CHICKEN ENTRAILS
*note: Octobers earnings was a very respectable $255. $140 Amazon ad commission, $25 Kindle book sales and $90 donations. A hearty hi-ho to all loving and generous minions. You guys rock!
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note: The Frugal Survivalist is reduced to $1, from $3 ( http://amzn.to/2htSahT ). The print version is down as low as I can get it, $4 ( http://amzn.to/2ijRb3q ). If the print price still says $7, go back later for it. I put in the price reduction which is usually delayed. Yes, it is the same version as over a decade ago. Not updated for inflation. That's why I put it on Kindle Unlimited and am now reducing the price. It would be an insane project revamping it.
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Not too long ago I was
reading someone talking about Peter Turchin and his original twenty year
forecast for collapse ( now only ten years away ). Turchin covers civilization secular cycles
and you can spend a lot of money to read really dreadfully math laden analysis
by him. I chose to focus on his one book
“War & Peace & War” which is written for Joe Shmoe the light
recreational reader. I don’t mind
endless tomes better suited for the authors peers, but I draw the line at
mathematics. It has its place, and its
pointy head practitioners, but count me out of that goat hump.
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The thing about his
analysis is that no matter how close or far from reality he is going to get, as
soon as you try to time the collapse you have entered Chicken Entrails Reading
territory. We all want to know when the
Really Bad Stuff happens, but no one can time the collapse, and when we do we
are falling into a security blanket trap ( plenty of time to procrastinate )
anyway. The same trap that says since we’ve
survived collapses before there is nothing to worry about. And not having read the source material, I
don’t even know if the timeframe was taken out of context or not.
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But something tells me it
was not. Math people tend to really
place a lot of faith in their practice, so it wouldn’t surprise me that the
author likes his probabilities of being more right than wrong. Look at all the economics by mathematics
idiots out there, so sure the model is the reality. It almost seems that math dweebs don’t care
for religion so they dedicate themselves to an equally arcane faith based but
scientific study to explain life, the universe and everything ( I can already
hear the engineers amongst you sputtering and gruffly countering that without
math my house would fall on my head-my issue is with applying math where it
shouldn’t go ).
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Capitalism is another
religion which, the point far from original with me, devotes itself to faith
based on growth. And when growth is your
god, exponential functioning cannot terminate in collapse. Growth Faith allows for fracking oil or
abiotic oil origin theory ( which, even if true, replenishes at FAR below
replacement rate ) or Drill, Baby, Drill or even tinfoil hat conspiracies that
the Seven Sisters control the world and suppress 100 MPG carburetors, cap
gushing wells and assassinate Tesla Free Energy scientists. It is far more rational to embrace
anti-physics than it is to abandon the God Growth.
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No matter what we base our
predictions on, we must beware defending them on faith based grounds. My pet theory is that European colonization
begat mercantilism which begat central banks which begat industrial empires
which begat our current globalization as the last extraction technique. Hence, any cycle WITHIN that 500 year super
cycle is invalidated with the demise of that five century western civilization. I could very well be full of crap. And I don’t particularly care. Not because I think I’m wrong, and not
because I would intentionally lead anyone astray, but because being wrong has
few consequences for myself.
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When you DON’T try to time
the collapse, when you are already prepared as good as you care to be, all this
is academic. Nothing wrong with
academic, it is part of the entertainment paradigm we immerse ourselves in to
pass the time, but let’s not get carried away either. Hell, for most of us any collapse plans are
fraudulent and unworkable anyway, as our picked and choosed faith has led us
down dead end corridors. Some of us poke
fun at the “received instructions from on high” fundamentalist Jesus Freaks,
and yet our own beliefs are equally based on supposition.
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Think about it like you
would politics. If you have faith in
your political party, you think the outcome of elections is important and
meaningful and worth following. If you
think the two political parties are really just the two departments of the same
Imperial Party, you could give two craps about what any politician says or what
letter-D or R-follows his name. You
cease to care. My views are that
collapse timing is equally irrelevant since collapse from overpopulation is
baked into the cake. Peak Oil would be
irrelevant if so many folks didn’t rely on oil for food.
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Timing the collapse leads
to stress. Already being prepared allows
you to go about living and-theoretically-enjoying your life. And timing the collapse can give you false
hope. Giving you time you may not
actually have. If you accept timing that
is too pessimistic, you stress yourself to the point of endangering your health
and pocketbook. For an example of false
hope, look at the fracking fag the Idahoan Yuppie Scum Survivalist guru. Really?
Peak Oil doesn’t hit us until 2030?
It was already here and gone! The
mail with your memo doesn’t run out there in the wilderness? And don’t get me started on the Druid Dude.
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For an example of doomer
porn forcing you to panic, look at the other idiot up in Idaho, running for
Congress, or any of his offshoots or imitators ( Jesus weeps that he even has
imitators ). The one thing Greer was
right on was his many examples of religious based prophesies that were way off
the mark. A fire lit under your ass is a
good thing. You take your two grand in
savings and buy years worth of wheat, more ammo and put a down payment on a
piece of junk land. Then, when your car
breaks down and you need that savings, perhaps you’ll decide to abandon car
ownership. But liquidating your
retirement fund to buy a warehouse of MRE’s and get a FLIR for every member of
your family, that is just timing panic.
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I do try to indicate the
collapse, myself, granted. The end of
the fracking oil industry probably next year.
