Category Archives: Uncategorized

Scientia potentia est

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Man, it’s hard not to read the news without incurring a a feeling of dread. No doubt someone in the comments will say something like “I don’t even watch the news anymore”, which in my opinion is like saying “I don’t keep my eyes open when I’m driving”. Sure, the news is almost uniformly gloomy, and rather depressing, but…so what? The whole point of news is to let you know about things that might impact you in a big way. Yeah, I feel a little helpless and hopeless reading the news, but I read it every single morning because, as a survivalist, I need every advantage I can get and knowing whats going on around me and around the world, even if its gloomy, is information that can give me an advantage.

Personally, while I think that we can objectively agree that the news is pretty often bad, my attitude is made better by knowing that once I know what the problem is, I can prepare against it. Still, it can be a bit of a downer to read the depressing news day after day.

The most…agitating…things in the news these days? The plethora of articles, seemingly at random, about ‘assault weapons’. It seems like every news outlet has a bunch of articles about an assault weapons ban. Were I the suspicious type, I’d say its part of a scheme to ‘normalize’ the idea….”Ban assault weapons? Why, everyone knows thats a good idea!” they’ll say…because it’s all theyve been fed as of late.

The other depressing news? With inflation running at levels unheard of since the days of eight-track, the current administration is wanting to spend more money it doesn’t have. You have to admire the optimism, if not the common sense, of the person who doubles down on a bad hand.

Resilience is the name of the game. And to be resilient against something you need to know what that something is. So, for me, yeah the news is a drag but so is being caught unprepared.

And, by the way, ingest news intelligently….remember, there’s three sides to every story: yours, theirs, and the truth (or facts). Don’t get all your news from just one (or even two or three) sources. These days forewarned really can wind up being forearmed.

CostCo canned beef…from pre-Trump days

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On todays episode of “Will It Digest” we have some of the Kirkland canned roast beef from CostCo. As far as canned meats go, I’m a big fan of this stuff and recommend it highly. Todays test subject was ‘Best By’ back when MAGA hats were just being introduced:

So…’Best By’ was six years ago. Shall we crack it open and see what happens? Well, the first thing that happens is that no matter what it is..beef, chicken, turkey, whatever…it always smells like cat food the minute you pierce that can. But, I know from experience that once you put the heat to the meat the smells start changing drastically.

Looks unappetizing, smells worse, but….as we bring it to temperature, the fats melt and mix with the meat, and after about ten minutes…..

Dumped it back in the pan with some spices, grabed some onion, cilantro, taco sauce, sour cream, outta the fridge, and…..

The point of this post isn’t to point out my half-assed attempts at cooking. But rather that some canned goods, especially a low-acid product like meat, kept in the classic ‘cool, dry place’, can be quite satisfactory long after the ‘Best By’ date. Ok, sure, it’s early and I really should wait eight hours and then make this post, but I’ve done this sort of thing before and I can tell you with empirical first-hand evidence that quality canned meats (meaning not something from some cannery in Samoa or Venezuela) can be useful a number of years after the date stamped on them.

And as far as the CostCo brand goes, if you have it in stock at your local CostCo (because it does tend to come and go) it is very much an excellent choice for stocking up. I normally find canned meats a bit repulsive, but I have to admit that once you get this thing in a pan and get some heat under it, it’s quite good.

Article – New rule on pistol attachments to boost gun safety, U.S. Justice Department says

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And so it begins….

WASHINGTON (Reuters) – The U.S. Justice Department announced on Friday a new rule targeting pistol attachments known as “stabilizing braces,” implementing a key move in the Biden administration’s efforts to beef up gun control regulations.

A stabilizing brace is an attachment to a pistol that functionally turns it into a short-barreled rifle, similar to a sawed-off shotgun. Such weapons are considered particularly deadly as they offer the power of a traditional rifle, but are much easier to conceal.

For decades, short-barreled rifles have been subject to strict regulations, including a law known as the National Rifle Act, which requires additional taxation and background checks for private transfers, among other provisions.

The new rule clarifies that pistols modified by a stabilizing brace are subject to those additional requirements, department officials said.

“This rule enhances public safety and prevents people from circumventing the laws Congress passed almost a century ago. In the days of Al Capone, Congress said back then that short-barreled rifles and sawed-off shotguns should be subjected to greater legal requirements than most other guns,” said Steven Dettelbach, the director of the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives (ATF).

Last year, President Joe Biden and U.S. Attorney General Merrick Garland announced they were planning measures to tackle stabilizing braces as well as “ghost guns” – a type of firearm that is assembled by users and practically untraceable.

