The drought here may be over — we’ve had above-normal rainfall for a month now. It’s not wiping out our deficit very fast, but maybe we’ll do OK anyway. I have this and another post lined up, so I hope the episode deficit is getting addressed too.
As I type this intro, I see a little moth at the window, the first of the year.
Saturday, March 23, 2013
Awakening
It’s finally spring. The earth awakens from its restless winter slumber.
Mrs. Fetched’s mom and I have a few zillion tomato plants in starter trays, not to mention the peppers. The perennial herbs wintered over just fine, minus some deer attacks (flavored meat if we catch ’em at it), and we’ve got the annuals started. She’s happier than I’ve seen her in a while — she was asked to conduct some basic gardening seminars for the people in big subdivisions who are starting the community gardens last month, and they were all well-attended. As Mrs. Fetched said, “her idea of a ‘small garden’ is 5 acres,” and they’re scaling up from there. Her kind of gardening — including a couple passes with a tractor and plow, just to get the sod dug up. There’s some concern about pesticides and all, but the extension office says that most of the people who abandoned their houses had quit intensive lawn maintenance before giving up altogether. The bad stuff has had plenty of time to break down.
Not all the “planting” is crops, though. Time capsules are a fad at schools again, another “planting” activity this spring. They’re including photos and student-written essays about various aspects of life, along with the usual newspaper clippings and tokens. They use a small candle, lit just before sealing it, to get rid of most of the oxygen inside the capsule before burying it. It would be interesting to be around when they open the capsules in 100 years — will “they” have figured out how to deal with energy shortages by then? Or will there even be anyone to dig them up? I remember being a kid, and hearing about the moon bases (and Mars, etc.) and flying cars we’d have by now. Of course, the closest anyone came to dreaming up home computers or the Internet was this idea that you would get a tailored newspaper delivered via fax every morning. I remember incredulously asking my dad, “You didn’t have TV when you were a kid?” With my kids, it was “You didn’t have computers?” My grandkids, if I have any, probably won’t have cars and might not have computers — but they may have stuff we haven’t even thought of now.
Now that winter is giving way, they’re finding people who didn’t make it through the winter and were never checked on. In some cities, the cops started patrolling with dogs and marking the houses like they did in Miami after Kim a couple years back (or New Orleans after Katrina). Some of the larger metro departments had burglars sitting in jail, and brought them along to pick locks in exchange for a reduced sentence. One of the network news shows interviewed one of the latter (face blocked); he said, “There’s not much worth stealing anymore anyway — why not help? The smell is pretty bad sometimes, but they give me a mask and the cops don’t make me go inside anyway. I just get the doors open for ’em.”
Even in the salad days, though, people died. They died of diseases, starvation, cold, heat, accident, combat, and old age. There aren’t any new ways of dying, but more people are dying of the same stuff than before. Except for disease and old age, though, it was “them” who were dying, not “us.” People who didn’t have the basics weren’t “our” people, so it was easy to ignore what has always gone on. Now we’re “them,” or “they” are us… maybe both, and it’s not just nature that’s awakening.
I’ve got more to write about this, but there’s stuff to do.
continued…
Showing posts with label peak oil. Show all posts
Showing posts with label peak oil. Show all posts
Tuesday, January 29, 2008 14 comments
Saturday, January 19, 2008 9 comments
FAR Future, Episode 20: Spreading the Wealth
Stay warm, everyone. Spring’s comin’. In FAR Future, it’s about here.
Friday, March 8, 2013
Spreading the Wealth
This has been all over the local media. A gang of suburban “mainstream” (i.e. WASP) teenagers have been stealing all sorts of stuff that’s easy to fence these days — bikes, motorcycles, solar panels, siphoning gasoline, etc. — and either selling them to pay their parents’ utility bills, or giving them to neighbors who need some help. The parents had no idea what was happening. “We thought we’d been put on an assistance program, and to be honest, we didn’t want to ask questions in case it was a mistake,” said one weepy mom.
Opinion is running every which way. The media always uses the phrase “suburban teenagers,” which brings to mind your wholesome, blond-haired, blue-eyed A student looking forward to starting a “good” college and then a professional career. “Robin Hoods” is another phrase being beaten into the ground. It sort of fits; they were going into the hotsy-totsy developments, the country clubs and so forth. Through the winter, they posed as the gutter cleaning or landscaping services; some of them wore makeup to darken their skin (since Hispanic folks do most of the work) so nobody paid much attention to them. They took ladders, went up and actually did the work, then scarfed stuff and tossed it in the panel truck they were using. They didn’t rob each house they went to, either — which was smart, they had a little more leeway before they inevitably got caught.
They spread the proceeds around pretty thoroughly; like I said, they paid utility bills, gave solar panels to people who needed them, and not just to friends and neighbors. The Atlanta civil rights groups are defending them, saying they only did what should have been done in the first place (“made sure that people could keep their houses warm and the lights on”). Their victims, obviously, disagree. Seeing that the patron class were the primary victims, Shotgun Sam and the others are trying to push the idea that they were a gang of rogue teenagers who were in it for their own enrichment. Things got a little interesting when one caller objected: “It turns out they helped my Aunt May with her utility bills. They were about to cut off her gas, and those Robin Hood kids went in and took care of the bill for her. She’d’a froze to death without them doin’ something for her.”
“Well, she obviously has family — you, for example. Why didn’t you help her?”
“I didn’t know how bad off she was; I’m in Columbus and she didn’t say nothin’ to us.”
“So that means it’s OK for someone to give her stolen property?”
“Them people that they took the stuff from ain’t hurtin’ for nothin’. Why ain’t they helpin’ out? They can afford to.”
Sam stuttered for a moment. “Well… they didn’t have a chance, they got robbed before they could do anything. You ever think of that?”
“Bleep. They ain’t gonna take their solar panels off their roof and give ’em to Aunt May. They’d’ve bought some for her, if they were gonna.”
Sam cut him off and went to a commercial break — a long one — then came back whining about the Wal-Marts that got closed. A few more people wanted to put in their two cents about the theft ring, but Sam insisted that they were on a new topic. When you’re losing the argument, change the subject. Another Wal-Mart closing is a topic that’s usually sure to get his listeners upset the way he wants them upset.
One of the TV stations pixellated one of the “Robin Hoods” and distorted her voice (I’m pretty sure it was a “she”) to get an interview. She said she’d do it again because it was the only way they could keep the lights on — for themselves and their neighbors. They know they’re in a big ol’ pile of trouble, but (she said) they did what they had to. They talked about quitting when the noose started to tighten, but then they saw that news piece about the people up north who died in the Arctic storm and decided they had to keep going to save lives. Some of the civil rights lawyers are offering pro bono defense, and one DA recused himself (it turns out the kids helped out one of his own relatives), so they might get a light sentence if they can find anyone who wants to be cast as the “Sheriff of Nottingham” and actually prosecute them.
What the country club set doesn’t seem to realize is that it’s their time to step up. If things get a lot worse than they are already, those guys will fall faster and land harder to get to the same level as everyone else — they need to start making friends before that happens.
continued…
Friday, March 8, 2013
Spreading the Wealth
This has been all over the local media. A gang of suburban “mainstream” (i.e. WASP) teenagers have been stealing all sorts of stuff that’s easy to fence these days — bikes, motorcycles, solar panels, siphoning gasoline, etc. — and either selling them to pay their parents’ utility bills, or giving them to neighbors who need some help. The parents had no idea what was happening. “We thought we’d been put on an assistance program, and to be honest, we didn’t want to ask questions in case it was a mistake,” said one weepy mom.
Opinion is running every which way. The media always uses the phrase “suburban teenagers,” which brings to mind your wholesome, blond-haired, blue-eyed A student looking forward to starting a “good” college and then a professional career. “Robin Hoods” is another phrase being beaten into the ground. It sort of fits; they were going into the hotsy-totsy developments, the country clubs and so forth. Through the winter, they posed as the gutter cleaning or landscaping services; some of them wore makeup to darken their skin (since Hispanic folks do most of the work) so nobody paid much attention to them. They took ladders, went up and actually did the work, then scarfed stuff and tossed it in the panel truck they were using. They didn’t rob each house they went to, either — which was smart, they had a little more leeway before they inevitably got caught.
They spread the proceeds around pretty thoroughly; like I said, they paid utility bills, gave solar panels to people who needed them, and not just to friends and neighbors. The Atlanta civil rights groups are defending them, saying they only did what should have been done in the first place (“made sure that people could keep their houses warm and the lights on”). Their victims, obviously, disagree. Seeing that the patron class were the primary victims, Shotgun Sam and the others are trying to push the idea that they were a gang of rogue teenagers who were in it for their own enrichment. Things got a little interesting when one caller objected: “It turns out they helped my Aunt May with her utility bills. They were about to cut off her gas, and those Robin Hood kids went in and took care of the bill for her. She’d’a froze to death without them doin’ something for her.”
“Well, she obviously has family — you, for example. Why didn’t you help her?”
“I didn’t know how bad off she was; I’m in Columbus and she didn’t say nothin’ to us.”
“So that means it’s OK for someone to give her stolen property?”
“Them people that they took the stuff from ain’t hurtin’ for nothin’. Why ain’t they helpin’ out? They can afford to.”
Sam stuttered for a moment. “Well… they didn’t have a chance, they got robbed before they could do anything. You ever think of that?”
“Bleep. They ain’t gonna take their solar panels off their roof and give ’em to Aunt May. They’d’ve bought some for her, if they were gonna.”
Sam cut him off and went to a commercial break — a long one — then came back whining about the Wal-Marts that got closed. A few more people wanted to put in their two cents about the theft ring, but Sam insisted that they were on a new topic. When you’re losing the argument, change the subject. Another Wal-Mart closing is a topic that’s usually sure to get his listeners upset the way he wants them upset.
One of the TV stations pixellated one of the “Robin Hoods” and distorted her voice (I’m pretty sure it was a “she”) to get an interview. She said she’d do it again because it was the only way they could keep the lights on — for themselves and their neighbors. They know they’re in a big ol’ pile of trouble, but (she said) they did what they had to. They talked about quitting when the noose started to tighten, but then they saw that news piece about the people up north who died in the Arctic storm and decided they had to keep going to save lives. Some of the civil rights lawyers are offering pro bono defense, and one DA recused himself (it turns out the kids helped out one of his own relatives), so they might get a light sentence if they can find anyone who wants to be cast as the “Sheriff of Nottingham” and actually prosecute them.
What the country club set doesn’t seem to realize is that it’s their time to step up. If things get a lot worse than they are already, those guys will fall faster and land harder to get to the same level as everyone else — they need to start making friends before that happens.
continued…
Friday, January 11, 2008 5 comments
FAR Future, Episode 19: Up Against the Wal
I’ve been doing a fair amount of writing, and some of it on future episodes. I hope to (eventually) return to a twice-weekly schedule, but for now I’ll try to do at least one a week.
Thursday, February 21, 2013
Up Against the Wal
From the “right thing for the wrong reasons” category: WalMart closed a couple of stores last week. “Low performers” is a phrase we’ll probably hearing a lot more out of Bentonville. Looking at a map, I’m guessing that those stores were using more fuel than the beanie counters want — they’re likely at the end of the supply line. That “warehouse on wheels” became a warehouse on rails pretty fast, but they still have to truck the stuff from the depot.
Speaking of WalMart, that article about Chinese factories knocking down outside walls so they can work by daylight was interesting. Even more so are the Chinese freighters being rigged with sails — people used to move a lot of freight that way, but how quick they can train a new generation of sailors is beyond me. There’s no telling how long it will be before they can start shipping a significant about of stuff that way, but I’m guessing it’s a bluff to keep people from reshoring (love that new buzzword, it rhymes with “restoring”). Just think: in a couple of generations, “Chinese junk” went from a name for a kind of boat, to the stuff they put in the boat to ship here, and now it’ll become a boat again. Long supply lines — or rather, the fuel costs associated with them — have to be eating up any advantages in labor costs… especially since the workers have woken up and started demanding a bigger share of the pie.
I haven’t seen anything on the US news sites, but there was a brief mention on the BBC site about container-loads of stowaways taking the slow boat from China to wherever. The only places where I’ve seen details are the nationalist (i.e. racist) sites — not even Shotgun Sam has brought it up yet — and I tend to discount most of that drivel. But either they’re sourcing the same lies, or they’re sourcing the same facts. Anyway, as the story goes: the Chinese government is outfitting shipping containers with food, water, toilets, and hammocks, loading about 10 or 20 people in each one, and putting several containers on each ship leaving the country. They ship to warehouses controlled by some front group, get the stowaways fake papers, and turn ’em loose. The only primary differences I’ve seen in the stories is who’s behind it: either the government (letting volunteers ride for free to get them out of the country) or a tong/mafia group (high payments, indentured servitude on this end of the ride). The US government is (supposedly) looking the other way in return for the Chinese government not calling their notes all at once. The Chinese have been collecting on our debts, but slowly, probably to keep from crashing our economy (or inviting a default), and probably to subsidize worker pay hikes.
Meanwhile, back here at home, Wally don’t wanna play with the locals, but I suspect it’s inevitable — if they want a store fill of crap, they need to fill it up somehow. But the domestic companies aren’t giving WalMart much of a discount these days, especially the ones who have reshored their operations. Wal-Mart naturally wants cost-reduced versions of stuff like microwaves and furniture, but I’m sure they’ve seen the surveys too. People buying appliances don’t want throwaway crap anymore, and they’ll pay for stuff that’s going to last a while. The “Site-to-Store” feature they’ve had for years accounts for a huge percentage of their sales now — I think anyone who has wasted gas going to Wally-World for something that was out of stock has become an instant convert.
Ironically, Wal-Mart’s cutthroat pricing policies are exactly what has come back to bite them. Higher-end retailers have barely seen any price moves; there are plenty of margins to cut into and a lot more goodwill with their suppliers. Not so with the razor-thin margins “enjoyed” by Wally’s suppliers: if labor costs go up, if shipping costs go up, if materials costs go up (and all of them have lately), Wally either has to absorb the increases themselves (and pass it on to their customers) or lose another supplier. So the prices are going up at the low end a lot more than the mid-range or high-end, at least so far. That’s one jaw of the pliers: the other is that much of Wally’s price-conscious customer base is spending all their dough just to keep the heat on. You would think that would be offset by formerly higher-end shoppers looking to stay on a budget, but the ones who have spoken out about it said the price breaks aren’t worth the hit to quality.
At work, we didn’t so much reshore as reshuffle. Our manufacturer in China is still making stuff for the Asia-Pacific market. A company we bought a while back has a factory in Mexico, so that’s where we moved Western Hemisphere production. Finally, we contracted with a factory in Italy to handle Europe/Middle East/Africa products. One of the manufacturing guys I talk to about one of our products says that’s becoming a trend: build the stuff close to where it’s being sold; sending information is still dirt-cheap and you can save big on shipping costs. Translating documentation is another inflation-resistant service — it’s all handled electronically and the people doing the actual translations often have wind or solar power (like me) to avoid blackout issues.
Things got a little shaky at work late last summer; the blackouts made it pretty difficult for our customers to deliver the goods to their customers, and we had an alarming dip in orders. Fortunately, things improved with cooler weather, and they’re pledging to not get caught out like that again, so maybe I’ll stay employed for another year. Our new product, an EMTA that can go 2 days on battery power, with data and two phone lines in constant use, made us one of the few growth companies last year… which is why I was able to afford my own backup power; our stock zoomed up and I cashed in some options. Go us. :-)
It’s already starting to warm up; the in-laws have started trays of tomato plants. We’ll be starting our gardens before you know it. This year, we probably won’t be going to Wal-Mart for much of anything, though.
continued…
Thursday, February 21, 2013
Up Against the Wal
From the “right thing for the wrong reasons” category: WalMart closed a couple of stores last week. “Low performers” is a phrase we’ll probably hearing a lot more out of Bentonville. Looking at a map, I’m guessing that those stores were using more fuel than the beanie counters want — they’re likely at the end of the supply line. That “warehouse on wheels” became a warehouse on rails pretty fast, but they still have to truck the stuff from the depot.
Speaking of WalMart, that article about Chinese factories knocking down outside walls so they can work by daylight was interesting. Even more so are the Chinese freighters being rigged with sails — people used to move a lot of freight that way, but how quick they can train a new generation of sailors is beyond me. There’s no telling how long it will be before they can start shipping a significant about of stuff that way, but I’m guessing it’s a bluff to keep people from reshoring (love that new buzzword, it rhymes with “restoring”). Just think: in a couple of generations, “Chinese junk” went from a name for a kind of boat, to the stuff they put in the boat to ship here, and now it’ll become a boat again. Long supply lines — or rather, the fuel costs associated with them — have to be eating up any advantages in labor costs… especially since the workers have woken up and started demanding a bigger share of the pie.
