From: Wolverine
Friday night I got a video clip from Tonto showing how to make a buck saw for backpacking or around the retreat for the low cost of $9. Tonto is a very clever survivalist and prepper. I have learned a lot from that man over the years and even stolen a few of his ideas for postings. We both have the plan to shelter in place when TSHTF, we just have different ideas on what we will be able to accomplish. We also both plan on having wood as a heat and cooking source once the grid goes down.
I finished my errands in very good time so I did stop at a flea market. I was elated to find a Bear Cub recurve bow there. My boys broke mine a few years back and I really miss it. I wasn’t able to buy the last couple I saw; they had nearly $100 price tags on them. I bought the replacement for $40. The bow is part of my survival strategy so it was important to replace it.
While wandering around the different stales I spotted an old style buck saw. No one was at the booth but I was able to check it out and saw it had a $12 price tag. I figured that for a sawbuck I could walk away with it. I called Tonto and asked if he was heart set on making one of those buck saws or would he like one for ten bucks? He told me that an old one for ten was great so I went back and looked up the booth owner.
Those of us that are cheap tend to bargain prices more often than not. I asked the booth owner what his best price was on that saw. He thought a few moments and told me he would take $8 for it. I paid the cash and left.
Yes, we can all save money and make our own supplies. There is a certain satisfaction in being very self-reliant. There is also satisfaction in being able to acquire a good quality survival tool for a very reasonable price.
After I got back to the farm I went out to the barn and double checked my buck saws. That leads me to a question for you guys. Were do you buy buck saw blades that a 30 and 36 inches long? I wouldn’t mind having a couple spares. I checked the local TSC and they didn’t have any larger size blades.
There are a lot of lessons here. Communicate your needs with your network of friends and support group. They may be able to help you save time and money in finding supplies. Supplies can come from any number of places, from the local Tractor Supply Company, flea market and garage sale finds, or building them yourself.
It is always good to keep yourself thinking about how you will handle your needs after an event than waiting for the event to start. Shelter and heat, water, food, and security all need to be planned out well in advance. Just how much will an $8 buck saw be worth if we go grid down and half of Michigan is cutting wood for heat? It is never too early to start acquiring supplies.
Wolverine
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Wednesday, January 26, 2011
Thursday, January 20, 2011
Acquiring “Nails”
Years ago I used to work as the night maintenance guy for McDonald’s. It consisted of a lot of cleaning and prepping equipment for the next day’s busy business cycle. It wasn’t my dream job that is for sure, but it did allow me to get “maintenance” experience that lead to my current millwright job of the last 29 years.
While I worked nights I would have the radio playing. I will be dating myself here and I doubt ten percent of the readers will know this, but I always had Jay Roberts’ Music ‘Til Dawn on WJR radio. There was a PSA that played four to six times a night. It started out with the old Ben Franklin piece;
For want of a nail the shoe was lost,
for want of a shoe the horse was lost,
for want of a horse the rider was lost,
being overtaken by the enemy and slain.
Forty years later that still sticks with me as to the importance of small detail. When I was an MP instructor in the reserves one of the things we drilled into the students was “Attention to Detail!”. It is the small things that make a difference.
Being a prepper means that you need to have the ability to handle lots of hiccups in our daily lives. It could be just a school closing on the day you absolutely have to be at work. It could be a blown light bulb in the lamp you need to do some work with. We make a quick phone call to one of your trusted friends that are part of our mutual support group and drop the child off on the way to work or we open the closest and pull out a spare bulb and keep on steppin’.
The thing is, of course, that it takes planning and work to be able to do that. You have to be friends with folks to develop a network of support and you have to plan ahead and buy extra items for those quick repairs. Those are the nails as it were.
Being a prepper isn’t always an ammo can full of bullets and a pantry full of canned goods, although that is part of it. What about a supply of spices to cook and bake with? Spare everythings are important if they are no longer available at the store.
On little thing that my wife and I do to help keep all those little things in the house it this. Since Michigan has a bottle deposit law we turn our bottles in once a month or so. We then pick up items we want to store up with the deposit money. Since that money was already spent we look at it as “free money”. Between what we pay deposit on and the bottles and cans I pick up we generate about $7 a month. Not a lot of money but enough to add all kinds of items to the larder.
Make a list of the items you would want extras of and then start picking them up with small amounts of extra cash. In time you will find that you have a lot of “nails” around to keep from losing the shoe, the horse, and the rider.
Wolverine
------------------------------------------
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Visit the Michigan Forum at www.MichiganPreppersNetwork.net
While I worked nights I would have the radio playing. I will be dating myself here and I doubt ten percent of the readers will know this, but I always had Jay Roberts’ Music ‘Til Dawn on WJR radio. There was a PSA that played four to six times a night. It started out with the old Ben Franklin piece;
For want of a nail the shoe was lost,
for want of a shoe the horse was lost,
for want of a horse the rider was lost,
being overtaken by the enemy and slain.
Forty years later that still sticks with me as to the importance of small detail. When I was an MP instructor in the reserves one of the things we drilled into the students was “Attention to Detail!”. It is the small things that make a difference.