While Democrats in Congress have pushed aggressively for new regulations of stabilizing braces, most Republicans have opposed such measures, portraying them as an infringement on Americans’ constitutional gun rights.

The new rule gives owners, manufacturers and distributors 120 days to report their stabilizing braces to the ATF tax-free. They may also remove the stabilizing brace or turn in any pistol modified by a stabilizing brace to the ATF.

It goes into effect once it is published in the Federal Register, likely next week, department officials said.

The perfect scenario?

ATF lets you register your arm-braced guns to SBR’s for free

Arm brace ruling gets struck down

Enjoy your new tax-free SBR’d guns AND enjoy your arm braced stuff.

The official story

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It isn’t that I’m necessarily prone to conspiracy theories…but I am prone to being suspicious of the ‘official story’. Just for kicks, though…what if….you’re a government that became aware of an impending and immediate threat to, or involving, commercial aircraft? And you need time to get your assets in place to control the situation (or the people involved). Wouldn’t you just…ground all air traffic on a believable pretext, a computer error perhaps, and then take the opportunity to neutralize the threat while the planes are still on the ground?

Or, maybe, it really was just a computer hiccup.

In other news, I see the folks in Illinois now have to put up with another ‘do it for the children’/’If it saves just one life’ assault weapons ban. Anyone who lives in Illinois will tell you that Illinois didn’t vote for this thing…Chicago did. Regardless, I’ve no doubt this will be trumpeted as a ‘victory for commonsense reasonable gun safety advocates’. I’m telling you, guys…this sorta ting is creeping closer and closer to a national level. Buy your stuff now and don’t spare the purse.

Watching the news is always a good way for me to get my blood pressure up a few notches. Nice to see todays events didn’t disappoint.

Living on 55%

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Every month I have a budget that I use. It doesn’t really change from month to month in terms of who gets paid, but the amounts differ for some things. I pay the exact same amount for utilities every month, regardless of what the bill actually says, so i usually have a small credit balance with them. I like the predictability of knowing I’m paying the same thing every month. It makes planning a lot easier and builds up a little cushion in case things fly off the rails.

But…some things I pay a percentage, rather than a fixed amount. Every paycheck I put 10% into savings, 15% into my retirement, 5% into my HSA, 10% into my emergency fund, and 5% into my Piece O’ Nowhere fund. That means that 45% of my (after tax) paycheck is gone …whoosh!…before I even see the cash. Or, in other words, I’m living on 55% of what I make. And, trust me on this, I don’t make a lot. In fact, according to various sources on the interweb, I make well below the average median American income. Way below. So how can I live on 55% of my paycheck?

Well, it isn’t an existence of big-screens, $5 latte’s, new cars every four years, and trips abroad ‘because I deserve them’. I have a paid-for house, paid-for truck, no medical/student/creditcard debt, and I live within my means. I eat leftovers, I eat out once a week, I use the same computer for years at a time, I take the high deductibles on insurance, I shop around, and I am content with ‘good enough’ most of the time. The only luxuries I really indulge in are guns.

As a result of all this, I get to feel fairly secure. And it’s that feeling of security that makes it worth the effort. Althoguh, to be fair, after a while it doesn’t seem like an effort at all. I’ll walk through CostCo and, yeah, that 84″ high definition TV sure looks good…but then I ask myself which I would rather have when I break a leg or lose a job…the TV or the couple grand in cash? Then it becomes an easier choice and a small TV doesn’t seem like such a bad thing.

The economic craziness we’re in (thanks Joe!) is a lot easier to weather when you’ve got something set aside for just these sorts of emergencies. Can everyone do it? No…there are plenty of people who have come late to the financial responsibility party and are bringing in baggage….mortgages, car payments, student loan debt, etc. Its like starting a race with lead weights tied to your feet. But, you know what, even with lead weight tied to your feet you can still run faster than if you didnt try running at all.

I don’t like telling anyone what to do, youre a sovereign individual…you do you, buddy. But, I can only tell you what”s worked for me and you can decide if thats something that might work for you. I’ve been living on a budget, and not a very tight one, for almost twenty years and it’s made my life a lot easier than it would have been if I didn’t have it. You can go back in the blog and see where water heaters have puked and alternators have died and it never amounted to more than a minor hiccup in my life. Wasn’t always that way, I promise you.