I haven’t seen anything on the US news sites, but there was a brief mention on the BBC site about container-loads of stowaways taking the slow boat from China to wherever. The only places where I’ve seen details are the nationalist (i.e. racist) sites — not even Shotgun Sam has brought it up yet — and I tend to discount most of that drivel. But either they’re sourcing the same lies, or they’re sourcing the same facts. Anyway, as the story goes: the Chinese government is outfitting shipping containers with food, water, toilets, and hammocks, loading about 10 or 20 people in each one, and putting several containers on each ship leaving the country. They ship to warehouses controlled by some front group, get the stowaways fake papers, and turn ’em loose. The only primary differences I’ve seen in the stories is who’s behind it: either the government (letting volunteers ride for free to get them out of the country) or a tong/mafia group (high payments, indentured servitude on this end of the ride). The US government is (supposedly) looking the other way in return for the Chinese government not calling their notes all at once. The Chinese have been collecting on our debts, but slowly, probably to keep from crashing our economy (or inviting a default), and probably to subsidize worker pay hikes.
Meanwhile, back here at home, Wally don’t wanna play with the locals, but I suspect it’s inevitable — if they want a store fill of crap, they need to fill it up somehow. But the domestic companies aren’t giving WalMart much of a discount these days, especially the ones who have reshored their operations. Wal-Mart naturally wants cost-reduced versions of stuff like microwaves and furniture, but I’m sure they’ve seen the surveys too. People buying appliances don’t want throwaway crap anymore, and they’ll pay for stuff that’s going to last a while. The “Site-to-Store” feature they’ve had for years accounts for a huge percentage of their sales now — I think anyone who has wasted gas going to Wally-World for something that was out of stock has become an instant convert.
Ironically, Wal-Mart’s cutthroat pricing policies are exactly what has come back to bite them. Higher-end retailers have barely seen any price moves; there are plenty of margins to cut into and a lot more goodwill with their suppliers. Not so with the razor-thin margins “enjoyed” by Wally’s suppliers: if labor costs go up, if shipping costs go up, if materials costs go up (and all of them have lately), Wally either has to absorb the increases themselves (and pass it on to their customers) or lose another supplier. So the prices are going up at the low end a lot more than the mid-range or high-end, at least so far. That’s one jaw of the pliers: the other is that much of Wally’s price-conscious customer base is spending all their dough just to keep the heat on. You would think that would be offset by formerly higher-end shoppers looking to stay on a budget, but the ones who have spoken out about it said the price breaks aren’t worth the hit to quality.
At work, we didn’t so much reshore as reshuffle. Our manufacturer in China is still making stuff for the Asia-Pacific market. A company we bought a while back has a factory in Mexico, so that’s where we moved Western Hemisphere production. Finally, we contracted with a factory in Italy to handle Europe/Middle East/Africa products. One of the manufacturing guys I talk to about one of our products says that’s becoming a trend: build the stuff close to where it’s being sold; sending information is still dirt-cheap and you can save big on shipping costs. Translating documentation is another inflation-resistant service — it’s all handled electronically and the people doing the actual translations often have wind or solar power (like me) to avoid blackout issues.
Things got a little shaky at work late last summer; the blackouts made it pretty difficult for our customers to deliver the goods to their customers, and we had an alarming dip in orders. Fortunately, things improved with cooler weather, and they’re pledging to not get caught out like that again, so maybe I’ll stay employed for another year. Our new product, an EMTA that can go 2 days on battery power, with data and two phone lines in constant use, made us one of the few growth companies last year… which is why I was able to afford my own backup power; our stock zoomed up and I cashed in some options. Go us. :-)
It’s already starting to warm up; the in-laws have started trays of tomato plants. We’ll be starting our gardens before you know it. This year, we probably won’t be going to Wal-Mart for much of anything, though.
continued…
Tuesday, January 01, 2008 13 comments
FAR Future, Episode 18: Political Theater
The in-laws have a superstition that whatever you do on New Year’s Day establishes a pattern for the year ahead — thus, it’s a good day for doing things you want to do all year and avoid things you don’t want (like work). I’m not sure if it’s a southern belief, or specific to the in-laws — but I figured holding back on this FAR Future post for one day might be just the thing I need to establish a pattern I want in the year ahead. By this time next year, I hope to be posting Episode 60 or thereabouts.
Happy New Year, everyone, and don’t forget to go easy on the fossil fuels!
Friday, February 8, 2013
Political Theater
The whole secession thing died back for a while — it turned out a lot of the people who were willing to pander to the lowest common denominator weren’t quite willing to cut the cords. Planet Georgia, as I said back in December, huffed and puffed about “respecting our values and concerns” after the people turned out to be seriously conflicted about the whole matter. Other states mostly followed suit, although Wyoming and Utah look a little shaky these days. After this week, though, it might start making more noise again. Or not.
The new Congressional leadership agreed to “hear and seriously consider the proposals of the minority,” which is even smaller than before. I don’t know how they managed to say “seriously” with a straight face; the goplets, which great enthusiasm, took the opportunity to really show their butts to the entire nation. They crafted a big ol’ grab-bag of their pet legislation: drill ANWR (nobody believes it will make a difference anymore, but that didn’t stop them), abolish the NFRB (rationing), eliminate heating fuel subsidies for low-income families, big tax cuts for their patrons, eliminate pollution controls (in the name of “energy efficiency” of course)… basically, attempting to re-do all the damage that Bush-league did and we’ve all worked so hard to undo.
I think at the highest levels, their plan was to introduce the legislation, let it die in committee or via filibuster, and tell the base that the government wasn’t interested in their wants. Instead, the committees let each bill go through, with no amendments and no serious opposition — the last few rational goplets started trying to kill the bills themselves when they saw what was happening, but to no avail. C-SPAN then got to show the supporters doing some incredible verbal contortions. Naturally, when it came time for a vote, each bill went down in flames. “Hear and seriously consider” has nothing to do with “support,” thankfully.
Boy, did Shotgun Sam get an earful though! A bunch of callers were complaining “what were our guys thinking, wanting to kill heating assistance, me and my family would be freezing to death without it!” and “whose brilliant idea was it to try repealing rationing, it’s the only way I can get enough gas to get to work.” Once again, he was having a hard time steering the mood of the listeners. Indeed, repealing heating assistance went down 427-6 or something like that — the only goplets with the stomach to deal with their voters on that one were in Florida or some of the high-income districts. Or both. I guess it goes to show that not even the most rabid right-wing voter has more sense than their candidates, who seem willing to hurt himself for “the cause” — in the end, the goplets ensured that a few more of their own voters will sit the next election out, and maybe lose a couple more seats.
Well… we’ve gotten past the worst of the winter, unless we get a late freeze. In a few months, we’ll be wishing it was cold again. We’ll be “looking forward” to blackouts all summer long, I’m sure. I’ve got as much wind & solar generation at FAR Manor as I could afford, and it should be enough to run my computers for work and keep a fridge or two (mostly) going. I’m actually looking forward to some warmer weather; going to the creek to cool off is tons easier than chopping food & feeding a stove.
continued…
Happy New Year, everyone, and don’t forget to go easy on the fossil fuels!
Friday, February 8, 2013
Political Theater
The whole secession thing died back for a while — it turned out a lot of the people who were willing to pander to the lowest common denominator weren’t quite willing to cut the cords. Planet Georgia, as I said back in December, huffed and puffed about “respecting our values and concerns” after the people turned out to be seriously conflicted about the whole matter. Other states mostly followed suit, although Wyoming and Utah look a little shaky these days. After this week, though, it might start making more noise again. Or not.
The new Congressional leadership agreed to “hear and seriously consider the proposals of the minority,” which is even smaller than before. I don’t know how they managed to say “seriously” with a straight face; the goplets, which great enthusiasm, took the opportunity to really show their butts to the entire nation. They crafted a big ol’ grab-bag of their pet legislation: drill ANWR (nobody believes it will make a difference anymore, but that didn’t stop them), abolish the NFRB (rationing), eliminate heating fuel subsidies for low-income families, big tax cuts for their patrons, eliminate pollution controls (in the name of “energy efficiency” of course)… basically, attempting to re-do all the damage that Bush-league did and we’ve all worked so hard to undo.
I think at the highest levels, their plan was to introduce the legislation, let it die in committee or via filibuster, and tell the base that the government wasn’t interested in their wants. Instead, the committees let each bill go through, with no amendments and no serious opposition — the last few rational goplets started trying to kill the bills themselves when they saw what was happening, but to no avail. C-SPAN then got to show the supporters doing some incredible verbal contortions. Naturally, when it came time for a vote, each bill went down in flames. “Hear and seriously consider” has nothing to do with “support,” thankfully.
Boy, did Shotgun Sam get an earful though! A bunch of callers were complaining “what were our guys thinking, wanting to kill heating assistance, me and my family would be freezing to death without it!” and “whose brilliant idea was it to try repealing rationing, it’s the only way I can get enough gas to get to work.” Once again, he was having a hard time steering the mood of the listeners. Indeed, repealing heating assistance went down 427-6 or something like that — the only goplets with the stomach to deal with their voters on that one were in Florida or some of the high-income districts. Or both. I guess it goes to show that not even the most rabid right-wing voter has more sense than their candidates, who seem willing to hurt himself for “the cause” — in the end, the goplets ensured that a few more of their own voters will sit the next election out, and maybe lose a couple more seats.
Well… we’ve gotten past the worst of the winter, unless we get a late freeze. In a few months, we’ll be wishing it was cold again. We’ll be “looking forward” to blackouts all summer long, I’m sure. I’ve got as much wind & solar generation at FAR Manor as I could afford, and it should be enough to run my computers for work and keep a fridge or two (mostly) going. I’m actually looking forward to some warmer weather; going to the creek to cool off is tons easier than chopping food & feeding a stove.
continued…
Thursday, December 13, 2007 9 comments
FAR Future, Episode 17
Happy New Year! Kind of.
Monday, January 14, 2013
Froze in the Middle
The Mayan calendar began a new cycle on December 21. It’s not exactly off to a wonderful start for a lot of people.
The rural poor (and not-so poor) are huddling together, cutting firewood, and pooling their other resources to stay relatively warm this winter. The urban poor tend to live in apartment buildings, which are easier to heat, and they have an established public assistance infrastructure to help them out. And suburbia?
Ouch. You’ve seen the stories, and I hope you haven’t lived them. The lucky ones still have jobs that cover their heat and transportation costs (if little else). The people in the Foreclosure Moratorium program (FMA) get a break on the mortgages, but they’re still on the hook for food and heat. Many suburbanites aren’t aware of other assistance programs, or how to apply if they do… or prefer to avoid them (pride, ideology, etc.). So even when the house payment isn’t an issue, some are deciding it isn’t worth the hassle. They mail their keys to the bank and move in with relatives (whether rural or not).
Suburbia’s thinning out, in more ways than one. Abandoned houses don’t last too long now: first the furniture disappears up their neighbors’ chimneys, then wood trim turns into fuel and carpet & padding goes on walls (extra insulation), then interior walls turn into firewood, then upstairs flooring, walls, the roof… and of course, the wiring gets stripped for the copper. After a week or so, there isn’t much left but pieces of sheetrock, vinyl siding, the heat pump, and other large appliances (or the remnants, after the motors get stripped for copper too). Houses that don’t get abandoned sometimes catch fire when people aren’t smart about using their fireplaces, or try using the oven as a firebox. So between strippers and fires, empty lots are appearing fairly quickly. I’ll bet some forward-thinkers are already clearing them up for gardens.
Naturally, this isn’t doing the financial “industry” any good. CWM was offering mortgagees in the FMA program some assistance with heating bills to keep people from giving up. That’s basically good business… an intact house is worth something; a lot with a pile of debris is worth less than the lot itself (since it has to be cleared). Other companies are trying a sort of rapid-response operation, with housesitters lined up and ready to rush to an abandoned house — but that’s a race they usually lose, because the neighbors know when people move out and have a head start on the mortgage companies, equal to the time it takes to send in the keys. Most housesitters arrive to find the house already stripped of furniture and often carpeting; if they’re lucky, the wiring is still intact. Losing a house like that is a double-whammy to the mortgage holders — the Feds let them not report FMA properties as write-offs, but they still aren’t allowed to hide destroyed assets or housesitter costs. They’re all dreading the April reporting. Some regional companies, in Florida and California, have already folded — and there’s no telling who owns their paper now. But against a backdrop of people freezing to death or dying in fires, figuring out who owns some worthless property doesn’t seem to be a priority.
Of course, the yap radio mouths blame their usual suspects for just about all of what’s happening — Shotgun Sam probably got himself a case of emphysema the other day, breathing all the dust coming off the global warming-denial mantle that he tried on. Something along the lines of, “Where’s the global warming gone? We sure could use a little bit of that right now, couldn’t we?” The spazz out there is just incredible. (“spazz” is an old term I defined during the Y2K days; it indicates the ability to cling to a belief after it has been disproved)
Closer to home, FAR Manor is getting through winter in reasonable shape so far. We had some trouble with wood-poachers for a little while, was the worst thing. Fortunately, someone close by asked for permission to get firewood off our place — I told him to only take deadfall and chase off the poachers, and that’s working out pretty well. Daughter Dearest has her teaching job, and she and another teacher are housesitting in a place within walking distance of the school. The county agreed to waive school taxes for the property, so that’s all working out (again, so far). The school buses pick up passengers as well as kids now, collecting fares from the non-students, which helps some with fuel costs. But the Feds had to step up and make sure that rural school districts had enough diesel to run the bus services. Now that they’re letting oil companies pay up to half of their taxes in fuel, that seems to be working out.
The scary thing is that there’s no master plan in effect — people are just making it up as they go. Most of us somehow manage to make it work, but some don’t… sometimes by not thinking things through, other times by just bad luck. Climate change notwithstanding, a mild winter and an early spring will help a lot of people stay alive.
continued…
Monday, January 14, 2013
Froze in the Middle
The Mayan calendar began a new cycle on December 21. It’s not exactly off to a wonderful start for a lot of people.
The rural poor (and not-so poor) are huddling together, cutting firewood, and pooling their other resources to stay relatively warm this winter. The urban poor tend to live in apartment buildings, which are easier to heat, and they have an established public assistance infrastructure to help them out. And suburbia?
Ouch. You’ve seen the stories, and I hope you haven’t lived them. The lucky ones still have jobs that cover their heat and transportation costs (if little else). The people in the Foreclosure Moratorium program (FMA) get a break on the mortgages, but they’re still on the hook for food and heat. Many suburbanites aren’t aware of other assistance programs, or how to apply if they do… or prefer to avoid them (pride, ideology, etc.). So even when the house payment isn’t an issue, some are deciding it isn’t worth the hassle. They mail their keys to the bank and move in with relatives (whether rural or not).
Suburbia’s thinning out, in more ways than one. Abandoned houses don’t last too long now: first the furniture disappears up their neighbors’ chimneys, then wood trim turns into fuel and carpet & padding goes on walls (extra insulation), then interior walls turn into firewood, then upstairs flooring, walls, the roof… and of course, the wiring gets stripped for the copper. After a week or so, there isn’t much left but pieces of sheetrock, vinyl siding, the heat pump, and other large appliances (or the remnants, after the motors get stripped for copper too). Houses that don’t get abandoned sometimes catch fire when people aren’t smart about using their fireplaces, or try using the oven as a firebox. So between strippers and fires, empty lots are appearing fairly quickly. I’ll bet some forward-thinkers are already clearing them up for gardens.
Naturally, this isn’t doing the financial “industry” any good. CWM was offering mortgagees in the FMA program some assistance with heating bills to keep people from giving up. That’s basically good business… an intact house is worth something; a lot with a pile of debris is worth less than the lot itself (since it has to be cleared). Other companies are trying a sort of rapid-response operation, with housesitters lined up and ready to rush to an abandoned house — but that’s a race they usually lose, because the neighbors know when people move out and have a head start on the mortgage companies, equal to the time it takes to send in the keys. Most housesitters arrive to find the house already stripped of furniture and often carpeting; if they’re lucky, the wiring is still intact. Losing a house like that is a double-whammy to the mortgage holders — the Feds let them not report FMA properties as write-offs, but they still aren’t allowed to hide destroyed assets or housesitter costs. They’re all dreading the April reporting. Some regional companies, in Florida and California, have already folded — and there’s no telling who owns their paper now. But against a backdrop of people freezing to death or dying in fires, figuring out who owns some worthless property doesn’t seem to be a priority.
Of course, the yap radio mouths blame their usual suspects for just about all of what’s happening — Shotgun Sam probably got himself a case of emphysema the other day, breathing all the dust coming off the global warming-denial mantle that he tried on. Something along the lines of, “Where’s the global warming gone? We sure could use a little bit of that right now, couldn’t we?” The spazz out there is just incredible. (“spazz” is an old term I defined during the Y2K days; it indicates the ability to cling to a belief after it has been disproved)
Closer to home, FAR Manor is getting through winter in reasonable shape so far. We had some trouble with wood-poachers for a little while, was the worst thing. Fortunately, someone close by asked for permission to get firewood off our place — I told him to only take deadfall and chase off the poachers, and that’s working out pretty well. Daughter Dearest has her teaching job, and she and another teacher are housesitting in a place within walking distance of the school. The county agreed to waive school taxes for the property, so that’s all working out (again, so far). The school buses pick up passengers as well as kids now, collecting fares from the non-students, which helps some with fuel costs. But the Feds had to step up and make sure that rural school districts had enough diesel to run the bus services. Now that they’re letting oil companies pay up to half of their taxes in fuel, that seems to be working out.
