He loves collecting things and piling them up in middle of the yard.

Lessons from Bulgaria

I just love the videography in this.

9mm is 21c a round at bulkammo for those interested.

Back in the day we didn't have internet. Get offa my lawn. This was before the time when computers screamed at each other over the phone lines. We had a thing called sneaker net. We shuttled floppy disks by hand.

When the SHTF, long winter nights will be.... long. It will be nice to have a book or even a dumb sitcom to watch. People who visit could connect to a small WIFI file server and download TV shows, movies or books.

Certainly you can do this with a raspberry PI or you can buy a travel router with a USB port. I have this particular one and you can plug a flash drive into it and save and share files. It's $30.

https://a.co/d/4RTn3MF

Does anyone within 2 hours of the middle of South Carolina have a set of these wheels?

It's kinda funny when people new to prepping think they are done when they have a couple guns. But there's more... there's sanitation (sanitary waste removal, food safety, hygiene for the girls)... there's food production and preserving. There's heating and energy production. There's shelter.

Then you get down to the short rows. What do you do on long winter nights? I asked my grandmother and her 26 brothers and sisters and she didn't know what her parents did on long winter nights. But all her siblings were born in late summer. lol. Board games, maybe some old TV shows or movies. Books to read as well. Do you have home schooling material for kids that will be home?

And finally there's the money thing. When the US dollar fails, it will have "sentimental value". People will remember that a gallon of gas is $5 and price gouge you. You will initially be able to buy things will us dollars but eventually that will stop as stores realize they can't exchange dollars for new supplies. Then we'll go to barter or silver for smaller transactions.

(continued)

Have you noticed the price of gold and silver? Gold has more than doubled in value since 2020. Rhetorical question: How long did it take to double before that? hmmm.... Silver has more than doubled since 2022. Silver hit it's record high today of $53.55.

The thing to keep in mind is that it's not that gold or silver costs more dollars... it is realizing that gold and silver retain their value; it is the dollar that is actually shrinking. One dollar used to buy 1/20th of an ounce of gold. Today one dollar buys 1/4400 of an ounce of gold.

It doesn't take a smart man to figure out this diminishing value will continue. Please don't be blind to this. The thing you need to realize is that despite the government trying to control the decline, it will accelerate. Please be aware that in the early 70's the US penned a deal with Saudi to sell gold in US dollars. Since all nations need oil, all nations lined up to purchase US dollars. The US could print all the money it wanted because there was infinite demand. We never felt the effects of inflation becuase those inflated dollars went to foreign countries. Now the 50 year old Saudi agreement has ended and Saudi will accept payment in Euros, Yuan, etc. So all those foreign countries no longer need dollars. Eventually those dollars will find their way back home and slap us with additional inflation. This is where the speedup of the decline will happen.

(continued)

In addition to those exported dollars coming home to roost, there is a reverse repo crisis looming. In 2019, the fed printed more money than it ever had. This caused a delayed surge of inflation (we are feeling parts of this now). In addition other factors are causing our economy to slow. So big money managers have decided the economy is too volitile to loan money, esp as the fed is lowering rates. So they have parked $2T at the fed. that money is "taking up space" at the fed and the fed needs them to withdraw that money. In a nutshell, the bankers have painted themselves in a corner. If they force that money out of the fed, they will cause more inflation. But if they continue to allow money to park there the economy can't improve. A classic mexican standoff.

(continued)

So what should you do? At a minimum, diversify away from dollars. Obtain the things you will need in the foreseeable future.... A new tractor... solar system.... a green house... tangible things. Gold can't be used for small transactions but silver can.... and silver will not be cheaper than it is today. Groceries will not be cheaper than they are today. A tractor will cost more in the future.... and your wages will stay the same.

Something that I fully expect is that some day, Saudi, Russia, and China will show up at the US treasury and cash in all those dollars we exported in the last 50 years. Why wouldn't they? We don't make a damn thing here, so no one really has need for dollars any longer. On the day that happens, the president will call for a banking holiday and close the banks until monday. You will find that the money in your checking, savings and 401k will have been converted to a new dollar system.

There will be a period of deflation... Let's say they deicde to chop off two zeros off the price of everything... $100 becomes $1. You can bet your ass they won't adjust the payoff on your mortgage by chopping off two zeros. They'll say that contract was written before the deflation and you then won't be able to afford your house payment. Pay your house off today if you can. Better to borrow against your 401k and use that money to finish off your mortgage.

I am no financial advisor but the time to stock up on things is NOW. Sure, talk it over with your better half. But realize the US dollar is a slowly sinking ship.

On a lighter note the wife and i stocked up on bouillon. I'm a bouilionaire right now!!!

If you want to get a good explaination of where the dollar is going since the end of the petrodollar deal ended, watch this. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=K-jWFhG6fEg

Teachable moment. Don't break or over tax what you can't replace. A neighbor uses a pair of these mobile home axles to move his shipping containers. he didn't want to take an extra hour to unload 60 sheets of plywood nor his 1500lbs zero turn mower... and has now bent this axle. I found another mobile home axle yesterday but we have now discovered that it is too narrow. In the end, he unloaded the 60 sheets and drove the mower to my house for storage... but for lack of an hour of labor, he's cost himself a few days of hunting to replace that axle.

We never have time to do it right, but we always have time to do it again.

Today: went to a neighbors house and killed and dressed 6 pigs. Hes got a storage building that is heavily insulated and chilled using a minisplit. We hung the 12 halves inside to be processed tomorrow. Sorry no pics.

I lived in a tiny cabin on 50 acres for about a year before my wife moved in. I was sleeping on a cot, lived out of a duffle bag of clothes and had a rifle rack and a stack of ammo cans in the corner. This was all I needed. We’re simple creatures…

Shit got harder when she came, I eventually had to upgrade the house, with that came greater expense…

Man lost a lot of weight in an extended hospital stay. Dog didn't recognize him at first. The nose knows.

Interesting seasonally adjustable panel mount... but... it needs jack screws, and if the wind kicks up it'll need to be stowed horizontally. There are part of me that loves this... and theres a part of me that says too much opportunity for a failure point... just buy more panels. The panels are the cheapest part of the system. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=u04C-M-FS9E

I am at 33 degrees north. Since my house is well insulated, my HVAC system doesn't use any more power in winter than summer and since we drive the electric cars the same amount each month, I need to generate the same amount of power each month of the year. By running various tilt angles through the PVWATTS calculator (on line), I found that a 29degree tilt gives me the most annual production 15503kwh vs 15291kwh at a 40 degree tilt. I'm able to trade some higher producing months in the summer for a little extra production in the winter by tilting my panels steeper than textbook.

Here we see that February is bad no matter what you do. The solution is to add more panels until February usage is covered.

PS: tilt is measured down from horizontal. 0 is horizontal and 90 is vertical.