09:17 – Things are pretty quiet around here. We have friends arriving later in the week to spend Christmas with us. Until then, we’ll be working on building more science kits.
We awoke this morning to heavy freezing fog, a heavy frost, and 23F (-5C). It doesn’t feel particularly cold because there’s no wind at all this morning.
10:36 – Barbara has friends coming up to spend the day. The weather is better than expected. It’s chilly, but no precipitation and little wind. I’m sure they’ll have a good time walking through downtown Sparta visiting shops and stalls.
Ah, the joys of living in a small town. I had a follow-up appointment scheduled with the dentist for 10:30 this morning. At 7:27 a.m. my phone rang. It was the dentist office calling to cancel the appointment because Dr. Flowers is taking a sick day today. She’s something like seven months pregnant, so that’s not surprising. What did surprise me is that the receptionist apologized for the inconvenience and said that they’d be crediting my account for $25 because Dr. Flowers missed the appointment. I’m used to doctors and dentists charging patients a penalty if they miss an appointment without calling to cancel it 24 or 48 hours in advance, but that’s the first time I’ve heard of a doctor or dentist charing themselves a penalty for missing an appointment.
Starting tomorrow, we need to get more science kits built. We’ll start by building another dozen or so biology kits, which we’re shortest of at the moment, and then another dozen or two chemistry kits, which we still have to fill chemical bottles and build chemical bags for. After that, we’ll do another dozen or so forensics kits.
We’ve been buying Costco AA and AAA alkalines for 10 or 15 years, and it’s time to start focusing more on rechargeables. I made an initial foray into rechargeables 10 or 15 years ago, back when NiMH rechargeables were just coming into common use. The problem with those early-generation NiMH was that they didn’t hold a charge very long, so they were mainly useful only in things like cordless phone handsets that could be put on a charger every night. Their rapid self-discharge made them entirely unsuitable for stuff like flashlights, remote controls, and so on. Also, many of them promised 500 to 1,000 charge cycles, but in my experience they often died after 100 cycles or even fewer, even when charged on an expensive “smart” charger. Finally, their mAH capacities were so much lower than alkalines that they weren’t particularly useful for anything that required a lot of current, unless it was something like a camera where they could be recharged easily and immediately.
But now the technology has improved immensely, and the cost has fallen pretty dramatically as well. Low self-discharge (LSD) models keep a high percentage of their charge even sitting on the shelf for a year or more, so they’re now usable in things like remote controls and flashlights. There’s still a three-way trade-off. High mAH capacity; usable recharge cycles; and LSD. Pick any two. And, of course, you can add in price as a fourth factor.
NiMH AA and AAA cells currently sell for $1 to $4 each, depending on specifications, name brand, and so on. That means they pay for themselves after anything from three or four up to ten recharge cycles.
09:49 – Barbara is cleaning house this morning. She has friends coming up tomorrow to spend the day visiting the craft stores and similar places in Sparta. The weather won’t be ideal for that. When I took Colin out first time this morning, we were already at the high for the day, about 54F (12C). It’s to get colder and colder throughout the day, with a low of 23F (-5C) with gusty winds later today and possibly freezing rain. Tomorrow’s high is to be only 39F (4C), but at least most of the frozen stuff should be gone.
Kit stuff today and continuing through this coming week, as we have time to spare from Christmas preparations.
10:50 – It warmed up overnight. When I took Colin out first time this morning, it was 43F (6C), but the winds were probably 30 MPH (48 KPH) sustained, with gusts up to around 50 MPH. Oddly, it actually seemed pretty warm, even with the wind. I guess I’m getting used to the Sparta climate.
The electrician came out Thursday while I was at the dentist. I had time to talk with him briefly before I had to leave for my appointment. He got the 120VAC receptacle installed for the gas oven, and we talked briefly about installing a cut-over switch for the generator. He said that in his opinion that was overkill, and suggested that we make provision just for running the circuits we really needed, like the well pump.
Afterwards, I talked to Barbara. Her attitude is that all we really, really need to be able to run off the generator is the well pump. She’d also like to be able to run the refrigerator and freezer, but said those weren’t essential. She suggested we just run extension cords to the refrigerator and freezer. We have plenty of long, heavy-duty extension cords, and the generator will sit right below the kitchen window and not far from the back garage window (where the freezer is located). That leaves only the well pump, which (oddly) is a 120VAC unit.
I disagree with Barbara about the freezer not being essential. If we have a power failure that lasts longer than a couple of days and occurs during hot weather, we might have upwards of $1,000 of food (primarily meat) in that freezer. I think being able to power it is essential.