The scary thing is that there’s no master plan in effect — people are just making it up as they go. Most of us somehow manage to make it work, but some don’t… sometimes by not thinking things through, other times by just bad luck. Climate change notwithstanding, a mild winter and an early spring will help a lot of people stay alive.
continued…
Sunday, December 02, 2007 4 comments
FAR Future, Episode 16
During recent spam-cleaning, I found a link in Episode 9 to a German translation. The page was rife with ads, so it could have been a blog spammer playing cute games. And now the link appears to be gone, but the page is still there — perhaps the spammer gets the payout for the ads then takes down the link? Very strange.
Life in the great online, I guess…
Wednesday, December 19, 2012
Holidaze, Shortage Style
At least for us rural folks, 3-day delivery is about to join overnight in the proverbial dustbin of history. After the Postal Service went first, announcing that they’re going to Mon/Wed/Fri mail delivery starting in January, FedEx and UPS are going to a “once a week, or sooner if we fill a truck” schedule. I really don’t blame them — so much of what people used to do by mail is done online nowadays. “Overnight delivery” usually refers to downloading a movie or a large software package. Getting bills three days a week instead of every day will be nice, even if the number of bills over the course of a week is the same. :-P
This holiday season is shaping up to be a big loser for retail — after people got their fuel oil or gas bill (if they didn’t run into spot shortages), they cut back on the presents to pay for heat. One of the few happy notes for the holidays comes from the NHTSA, which is predicting the “safest holiday driving season in years.” Duh, hardly anybody’s going anywhere!
One of the few happy retailers this year is Sears — their traditional catalog business has come roaring back, and they’ve even started to open “catalog centers” in small towns again, like we had when I was a kid. They cut you a big break on shipping if you have your order delivered to a catalog center and pick it up there, and that’s been a bigger hit than I would have expected.
We’re still going to have lots of relatives at FAR Manor this year, mainly because they’re close by. That’s not all bad — I paid a nephew to cut up deadfall and stack it near the house, and he did a pretty good job. We splurged on a tank of propane too, but we plan to mostly use the fireplace insert unless it gets really cold. With the kids gone, we’ve closed down the upstairs for the winter, so we only have to heat the downstairs.
Speaking of nephews, he and his family have moved in with one of the other in-laws; their basement is big and finished out, so they're living downstairs. He said it isn’t bad; he just puts his headphones on and turns up the volume when they start squabbling, or walks up here to see if he can earn a few bucks doing something around the house. “Consolidating” seems to be the thing now; take two or three families and move them all into the biggest house for the winter. Everyone helps with the heating bills, and the smart ones have had plumbers come to the houses being shut down and put RV antifreeze in the water lines so they won’t freeze up. Mrs. Fetched was trying to get her parents to move into the guest bedroom, but they don’t want to leave their place. Whew! I don’t know if I could get much work done at home with them arguing, running the TV, arguing, cooking, arguing some more, all day long.
Meanwhile, back in the World At Large, the Secession Question has taken a breather for the holidays. Planet Georgia’s ASSembly passed a resolution to support withdrawal “if the rights and values of our citizens are not respected” — basically a threat, maybe half-full. The only surprise was that the vote was closer than expected. One “solution” talking shape is to allow states (or regions of like-minded states) to set policies for taxation and other things if they agree to respect the 14th amendment and the equal rights of all citizens (there’s been some noise about that). I’m not keen on the idea, because there’s been a lot of “overlooking” of equal rights for all citizens in the past; I don’t expect that to improve.
Sheesh, I almost forgot. Another thing that isn’t improving is the fuel supply. The NFRD is saying that fuel allocations are going to drop some, maybe 5%, starting early next year — Iraq is pumping flat-out and it’s still not enough to make up for drops in Saudi Arabia and Kuwait, let alone Mexico. The yap radio mouths are having a field day with that — it’s getting listeners’ minds off secession, which has to be a relief for their patrons. Things might not change much, though — people have had since August to make adjustments, and we had some allocations expire without any bids week before last. But bids for fresh allocations started picking up late last week; those people still driving somewhere for the holidays are probably trying to line up their supplies ahead of time. But between the people who let their unused allocations expire, and the ones who buy them up to take them off the market, I have to wonder where the extra gas is going — or has the NFRD deliberately overbooked a little?
Now if only they could make me an electric motorbike with a 100 mile range, I wouldn’t worry too much.
continued…
Life in the great online, I guess…
Wednesday, December 19, 2012
Holidaze, Shortage Style
At least for us rural folks, 3-day delivery is about to join overnight in the proverbial dustbin of history. After the Postal Service went first, announcing that they’re going to Mon/Wed/Fri mail delivery starting in January, FedEx and UPS are going to a “once a week, or sooner if we fill a truck” schedule. I really don’t blame them — so much of what people used to do by mail is done online nowadays. “Overnight delivery” usually refers to downloading a movie or a large software package. Getting bills three days a week instead of every day will be nice, even if the number of bills over the course of a week is the same. :-P
This holiday season is shaping up to be a big loser for retail — after people got their fuel oil or gas bill (if they didn’t run into spot shortages), they cut back on the presents to pay for heat. One of the few happy notes for the holidays comes from the NHTSA, which is predicting the “safest holiday driving season in years.” Duh, hardly anybody’s going anywhere!
One of the few happy retailers this year is Sears — their traditional catalog business has come roaring back, and they’ve even started to open “catalog centers” in small towns again, like we had when I was a kid. They cut you a big break on shipping if you have your order delivered to a catalog center and pick it up there, and that’s been a bigger hit than I would have expected.
We’re still going to have lots of relatives at FAR Manor this year, mainly because they’re close by. That’s not all bad — I paid a nephew to cut up deadfall and stack it near the house, and he did a pretty good job. We splurged on a tank of propane too, but we plan to mostly use the fireplace insert unless it gets really cold. With the kids gone, we’ve closed down the upstairs for the winter, so we only have to heat the downstairs.
Speaking of nephews, he and his family have moved in with one of the other in-laws; their basement is big and finished out, so they're living downstairs. He said it isn’t bad; he just puts his headphones on and turns up the volume when they start squabbling, or walks up here to see if he can earn a few bucks doing something around the house. “Consolidating” seems to be the thing now; take two or three families and move them all into the biggest house for the winter. Everyone helps with the heating bills, and the smart ones have had plumbers come to the houses being shut down and put RV antifreeze in the water lines so they won’t freeze up. Mrs. Fetched was trying to get her parents to move into the guest bedroom, but they don’t want to leave their place. Whew! I don’t know if I could get much work done at home with them arguing, running the TV, arguing, cooking, arguing some more, all day long.
Meanwhile, back in the World At Large, the Secession Question has taken a breather for the holidays. Planet Georgia’s ASSembly passed a resolution to support withdrawal “if the rights and values of our citizens are not respected” — basically a threat, maybe half-full. The only surprise was that the vote was closer than expected. One “solution” talking shape is to allow states (or regions of like-minded states) to set policies for taxation and other things if they agree to respect the 14th amendment and the equal rights of all citizens (there’s been some noise about that). I’m not keen on the idea, because there’s been a lot of “overlooking” of equal rights for all citizens in the past; I don’t expect that to improve.
Sheesh, I almost forgot. Another thing that isn’t improving is the fuel supply. The NFRD is saying that fuel allocations are going to drop some, maybe 5%, starting early next year — Iraq is pumping flat-out and it’s still not enough to make up for drops in Saudi Arabia and Kuwait, let alone Mexico. The yap radio mouths are having a field day with that — it’s getting listeners’ minds off secession, which has to be a relief for their patrons. Things might not change much, though — people have had since August to make adjustments, and we had some allocations expire without any bids week before last. But bids for fresh allocations started picking up late last week; those people still driving somewhere for the holidays are probably trying to line up their supplies ahead of time. But between the people who let their unused allocations expire, and the ones who buy them up to take them off the market, I have to wonder where the extra gas is going — or has the NFRD deliberately overbooked a little?
Now if only they could make me an electric motorbike with a 100 mile range, I wouldn’t worry too much.
continued…
Friday, November 16, 2007 7 comments
FAR Future, Episode 15 (or 14b if you prefer)
In the FAR Future-verse, this episode & the last one are only a day apart, so I thought it would be proper to post them a day apart…
Tuesday, November 20, 2012
Wow
Words fail me, but I’ll try. I’m still way too worked up about what happened. I’m sure footage will get to YouTube or VideoNation soon — if you didn’t see it, you really have to. I’ll try to describe it here, but you have to see the video. You just have to.
Mrs. Fetched had the TV on — didn’t matter what channel; all the Atlanta stations were carrying this. The “militia” were camped out around the Capitol building itself, and up and down the streets — except on MLK Blvd, which tells you pretty much everything you need to know — and spilled into the parking deck. The National Guard blocked through traffic and let the militia camp in the middle of the street — one of the officers said they had consulted with the city government, and they agreed that it would be the best way to avoid disrupting a wider area. The reprehensibles weren’t bothering to come in; they teleconference most of the time like everyone else anyway, but some said they were “hearing the message.”
On the evening news last night, they interviewed street vendors who were selling food, drinks, sweaters, caps, even socks and underwear, to the campers. It doesn’t matter what happens, someone will find a way to turn a buck off it, right? A lot of the vendors are black, and they think the campers are bleep bleep and bleeeep, but the money is still green. I guess. The campers didn’t seem to care either way; they were just glad someone was making it easier on them.
Again, I digress. The counter-demonstrators convened at the Georgia State campus, just up the road, and planned to march down Courtland, around the square, then back up Piedmont to the campus. Some of the TV crews (including the news personalities) set up on the roofs of the Capitol Museum and the State Supreme Court building, but some camera crews put themselves right down in the action. One of the newsies said, “we’re hearing the counter-demonstrators are on their way now,” and everyone started standing up. The Capitol Police had cleared the middle of the streets to make room for the marchers, and the militia types were thronging the edges, trying to get a look.
Then they came, in their hundreds and tens of hundreds. Carrying luminaries and singing, “God Bless America.” Go find the video — it was just stunning. Not the marchers themselves, but the effect it had on the militia. You have to remember, these guys were brought up on God and Country — and whatever beef they had with the latter, they hadn’t been completely de-programmed. Some of them stood at attention, others sang along… and they all put down their guns. I hope you get to see the clip where one red-faced yahoo started chanting whatever they’d planned on, and everyone around him turned and stared him down until he just left. There’s another clip where you can see some of the guys shouldering their arms and… well, changing sides, joining the marchers. Mrs. Fetched and I both teared up, and so did a lot of the militia guys. The leaders were camped in front of the Capitol, across from the Supreme Court building, and the crew across the street got a “priceless” shot — those guys looked like they were watching their best friends wearing pink tutus and practicing ballet. The newscasters were somehow imbued with a clue, and just let the cameras roll. Or maybe they were choked up too.
It was over in 15 minutes. The marchers went through, crossed MLK again, and headed back toward the campus — still singing. The militia guys started packing their stuff. The reporter found his voice and said (I taped it & am transcribing): “This is surely a historic moment. I — I don’t have words to describe what just happened here today, and I’m not sure I could add anything to what we’ve just seen. It appears that the ‘Citizen Militia’ is dispersing — most of them are packing their things and some of them are following the marchers up Capitol Avenue, possibly to the Georgia State MARTA station.
“Wait… we take you now to the militia’s Field Headquarters, in front of the Capitol building.”
They cut over to a young black woman (pretty in that way that transcends race, a must for urban TV news) interviewing one of the leaders. He was already talking: “—a success, overall. I have to admit I was surprised at the tactics of the counter-demonstrators, but the Assembly has received our message and I expect we’ll prevail when it comes to a vote.”
And just like that, the magic faded back into the banality of a typical live newscast.
Unfortunately, the Secession Question doesn’t appear to have been answered — or maybe now it’s less answered than before. The evening news opened with it tonight. A lot of closed-door discussions have been going on over the last week, in violation of who knows how many sunshine laws, and (being run by goplets) probably off the transcripts entirely. Debates are going on across the Old South, at least from South Carolina to Louisiana, and in parts of the mountain west. More rumors, some online, others officially denied: Congress is negotiating with various state reps about home rule; the Guard in certain states are being put under national command; the Navy is stationing task groups out to sea but close to certain seaports; the pipelines could get nationalized or shut down. Despite what happened today, we’re not much closer to holding hands and singing Kumbayah than we were before.
continued…
Tuesday, November 20, 2012
Wow
Words fail me, but I’ll try. I’m still way too worked up about what happened. I’m sure footage will get to YouTube or VideoNation soon — if you didn’t see it, you really have to. I’ll try to describe it here, but you have to see the video. You just have to.
Mrs. Fetched had the TV on — didn’t matter what channel; all the Atlanta stations were carrying this. The “militia” were camped out around the Capitol building itself, and up and down the streets — except on MLK Blvd, which tells you pretty much everything you need to know — and spilled into the parking deck. The National Guard blocked through traffic and let the militia camp in the middle of the street — one of the officers said they had consulted with the city government, and they agreed that it would be the best way to avoid disrupting a wider area. The reprehensibles weren’t bothering to come in; they teleconference most of the time like everyone else anyway, but some said they were “hearing the message.”
On the evening news last night, they interviewed street vendors who were selling food, drinks, sweaters, caps, even socks and underwear, to the campers. It doesn’t matter what happens, someone will find a way to turn a buck off it, right? A lot of the vendors are black, and they think the campers are bleep bleep and bleeeep, but the money is still green. I guess. The campers didn’t seem to care either way; they were just glad someone was making it easier on them.
Again, I digress. The counter-demonstrators convened at the Georgia State campus, just up the road, and planned to march down Courtland, around the square, then back up Piedmont to the campus. Some of the TV crews (including the news personalities) set up on the roofs of the Capitol Museum and the State Supreme Court building, but some camera crews put themselves right down in the action. One of the newsies said, “we’re hearing the counter-demonstrators are on their way now,” and everyone started standing up. The Capitol Police had cleared the middle of the streets to make room for the marchers, and the militia types were thronging the edges, trying to get a look.
Then they came, in their hundreds and tens of hundreds. Carrying luminaries and singing, “God Bless America.” Go find the video — it was just stunning. Not the marchers themselves, but the effect it had on the militia. You have to remember, these guys were brought up on God and Country — and whatever beef they had with the latter, they hadn’t been completely de-programmed. Some of them stood at attention, others sang along… and they all put down their guns. I hope you get to see the clip where one red-faced yahoo started chanting whatever they’d planned on, and everyone around him turned and stared him down until he just left. There’s another clip where you can see some of the guys shouldering their arms and… well, changing sides, joining the marchers. Mrs. Fetched and I both teared up, and so did a lot of the militia guys. The leaders were camped in front of the Capitol, across from the Supreme Court building, and the crew across the street got a “priceless” shot — those guys looked like they were watching their best friends wearing pink tutus and practicing ballet. The newscasters were somehow imbued with a clue, and just let the cameras roll. Or maybe they were choked up too.
It was over in 15 minutes. The marchers went through, crossed MLK again, and headed back toward the campus — still singing. The militia guys started packing their stuff. The reporter found his voice and said (I taped it & am transcribing): “This is surely a historic moment. I — I don’t have words to describe what just happened here today, and I’m not sure I could add anything to what we’ve just seen. It appears that the ‘Citizen Militia’ is dispersing — most of them are packing their things and some of them are following the marchers up Capitol Avenue, possibly to the Georgia State MARTA station.
“Wait… we take you now to the militia’s Field Headquarters, in front of the Capitol building.”
They cut over to a young black woman (pretty in that way that transcends race, a must for urban TV news) interviewing one of the leaders. He was already talking: “—a success, overall. I have to admit I was surprised at the tactics of the counter-demonstrators, but the Assembly has received our message and I expect we’ll prevail when it comes to a vote.”
And just like that, the magic faded back into the banality of a typical live newscast.
Unfortunately, the Secession Question doesn’t appear to have been answered — or maybe now it’s less answered than before. The evening news opened with it tonight. A lot of closed-door discussions have been going on over the last week, in violation of who knows how many sunshine laws, and (being run by goplets) probably off the transcripts entirely. Debates are going on across the Old South, at least from South Carolina to Louisiana, and in parts of the mountain west. More rumors, some online, others officially denied: Congress is negotiating with various state reps about home rule; the Guard in certain states are being put under national command; the Navy is stationing task groups out to sea but close to certain seaports; the pipelines could get nationalized or shut down. Despite what happened today, we’re not much closer to holding hands and singing Kumbayah than we were before.
continued…
Thursday, November 15, 2007 2 comments
FAR Future, Episode 14
Second episode in a row posted on a “cold” (low of 0°C or slightly less) night. I’d like to think I’m not going to make a habit of it, but we’re sliding into the bottom of the year now. Gas hitting $3/gal again has soured Mrs. Fetched on SUVs; she went out and traded Barge Vader for a 2002 Civic EX. Very pretty, although I think the instrument console is somewhat cartoon-like.