Being a prepper means that you need to have the ability to handle lots of hiccups in our daily lives. It could be just a school closing on the day you absolutely have to be at work. It could be a blown light bulb in the lamp you need to do some work with. We make a quick phone call to one of your trusted friends that are part of our mutual support group and drop the child off on the way to work or we open the closest and pull out a spare bulb and keep on steppin’.
The thing is, of course, that it takes planning and work to be able to do that. You have to be friends with folks to develop a network of support and you have to plan ahead and buy extra items for those quick repairs. Those are the nails as it were.
Being a prepper isn’t always an ammo can full of bullets and a pantry full of canned goods, although that is part of it. What about a supply of spices to cook and bake with? Spare everythings are important if they are no longer available at the store.
On little thing that my wife and I do to help keep all those little things in the house it this. Since Michigan has a bottle deposit law we turn our bottles in once a month or so. We then pick up items we want to store up with the deposit money. Since that money was already spent we look at it as “free money”. Between what we pay deposit on and the bottles and cans I pick up we generate about $7 a month. Not a lot of money but enough to add all kinds of items to the larder.
Make a list of the items you would want extras of and then start picking them up with small amounts of extra cash. In time you will find that you have a lot of “nails” around to keep from losing the shoe, the horse, and the rider.
Wolverine
------------------------------------------
Join the APN Forum at www.AmericanPreppersNetwork.net
Visit the Michigan Forum at www.MichiganPreppersNetwork.net
Friday, January 14, 2011
Rual King Sale
Here is a special emailed to me from Getting Started
Do You Live in IL, IN, KY, MI, MO, OH, or TN
.. then I have a deal for you.
Rural King has a sell on 5-gallon buckets. These buckets are the thicker .90 mil buckets, they are thicker and stronger then .75 mil buckets. The cost ...
$1.99
Now, I don't know if these are food-grade buckets, so caveat emptor.
Now, the bad news.
The sale ends Sunday; the buckets have a painted Rural King logo; and the $1.49 lids are flimsy.
Let me say this again.
The on sale lids are flimsy. If you plan to stack the buckets, you will need to buy a .75 or .90 mil lid.
Link:
Rural King - Store Locator
Rural King - Weekly Ad
P.S.
Just so you know, I just paid over six bucks for some buckets and two bucks for some lids from my local supplier.
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Sunday, January 9, 2011
So congress read the Constitution: Well, isn’t that special
Marti Oakley, Contributing Writer
Activist Post
I tried watching the swearing in of the new House for the 112th Congress. I couldn’t stand it. Standing on the steps outside the House, was one of the greatest collections of career liars, thieves and thugs ever publicly assembled, sprinkled with a few new-comers who probably believe they are actually going to affect a change in the District of Criminals.
By the end of January, these newbies will have been thoroughly indoctrinated and will have had the law laid down to them about how things really work in the District. The newbies will resurface along about February with their talking points memo’s in hand and will dutifully be spouting the party line and will have totally dismissed any notions they may have had about “changing” the way the District does business.
Next I tried to watch the changing of the Speaker of the House. In these moments I am always amazed at the ability of the players to stand in front of not only the House members, but the American public thanks to all the camera’s present, and to deliver vacant and pointless speeches, the words of which sound like they should mean something . . . but really don’t.
Nancy Pelosi had the gall to speak about defending the Constitution. This from a woman who has single-handedly violated the provisions of that document on so many occasions it is staggering. Now she thinks the Constitution should be defended. Apparently Ms. Pelosi suffers from some form of congressional alzheimers or maybe she just has selective memory.
John Boehner took the gavel as he assumed his new position as speaker and talked about “openness, transparency and honesty”. Words I believe were taken from Obama’s now infamous remarks during his campaign. Yeah…..I’ll be looking for John to deliver on that one.
The grand coup’ in all of this, the zinger meant to incite the public, to make the American people believe was a new day with new leadership that was really going to listen to the American people and a leadership that held the Constitution in high regard, promising to uphold it at all times …….was the reading of the Constitution on the floor of the House. While this reading of America’s most historical and profoundly important document was read, congress men and women chatted with one another and I believe a few might have napped.
Not one congressmen, not the outgoing speaker or the incoming speaker, said one word about repealing any of the egregious assaults on Constitutional rights and protections that were contained in numerous pieces of legislation that they themselves, in many instances, voted to pass
Having watched these stage shows put on by both the House and Senate for more years than I care to admit, I was none-the-less taken back by the unmitigated gall, the phony posturing, the vacant speeches and remarks that were capped with the reading of the Constitution. Call me cynical, but I get the uneasy feeling this was some kind of insider joke. Maybe this is Congress’s idea of fun. I don’t know.
Here’s what I do know: We have allowed ourselves repeatedly to be conned by people we elect to office. We believe the speeches and the declarations, but once they are in office, they forget who they work for. Or maybe they never had any intentions of working for us to begin with.