The guy who came out to install the receptacle for the oven said that we really needed to talk to Jay, who’s their go-to guy for generator connection issues. The well pump is currently wired straight into a breaker on the main panel. I think I’ll ask Jay if he could convert the well pump power feed into a standard 120VAC plug and install a receptacle on that circuit. That way, if the power does go down, we could simply unplug the well pump from its receptacle and plug it into an extension cord that runs to a 120VAC output on our generator.
And this from a link that OFD sent me, via Matt Bracken on Western Rifle Shooters. I think it sums things up pretty well.
Obviously, having even a doofus like this banging away at you with his AK held sideways is no joke, as is pointed out in the comments, but Bracken’s point is that on average a whole lot more of the doofuses are going down than good guys.
11:14 – I spent the morning yesterday at the dentist, undergoing oral surgery. When Barbara retired from the law firm as of 10/30/15, we elected to continue her dental insurance under COBRA. That expires in March 2017, so I wanted to get done whatever needed to be done while we were still covered for dental. Barbara is volunteering again today to get the public library moved to its new location. She just called to check on me.
It was 14.8F (-10C) when I got up this morning to take Colin out. By the time I did his after-breakfast walk an hour or so later, the temperature had skyrocketed up to 15.3F. It’s not officially winter for another week or so, but winter has definitely arrived in Sparta, NC.
I just ordered another humidifier like the one we’re currently using. The tank holds just short of a gallon (maybe 3.5L), which on high it runs through in about 12 hours. Putting two gallons of water per day into the air helps, but it’s not quite enough. When it’s really cold outside, our indoor humidity starts to drop. Even with one unit running flat-out, the humidity gets down into the 45% range, which is uncomfortable for Barbara. She likes it up around 55% to 60%, which running two units should allow us to maintain.
Email overnight from Jen. They’ve run several readiness exercises over the last couple of years, hunkering down in their home over a long weekend. They decided to run another, longer-term exercise over Christmas, starting Friday evening the 23rd and running through Monday morning the 2nd of January. They’ll have to “cheat” a bit because not all of them can take off the whole week between Christmas and the New Year. Her husband David, for example, has to cover two days that week at his veterinary practice, and her brother Jim will have to go into work for at least half-days most of that week. They’ll both be taking their lunches and thermoses with them, so it’s only a minor cheat.
They haven’t tried to do a week-long readiness exercise before, because Christmas was the only realistic time to run it and the women decided there was just too much going on over that holiday to try a hunkering down exercise. But Jen and David have made some significant improvements to their infrastructure over the last year that’ll make it a lot easier for them. They’ve installed a decent size off-grid solar setup with a high amperage true sine-wave inverter that allows them to run their well pump, basic lighting (which is all LED now), TV, and so on. They also installed a high wattage Honda inverter generator as a backup means of charging their battery bank and driving their refrigerator and freezer directly. Finally, they also did what we just did: installed a large propane tank and a gas cooktop in their basement living area, along with a small propane water heater, which feeds only the sink and bathroom in the basement living area. They didn’t replace their main electric water heater because propane is about three times as costly as electricity, and they use a lot of hot water. Still, as Jen says, that gives them hot water for showers and food-prep/dish-washing downstairs. She can still do laundry upstairs, but she’ll just have to run cold-water washes.
08:08 – Barbara spent all day yesterday volunteering: 0800 through lunch helping with the move to their new quarters, a quick stop at home to shower, and all afternoon at the Friends of the Library bookstore. She’d intended to head home late-morning to meet the mattress delivery people, but she didn’t need to. About 1000, she called to tell me that Al was heading up from Winston and was about ten minutes out. He pulled in the drive about 90 seconds after her call. I hadn’t even had time to start a pot of coffee for him.
The mattress delivery truck pulled in our drive about 1130. The two guys made short work of hauling off the old one and hauling in the new one. It’s now in place, the bed is made, and everything is ready for Frances and Al’s next visit.
After Al headed home to Winston and Barbara to the FoL bookstore, I called the county ag extension office and spoke to a delightful young woman named Amy Lucas about volunteering for 4H. She told me I’d need to fill out an application, which I could find on the state site. It’s five pages long, but I understand they have to be very careful about allowing random adults to work with teens.
Amy said they would need to do a background check on me. It used to be required initially and then every five years, but now they’ve dropped that to every two years. Amy was born and raised here, and said it was embarrassing for her to have to explain to people she’s known all her life that by state law they had to undergo a detailed background check before they were allowed to volunteer.
I shouldn’t have any problem passing the background check. My most recent encounter with LE was about 30 years ago, when I got a ticket in Winston for going 40 in a 35 zone. I’ve never been arrested for, let alone convicted of, even a misdemeanor.