Thanks to everyone over at Nancy’s blog, Sweet Mystery of Life, for all the encouragement I’ve been getting on this and other projects.
Yeah, yeah, enough with the suspense already…
Monday, November 19, 2012
Marching Through Georgia
The media is estimating about 5,000 people — more than I’d hoped, less than I’d feared — “joined the citizen’s militia” and are marching to Atlanta. A few dozen left from here (so much for five), more from larger counties, and they’re meeting up along the way. South of Macon, they chartered buses to bring them up to Atlanta.
The State Patrol said the marchers can carry their guns, as long they they’re unloaded; they threatened to confiscate loaded weapons but I don’t know how they could tell who’s loaded unless someone fires a round. The “vanguard” has already arrived at the Capitol building and the others are trickling in along the streets. The ones who are there have started pitching tents wherever they can find room and are giving interviews with the media. Rumors are flying again: shootouts with gang-bangers (wouldn’t surprise me), the National Guard is being mobilized to keep order (ditto), a bunch of the militia are actually infiltrators (could be), the State Patrol is barricading everything at I-285 (don’t think so), the legislature will convene in Savannah (I’d be maybe a little surprised).
It’s also true that they’ve lost a few people — not dead, just dropped out. Some had to be treated for hypothermia, camping in sub-freezing weather without adequate gear. (The Boy camped out on cold nights, when he was a teenager, but stayed warm enough.) Others caught the flu that’s going around this year, and had to go home or to a clinic. If they got sick inside I-285, the ambulances took them straight to Grady — just to honk their frozen noses, I guess. Some of the older folks started walking from the various courthouses, but caught a ride when hips or knees started to seize up. I’ve had my knee act up like that, especially with the way the weather changes this time of year, so I can relate to that if nothing else. So the least mobile were among the first to arrive at the Capitol… go figure.
There’s a counter-demonstration being planned for tomorrow. I wish I had the guts to provoke armed lunatics too; if nothing else, I'd like to go with a video camera and pretend to be a news stringer or something. Mrs. Fetched, who is concerned about my income if not my safety (and she is), scotched the idea — I have to work, don’t need to waste gas going there & back, and don’t need to be doing anything that dangerous when I’m almost 54 (thanks for the reminder, honey). Oh well. I guess I’ll watch it on TV like everyone else.
continued…
Thanks to everyone over at Nancy’s blog, Sweet Mystery of Life, for all the encouragement I’ve been getting on this and other projects.
Yeah, yeah, enough with the suspense already…
Monday, November 19, 2012
Marching Through Georgia
The media is estimating about 5,000 people — more than I’d hoped, less than I’d feared — “joined the citizen’s militia” and are marching to Atlanta. A few dozen left from here (so much for five), more from larger counties, and they’re meeting up along the way. South of Macon, they chartered buses to bring them up to Atlanta.
The State Patrol said the marchers can carry their guns, as long they they’re unloaded; they threatened to confiscate loaded weapons but I don’t know how they could tell who’s loaded unless someone fires a round. The “vanguard” has already arrived at the Capitol building and the others are trickling in along the streets. The ones who are there have started pitching tents wherever they can find room and are giving interviews with the media. Rumors are flying again: shootouts with gang-bangers (wouldn’t surprise me), the National Guard is being mobilized to keep order (ditto), a bunch of the militia are actually infiltrators (could be), the State Patrol is barricading everything at I-285 (don’t think so), the legislature will convene in Savannah (I’d be maybe a little surprised).
It’s also true that they’ve lost a few people — not dead, just dropped out. Some had to be treated for hypothermia, camping in sub-freezing weather without adequate gear. (The Boy camped out on cold nights, when he was a teenager, but stayed warm enough.) Others caught the flu that’s going around this year, and had to go home or to a clinic. If they got sick inside I-285, the ambulances took them straight to Grady — just to honk their frozen noses, I guess. Some of the older folks started walking from the various courthouses, but caught a ride when hips or knees started to seize up. I’ve had my knee act up like that, especially with the way the weather changes this time of year, so I can relate to that if nothing else. So the least mobile were among the first to arrive at the Capitol… go figure.
There’s a counter-demonstration being planned for tomorrow. I wish I had the guts to provoke armed lunatics too; if nothing else, I'd like to go with a video camera and pretend to be a news stringer or something. Mrs. Fetched, who is concerned about my income if not my safety (and she is), scotched the idea — I have to work, don’t need to waste gas going there & back, and don’t need to be doing anything that dangerous when I’m almost 54 (thanks for the reminder, honey). Oh well. I guess I’ll watch it on TV like everyone else.
continued…
Tuesday, November 06, 2007 3 comments
FAR Future, Episode 13
Chilly outside tonight. Will covering the peppers keep them alive?
Hello to Randy Russell aka GhostFolk, who calls FAR Future “an incredibly dynamic way to use the internet.” (Hey, I don’t have a reviews page!)
Speaking of chills, let’s get back to the story…
Wednesday, November 14, 2012
Nothing Secedes Like Success
This is worse than election season. That, you could mostly get away from for a while — turn off the TV and radio, and you’re mostly in a campaign-free bubble. Since the Secession Question is also all over the net, and (at least here) dominates discussions even in the office (although the primary concern is whether we’ll all have to move north or not), I guess adding one more blog post to the general clutter isn’t going to push it over the edge.
The dividing line crosses both parties, the usual conservative/liberal divide, north and south, age, income, and just about everything else. Pollsters say beyond southern whites over age 60 (who are 2:1 pro-secession), southern blacks (uniformly against), and anyone under age 30 (2:1 against), there are no clear demographics for either side. The Gainesville paper did one of their “You Speak” columns on the topic; the arguments, both pro and con, can get amazingly silly. Bubba Something, pictured wearing a cap with a Confederate flag on it, said he was against it. “At least wait until football season is over,” he said. “The baseball leagues already play in Canada, so they have passports and they can work stuff out before the season starts.” I guess he doesn’t follow basketball or hockey. Then there was the kid with dreadlocks (but white) and a zillion piercings, who was for it “because we won’t have gas rationing anymore and we can cruise on Saturday nights again.” Lest you think the paper is going for the weirdest examples, they had an older lady who said, “Let’s keep this one nation under God, indivisible. Didn’t we learn anything from history?” and a businessman who said (and I agree), “Secession won’t make anything better. Our infrastructure is too integrated to just rip it all apart and draw boundaries.”
I can’t even get away from the question at FAR Manor. Mrs. Fetched has asked me a variation of the same question nearly every night for the last week: what are you going to do if we secede? She seems to think I’m going to pack my bags and bail for Michigan first thing… like we have enough gas allocations to do that. Sure, I’ve given it some serious thought, but right now I’m leaning toward sticking it out here on Planet Georgia. For one thing, she won’t leave her parents, and they barely leave the county anymore. For another, there’s a really good chance this whole thing is going to fizzle out either before it gets off the ground or shortly afterwards. Emotion rules the day today, but tomorrow people might start really thinking things over.
The talking heads are acting really weird now. It’s like their patrons had given them this idea to let people blow off steam about losing another election, but it got away from them so the marching orders are now to tamp it down. I’d guess Shotgun Sam is actually anti-secession, or he’s being told to be anti-, but most of his audience are pro- so he doesn’t have the nards to come out and say it. When you make a living being as politically outrageous as the FCC will allow, sitting on a fence doesn’t work well, and it’s showing. One of the chats was almost surreal yesterday afternoon: a caller was talking about “putting everything back the way it was supposed to be, before Martin Luther King stirred bleep up and all that.”
Sam stammered(!), “Um… y’know, you need to think about that. First, you don’t know if the union will split up or not. And even if it does, you’re talking about alienating a large group of people who already have a reason to mistrust you. You could provoke an uprising and give the other side a reason to invade — and all the guns you got aren’t gonna do much against what the Army and Air Force can throw at you.”
“Naw, naw, I ain’t talkin’ no Jim Crow. They can have their place, and we can have ours, and we jus’ stay outta each other’s bidness unless we both want to.”
“So you’re talking about a nation inside a nation that just split off from another nation?” I think Sam was trying to be funny, but it fell flat.
“I guesso, if you wanna look at it that way.”
Sam pried him off and went to a commercial right away, then when he came back he was on a completely different topic. When in doubt, change the subject.
Sam’s not the only one having second thoughts. After lots of demonstrations in Boise, and Coeur d'Alene nearly shut down with all the protests, the Idaho legislature is making noises about withdrawing their petition. The only surprise about Utah, though, is that they were a little slow to jump on the bandwagon. Looks like Idaho might give Utah their seat? The mountain West has hosted some of the strangest political shifts in the last 10 years or so, and you just can’t tell who’s going to do what if you don’t live there. The lower plains states (Kansas, Oklahoma, Texas) have secession bills in their state legi’s too, but not even Texas is really showing a lot of support for the idea. (Which is fantastic news, because there would have been a war over the oil fields.)
Vermont cracked me up though: they introduced a secession bill, and then even the guy who introduced it voted against it. I guess they wanted everyone else to know where they stood on the matter.
Sunday’s the day the “citizen’s militia musters.” I called some of the Atlanta stations and asked if they’d be interested in buying video, but they’re sending a crew. Oh well, if I don’t have to get up at 4a.m. that’s a Good Thing. It would have sucked royally if I’d gone down there to video a “division” of 4 or 5 people — the TV stations wouldn’t have bought that, and I would have gotten up for nothing. We’re supposed to have a hard freeze Sunday morning, so I plan and hope to be snug in bed then. With any luck, I won’t lie awake thinking about it.
continued…
Hello to Randy Russell aka GhostFolk, who calls FAR Future “an incredibly dynamic way to use the internet.” (Hey, I don’t have a reviews page!)
Speaking of chills, let’s get back to the story…
Wednesday, November 14, 2012
Nothing Secedes Like Success
This is worse than election season. That, you could mostly get away from for a while — turn off the TV and radio, and you’re mostly in a campaign-free bubble. Since the Secession Question is also all over the net, and (at least here) dominates discussions even in the office (although the primary concern is whether we’ll all have to move north or not), I guess adding one more blog post to the general clutter isn’t going to push it over the edge.
The dividing line crosses both parties, the usual conservative/liberal divide, north and south, age, income, and just about everything else. Pollsters say beyond southern whites over age 60 (who are 2:1 pro-secession), southern blacks (uniformly against), and anyone under age 30 (2:1 against), there are no clear demographics for either side. The Gainesville paper did one of their “You Speak” columns on the topic; the arguments, both pro and con, can get amazingly silly. Bubba Something, pictured wearing a cap with a Confederate flag on it, said he was against it. “At least wait until football season is over,” he said. “The baseball leagues already play in Canada, so they have passports and they can work stuff out before the season starts.” I guess he doesn’t follow basketball or hockey. Then there was the kid with dreadlocks (but white) and a zillion piercings, who was for it “because we won’t have gas rationing anymore and we can cruise on Saturday nights again.” Lest you think the paper is going for the weirdest examples, they had an older lady who said, “Let’s keep this one nation under God, indivisible. Didn’t we learn anything from history?” and a businessman who said (and I agree), “Secession won’t make anything better. Our infrastructure is too integrated to just rip it all apart and draw boundaries.”
I can’t even get away from the question at FAR Manor. Mrs. Fetched has asked me a variation of the same question nearly every night for the last week: what are you going to do if we secede? She seems to think I’m going to pack my bags and bail for Michigan first thing… like we have enough gas allocations to do that. Sure, I’ve given it some serious thought, but right now I’m leaning toward sticking it out here on Planet Georgia. For one thing, she won’t leave her parents, and they barely leave the county anymore. For another, there’s a really good chance this whole thing is going to fizzle out either before it gets off the ground or shortly afterwards. Emotion rules the day today, but tomorrow people might start really thinking things over.
The talking heads are acting really weird now. It’s like their patrons had given them this idea to let people blow off steam about losing another election, but it got away from them so the marching orders are now to tamp it down. I’d guess Shotgun Sam is actually anti-secession, or he’s being told to be anti-, but most of his audience are pro- so he doesn’t have the nards to come out and say it. When you make a living being as politically outrageous as the FCC will allow, sitting on a fence doesn’t work well, and it’s showing. One of the chats was almost surreal yesterday afternoon: a caller was talking about “putting everything back the way it was supposed to be, before Martin Luther King stirred bleep up and all that.”
Sam stammered(!), “Um… y’know, you need to think about that. First, you don’t know if the union will split up or not. And even if it does, you’re talking about alienating a large group of people who already have a reason to mistrust you. You could provoke an uprising and give the other side a reason to invade — and all the guns you got aren’t gonna do much against what the Army and Air Force can throw at you.”
“Naw, naw, I ain’t talkin’ no Jim Crow. They can have their place, and we can have ours, and we jus’ stay outta each other’s bidness unless we both want to.”
“So you’re talking about a nation inside a nation that just split off from another nation?” I think Sam was trying to be funny, but it fell flat.
“I guesso, if you wanna look at it that way.”
Sam pried him off and went to a commercial right away, then when he came back he was on a completely different topic. When in doubt, change the subject.
Sam’s not the only one having second thoughts. After lots of demonstrations in Boise, and Coeur d'Alene nearly shut down with all the protests, the Idaho legislature is making noises about withdrawing their petition. The only surprise about Utah, though, is that they were a little slow to jump on the bandwagon. Looks like Idaho might give Utah their seat? The mountain West has hosted some of the strangest political shifts in the last 10 years or so, and you just can’t tell who’s going to do what if you don’t live there. The lower plains states (Kansas, Oklahoma, Texas) have secession bills in their state legi’s too, but not even Texas is really showing a lot of support for the idea. (Which is fantastic news, because there would have been a war over the oil fields.)
Vermont cracked me up though: they introduced a secession bill, and then even the guy who introduced it voted against it. I guess they wanted everyone else to know where they stood on the matter.
Sunday’s the day the “citizen’s militia musters.” I called some of the Atlanta stations and asked if they’d be interested in buying video, but they’re sending a crew. Oh well, if I don’t have to get up at 4a.m. that’s a Good Thing. It would have sucked royally if I’d gone down there to video a “division” of 4 or 5 people — the TV stations wouldn’t have bought that, and I would have gotten up for nothing. We’re supposed to have a hard freeze Sunday morning, so I plan and hope to be snug in bed then. With any luck, I won’t lie awake thinking about it.
continued…
Thursday, November 01, 2007 9 comments
FAR Future, Episode 12
Friday, November 9, 2012
Election Rejection, What’s Your Secession
I’m shocked. Completely shocked.
NOT.
The 99 goplets left in the House are already calling themselves the “99 Percent’ers,” as if they’re fooling anyone. Then again, it worked for the Bolsheviks (“majority”) in 1918, when they were actually the minority. Not that I think it will work for them now. The Senate is in slightly better (for the wingies) shape, with 32 goplets left there… but they’re still working on a catchy name, I guess.
But if Wyoming and Idaho get their way, the 99 Percent’ers will lose a few members right away. The state legislatures must have had this “Petition for Dissolution” all planned ahead of time, because they were submitting it to Congress first thing yesterday morning. Smarmy SOBs anyway, blithering about how the federal government has abandoned them and irreconcilable differences and all that hoo-hah. It’s not exactly a united front on the Wrong Right — not even all the congresscritters in the affected states are on board, but some of the talk radio goobers are making it sound like the Second Coming. The Dems are similarly conflicted… some think cutting Idaho and Wyoming loose would help the budget (more tax dollars go in than come out), others don’t like the precedent. But it may come down to a matter of energy, like everything else does these days. Wyoming has some resources that the US can’t afford to just let go, and I guess both states have missile silos.
The prez’s press secretary suggests that it’s a ploy to get the feds negotiating for something or another, perhaps more reps in the House or more funding for this or that, but somehow I don’t think that’s the goal here. I really think they want to secede and create their own right-wing mountain paradise.
Rumors are flying everywhere: the prez has deployed the National Guard to seize control of coal mines in Wyoming and are positioning to “defend” the offshore platforms; southern governors are having a powwow to discuss “events of the last few days”… all of which have been officially denied, but you know how that goes, denials are just more fuel on the fire.
So I wrote all that because it provides the context for something that really has me spooked. Our allocations came in for the week, and I stopped on the way to work to top up. Someone had taped a stack of these flyers to the gas pump. The scan will be pretty hard to read, so here’s the text (misspellings left intact):Calling all who LOVE FREEDOM
TO ARMS!
In these troubled times, we mourn the GREVIOUS LOSS of our AMERICAN FREEDOMES, as “our” government has SYSTEMATICALY REMOVED our INALIENABLE RIGHTS and LIBERTIES!
THEREFORE, we call upon ALL GOOD SONS OF THE SOUTH to support the RIGHTOUS WORK of our STATE LEGISLATURE as they debate the MERITS of SUCCESSION from these formerly United States.
On SUNDAY, NOVEMBER 18TH, we ask all ABLE-BODYED MEN to TAKE UP ARMS, meet at the Courthouse by 6 a.m., and MARCH TO ATLANTA to LEND OUR SUPPORT to our TRUE REPRESENATIVES in the Capital!