I know, I know….this is a blog about preparedness, not personal finance. But the thing is, personal finance is part of preparedness. If youre the kinda guy (or gal) who keeps a spreadsheet of how much food, motor oil, and ammo they keep on hand then you shouldbe just as diligent about knowing where each dollar you make is going to go. Thats all a budget is…it’s a plan for what youre going to do with the resources you have. You make $3,000 per month? Write down how youre going to spend all $3,000 next month. Spend it all on paper until zero remains. Then stick to that budget as best you can. Next month, tweak it a bit. Next month, a bit more. Pretty soon you’ll know exactly what you need to allocate and where.

2023 promises to be no better than the last two years, so getting your ducks in a row regarding money…while you still have some….is probably not a terrible idea.

Radio active

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I should mention that in addition to getting that Piece O’ Nowhere purchased this year, my only other thing I’ve been putting off is getting a decent radio. I wanted to get the Icom 7200 which seemed to, from reviews I’ve read, checked most of the boxes for what I need. Naturally, it is discontinued and the newer model, the 7300, is available. Although it is a radio that sends as well as receives, my main interest is listening. So, I need to add that, a good antennae, power sources, and a few other bells and whistles to my list.

My go-to for any communications questions has always been the fabulously informative and maddeningly evasive internet personality known as Ticom. Its not that he’s an expert on the subject (he clearly is), but that he’s an expert on the subject and also has the survivalist mindset…which means that when I ask a question he can give me an answer that might be different from the answer he’d give to someone who wasn’t planning for a descent into chaos and anarchy.

Unfortunately, Ticom seems to be a rather frequently moving target in terms of blogs and URLs. This is why, like Batman, the easiest way to contact him is to make your desire known and then he contacts you.

I think I asked him his opinion of the 7200/7300 at some point but I’ll have to see if I have that archived somewhere. I like to think he could look at the specs and just give me a shopping list of “Buy this power supply and this antennae”. Man, I wish it was that simple.

But, information is power and when the lights go out, the sirens are wailing in the distance, and you have no idea WTF is going on…being able to listen in on the outside world can be a pretty valuable resource. So, in a month or two, assuming I’m not dissuaded from it, I’ll start the ball rolling and pick up the radio in question and it’s ancillary equipment. Then I gotta convince myself to climb on the roof and stick an antennae up there. Not a job I relish.

2022, the year that was…something

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Year-end reviews are one of the low-hanging fruits of the blogging world. And, who am I to turn away a post topic that doesn’t require any imagination on my part?

My biggest goal for 2022 was to, at right about this time, be purchasing a nice chunk of middle o’ nowhere. Sadly, the stock market decided not to cooperate and as a result this particular goal is getting bumped into 2023. On the bright side, with interest rates going up dramatically, the pool of qualified buyers will be smaller, demand will drop, and hopefully prices will start to come down as well. In other words, 2023 may provide a better buying opportunity than 2022.

Gun-wise, 2022 was a fairly heavy year. What can I say, this Biden clown and whoever is pulling his strings have made no secret about their plan ro ‘ban assault weapons’. So…if what I have today may be all I have for the rest of my life, well, I better make sure what I have today is a lot.

As for the rest of the year…no blackouts, no hurricanes, no earthquakes, no Xenu, no zombies, no riots in the street, no intruders, no blue helmets….I didnt have to use my AK, it was a good year.

Gilded the lily a bit and beefed up my stockpiles of food and fuel cans. Picked up a bit more silver. Spent a lot of time keeping an eye on the news and trying to scry what sorta unpleasantness may be looming ahead.

As for 2023, well….I’ll be another year older, dang it. Other than that my big goal for 2023 is to redouble my efforts and work on getting that piece of land out in the boonies. And, if a little Serbu semi auto .50 happens to cross my path, I wouldn’t say no to that. Other than those things….not much to do for 2023 that isnt already taken care of.

Article – Buffalo blizzard fuels racial and class divides in polarized city

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C’mon, you knew it was only a matter of time before Buffalo’s blizzard became a symbol of racist oppression……..

As the toll on the city has become clearer, a dozen residents and community leaders said in interviews that structural issues such as poverty, food deserts, poor housing and a lack of investment by government have made the impacts on working-class, Black and Brown neighborhoods much worse. They expressed concerns that surrounding wealthier and Whiter suburbs appeared to be more prepared, their response better coordinated, their power and roads restored faster.

Now, maybe I’m crazy but hear me out on this…is it possible that some people were more prepared and better coordinated not because they are ‘wealthy’ but rather because the things that caused them to be wealthy…initiative, responsibility, work ethic, foresight, cooperation, etc….lead them to also be prepared and coordinated?

I’m not sure what relative wealth ‘inequity’ has to do with being able to pick up a shovel and start digging your street out from a major snowfall.