I had her on the phone, so I also asked Amy if they did pressure tests on pressure canners. She said they sure did, that anyone in the office was able to do those tests, and that it took about five minutes. All I need to do is bring in the lid. As it turns out, she’s a home canning enthusiast, as is her mother. She said the the county ag department had regular canning classes at the library and elsewhere and that they were also happy to do one-on-one lessons.
She asked what kind of pressure canner I had, and I told her a Presto 23-quart. She said Presto was good, as were Mirro and All-American. She said the only real difference between a $70 Presto and an All-American that sells for five times as much was that the Presto required replacing the gasket periodically while the AA didn’t use a gasket. I said that for one fifth the cost I could buy a lot of spare gaskets.
When Amy mentioned the library, I told her that Barbara had spent the morning helping move the books to the new library building and was spending the afternoon at the FoL bookstore. She said she’d stop in one day soon to meet Barbara. I mentioned that Barbara wasn’t yet sold on doing our own canning, but I wanted to can dark meat chicken and ground beef for LTS. Amy said she bet she could make Barbara a convert in short order.
08:37 – Barbara left at 0800 to head over to the library, where she’s volunteering to help with their move to a new location. They’ve been boxing up books and other materials, which they have to move over to the new building, unpack, and reshelve.
She’ll be back home in time to meet the mattress delivery people. Frances and Al decided buy a new mattress for our guest room bed and have it delivered here. Barbara put her foot down, and said they will be hauling away the old mattress. She knew I’d want to keep it and stick it up in the attic. The secret to a happy marriage is to let your spouse win such debates, particularly when they don’t really matter much to you. That way, you can save up credits for issues that really matter.
I read an interesting series of comments to an article I read yesterday. FTC:
I Am Screwed says:
Comment ID: 3641814
December 12, 2016 at 2:51 pmIt’s hard to read some of the comments because I am black and I am screwed no matter what. Why do I say that? Well, because I am a black female in my 40s, voted for Bush/Cheney way back when, was on the Republican Women’s Committee at one time in my state and did not and would not ever vote for Obama. He is/was against everything I believe in. I was a Ted Cruz supporter but voted for Trump when Cruz didn’t get the nomination. So, I often think about getting out of dodge. Cause my husband is white and I fear for him cause of all the racism and hate coming from black people. But then where to? Idaho was on the list but if you see me coming you are thinking I am the enemy. And I am not! I love America, believe in the right to carry, believe in the Constitution and I have a wonderful life! I was a Pharmaceutical Rep and left that career to be a stay-home, homeschooling Mom. I am raising my children to love our country and to learn about the Constitutional Republic that we are or were. I am sad that now I don’t feel safe anywhere anymore on either side. We have been looking for a BOL, but I don’t know where to go. I think people who really love the US and our constitution are the conservatives who would see me as a person. It’s the liberals that worry me. Anyway, sorry for the rant. Just wanted you to know there are some black people who don’t live in in the inner city, don’t want handouts, don’t like rap music (I prefer Christian), don’t like liberal policies, always vote conservative, don’t like the moral decline of our nation or the immigration issue and want a wall built and certainly I am upset about the refugee craziness and never thought I would ever see someone in a Birka at TJ Maxx and someone who thinks Reagan was one of the best Presidents ever. God bless everyone and be safe.
I can sympathize with her. Preppers tend to be white, male, and Christian, so anyone who doesn’t fit those norms may feel marginalized. On the other hand, preppers tend strongly towards a live-and-let-live outlook, happy to welcome anyone who shares their concerns. I’d be happy to have this woman and her family as neighbors, and I suspect that most preppers would feel the same.
10:16 – Barbara left at 0900 to pick up Bonnie Tedder, our next-door neighbor, and take her to run errands. Bonnie is almost 90 years old, and doesn’t get out much. Barbara said she’d probably be gone most of the day, taking Bonnie to two doctor appointments and various other errands.
In the wake of Trump’s election, a lot of preppers seem to be slacking off a bit on their efforts. Part of that may be relief that Trump is a lot less likely to get us into a nuclear war than Clinton would have been. Part of it, too, may be that many people were working so feverishly to get prepared in the run-up to the election that they’re now reasonably happy with where they stand preparedness-wise and are just taking a breather.
Obviously, in one sense, preparedness is a way of life rather than a discrete activity, but in another sense it’s quite reasonable to set preparedness goals, meet them, and then put further preparedness activities on the back burner. That latter is pretty much our situation at present. Sure, there are additional things I want to do, but at this point we’re better-prepared for any emergency than 99.9% of the US public. Probably even 99.99%.