Please bring sufficient FOOD, WATER, and BEDDING for the march! We shall join with LIKE-MINDED MEN along the way and form the GEORGIA CITIZENS MILITIA to REPEL ALL ATTACKS AGANST OUR SOVERIN GOVERMENT!
If you are unable to march, but wish to LEND YOUR AID, we will have limited TRANSPORTATION on Monday afternoon.
I hope these guys are blowing hot air. Wait: actually, I hope these guys raise an army of about 30 people and half of them “desert” on the march to Atlanta. You’ll know something more as soon as I do.
continued…
Saturday, October 20, 2007 7 comments
FAR Future, Episode 11
Starting with this episode, the “exactly five years from today” setting is going away. The future moves at its own speed, after all.
Tuesday, October 30, 2012
October Surprises
Not much of one, really. There are so many foreclosures in the works that even some bankers (anonymously) expressed relief that the Foreclosure Moratorium Act went through. The same goplets tried the throw the same roadblocks as always, but what do they have to lose? They’ve been toast for several years, and in two weeks they’ll be burnt toast.
That talking heads haven’t even said boo about it, which (seeing that it’s Hallowe’en tomorrow) is hardly sporting. I guess they realize that FMA is wildly popular among just about everyone, and talking about it is only going to be a distraction. Thus, they’re still pounding the fraud angle on gas rationing, and claiming selective enforcement when their own get dinged for it. The thing that got me worried, though, was earlier this week when Shotgun Sam was talking to a caller whining about yet another goplet blowout on the way. “Don’t worry about it,” Sam said. “We’ll win either way.” Then he changed the subject.
What was that about?
I don’t think they could pull off election fraud on the scale it would take to shift more than a couple of districts, but a whole state? Enough states to swing the electoral college? Not likely. I wonder if it has anything to do with those “Dixie Shall Rise” stickers I’ve been seeing on road signs and gas pumps lately.
Are the wingies planning an armed coup? Frankly, the thought prompted me to think about taking a couple weeks of vacation up north after the election. But goobers are everywhere, even if they’re not numerous in most places (Planet Georgia being an unfortunate exception). Mrs. Fetched thinks we’ll be better off staying put, since they won’t feel threatened where they’re the majority. Maybe. She also said that even if I’m right, we don’t know when things go pear-shaped — it could be next month, it could be January, or even later.
It could be some kind of secession movement. Some state reprehensible candidates started pushing this “new majority” theme last week. I spent some time trying to figure out what that meant — nobody’s crazy enough to think the goplets will have more than 100 reps in the House next year, or 20 Senators, let alone get a majority. (Except, of course, the delusional dude they have running for Prez that claims he’ll carry 40 states and 67% of the popular vote.) On Planet Georgia, of course, the legislature has been a majority for 10 or 12 years, so there’s nothing “new” about that. Unless (again) they’re plotting an overthrow, secession is the only thing I can think of that would create some kind of new majority — and I don’t think you can let that many people in on a plot to overthrow the government without someone spilling the beans. Of course, if they do try pulling something like that, Shotgun Sam’s little outburst back in late August will get him a lot of unwanted attention — he could be doing his show from a jail cell (which would be kind of fun to listen to).
Secession would bring its own problems, though, and energy would top the list. I doubt that the government would let, say, the Texas/Louisiana oil fields go without a fight. Then there’s the question of electrical supply; the grids might tie us together more tightly than the politics. Families scattered in different places, Internet links, phone links… what a mess it would be.
Wow, talk about a digression. The Foreclosure Moratorium is supposed to give people some breathing room. Home“owners” have to put their houses up for sale to avoid foreclosure, they avoid bankruptcy, and the bank sets the minimum acceptable price (although the loan-holder supposedly gets to negotiate with the bank about that). Some banks have been re-negotiating loan terms to give the buyer enough breathing room to pay the loan — the bank eats some unrealized income that they wouldn’t have gotten, and get a performing loan on the books — but some have refused to change their procedures & would up holding a ton of crumbling houses they can’t unload. Sure, if the economy ever recovers they’ll have a bunch of valuable acreage, but that in itself is a gamble. I think the FMA will push them to start taking a more reasonable line… and keep those banking execs from getting shot at or worse.
continued…
Tuesday, October 30, 2012
October Surprises
Not much of one, really. There are so many foreclosures in the works that even some bankers (anonymously) expressed relief that the Foreclosure Moratorium Act went through. The same goplets tried the throw the same roadblocks as always, but what do they have to lose? They’ve been toast for several years, and in two weeks they’ll be burnt toast.
That talking heads haven’t even said boo about it, which (seeing that it’s Hallowe’en tomorrow) is hardly sporting. I guess they realize that FMA is wildly popular among just about everyone, and talking about it is only going to be a distraction. Thus, they’re still pounding the fraud angle on gas rationing, and claiming selective enforcement when their own get dinged for it. The thing that got me worried, though, was earlier this week when Shotgun Sam was talking to a caller whining about yet another goplet blowout on the way. “Don’t worry about it,” Sam said. “We’ll win either way.” Then he changed the subject.
What was that about?
I don’t think they could pull off election fraud on the scale it would take to shift more than a couple of districts, but a whole state? Enough states to swing the electoral college? Not likely. I wonder if it has anything to do with those “Dixie Shall Rise” stickers I’ve been seeing on road signs and gas pumps lately.
Are the wingies planning an armed coup? Frankly, the thought prompted me to think about taking a couple weeks of vacation up north after the election. But goobers are everywhere, even if they’re not numerous in most places (Planet Georgia being an unfortunate exception). Mrs. Fetched thinks we’ll be better off staying put, since they won’t feel threatened where they’re the majority. Maybe. She also said that even if I’m right, we don’t know when things go pear-shaped — it could be next month, it could be January, or even later.
It could be some kind of secession movement. Some state reprehensible candidates started pushing this “new majority” theme last week. I spent some time trying to figure out what that meant — nobody’s crazy enough to think the goplets will have more than 100 reps in the House next year, or 20 Senators, let alone get a majority. (Except, of course, the delusional dude they have running for Prez that claims he’ll carry 40 states and 67% of the popular vote.) On Planet Georgia, of course, the legislature has been a majority for 10 or 12 years, so there’s nothing “new” about that. Unless (again) they’re plotting an overthrow, secession is the only thing I can think of that would create some kind of new majority — and I don’t think you can let that many people in on a plot to overthrow the government without someone spilling the beans. Of course, if they do try pulling something like that, Shotgun Sam’s little outburst back in late August will get him a lot of unwanted attention — he could be doing his show from a jail cell (which would be kind of fun to listen to).
Secession would bring its own problems, though, and energy would top the list. I doubt that the government would let, say, the Texas/Louisiana oil fields go without a fight. Then there’s the question of electrical supply; the grids might tie us together more tightly than the politics. Families scattered in different places, Internet links, phone links… what a mess it would be.
Wow, talk about a digression. The Foreclosure Moratorium is supposed to give people some breathing room. Home“owners” have to put their houses up for sale to avoid foreclosure, they avoid bankruptcy, and the bank sets the minimum acceptable price (although the loan-holder supposedly gets to negotiate with the bank about that). Some banks have been re-negotiating loan terms to give the buyer enough breathing room to pay the loan — the bank eats some unrealized income that they wouldn’t have gotten, and get a performing loan on the books — but some have refused to change their procedures & would up holding a ton of crumbling houses they can’t unload. Sure, if the economy ever recovers they’ll have a bunch of valuable acreage, but that in itself is a gamble. I think the FMA will push them to start taking a more reasonable line… and keep those banking execs from getting shot at or worse.
continued…
Thursday, October 04, 2007 5 comments
FAR Future, Episode 10
This was going to be Episode 11, but the way things worked out I ended up swapping them. At least I have a post (mostly) ready for later.
Thursday, October 4, 2012
Great Timing
It was like flipping a switch here. One week, we were blacked out most of the daylight hours. The next… hardly a glitch. Fall weather has arrived at last, and brought some electricity with it! Of course, with summer gone, the windmill is turning, and the solar panels got delivered yesterday too. Oh well, at least I’ll have everything ready for next summer.
Another thing that fall has brought are tourists on bicycles. Last year, I finally setup the cyclist rest stop that I’ve been meaning to do, and it’s really getting used at the moment. Clubs organize group rides, but that usually means a bunch of small groups, where each group comes together from people riding the same pace… so there’s usually no more than 5 or 6 people there at a time, but they come & go through the day. I keep a water dispenser filled up, or try to these days — I left a sign showing where the outside water is if I’m slow, and the cyclists pretty much take care of it when I don’t. They do a good job of keeping the place clean too; I just change out the trash bags.
On my off-days, or days when not much is going on work-wise, I like to sit down there and talk with the people coming through. Most of the rides now are day/weekend things, but some of the really serious bikers are taking October off entirely and doing some long tours. Some of the weekenders camp out, which I don’t have a problem with. Mrs. Fetched was wary at first, but the clubs have put the word out: be nice to these guys. :-) I’ve brought up the idea of putting up a big pergola in the kudzu for shade, and got a bunch of people volunteering materials and labor. I wasn’t sure they were serious enough to actually follow through, but I just got an email from one of the bigger clubs about setting up a work day. I figure we can use it for a roadside produce stand next year, too.
A news article came down my Yahoo feed, about people who are letting their unused gas allotments expire instead of trying to sell them. Some don’t want to go through the hassle of transferring them, some are doing it out of principle (like the folks who buy carbon permits to take them off the market), and some are concerned about fraud. Shotgun Sam has been directed to talk up that last point, from the sound of it, and he might have finally found an anti-rationing topic with legs… either that, or using the faux-outrage that the wingies project so well as a cover, he managed to suggest several ways that his listeners could join the fun and get more fuel:
• Apply for a separate ration card under the wife’s maiden name, tacking an “apartment number” to the home address
• Lie about your occupation (everyone is a carpenter or farmer!)
• If you live near an abandoned house (and there’s a few of those in the burbs), use the name and address of the last occupant and snag the mail when it comes in
[Note to any NFRD enforcers reading this: I transcribed these suggestions from today’s “Shotgun Sam Weatherby’s Truthcast,” heard on AM750 from 2 to 4 on weekday afternoons and available on the Internet as a podcast. I’ve saved an MP3 if they delete or modify this particular episode. Don’t shoot the messenger.]
Now that I went and disinfected my fingers after typing the title of that show… Of the three, I’d say the last is the safest — the biggest risk is that someone gets the mail before you do, but you don’t have an illegal activity associated with your address (aka: plausible deniability). Sam’s (or rather, his patrons’) motives are obvious: game the system to death. Rationing is working, a bit too well for the cons in fact.
Come to think of it, that article left off another possible reason for allotments expiring: with summer over, people aren’t driving so much. Then again, the going rate on the exchange hasn’t dropped much, which makes me wonder whether people are buying and storing gas. Come to think of it, I’m seeing certain names turning up on the buy side quite a bit, buying up stale allotments and even offering to buy expiring (less than 4 days) allotments on the private exchange. I wonder if there’s any provisions for checking into those folks. On the other hand, if they only blow themselves up… like Larry Niven said, think of it as evolution in action.
continued…
Thursday, October 4, 2012
Great Timing
It was like flipping a switch here. One week, we were blacked out most of the daylight hours. The next… hardly a glitch. Fall weather has arrived at last, and brought some electricity with it! Of course, with summer gone, the windmill is turning, and the solar panels got delivered yesterday too. Oh well, at least I’ll have everything ready for next summer.
Another thing that fall has brought are tourists on bicycles. Last year, I finally setup the cyclist rest stop that I’ve been meaning to do, and it’s really getting used at the moment. Clubs organize group rides, but that usually means a bunch of small groups, where each group comes together from people riding the same pace… so there’s usually no more than 5 or 6 people there at a time, but they come & go through the day. I keep a water dispenser filled up, or try to these days — I left a sign showing where the outside water is if I’m slow, and the cyclists pretty much take care of it when I don’t. They do a good job of keeping the place clean too; I just change out the trash bags.
On my off-days, or days when not much is going on work-wise, I like to sit down there and talk with the people coming through. Most of the rides now are day/weekend things, but some of the really serious bikers are taking October off entirely and doing some long tours. Some of the weekenders camp out, which I don’t have a problem with. Mrs. Fetched was wary at first, but the clubs have put the word out: be nice to these guys. :-) I’ve brought up the idea of putting up a big pergola in the kudzu for shade, and got a bunch of people volunteering materials and labor. I wasn’t sure they were serious enough to actually follow through, but I just got an email from one of the bigger clubs about setting up a work day. I figure we can use it for a roadside produce stand next year, too.
A news article came down my Yahoo feed, about people who are letting their unused gas allotments expire instead of trying to sell them. Some don’t want to go through the hassle of transferring them, some are doing it out of principle (like the folks who buy carbon permits to take them off the market), and some are concerned about fraud. Shotgun Sam has been directed to talk up that last point, from the sound of it, and he might have finally found an anti-rationing topic with legs… either that, or using the faux-outrage that the wingies project so well as a cover, he managed to suggest several ways that his listeners could join the fun and get more fuel:
• Apply for a separate ration card under the wife’s maiden name, tacking an “apartment number” to the home address
• Lie about your occupation (everyone is a carpenter or farmer!)
• If you live near an abandoned house (and there’s a few of those in the burbs), use the name and address of the last occupant and snag the mail when it comes in
[Note to any NFRD enforcers reading this: I transcribed these suggestions from today’s “Shotgun Sam Weatherby’s Truthcast,” heard on AM750 from 2 to 4 on weekday afternoons and available on the Internet as a podcast. I’ve saved an MP3 if they delete or modify this particular episode. Don’t shoot the messenger.]
Now that I went and disinfected my fingers after typing the title of that show… Of the three, I’d say the last is the safest — the biggest risk is that someone gets the mail before you do, but you don’t have an illegal activity associated with your address (aka: plausible deniability). Sam’s (or rather, his patrons’) motives are obvious: game the system to death. Rationing is working, a bit too well for the cons in fact.
Come to think of it, that article left off another possible reason for allotments expiring: with summer over, people aren’t driving so much. Then again, the going rate on the exchange hasn’t dropped much, which makes me wonder whether people are buying and storing gas. Come to think of it, I’m seeing certain names turning up on the buy side quite a bit, buying up stale allotments and even offering to buy expiring (less than 4 days) allotments on the private exchange. I wonder if there’s any provisions for checking into those folks. On the other hand, if they only blow themselves up… like Larry Niven said, think of it as evolution in action.
continued…
Thursday, September 27, 2007 13 comments
Peak Oil: the 20% Remedy
We interrupt FAR Future for a moment…
It has often been said that “less is more,” and that may apply especially to the suburban lifestyle that has come to define the American consumer in the last couple of decades. We end up with too much house, live too far away from work, drive vehicles far larger than needed, then we fill that house with too much stuff. We’re dissatisfied with our lives, and think even more stuff is going to make it better.
I read a great book a while back, Your Money or Your Life, which outlines an iterative process for defining (and having) “enough” — and then going beyond that, to becoming truly financially independent (defined as not having to work for a living). It’s actually quite logical: you track your spending by categories, analyze it every month, and then determine whether you’re overspending, underspending, or spending enough in each category. It’s not about depriving yourself of things you really want, it’s about figuring out what you really want instead of just shotgun-buying more stuff.
What does that have to do with peak oil? Well, both peak oil and the book use a bell curve to illustrate their main points. Oil production, whether looking at one well or the world in aggregate, starts out low, climbs to a plateau and peaks (which is, according to the most reliable experts, where we are now), then falls back. The book puts its own bell curve in a graph (PDF, see page 12), with “stuff” on the X-axis and “fulfillment” on the Y-axis. On this graph, the plateau is what defines “enough.”
Beyond lines on a chart, though, the Culture of More is really what is making peak oil a problem. Bigger houses require more energy to heat or cool. Bigger vehicles and longer commutes require more energy to run. Demanding more stuff at cheaper prices is what has sent our manufacturing jobs to Asia, and sacrificed so many local business to Wal-Mart. With all the money pouring into China and India, their economies are booming… and guess what their growing middle class is doing? Yup, looking to America as the model for the good life. So with production leveling off, and demand still climbing, the plateau is rapidly becoming “not enough.” In classic supply and demand terms, demand is about to overtake the supply, and supply is “constrained” (a fancy way of saying it can’t be increased, despite happy-talk from industry groups and the Saudis).
In FAR Future, I’ve been writing about what things could be like in five years, when there’s not enough fuel to go around. I’m making a rather large and optimistic assumption, though: that governments will accept that supplies are dwindling and most people will make the best of the situation. Delusional conservatives insist that “the free market” is capable of optimizing fuel distribution, but they overlook a crucial point: the “market” is reactive, and we need to be proactive to minimize disruptions in what President-in-Fact Cheney calls “our non-negotiable way of life.” Every gallon of gasoline we use now, every cubic foot of natural gas, is that much we won’t have in the future — when it’s gone, it’s gone (over geological time spans, that’s not completely true, but I don’t expect humans to be around in 50 million years).