The truth of the matter is that no matter what their intentions, corporations, lobbyists and other forces that we are just now learning about pull the strings. The fact is, we are subsidizing a political body that has ceased to be anything other than the facilitators for corporate takeover of all parts of our lives while subjecting us to agreements with foreign governments, international bodies and foreign organizations, populated by people who have no interest in seeing this country thrive and survive.
My question is this: Why do we continue to pay them?
After all, if you look at the money trail attached to each and every bill you see that they all garner millions in funding from the corporations who run the government; a donation no doubt meant to influence their votes.
I did not hear the out going speaker or the new speaker make any mention of ending this influence buying by corporations, and it was never mentioned either before or after the reading of the Constitution.
Speeches and vacant promises aside, there will be no change in the District of Criminals. The only thing that has changed is “who holds the gavel”.
Marti Oakley is a political activist and former op-ed columnist for the St Cloud Times in Minnesota. She was a member of the Times Writer’s Group until she resigned in September of 07. She is neither Democrat nor Republican, since neither party is representative of the American people. She says what she thinks, means what she says, and is known for being outspoken. She is hopeful that the American public will wake up to what is happening to our beloved country . . . little of it is left. Her website is The PPJ Gazette
------------------------------------------
Join the APN Forum at www.AmericanPreppersNetwork.net
Visit the Michigan Forum at www.MichiganPreppersNetwork.net
Activist Post
I tried watching the swearing in of the new House for the 112th Congress. I couldn’t stand it. Standing on the steps outside the House, was one of the greatest collections of career liars, thieves and thugs ever publicly assembled, sprinkled with a few new-comers who probably believe they are actually going to affect a change in the District of Criminals.
By the end of January, these newbies will have been thoroughly indoctrinated and will have had the law laid down to them about how things really work in the District. The newbies will resurface along about February with their talking points memo’s in hand and will dutifully be spouting the party line and will have totally dismissed any notions they may have had about “changing” the way the District does business.
Next I tried to watch the changing of the Speaker of the House. In these moments I am always amazed at the ability of the players to stand in front of not only the House members, but the American public thanks to all the camera’s present, and to deliver vacant and pointless speeches, the words of which sound like they should mean something . . . but really don’t.
Nancy Pelosi had the gall to speak about defending the Constitution. This from a woman who has single-handedly violated the provisions of that document on so many occasions it is staggering. Now she thinks the Constitution should be defended. Apparently Ms. Pelosi suffers from some form of congressional alzheimers or maybe she just has selective memory.
John Boehner took the gavel as he assumed his new position as speaker and talked about “openness, transparency and honesty”. Words I believe were taken from Obama’s now infamous remarks during his campaign. Yeah…..I’ll be looking for John to deliver on that one.
The grand coup’ in all of this, the zinger meant to incite the public, to make the American people believe was a new day with new leadership that was really going to listen to the American people and a leadership that held the Constitution in high regard, promising to uphold it at all times …….was the reading of the Constitution on the floor of the House. While this reading of America’s most historical and profoundly important document was read, congress men and women chatted with one another and I believe a few might have napped.
Not one congressmen, not the outgoing speaker or the incoming speaker, said one word about repealing any of the egregious assaults on Constitutional rights and protections that were contained in numerous pieces of legislation that they themselves, in many instances, voted to pass
Having watched these stage shows put on by both the House and Senate for more years than I care to admit, I was none-the-less taken back by the unmitigated gall, the phony posturing, the vacant speeches and remarks that were capped with the reading of the Constitution. Call me cynical, but I get the uneasy feeling this was some kind of insider joke. Maybe this is Congress’s idea of fun. I don’t know.
Here’s what I do know: We have allowed ourselves repeatedly to be conned by people we elect to office. We believe the speeches and the declarations, but once they are in office, they forget who they work for. Or maybe they never had any intentions of working for us to begin with.
The truth of the matter is that no matter what their intentions, corporations, lobbyists and other forces that we are just now learning about pull the strings. The fact is, we are subsidizing a political body that has ceased to be anything other than the facilitators for corporate takeover of all parts of our lives while subjecting us to agreements with foreign governments, international bodies and foreign organizations, populated by people who have no interest in seeing this country thrive and survive.
My question is this: Why do we continue to pay them?
After all, if you look at the money trail attached to each and every bill you see that they all garner millions in funding from the corporations who run the government; a donation no doubt meant to influence their votes.
I did not hear the out going speaker or the new speaker make any mention of ending this influence buying by corporations, and it was never mentioned either before or after the reading of the Constitution.
Speeches and vacant promises aside, there will be no change in the District of Criminals. The only thing that has changed is “who holds the gavel”.
Marti Oakley is a political activist and former op-ed columnist for the St Cloud Times in Minnesota. She was a member of the Times Writer’s Group until she resigned in September of 07. She is neither Democrat nor Republican, since neither party is representative of the American people. She says what she thinks, means what she says, and is known for being outspoken. She is hopeful that the American public will wake up to what is happening to our beloved country . . . little of it is left. Her website is The PPJ Gazette
------------------------------------------
Join the APN Forum at www.AmericanPreppersNetwork.net
Visit the Michigan Forum at www.MichiganPreppersNetwork.net
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