Homestead mailing list

[EarthNSky <erthnsky AT gmail.com>]

Lynda wrote:
> At least half this county is off the grid.  About 25% of the county we 
> moved from is off the grid.  The local power company is only sort of 
> tied into the national grid and can easily be switched off.  At this 
> point in time, there have been few instances, even during droughts, 
> when the local power company had to buy energy.  Generally speaking, 
> the connection to the national grid is idle.
Connected or not, unless someone is living a very different lifestyle 
now, they will be severely affected later.  Most off grid folks I am 
aware of still produce their own electricity and store it as battery 
power.  A good CME will take that out right along with the grid.  Do you 
know if any one out there uses Faraday cages or has their systems 
otherwise protected?



> We have two creeks on our property.  We also have a couple of places 
> that have underground springs.  The only problem would be getting the 
> water up the hill.

That is kind of what I meant...we too have lost of springs and there is 
surface water close by, but hauling water is rough on the body.  Just 
hauling for animals day in and day out will stress you after a few 
months.  I can't imagine hauling water for everything, everyday, all 
year long the way I know some have (Lynn in SC comes to mind) at my 
age.   Now mind you, I feel pretty good now at almost 50, but I am under 
no illusions about how much labor hauling water takes.



> The current woodstove is great for heating and I can do basic cooking 
> on it but I'd need a wood cookstove.  I could BWB on the current one 
> but not pressure can.  I've had pretty good luck (knock on wood) 
> reusing canning lids, although I think I'm going to buy a whole sleeve 
> of them next time I have a couple of extra dollars.
>
> Gardens all good to go and we'll have two hoophouses up by the end of 
> the summer.  We're also gutting an old travel trailer and will be 
> using it during the winter as a greenhouse.  I hate store bought 
> lettuce and hate not having salad in the winter, so I'm getting 
> creative. <g>

Interesting.  Like Lisa, I want to hear more and see pictures. 
As you know, I also heat with wood, and I live in a forest, too, but I'm 
not sure how many years we could cut without a chainsaw.  I do have a 
old two man saw blade that we could re-handle, but wow, that would be a 
job!   We would resort to more gathering, which would be more time and 
labor-or at least equal labor.  I've got 6 permanent raised beds now, 
each about 4x12 or 3x16 or 3.5x10.  Those are my no till zones-less than 
250 sf of space.  In order to feed myself, I still have to till a small 
area, and of course after a CME  we would not be using tillers.  I would 
be out there turning over the soil with a hoe, spade, or mattock as the 
case may be.  It is entirely doable by hand, but I would most certainly 
feel it, even spreading the work out over a couple of weeks.


> Medications?  Well, there are alternatives, at least for me.  I'd miss 
> iced tea in the summer but then again I wouldn't have the ice <g>

Living at elevation, you'd be closer to having ice than I would.  
There's one luxury that almost one takes for granted.
I know folks with outhouses and generators and even stills, but I don't 
know anyone with an ice house anymore.

Could I live without my meds...yeah.  Could I function at the level I 
would need to function without them, I seriously doubt it. 

The paradigm shift I would hope for would be one that value and use 
natural resources like oil and the rainforests for medicine more than 
for transportation and tourism.   With our present technology, we could 
become virtual tourists without becoming physical tourists- we can 
communicate around the world without going.  It is happening already 
with Facebook-people are using Facebook INSTEAD of going to reunions.  
You text or video phone or go the GoToMeeting INSTEAD of visiting face 
to face.
After a CME, none of that would be possible, and we would be back to 
more primitive travel and communications for a time, BUT when the world 
comes back online(and it will), perhaps the technology will be used in 
even more practical ways.  We are already moving in the 'one device' 
direction thanks to Steve Jobs, but it would be truly futuristic if 
everyone had an ipad and could connect and communicate with everyone 
else in the world.  Electricity would be for charging more than 
lighting.  Perhaps instead of money, we are paid in kilowatts for the 
work we do. ( LOL )  We would cook less(lose fast food restaurants of 
all kinds because we would not be so fast and mobile anyway), eat more 
raw veggies and fruits, and dry more-lighter and more portable for all 
that walking/biking we would be doing.  Oil as a resource would go more 
for petrochemicals and pharmaceuticals and mass transport, not as much 
for individual transport.  I just think we have to get a better handle 
on technology and use it wisely.  IMO, we haven't done that so far and 
Nature will probably wipe the slate clean for us to start over.  I hope 
we have a good plan so that we don't make the same mistakes over again.


--
The democracy will cease to exist when you take away from those who are willing to work and give to those who would not.      Thomas Jefferson