Thus, the 20% Remedy. My personal theory is that the country as a whole has overshot the “enough” plateau, and that we would be happier and better off if we cut about 20% out of our resource usage. Why 20%? I’ll admit I pulled the number out of my back pocket, but it can represent (among other things) one day of the work week. Some people are using close to the optimum amount of energy for a satisfying life now, others are using more than 20% too much, so think of 20% as an average figure, or a first approximation. You can arrive at your own figure through the same iterative process as Your Money or Your Life advises for optimizing your expenditures.
What does 20% mean in practical terms?
Commuting: Telecommute, or use transit, once a week — or take a two-person carpool twice a week. Indirect benefits come with scale (i.e. enough people embracing 20%): less traffic means you get “there” faster, and reduces the need for road construction (lower taxes, and asphalt is a petroleum product). Replace your vehicle, when the time comes, with one that uses 20% less fuel for the same amount of driving. Better driving habits won’t net you 20% better mileage with the car you have, unless you’re a serious lead-foot, but 5% to 10% is certainly possible. Combine your trips and plan those combined outings to minimize mileage — it can be fun, like solving a puzzle.
Electricity: Hang out the wash instead of using the dryer, every fifth load. Set the thermostat so that the air conditioner runs 20% less often. Skip every fifth shower to reduce hot water usage. The old standby, switching to CF light bulbs (at FAR Manor, we’re replacing the incandescents as they burn out, to delay that trip to the landfill). Watch 20% less TV and spend the new-found free time walking or getting to know your family.
Food: Fertilizer requires fossil fuels to produce, and winter veggies don’t fly themselves here from South America. Try to grow some of your own food — 20% might be difficult, though. Make up the difference by buying local produce — especially organic produce — at farmers markets or subscription co-ops. Get more than you need and preserve the extra for the winter (canning, dehydrating, etc.), so you aren’t as tempted to look for those South American tomatoes. Skip that fifth “dinner out,” or replace it with a picnic. Make Eat4Today a regular web-stop if you don’t already, and lose some weight (again, 20% might be difficult, but again YMMV).
Plastics: Plastics are a petroleum product! Over non-geological time, plastic doesn’t degrade much, so just using less of the stuff (say… about 20% less?) makes sense. Crafty Green Poet recently wrote a great article about how (and why) to reduce use of plastic in general. There was recently a flurry of articles about bottled water causing a huge upswing in plastic bottle waste — if you don’t like your tap water, consider filtering it and reusing those water bottles. Reuse the plastic you bring home as much as possible, then recycle it.
That’s a start, anyway. By using fewer resources, we can get ahead of the oil depletion curve — and when constraints become mandatory instead of voluntary, they won’t affect us as much. Even if you think a technology-fix is just around the corner, you might still find a more satisfying life inside a smaller footprint. I’m sure I ’ve missed a few examples, feel free to provide them in the comments!
It has often been said that “less is more,” and that may apply especially to the suburban lifestyle that has come to define the American consumer in the last couple of decades. We end up with too much house, live too far away from work, drive vehicles far larger than needed, then we fill that house with too much stuff. We’re dissatisfied with our lives, and think even more stuff is going to make it better.
I read a great book a while back, Your Money or Your Life, which outlines an iterative process for defining (and having) “enough” — and then going beyond that, to becoming truly financially independent (defined as not having to work for a living). It’s actually quite logical: you track your spending by categories, analyze it every month, and then determine whether you’re overspending, underspending, or spending enough in each category. It’s not about depriving yourself of things you really want, it’s about figuring out what you really want instead of just shotgun-buying more stuff.
What does that have to do with peak oil? Well, both peak oil and the book use a bell curve to illustrate their main points. Oil production, whether looking at one well or the world in aggregate, starts out low, climbs to a plateau and peaks (which is, according to the most reliable experts, where we are now), then falls back. The book puts its own bell curve in a graph (PDF, see page 12), with “stuff” on the X-axis and “fulfillment” on the Y-axis. On this graph, the plateau is what defines “enough.”
Beyond lines on a chart, though, the Culture of More is really what is making peak oil a problem. Bigger houses require more energy to heat or cool. Bigger vehicles and longer commutes require more energy to run. Demanding more stuff at cheaper prices is what has sent our manufacturing jobs to Asia, and sacrificed so many local business to Wal-Mart. With all the money pouring into China and India, their economies are booming… and guess what their growing middle class is doing? Yup, looking to America as the model for the good life. So with production leveling off, and demand still climbing, the plateau is rapidly becoming “not enough.” In classic supply and demand terms, demand is about to overtake the supply, and supply is “constrained” (a fancy way of saying it can’t be increased, despite happy-talk from industry groups and the Saudis).
In FAR Future, I’ve been writing about what things could be like in five years, when there’s not enough fuel to go around. I’m making a rather large and optimistic assumption, though: that governments will accept that supplies are dwindling and most people will make the best of the situation. Delusional conservatives insist that “the free market” is capable of optimizing fuel distribution, but they overlook a crucial point: the “market” is reactive, and we need to be proactive to minimize disruptions in what President-in-Fact Cheney calls “our non-negotiable way of life.” Every gallon of gasoline we use now, every cubic foot of natural gas, is that much we won’t have in the future — when it’s gone, it’s gone (over geological time spans, that’s not completely true, but I don’t expect humans to be around in 50 million years).
Thus, the 20% Remedy. My personal theory is that the country as a whole has overshot the “enough” plateau, and that we would be happier and better off if we cut about 20% out of our resource usage. Why 20%? I’ll admit I pulled the number out of my back pocket, but it can represent (among other things) one day of the work week. Some people are using close to the optimum amount of energy for a satisfying life now, others are using more than 20% too much, so think of 20% as an average figure, or a first approximation. You can arrive at your own figure through the same iterative process as Your Money or Your Life advises for optimizing your expenditures.
What does 20% mean in practical terms?
Commuting: Telecommute, or use transit, once a week — or take a two-person carpool twice a week. Indirect benefits come with scale (i.e. enough people embracing 20%): less traffic means you get “there” faster, and reduces the need for road construction (lower taxes, and asphalt is a petroleum product). Replace your vehicle, when the time comes, with one that uses 20% less fuel for the same amount of driving. Better driving habits won’t net you 20% better mileage with the car you have, unless you’re a serious lead-foot, but 5% to 10% is certainly possible. Combine your trips and plan those combined outings to minimize mileage — it can be fun, like solving a puzzle.
Electricity: Hang out the wash instead of using the dryer, every fifth load. Set the thermostat so that the air conditioner runs 20% less often. Skip every fifth shower to reduce hot water usage. The old standby, switching to CF light bulbs (at FAR Manor, we’re replacing the incandescents as they burn out, to delay that trip to the landfill). Watch 20% less TV and spend the new-found free time walking or getting to know your family.
Food: Fertilizer requires fossil fuels to produce, and winter veggies don’t fly themselves here from South America. Try to grow some of your own food — 20% might be difficult, though. Make up the difference by buying local produce — especially organic produce — at farmers markets or subscription co-ops. Get more than you need and preserve the extra for the winter (canning, dehydrating, etc.), so you aren’t as tempted to look for those South American tomatoes. Skip that fifth “dinner out,” or replace it with a picnic. Make Eat4Today a regular web-stop if you don’t already, and lose some weight (again, 20% might be difficult, but again YMMV).
Plastics: Plastics are a petroleum product! Over non-geological time, plastic doesn’t degrade much, so just using less of the stuff (say… about 20% less?) makes sense. Crafty Green Poet recently wrote a great article about how (and why) to reduce use of plastic in general. There was recently a flurry of articles about bottled water causing a huge upswing in plastic bottle waste — if you don’t like your tap water, consider filtering it and reusing those water bottles. Reuse the plastic you bring home as much as possible, then recycle it.
That’s a start, anyway. By using fewer resources, we can get ahead of the oil depletion curve — and when constraints become mandatory instead of voluntary, they won’t affect us as much. Even if you think a technology-fix is just around the corner, you might still find a more satisfying life inside a smaller footprint. I’m sure I ’ve missed a few examples, feel free to provide them in the comments!
Wednesday, September 19, 2007 5 comments
FAR Future: Episode 9
Step 1: write. check
Step 2: post. whoops
Wednesday, September 19, 2012
Time Off, and the Barter Economy
Somehow, Labor Day just wasn’t the same now that every Monday is a day off. More people were around, that was the major difference. We’ve done a lot of cooking on the patio this summer to keep the heat outside, like everyone else, so that really wasn’t different either. I know a lot of people are burning cardboard or paper to cook with, which hasn’t helped the air quality any — but when it comes right down to it, wood, charcoal and even propane create fumes too. I can appreciate making use of the trash instead of chucking it in the landfill, too.
Right after Labor Day, we went up to the resort in Helen for a couple of weeks. We got a Tuesday-Friday block for like $150, and it was even the same unit where we have our regular week so we didn’t have to move our stuff. Internet access was pretty much gone this year; they've given up trying to keep wi-fi running and the units aren’t wired for Ethernet. Sure, I could have gone up to the clubhouse and plugged in, but we were too busy doing things together. (You know: walking, swimming, biking…) Helen is worried that their Octoberfest is going to be a bust this year, but the hotels got smart and chartered a daily bus service down to Atlanta (with a stop in Gainesville). People can come up for a day trip or stay a few days.
The other trendy vacation thing I heard about this year is a “Resort @Home” service — a maid, butler, and cook straighten up your house and wait on you hand & foot for one or two weeks. It sounds really nice, but it wouldn’t work at FAR Manor (maybe next year when the chicken houses are shut down) even if we could afford it. I guess the staff lives in a motorhome unless you have extra bedrooms.
We had a quiet vacation overall. The Boy is installing and maintaining backup power systems (with solar or wind), it’s good money and he’s staying busy; Daughter Dearest is doing a little post-grad work before starting her new job in October. We traded last year for a week in July, so she could spend the week with us without missing the start of the school year. There weren’t too many people here this year, so we didn’t have a problem finding pool chairs and we didn’t get caught behind too many people playing mini-golf. Mrs. Fetched enjoyed walking around this year, which is nice. A lot of Mountain Shadows properties are up for sale, cheap; if I thought we wouldn’t need the money for composting toilets or solar panels, I’d grab one. Of course, then I’d have two places that would need composting toilets and solar panels. I guess not.
More people are taking vacations close to home this year. Since rationing allotments are only good for 3 weeks, you can’t save up all year to burn a bunch of gas on a long road trip. Labor Day was the first holiday since rationing went into effect, and it seems that holidays (or rather, the 2 weeks previous) are going to bring a lot of activity to the exchange, and a bid-up on allotment prices — not everyone is ready to give up their long trips, I suppose. You can get stale (4 to 7 days to expiration) allotments for 25 cents/gallon most of the time, but they went to nearly a buck the week before Labor Day. We usually sell our freshest allotments, since they generally bring a higher price, and use up the stale ones. We haven’t needed to yet, but we figure we can pick up some more allotments if we run short. We’ve cleared close to $20 so far on the exchange — nobody’s getting rich on it — so we just leave it in the account just in case we need some extra go-juice. Given that rationed gas is pretty much available, we may make that trip to Florida after all — the other side of that coin is that we can’t get a place for next to nothing now.
Our new plan, though, might be to start trading. Allotments that have less than 4 days to expire can’t be auctioned on the exchange, but you can use the “private exchange” section to transfer allotments and settle the bill off-line. What with milk topping $7 at the supermarket, one of our neighbors bought a goat for milk. She’s a good producer, I guess — they said they have more milk than they know what to do with, so we might start trading allotments for goat milk. They gave us some to try; Mrs. Fetched thinks it tastes a little strange, but she said she could get used to it. (I tried it in college, and liked it quite a bit, and that hasn’t changed.) We’ve done a lot of produce-swapping this summer, too. I traded peppers and herbs for spinach, corn, and eggs. The in-laws have these green beans that can embarrass zucchini to death (I’ve seen it happen), and they had plenty to trade for stuff they wanted, too. The church down the road started offering their yard as an open-air market the last couple of weeks; I think they’ll start earlier next year.
The in-laws are doing quite well with the cattle nowadays, which is giving them a cushion for when they shut down the chicken houses next spring. Beef might be a luxury item, what with so much corn going to ethanol, but this herd eats grass. That pretty much means the only expense is fuel for cutting hay or taking the cows to the auction. The cattle farm was certified organic last year, and that’s helped a lot too. We’ve put a lot of brainwork, and a bit of physical labor, into trying to minimize the amount of fuel needed for the hay. I’m sure we could come up with some better stuff than what we’ve done so far, but every bit helps. Sooner or later, others will catch on and stop using corn for feeding livestock, but for now the advantage is ours. It’s amazing what you can get in trade for a whole cow… someone even offered them an older SUV (yeah, right — who wants a gas hog these days?). Mostly they take cash, unless it’s from a neighbor; they have enough fuel to run the farm and aren’t lacking for anything else.
What’s your “beef” these days?
continued…
Step 2: post. whoops
Wednesday, September 19, 2012
Time Off, and the Barter Economy
Somehow, Labor Day just wasn’t the same now that every Monday is a day off. More people were around, that was the major difference. We’ve done a lot of cooking on the patio this summer to keep the heat outside, like everyone else, so that really wasn’t different either. I know a lot of people are burning cardboard or paper to cook with, which hasn’t helped the air quality any — but when it comes right down to it, wood, charcoal and even propane create fumes too. I can appreciate making use of the trash instead of chucking it in the landfill, too.
Right after Labor Day, we went up to the resort in Helen for a couple of weeks. We got a Tuesday-Friday block for like $150, and it was even the same unit where we have our regular week so we didn’t have to move our stuff. Internet access was pretty much gone this year; they've given up trying to keep wi-fi running and the units aren’t wired for Ethernet. Sure, I could have gone up to the clubhouse and plugged in, but we were too busy doing things together. (You know: walking, swimming, biking…) Helen is worried that their Octoberfest is going to be a bust this year, but the hotels got smart and chartered a daily bus service down to Atlanta (with a stop in Gainesville). People can come up for a day trip or stay a few days.
The other trendy vacation thing I heard about this year is a “Resort @Home” service — a maid, butler, and cook straighten up your house and wait on you hand & foot for one or two weeks. It sounds really nice, but it wouldn’t work at FAR Manor (maybe next year when the chicken houses are shut down) even if we could afford it. I guess the staff lives in a motorhome unless you have extra bedrooms.
We had a quiet vacation overall. The Boy is installing and maintaining backup power systems (with solar or wind), it’s good money and he’s staying busy; Daughter Dearest is doing a little post-grad work before starting her new job in October. We traded last year for a week in July, so she could spend the week with us without missing the start of the school year. There weren’t too many people here this year, so we didn’t have a problem finding pool chairs and we didn’t get caught behind too many people playing mini-golf. Mrs. Fetched enjoyed walking around this year, which is nice. A lot of Mountain Shadows properties are up for sale, cheap; if I thought we wouldn’t need the money for composting toilets or solar panels, I’d grab one. Of course, then I’d have two places that would need composting toilets and solar panels. I guess not.
More people are taking vacations close to home this year. Since rationing allotments are only good for 3 weeks, you can’t save up all year to burn a bunch of gas on a long road trip. Labor Day was the first holiday since rationing went into effect, and it seems that holidays (or rather, the 2 weeks previous) are going to bring a lot of activity to the exchange, and a bid-up on allotment prices — not everyone is ready to give up their long trips, I suppose. You can get stale (4 to 7 days to expiration) allotments for 25 cents/gallon most of the time, but they went to nearly a buck the week before Labor Day. We usually sell our freshest allotments, since they generally bring a higher price, and use up the stale ones. We haven’t needed to yet, but we figure we can pick up some more allotments if we run short. We’ve cleared close to $20 so far on the exchange — nobody’s getting rich on it — so we just leave it in the account just in case we need some extra go-juice. Given that rationed gas is pretty much available, we may make that trip to Florida after all — the other side of that coin is that we can’t get a place for next to nothing now.
Our new plan, though, might be to start trading. Allotments that have less than 4 days to expire can’t be auctioned on the exchange, but you can use the “private exchange” section to transfer allotments and settle the bill off-line. What with milk topping $7 at the supermarket, one of our neighbors bought a goat for milk. She’s a good producer, I guess — they said they have more milk than they know what to do with, so we might start trading allotments for goat milk. They gave us some to try; Mrs. Fetched thinks it tastes a little strange, but she said she could get used to it. (I tried it in college, and liked it quite a bit, and that hasn’t changed.) We’ve done a lot of produce-swapping this summer, too. I traded peppers and herbs for spinach, corn, and eggs. The in-laws have these green beans that can embarrass zucchini to death (I’ve seen it happen), and they had plenty to trade for stuff they wanted, too. The church down the road started offering their yard as an open-air market the last couple of weeks; I think they’ll start earlier next year.
