me.”
No problemo, amigo.
“All of the accounts are from someone who knew someone who knew someone who knew someone who said …”
Remove two of those someone’s.
http://www.amazon.com/Redating-Testament-Arthur-Thomas-Robinson/dp/0664213367/ref=mt_hardcover?_encoding=UTF8&me=
Again, a religious apologist, whose writings are worthless because he has an axe to grind. Religious apologists have been twisting things, cherry-picking data, and making up data ever since there have been religious apologists.
Give me something from an archaeologist or a secular historian, someone who doesn’t care either way. I, incidentally, am an example of someone who doesn’t care either way.
I don’t care what you choose to believe, as long as you don’t attempt to force your beliefs on me.
I am not going to go buy a sword, drive to your home, and force you to convert or die. Any Christian who tries to force Christianity on anyone else is sadly in error. Jesus would never condone that behavior. And anyone who practices that behavior will probably slip into that old Bible saying, “live by the sword, die by the sword”, as @Bob will probably put a .45 bullet between their eyes. And justifiably so.
Nah, I’d never do that.
It’s too easy to miss a head shot because the head is pretty mobile compared to the chest.