The truly sad thing is, the people who were prepared weren’t prepared by accident. They made a conscious and deliberate effort to take responsibility for their own well being….but their efforts will be parsed as ‘racist’ and ‘supremacist’ because…y’know…institutional racism and all that.

Article – Bullet sales are rising and so are death totals in mass shootings. Can they be stopped?

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After a mass shooting, public attention inevitably turns to a debate on the control of guns. But with shooters so often stocked up on ammunition in order to kill as many as possible, many are left to wonder: What about the bullets?
….
It’s remarkably easy for anyone to obtain large quantities of ammunition, said Ari Freilich, state policy director at the Giffords Law Center to Prevent Gun Violence, led by former U.S. Rep. Gabrielle Giffords, who survived a 2011 mass shooting.

In most places in the country, people can go online and have hundreds or thousands of bullets delivered to their door, “as if ordering a pizza,” he said.

They go after the guns, then they go after the mags, then they go after the ammo. No reasonably intelligent person should be surprised at this. And, naturally, it’s all “commonsense” and “reasonable” restrictions. Thus, if you oppose it, you are, by definition, being unreasonable. Control the language, control the narrative.

Time was, you actually did need to go to a gun shop and sign out for ammo. That changed back in ’86 when the Gun Owners Protection Act allowed the average guy to order ammo through the mail. When the internet came into being the market, of course, expanded exponentially.

Note that the career nosebleed writing this article continually conflates ‘bullets’ and ‘ammunition’…two entirely separate things. Much like using ‘tires’ and ‘automobile’ interchangeably. I used to see this all the time…some idiot would come into the shop and ask for a ‘box of 7mm bullets’. I’d hand him a box of bullets and he’d act surprised that “There’s a hundred bullets in that tiny box?”. And then I’d open the box to show him that those were actually bullets and invariably they’d say something brilliant like “No, I want the complete bullet.” What the idiot meant to say was they wanted cartridges or ammunition. Its like going into the car dealership and saying you want some tires, then when they roll four tires out of the storeroom you say “No, I mean the fully assembled tires…with the body, seats, and engine.”

Regardless of the semantic issues, this is just further evidence that the culture war continues unabated. Buy it cheap and stack it deep. Prices only go up and sooner or later these retards are going to get lucky and manage to pass some of this legislation.

MRE dude

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So the big holiday crush is behind us now. I was traveling for the holidays, unfortunately, but managed to not get stuck in an airport so…there’s a triumph. However, I did have some interesting experiences after all….I got to meet, and pick the brain of, the head honcho of a company that makes MRE’s. Funny who you meet in the course of your travels.

I had a lengthy and technical conversation about MRE’s, packaging, development, cost accounting, whats new on the horizon, who are the big contracts with, calorie requirements from various customers, who are the international customers, etc. All in all, a very informative and illuminating conversation.

I have a goodly stash of MRE’s simply because theyre the epitome of grab-n-go food. They are bulky and they are heavy. But…they are literally everything you need in one place. I don’t view them as a long-term solution but rather as a short-term solution to a particular episode. For example, if I was simply staying home through a blizzard or the aftermath of a hurricane….no need for them, there’s plenty of ways to create better, tasteir meals from my food stocks. But for a ‘get everything in the truck, we have to leave nownownnow!’ sort of situation, they’re pretty much ideal.

Same story on the freeze drieds….they’re not a three-meals-a-day-for-months type of food but rather a specialized item for particular situations. Most notably stowing them in environments where space is at a premium, and long shelf life is paramount. For example, a big sealed drum of them in the closet at your bug-out cabin.

But MRE’s have always had that interesting history of military and .gov development and use. Sure, Mountain House has an R&D department, but it’s probably constrained by the relatively limited resources of a private company. Uncle Sam, however, has no such limitations on how much cash he can swing around if he really wants something. And then he orders five million at a time to get the quantities-of-scale advantage.

Anyway, it was definitely a highlight of this seasons travel experience to meet and talk to someone who is ‘in the know’ on a topic that I’ve found interesting for so many years.

ETA: This was a conversation that was casual and ‘off the record’. I don’t want to say anything that would come back to get this guy in trouble for divulging company secrets or anything like that. So, I won’t say which company, and I won’t say the exact title. What can I say? I was told shelf life of current MRE’s is “five years”. Biggest bottlenecks? Labor and packaging supplies. Biggest customer? .mil and various FEMA-types. International orders? Very few since nations want the stuff made domestically and you cant just build a food-safe facility for one contract.