The in-laws are doing quite well with the cattle nowadays, which is giving them a cushion for when they shut down the chicken houses next spring. Beef might be a luxury item, what with so much corn going to ethanol, but this herd eats grass. That pretty much means the only expense is fuel for cutting hay or taking the cows to the auction. The cattle farm was certified organic last year, and that’s helped a lot too. We’ve put a lot of brainwork, and a bit of physical labor, into trying to minimize the amount of fuel needed for the hay. I’m sure we could come up with some better stuff than what we’ve done so far, but every bit helps. Sooner or later, others will catch on and stop using corn for feeding livestock, but for now the advantage is ours. It’s amazing what you can get in trade for a whole cow… someone even offered them an older SUV (yeah, right — who wants a gas hog these days?). Mostly they take cash, unless it’s from a neighbor; they have enough fuel to run the farm and aren’t lacking for anything else.
What’s your “beef” these days?
continued…
Thursday, August 30, 2007 7 comments
FAR Future: Episode 8
I’ve gone out on a limb this time, in several ways. I also see where I’ll have to fill in some backstory sooner or later — but if I waited for it all to happen, it would be 2012 when I got around to posting. :-P
Thursday, August 30, 2012
Crossin’ the Line
Well, I’ve been saying it for a couple of years now, but the FCC finally agreed.
As expected, my Monday “off” was given to the chicken house. They took the last batch out at the beginning of July, and gave us the month off. Some places had 50% (or worse) die-offs when power started getting really flaky, so they figured it was probably best to just sit out July and bring a new batch in a few weeks ago. August is a good time to start a bunch, because they need that heat the first few weeks. By the time they start really producing their own heat, it will have cooled off enough that we won’t need to run fans constantly. The company wants to run a “split” house, where they close off half the house and stagger the flocks — they blow the hot air out of the side with older flock into the side with the younger flock. That knocks off like half the gas needed to keep the young side warm. But Mrs. Fetched has already told them we’re on our last year. Come May, we’re done (and there was MUCH rejoicing).
But I digress. We spent the morning dealing with the chickens, then did some gardening work, then I talked Mrs. Fetched into spending a couple hours at the creek. Just for grins, I grabbed the wind-up radio and took it with us — Shotgun Sam comes on at 3 and it’s been kind of fun to listen in lately. Not because he has anything intelligent to say (quite the contrary), but lately he’s starting to lose touch with his listeners and he gets frustrated pretty quick.
Sam must have figured gas rationing was going to be The Thing to keep the listeners stirred up, angry, and ready to do what his handlers want them to… and it just hasn’t worked that way, at least on Planet Georgia. People talk about their three-day weekends, using Sam’s show to hook up with a carpool, and mostly they couldn’t care less about rationing. I’ve been pleasantly surprised, I’ll have to admit. So this afternoon, Sam was delivering the usual talking points — rationing Bad, free market Good — and took a caller.
“Hey Sam,” the guy said. “I’m an electrician outta Gainesville —”
“Yeah, I can imagine how rationing has killed your business.”
“Actually, it’s helped,” he said. Mrs. Fetched was only half-listening, but she caught that. Neither one of us were expecting to hear that on Shotgun Sam.
Neither was Sam: “Whaaat?” was all he managed to get out.
“Yeah. I know it’s gotta be hurting somewhere, but I’m better off with it now. Before, I couldn’t count on getting enough gas to get through the week — I had to turn down work because I didn’t know if I could get there — but I know I’ll get 20 gallons a week now ’cuz I’m in construction…”
Mrs. Fetched and I gave each other the goggle-eye. “You’re in the wrong line of work,” she said. Sam was trying to take over, but all he could get out was an occasional “Yeah, but—” or “You gotta—” while the guy kept on:
“…on the exchange. And contractors in Athens and Cleveland are staying closer to home, too. I swapped jobs with a guy in Clarkesville, and it’s workin’ out for me. If I got a bigger job, I toss the dirt bike in the truck and ride that home for the nights. Sure, I’d like to have a full tank all the time, and I never thought I’d say it, but this rationing is actually workin’ out for me.” (Yes, I’m paraphrasing. I wasn’t recording the show, but I think I remember what he said pretty well.)
Sam finally got his jaw off the desk, cut the guy off, and started ranting. It was mostly incoherent, or maybe I was laughing so hard I was trying to keep from going under (I like laying in the creek on these 90+ days) and couldn’t concentrate. I caught the gist of it, I think: the shortages are artificial, it’s because we didn’t drill ANWR, it’s because we got out of Iraq (funny how that works, they’re actually getting their production act back together), it’s because we didn’t invade Iran when we had the chance, it’s because goplets are getting cheated in each election (yeah right), it’s the unions’ fault, it’s the immigrants’ fault…. At this point, he got to stammering. It was totally hilarious, right up until he forgot to use code language, and came out and said it: “I guess there’s only one thing left. We need to start takin’ Congress out, one at a time.” He might have managed to pass it off as meaning electorally, except that he added his trademark shotgun-racking sound effect. I think the producers panicked at this point, about a minute too late. He started in again, they faded him out and went to commercials, then some news & sports reporting came on.
Mrs. Fetched cocked her head at me. “Did he say what I just think he said?”
“Yup. He’s in some major hot water.”
I’ve been waiting to hear how things went down before posting, not like I’ve had a lot of time this week for anything else. Anyway, the FCC is fining him $200,000 and giving a wrist-slap fine to all the stations who carried the show. I suppose a couple of sponsors will drop the show (until the publicity dies down, anyway), Sam issued a non-apology yesterday, and the rest of the professional mouths that seem to own the media will moan about how “unfair” it is and urge their listeners to help out “poor Sam” (like he needs it — Scaife, or whoever’s hand is up Sam’s… back… probably calls it a cost of doing business and will pay it out of petty cash).
It’s like I said before, the wingies will try taking by force what they can’t get at the polls. The Dems got a filibuster-proof majority in the Senate in 2008 (and Lordy was it fun to watch Lieberman whine when he got stripped of his appointments), along with the Presidency — then (as if it was needed) a veto-proof majority in both houses in 2010. The goplets are putting up one of the most unelectable candidates ever for President this year, so it doesn’t look like they’ll get any traction with the White House, and their prospects in Congress don’t look much better. Only seven states, Planet Georgia unfortunately being one, still sends a majority of goplets to Washington. People aren’t happy with the energy problems, but they seem to understand the (current) government isn’t to blame for the situation. The Right is starting to lose its grip, on a lot of people and (so it seems) mentally. If they ever had the latter…
Oh well, on to more pleasant thoughts. With the four-day work week underway, I’ll be telecommuting three days out of four — so that’s a little less gas I’ll need to burn each week. I get to spend Mondays in the chicken houses, but only for the mornings, and only for a few more months. I guess I’ll spend afternoons down at the creek, especially if Mrs. Fetched joins me. Nothing like skinny-dipping with your SO to take your mind off politics…
continued…
Thursday, August 30, 2012
Crossin’ the Line
Well, I’ve been saying it for a couple of years now, but the FCC finally agreed.
As expected, my Monday “off” was given to the chicken house. They took the last batch out at the beginning of July, and gave us the month off. Some places had 50% (or worse) die-offs when power started getting really flaky, so they figured it was probably best to just sit out July and bring a new batch in a few weeks ago. August is a good time to start a bunch, because they need that heat the first few weeks. By the time they start really producing their own heat, it will have cooled off enough that we won’t need to run fans constantly. The company wants to run a “split” house, where they close off half the house and stagger the flocks — they blow the hot air out of the side with older flock into the side with the younger flock. That knocks off like half the gas needed to keep the young side warm. But Mrs. Fetched has already told them we’re on our last year. Come May, we’re done (and there was MUCH rejoicing).
But I digress. We spent the morning dealing with the chickens, then did some gardening work, then I talked Mrs. Fetched into spending a couple hours at the creek. Just for grins, I grabbed the wind-up radio and took it with us — Shotgun Sam comes on at 3 and it’s been kind of fun to listen in lately. Not because he has anything intelligent to say (quite the contrary), but lately he’s starting to lose touch with his listeners and he gets frustrated pretty quick.
Sam must have figured gas rationing was going to be The Thing to keep the listeners stirred up, angry, and ready to do what his handlers want them to… and it just hasn’t worked that way, at least on Planet Georgia. People talk about their three-day weekends, using Sam’s show to hook up with a carpool, and mostly they couldn’t care less about rationing. I’ve been pleasantly surprised, I’ll have to admit. So this afternoon, Sam was delivering the usual talking points — rationing Bad, free market Good — and took a caller.
“Hey Sam,” the guy said. “I’m an electrician outta Gainesville —”
“Yeah, I can imagine how rationing has killed your business.”
“Actually, it’s helped,” he said. Mrs. Fetched was only half-listening, but she caught that. Neither one of us were expecting to hear that on Shotgun Sam.
Neither was Sam: “Whaaat?” was all he managed to get out.
“Yeah. I know it’s gotta be hurting somewhere, but I’m better off with it now. Before, I couldn’t count on getting enough gas to get through the week — I had to turn down work because I didn’t know if I could get there — but I know I’ll get 20 gallons a week now ’cuz I’m in construction…”
Mrs. Fetched and I gave each other the goggle-eye. “You’re in the wrong line of work,” she said. Sam was trying to take over, but all he could get out was an occasional “Yeah, but—” or “You gotta—” while the guy kept on:
“…on the exchange. And contractors in Athens and Cleveland are staying closer to home, too. I swapped jobs with a guy in Clarkesville, and it’s workin’ out for me. If I got a bigger job, I toss the dirt bike in the truck and ride that home for the nights. Sure, I’d like to have a full tank all the time, and I never thought I’d say it, but this rationing is actually workin’ out for me.” (Yes, I’m paraphrasing. I wasn’t recording the show, but I think I remember what he said pretty well.)
Sam finally got his jaw off the desk, cut the guy off, and started ranting. It was mostly incoherent, or maybe I was laughing so hard I was trying to keep from going under (I like laying in the creek on these 90+ days) and couldn’t concentrate. I caught the gist of it, I think: the shortages are artificial, it’s because we didn’t drill ANWR, it’s because we got out of Iraq (funny how that works, they’re actually getting their production act back together), it’s because we didn’t invade Iran when we had the chance, it’s because goplets are getting cheated in each election (yeah right), it’s the unions’ fault, it’s the immigrants’ fault…. At this point, he got to stammering. It was totally hilarious, right up until he forgot to use code language, and came out and said it: “I guess there’s only one thing left. We need to start takin’ Congress out, one at a time.” He might have managed to pass it off as meaning electorally, except that he added his trademark shotgun-racking sound effect. I think the producers panicked at this point, about a minute too late. He started in again, they faded him out and went to commercials, then some news & sports reporting came on.
Mrs. Fetched cocked her head at me. “Did he say what I just think he said?”
“Yup. He’s in some major hot water.”
I’ve been waiting to hear how things went down before posting, not like I’ve had a lot of time this week for anything else. Anyway, the FCC is fining him $200,000 and giving a wrist-slap fine to all the stations who carried the show. I suppose a couple of sponsors will drop the show (until the publicity dies down, anyway), Sam issued a non-apology yesterday, and the rest of the professional mouths that seem to own the media will moan about how “unfair” it is and urge their listeners to help out “poor Sam” (like he needs it — Scaife, or whoever’s hand is up Sam’s… back… probably calls it a cost of doing business and will pay it out of petty cash).
It’s like I said before, the wingies will try taking by force what they can’t get at the polls. The Dems got a filibuster-proof majority in the Senate in 2008 (and Lordy was it fun to watch Lieberman whine when he got stripped of his appointments), along with the Presidency — then (as if it was needed) a veto-proof majority in both houses in 2010. The goplets are putting up one of the most unelectable candidates ever for President this year, so it doesn’t look like they’ll get any traction with the White House, and their prospects in Congress don’t look much better. Only seven states, Planet Georgia unfortunately being one, still sends a majority of goplets to Washington. People aren’t happy with the energy problems, but they seem to understand the (current) government isn’t to blame for the situation. The Right is starting to lose its grip, on a lot of people and (so it seems) mentally. If they ever had the latter…
Oh well, on to more pleasant thoughts. With the four-day work week underway, I’ll be telecommuting three days out of four — so that’s a little less gas I’ll need to burn each week. I get to spend Mondays in the chicken houses, but only for the mornings, and only for a few more months. I guess I’ll spend afternoons down at the creek, especially if Mrs. Fetched joins me. Nothing like skinny-dipping with your SO to take your mind off politics…
continued…
Thursday, August 23, 2007 10 comments
FAR Future: Episode 7
Hooray, we got some rain today! First in nearly a month. I hope it’s not this dry five years from now…
Thursday, August 23, 2012
Headin’ Out
I’ve noticed that the power seems to be getting a little more reliable… that is, it’s more likely to be up when it’s scheduled to be up. Maybe people have finally gotten smart and turned off their air conditioners. Most of us, those without serious health problems anyway, are getting used to the heat. I thought it would hit Mrs. Fetched harder than it has — but then again, she was born here and they didn’t have luxuries like air conditioning when she was younger. Au contraire, if anything it’s done her some good. She spends a lot of time outside anyway; if she’s not dealing with the chickens she’s working on our garden through the day. She’s sweated off a lot of weight and seems to have more energy. The weight loss is really helping her knee, and she’s actually doing a little bicycling. Yup, you can change your ways in your 50s…
Or the reason that power is getting more reliable could be that the big desert cities are emptying out — Phoenix, Tucson, Vegas, Reno, etc. Not to mention most of Florida. I can’t imagine what it would be like trying to live in those places without air conditioning during the summer. I saw an article last month where a lot of people in Flagstaff were facing foreclosure, then all the Scottsdale people came up and started buying up property at a premium price. Suddenly, those fortunate souls had their mortgages (and the rest of their bills) paid off, with enough left over to start over elsewhere. That last part was kind of important, because they had to go find somewhere else to live… preferably where they could find work. So there’s been a lot of migration lately.
Naturally, most of the migration this summer has been north. The Great Lakes region has lots of water, while so many places out west are drying up, so things have really been booming up that way. My dad gets calls from real estate agents at least two or three times a week, wanting to know if he wants to sell his lake house. He responses have gotten… shall we say, somewhat sharper as time goes on. There used to be a hydro plant on the river where I grew up; I think they’re talking about re-commissioning it to feed the new businesses coming in. Talk about a godsend… with the auto industry all but dead (idiots couldn’t let go of their freeking high-margin SUVs), new business are coming in, and old businesses are staying plenty busy. The unemployment rate isn’t great, but (for a change) no worse than the national average.
The resorts up north are really cleaning up. One of the Atlanta companies rented a dozen cabins in northern Wisconsin for the entire summer, and moved their executive team en masse to cooler climes. Of course, the employees doing the real work are sweltering in near-sweatshop conditions while the bosses drink beer around a campfire and do what they call “strategic planning.” Translated into English, that probably means “figuring out how to skim a few million more off the top and make the grunts pay for it.” Of course, the only reason we heard about it at all was because some employees were being investigated for swiping not-so-surplus equipment; when the reporters started snooping around, they got an earful. Heck, I don’t blame the employees in that case.
The question came up at the last town hall meeting at work, about rumors that the company was going to move into facilities north of Boston that we used to use, and never were able to get rid of. The answer sounded pretty reasonable: the power situation there wasn’t any better than it was here, but expenses there were higher, so it wouldn’t do any good to move. Another question got a double-take: “Given the fuel situation, do you see any problem getting shipments out of our factory in China? And is the factory having power problems?” I’ve never seen the execs go into a huddle like that in a town hall — ever. They finally admitted that both were likely, but they couldn’t talk further about it (which probably means they haven’t given it much thought). Our sales are good… with so many people telecommuting these days, they almost have to be. But if we can’t get the gadgets built — or shipped to where they need to go — we’re going to have A Problem.
But I digress. Down south, tourism is not doing nearly as well. The Gulf Coast usually gets plenty of traffic, but nobody wants to make reservations now that we’re getting into the ugly half of hurricane season. People are waiting until the last minute, then calling around to find a vacancy for the next week. They usually don’t have too much trouble, and can usually get “special rates” anyway. If you’re employed (so you have money for a vacation), and aren’t tied to a specific place, you can get a lot of vacation for your money along the Gulf this year. The running joke is that it costs more to drive to the Redneck Riviera than it does to stay there for a week. Mom says if I can get down to Florida this winter, we could probably stay in one of the condos for the cost of the utilities. If they don’t get clobbered by a hurricane first. I’m thinking we might have to pass, depending on fuel availability. If I could get 20 gallons all at once, I could put two 5-gallon cans in the trunk and get there without having to worry about a fuel stop — if the fumes didn’t get to us. And we didn’t get waylaid. I’ve heard that Amtrak is planning an Atlanta-Gainesville (FL) schedule, with legs from there to Tampa-Fort Myers and Orlando-Miami. That would probably be the way to go, if they actually do it.