The 2030 duplication of oil production a century prior. I don’t place that much faith in the dates,
however. They are guidelines only. I do place FAITH in the hope that all my
readers as poor as myself have followed the dictates of frugal prepping and
those better off still have that basic level even if greater heights are
currently being reached. That we are all
prepared enough that timing doesn’t matter.
END ( today's related link http://amzn.to/2zdyDN4 )
* By the by, all my writing is copyrighted. For the obtuse out there
Don't worry, always just be happy. Knowing ya done the best you could , with what ya had.
ReplyDeleteTruly at my age, and long as we've been preparing. Anything more is just perishables or restock as used.
Right, be content without looking at the greener grass over yonder. A good way to drive yourself crazy.
DeleteMaybe *collapse* can be an individual thing. Say you lose your job and 6 months later you still have no income nor nothing on the horizon. You've sold all your stuff, have finaggled places to live and worn out your welcome everywhere, haven't eaten in 6 days, and are at the bottom rung. That is your own personal collapse. You don't care that the ICBM's aren't on the way or that the Fed has not went bankrupt or food is getting scarce cause for you food is already scarce and you have no money and the ICBM's might be a welcome relief. All you can do is hope for some sort of recovery. We've all been there haven't we?
ReplyDeleteYou are now in your own personal collapse and there is nothing you can do about it.
But wait, isn't that exactly what we talk about here everyday?
A time in the future when life is drastically different than it might be right now?
With junk land, a years worth of wheat, a bike, and a BPOD, look at the things mentioned above that could have been avoided.
With no income you are evicted so you move in the junk land compound. With no income you start to consume whole wheat pancakes, etc. With no income and no vehicle you ride that bike to job interviews, in the rain, in 20 below, up hill both ways, with flat tires, for 30 miles.
When gas goes to $10 and the shelves are bare and the jackboots are confiscating everyones stuff collapse will be here but for each of us our own personal collapse will happen before that. Mentally put yourself in the position I described above and come up with some ideas on how to outsmart your own personal collapse.
Before the jackbooted thugs begin trying to confiscate ( remember, lack of boots on the ground ) I think we will be seeing Serbia civil war/Rwanda genocide. I think most of our fantasies don't include enough people and we get to skip that part.
DeleteI think you are EXACTLY right Ghostsniper - Collapse is as much individual and local (or regional even) as it is national or global. Even during the fall of rome there were some places where nothing much changed, and leading up to the fall, there were some places that suddenly and massively had to suffer invasions, famines, etc.
DeleteWhat difference if you are unemployed because your company decided you were an idiot they didnt like or if your company had to close its doors forever because of a hurricane, or because of a massive economic downturn? and if no other companies are hiring you, it really doesn't matter why - it matters instead how else you can get the goods and services you need. If you have a deep enough stockpile it might no longer matter at all. If you live close enough to the bone or have the ability to do so, then you can cut back on what you need and scrape by with mowing lawns or the like.
Prepping is insurance. Prepping is saving for (forced) retirement. Not just a generator and guns for a two day power outage or blizzard.
There ya go, I was forcebly retired in 2014 when the lady ran me over. Been doing what I can , since then using the stockpile but still adding to it .
DeleteIn some ways, my accident was shtf. No matter how you prepare , in the end , it may not come out like you planned. So what ! Coming out the end is all that matters...till it don't.
Well, the Bison Plan is my Plan B.
DeleteAs it stands now it's a hybrid Ave / Bison / Dingo plan that tries to hold onto the working class promised lifestyle. Yeah I know but I don't think, nah I know that the missus wouldn't be on board with Bison Plan so that's my fall back
Almost no one of either gender likes the Bison Plan. Just because it is perfect doesn't mean it is feasible. In theory, anarchy is the perfect social organization-in practice it ignores the nature of man which is far less than the square jawed Randian heroic figure only living in comic books. Actually, seeking out comfort, extra luxury foods, less exercise and the like is all a survival trait ( less calories, predation ), so it should come as little surprise we prefer to live the Yuppie Scum lifestyle.
DeleteWhenever I would go camping (which is more or less the Bison plan, but on junk land) for longer periods of time, it would take a day or two to adapt to primitive living conditions, and then it became much easier. Your plan appeals to me probably more than it does most, because I can live without television, movies, or our sick pop culture. I hate almost everyone, left or right (the modern right is so watered down as to be completely useless to me). I was a late adopter to the internet, having not owned a computer prior to 1999, and therein lies my weakness; the world wide web is just too fantastic of a thing to willingly give up once you’ve had a taste of its endless knowledge. Fortunately, most places now, even rural areas, do have connectivity. My Elko land actually shows service on the coverage map. But whether there is or not in actuality remains to be seen? If not, it would take a little while to adapt back to the 80’s, of having only good books and radio for entertainment, with occasionally going to town for internet use.
DeleteIt would be nice to find a few people that shared the same views, and that you could head out into the wilderness with. I’m a loner, but complete isolation might be challenging for even someone like myself. But I don’t see that happening, particularly with females. If they would just hurry up and invent those damn Cherry 2000 Sexbots, my problems would be solved!
They overpromised on flying cars, too cheap to meter nuclear, meal in a pill, unlimited fusion and flying cars. That was bad enough. But to lie about the Cherry 2000's! Bastards.
Delete