Comfort level vary widely. I’ve gotten email from people who have three months’ worth of food and little else stored, but consider themselves well-prepared. Conversely, I’ve gotten email from people who have spent literally hundreds of thousands of dollars on preparations, have literally five years’ or more of food, dozens of guns and tens of thousands of rounds of ammunition, enough medical supplies to start a clinic, and large-scale solar power and water systems installed, and still consider their preparations inadequate. I think the first group are much too optimistic and the latter group much too pessimistic, but that’s just my take. How and to what degree people decide to prepare is their decision, but I love talking to other preppers regardless of their level of preparation. The more people who are prepared and the more they are prepared, the better. When (not if) something bad happens, it’s much better to be surrounded by a bunch of preppers than not.
09:50 – Barbara is off to the gym and the bank. We’ve gone from cold and dry weather to warmer and a drizzle. Later this week, we’re to have the worst of both worlds: lows in the single digits F (~ -15C) with precipitation. Ugh.
Several people commented, here or via email, that cast iron wasn’t a good choice for a wok. Before I ordered, I read a lot of the comments that were discussing this very issue. The weight of opinion seems to be that heavy cast-iron is a much better choice than thin, light steel because the cast-iron wok retains its high temperature when one adds things to it. Neither of us is Godzilla, so we won’t be flipping the food in a 14-pound wok, or even tilting the wok to dump food onto plates, but the average of almost 1,000 customer reviews on Amazon is close to five stars, so it obviously works for a lot of people.
Several prepper sites have been running articles about how the supply of “fish antibiotics” is supposedly going to dry up as of 1/1/17. That’s simply not true. What is true is that antibiotics for agricultural/livestock use will become harder to come by. As of now, you can simply buy many antibiotics over-the-counter from farm-supply places. Many farmers and ranchers routinely treat their cattle, pigs, and fowl with sub-clinical dosages of various antibiotics because that allows them to grow and put on weight faster. Unfortunately, routine sub-clinical dosages are also the best way possible to help bacteria develop resistance to antibiotics. That’s what these new regulations are aimed at. Starting January 1st, many widely used livestock antibiotics (such as this one) will now require what amounts to a veterinarian’s prescription. Antibiotics intended for use with ornamental fish, such as those sold by Thomas Labs, should not be affected by these new regulations.
That said, regulations can change any time, so it’s not a bad idea to acquire at least a minimal stock of a few key antibiotics. I still recommend aquabiotics.net as a good source. They sell a much broader range of antibiotics than Thomas Labs does, and they’re much less expensive. A few weeks ago, Brittany ordered what seems to me to be a reasonable supply for a family or a small group. As Brittany is aware, all of these antibiotics are to be used only in an absolute emergency, where regular medical services are unavailable. Every one of these antibiotics has the potential for severe side effects, up to and including death. Do NOT self-medicate when a physician is available. I regard these antibiotics as an absolute last-ditch solution. I wouldn’t administer them to myself or others unless I was pretty sure the person was in imminent danger of dying without them.
10:45 – Barbara cooked dinner on her new propane cooktop last night. A pound of pasta, a pound of ground beef, a pound can of chili beans, a 6-oz. can of tomato paste, 1.5 cups of water, one tsp. of chili powder, and one Tbsp. of onion flakes. It turned out pretty well, although I’d boost the onion to 2 Tbsp and add a tsp. of garlic powder.
Barbara really likes her new propane cooktop, although she’s having to get used to the burners. There are four: 15,000, 12,000, 9,100, and 5,000 BTUs. Papa Bear, Mama Bear, Tweenie Bear, and Baby Bear.
I’ve been building our collection of cast-iron cookware, which is particularly well suited to use on a gas cooktop with a heavy cast-iron grate. I just ordered a Lodge P14W3 Pro-Logic Cast Iron Wok. We’re doing stir-fry more often. We have a cast-steel wok that works fine, but I want to have a reasonably full set of cast-iron cookware.
If electric power goes down long-term, we’ll have to do all our cooking on the propane cooktop. I’ve never baked bread in a Dutch oven on a cooktop, but there are numerous pages on the web that describe how to do so. The next time we bake bread, I want to try baking at least one loaf in a Dutch oven on the gas cooktop.
Email overnight from Brittany, who’s been following our progress on getting propane installed for cooking. They currently have an electric cooktop and oven, and have decided to switch to a propane cooktop. Brittany ordered the same cooktop we have from Lowe’s, and has contacted their local propane supplier to have a tank installed and connected up to the cooktop. They’re going to move their current electric cooktop down to the food storage area in the basement and use it primarily for canning. I plan to do the same thing with our old electric cooktop.