The first of the permanent three-day weekends starts tomorrow. Remember to stay in bed Monday morning — no sense in wasting gas!
continued…
Thursday, August 23, 2012
Headin’ Out
I’ve noticed that the power seems to be getting a little more reliable… that is, it’s more likely to be up when it’s scheduled to be up. Maybe people have finally gotten smart and turned off their air conditioners. Most of us, those without serious health problems anyway, are getting used to the heat. I thought it would hit Mrs. Fetched harder than it has — but then again, she was born here and they didn’t have luxuries like air conditioning when she was younger. Au contraire, if anything it’s done her some good. She spends a lot of time outside anyway; if she’s not dealing with the chickens she’s working on our garden through the day. She’s sweated off a lot of weight and seems to have more energy. The weight loss is really helping her knee, and she’s actually doing a little bicycling. Yup, you can change your ways in your 50s…
Or the reason that power is getting more reliable could be that the big desert cities are emptying out — Phoenix, Tucson, Vegas, Reno, etc. Not to mention most of Florida. I can’t imagine what it would be like trying to live in those places without air conditioning during the summer. I saw an article last month where a lot of people in Flagstaff were facing foreclosure, then all the Scottsdale people came up and started buying up property at a premium price. Suddenly, those fortunate souls had their mortgages (and the rest of their bills) paid off, with enough left over to start over elsewhere. That last part was kind of important, because they had to go find somewhere else to live… preferably where they could find work. So there’s been a lot of migration lately.
Naturally, most of the migration this summer has been north. The Great Lakes region has lots of water, while so many places out west are drying up, so things have really been booming up that way. My dad gets calls from real estate agents at least two or three times a week, wanting to know if he wants to sell his lake house. He responses have gotten… shall we say, somewhat sharper as time goes on. There used to be a hydro plant on the river where I grew up; I think they’re talking about re-commissioning it to feed the new businesses coming in. Talk about a godsend… with the auto industry all but dead (idiots couldn’t let go of their freeking high-margin SUVs), new business are coming in, and old businesses are staying plenty busy. The unemployment rate isn’t great, but (for a change) no worse than the national average.
The resorts up north are really cleaning up. One of the Atlanta companies rented a dozen cabins in northern Wisconsin for the entire summer, and moved their executive team en masse to cooler climes. Of course, the employees doing the real work are sweltering in near-sweatshop conditions while the bosses drink beer around a campfire and do what they call “strategic planning.” Translated into English, that probably means “figuring out how to skim a few million more off the top and make the grunts pay for it.” Of course, the only reason we heard about it at all was because some employees were being investigated for swiping not-so-surplus equipment; when the reporters started snooping around, they got an earful. Heck, I don’t blame the employees in that case.
The question came up at the last town hall meeting at work, about rumors that the company was going to move into facilities north of Boston that we used to use, and never were able to get rid of. The answer sounded pretty reasonable: the power situation there wasn’t any better than it was here, but expenses there were higher, so it wouldn’t do any good to move. Another question got a double-take: “Given the fuel situation, do you see any problem getting shipments out of our factory in China? And is the factory having power problems?” I’ve never seen the execs go into a huddle like that in a town hall — ever. They finally admitted that both were likely, but they couldn’t talk further about it (which probably means they haven’t given it much thought). Our sales are good… with so many people telecommuting these days, they almost have to be. But if we can’t get the gadgets built — or shipped to where they need to go — we’re going to have A Problem.
But I digress. Down south, tourism is not doing nearly as well. The Gulf Coast usually gets plenty of traffic, but nobody wants to make reservations now that we’re getting into the ugly half of hurricane season. People are waiting until the last minute, then calling around to find a vacancy for the next week. They usually don’t have too much trouble, and can usually get “special rates” anyway. If you’re employed (so you have money for a vacation), and aren’t tied to a specific place, you can get a lot of vacation for your money along the Gulf this year. The running joke is that it costs more to drive to the Redneck Riviera than it does to stay there for a week. Mom says if I can get down to Florida this winter, we could probably stay in one of the condos for the cost of the utilities. If they don’t get clobbered by a hurricane first. I’m thinking we might have to pass, depending on fuel availability. If I could get 20 gallons all at once, I could put two 5-gallon cans in the trunk and get there without having to worry about a fuel stop — if the fumes didn’t get to us. And we didn’t get waylaid. I’ve heard that Amtrak is planning an Atlanta-Gainesville (FL) schedule, with legs from there to Tampa-Fort Myers and Orlando-Miami. That would probably be the way to go, if they actually do it.
The first of the permanent three-day weekends starts tomorrow. Remember to stay in bed Monday morning — no sense in wasting gas!
continued…
Thursday, August 16, 2007 3 comments
FAR Future: Episode 6
Believe it or not, I wrote this before Hurricane Dean was a tropical depression!
This will probably be my last post for the week. I’m leaving for NC in the morning, my laptop is staying here, and Mom might have dialup but I probably won’t get on unless she’s watching some TV show I’m not interested in. See you Sunday, God willing.
Thursday, August 16, 2012
Down on the Farm
This is the time of year that gardens are in full swing, and it’s no exception on Planet Georgia. The rain has been mostly good, at least up to now, and Hurricane DeeDee will probably bring us a few inches on Monday. But that means we need to be grabbing anything ripe while the grabbing’s good, and canning what isn’t getting eaten or sold. My mother-in-law is the gardening wizard around here, although her idea of a “small garden” is 2 acres. Sheesh. But we brought in a bunch of corn, several varieties of beans, tomatoes, squash, cucumbers, and zucchini yesterday evening (we wait until dusk to pick because it’s too hot during the day, and those wind-up flashlights give us a little more time to pick).
I hear she had a good day at the farmer’s market; I guess a lot of people were getting what fresh stuff they could with DeeDee on the way. The power situation’s bad enough; I can’t imagine that 4 inches of rain and stiff winds are going to improve matters any. But there’s still a lot to put up, and the county cannery is staying open late through the week (and will be open this weekend) because they expect to be closed Monday and Tuesday. When we start getting Mondays off in a couple of weeks, I’ll be there more often, but this evening was a rarity — the cannery was open and I finished my work stuff early, so I went to help.
Sometimes, my mother-in-law would have the place mostly to herself… not anymore. She had been there all morning, so I jumped on the motorbike — I brought a little cooler with some water and snacks in it for us, so we won’t have to go into town. The place was crowded when I got there, but it doesn’t take much room to park a motorbike and I found a shady spot under the eaves of a shed across the parking lot.
I was there a couple of hours, but never quite figured out the system. It seems easy enough — a long row of tables and steamers down the center, vats and several big boilers along the far wall — but either I still had my head in the battery backup stuff I was writing today, or what I was doing (mostly steppin’ and fetchin’) didn’t let me follow the plot. The wimmin outnumbered us guys by 5 to 1 easily — there were four guys there, and two of them “run” the cannery. The other guy was also steppin’ and fetchin’ (although we took a quick commiseration break once or twice); the women were helping each other with just about every phase of their canning. I think the system runs like this: veggies that need to be peeled go in the steamer; it helps loosen the peels. Then anyone who’s not doing something else helps pull off the peels. If the peeled food is being canned by itself, they dump it into jars (with a teaspoon of salt) and move on… otherwise, it goes to the cooking vats.
The vats are basically big cookpots — and when I say big, I mean like 20 gallons. Someone like Mrs. Fetched’s mom really uses them — that comes to 80 quarts, and that’s a fraction of what she does when she gets going (one year, she brought home 120 boxes, and each box has 12 quart jars in it). So you make your beef stew, or chili, or whatever, in the vats, ladle it into jars, and wheel the jars over to the boilers. The guys running the cannery pretty much run the boilers; I think there’s some liability issues going on there… although Mrs. Fetched’s mom has run the place a couple of times when they couldn’t keep up. If you get this far in the morning, you can take your jars home in the evening — otherwise, you come back for them the next day.
They use an incredible amount of water: rinsing, steaming, cooking, boiling the jars — and the floor has a drainage slot that runs the length of the cannery. They also use a fair amount of gas for heating the water… so naturally, the cost to use the cannery has gone up quite a bit. It’s still cheaper (and better) than the supermarket. I’ve been looking for indications of whether we’ll get winter produce from South America this year, and haven’t found anything. I’m going to assume that no news is bad news.
So I just got home. After spending 4–5 hours in the cannery, the ride home seemed almost cold. I guess I’ll take a French bath, get a drink of something, and go to bed.
continued…
This will probably be my last post for the week. I’m leaving for NC in the morning, my laptop is staying here, and Mom might have dialup but I probably won’t get on unless she’s watching some TV show I’m not interested in. See you Sunday, God willing.
Thursday, August 16, 2012
Down on the Farm
This is the time of year that gardens are in full swing, and it’s no exception on Planet Georgia. The rain has been mostly good, at least up to now, and Hurricane DeeDee will probably bring us a few inches on Monday. But that means we need to be grabbing anything ripe while the grabbing’s good, and canning what isn’t getting eaten or sold. My mother-in-law is the gardening wizard around here, although her idea of a “small garden” is 2 acres. Sheesh. But we brought in a bunch of corn, several varieties of beans, tomatoes, squash, cucumbers, and zucchini yesterday evening (we wait until dusk to pick because it’s too hot during the day, and those wind-up flashlights give us a little more time to pick).
I hear she had a good day at the farmer’s market; I guess a lot of people were getting what fresh stuff they could with DeeDee on the way. The power situation’s bad enough; I can’t imagine that 4 inches of rain and stiff winds are going to improve matters any. But there’s still a lot to put up, and the county cannery is staying open late through the week (and will be open this weekend) because they expect to be closed Monday and Tuesday. When we start getting Mondays off in a couple of weeks, I’ll be there more often, but this evening was a rarity — the cannery was open and I finished my work stuff early, so I went to help.
Sometimes, my mother-in-law would have the place mostly to herself… not anymore. She had been there all morning, so I jumped on the motorbike — I brought a little cooler with some water and snacks in it for us, so we won’t have to go into town. The place was crowded when I got there, but it doesn’t take much room to park a motorbike and I found a shady spot under the eaves of a shed across the parking lot.
I was there a couple of hours, but never quite figured out the system. It seems easy enough — a long row of tables and steamers down the center, vats and several big boilers along the far wall — but either I still had my head in the battery backup stuff I was writing today, or what I was doing (mostly steppin’ and fetchin’) didn’t let me follow the plot. The wimmin outnumbered us guys by 5 to 1 easily — there were four guys there, and two of them “run” the cannery. The other guy was also steppin’ and fetchin’ (although we took a quick commiseration break once or twice); the women were helping each other with just about every phase of their canning. I think the system runs like this: veggies that need to be peeled go in the steamer; it helps loosen the peels. Then anyone who’s not doing something else helps pull off the peels. If the peeled food is being canned by itself, they dump it into jars (with a teaspoon of salt) and move on… otherwise, it goes to the cooking vats.
The vats are basically big cookpots — and when I say big, I mean like 20 gallons. Someone like Mrs. Fetched’s mom really uses them — that comes to 80 quarts, and that’s a fraction of what she does when she gets going (one year, she brought home 120 boxes, and each box has 12 quart jars in it). So you make your beef stew, or chili, or whatever, in the vats, ladle it into jars, and wheel the jars over to the boilers. The guys running the cannery pretty much run the boilers; I think there’s some liability issues going on there… although Mrs. Fetched’s mom has run the place a couple of times when they couldn’t keep up. If you get this far in the morning, you can take your jars home in the evening — otherwise, you come back for them the next day.
They use an incredible amount of water: rinsing, steaming, cooking, boiling the jars — and the floor has a drainage slot that runs the length of the cannery. They also use a fair amount of gas for heating the water… so naturally, the cost to use the cannery has gone up quite a bit. It’s still cheaper (and better) than the supermarket. I’ve been looking for indications of whether we’ll get winter produce from South America this year, and haven’t found anything. I’m going to assume that no news is bad news.
So I just got home. After spending 4–5 hours in the cannery, the ride home seemed almost cold. I guess I’ll take a French bath, get a drink of something, and go to bed.
continued…
Monday, August 13, 2007 7 comments
FAR Future: Episode 5
I’ve been meaning to post two episodes per week — obviously, that didn’t happen last week. I might try doing three this week to make it up.
Monday, August 13, 2012
Card Sharps
That was… interesting. The DoE must have had everything lined up in advance for the rationing announcement. How they kept it under wraps is anyone ’s guess.
But if you didn’t need to get gas today, and you haven’t had the radio on, give yourself a couple extra minutes when you do go to get gas. You’ll have to go inside and show them your driver’s license, they punch in the number and out pops a temporary ration card with 20 gallons on it. That ’s supposed to last you at least through the end of the month, so don’t use it up right away. People who planned on some advance warning, so they could stockpile gas, are gonna be pissed. A couple of co-workers were pretty agitated… I think one of them forgot his wallet, so he wouldn’t have been able to get gas anyway.
I just had to catch some talk radio to hear what the double-digit IQ brigade is being told to think about it. Shotgun Sam had one of the Planet Georgia congresscritters on this evening; I didn’t catch which one. Could have been mine, for all I know or care. Pretty much what I expected, oh boo hoo hoo, free market, boo hoo hoo, warnings about “playing politics” with allocations (right wing-speak for “we want more than our fair share”), boo hoo hoo, etc.
(I was going to delete this part, but it’s sort of related, so…) The spew-bots earn their pay by stirring up their listeners; threats and actual attempts on government officials make the news more often than not these days. Figures: conservatives have always been willing to use force when they can’t trick enough idiots into voting for them (and except for places like Planet Georgia, fewer and fewer are falling for the lies). It probably didn’t help when the NRA got designated a “terrorist-sympathetic” organization last year; wingers hate getting their faces rubbed in reality. To them, terrorists are the brown people with turbans who want to kill us, not the goober looking to settle an imagined score with the gubmint.
But anyway, the NFRD site (the URL is printed on the temporary cards, hard to miss actually) is actually well-done, and they gave it enough bandwidth — it probably helps that half the country is blacked out at any given moment. Check it out, you can fill out a little questionnaire and get a pretty good idea of what your weekly allotment is going to be. Oh, if you haven’t figured it out, when you use your new (not the temporary) ration card the first time, it will dock your purchases from the temporary card and invalidate the temp card. Again, don’t go nuts with your temporary! It turns out that since Mrs. Fetched works on a farm, we’ll get a little extra gas per week. Living in a rural area got us a little more, but having an “office job” took most of it back — I’m supposed to telecommute more, I guess (which suits me just fine). 10 gallons a week doesn’t sound like much, but I use less than 3 for my twice-weekly commute, and I can pick up some groceries on the way home. Mrs. Fetched isn’t thrilled, but two trips for shopping a week won’t use more than another 2-1/2. So if we’re careful, we can get by with half our allocation and make a little extra money selling what’s left over on the exchange. But we’ll probably build up a cushion first, in case we have any problems.
Speaking of the exchange, I saw where eBay is threatening to sue the DoE, saying Yahoo had some kind of inside track to getting the contract to manage the NFRD “exchange” site (think auction with fairly tight controls). Yahoo’s response amounted to “sore loser, nyah nyah,” which I suppose is the only real way to respond in a situation like this. Either eBay can prove something, in which case the bids should be re-negotiated, or they can’t and should just shut up. I wonder how much energy they’ll waste on that.
continued…
Monday, August 13, 2012
Card Sharps
That was… interesting. The DoE must have had everything lined up in advance for the rationing announcement. How they kept it under wraps is anyone ’s guess.
But if you didn’t need to get gas today, and you haven’t had the radio on, give yourself a couple extra minutes when you do go to get gas. You’ll have to go inside and show them your driver’s license, they punch in the number and out pops a temporary ration card with 20 gallons on it. That ’s supposed to last you at least through the end of the month, so don’t use it up right away. People who planned on some advance warning, so they could stockpile gas, are gonna be pissed. A couple of co-workers were pretty agitated… I think one of them forgot his wallet, so he wouldn’t have been able to get gas anyway.
I just had to catch some talk radio to hear what the double-digit IQ brigade is being told to think about it. Shotgun Sam had one of the Planet Georgia congresscritters on this evening; I didn’t catch which one. Could have been mine, for all I know or care. Pretty much what I expected, oh boo hoo hoo, free market, boo hoo hoo, warnings about “playing politics” with allocations (right wing-speak for “we want more than our fair share”), boo hoo hoo, etc.
(I was going to delete this part, but it’s sort of related, so…) The spew-bots earn their pay by stirring up their listeners; threats and actual attempts on government officials make the news more often than not these days. Figures: conservatives have always been willing to use force when they can’t trick enough idiots into voting for them (and except for places like Planet Georgia, fewer and fewer are falling for the lies). It probably didn’t help when the NRA got designated a “terrorist-sympathetic” organization last year; wingers hate getting their faces rubbed in reality. To them, terrorists are the brown people with turbans who want to kill us, not the goober looking to settle an imagined score with the gubmint.
But anyway, the NFRD site (the URL is printed on the temporary cards, hard to miss actually) is actually well-done, and they gave it enough bandwidth — it probably helps that half the country is blacked out at any given moment. Check it out, you can fill out a little questionnaire and get a pretty good idea of what your weekly allotment is going to be. Oh, if you haven’t figured it out, when you use your new (not the temporary) ration card the first time, it will dock your purchases from the temporary card and invalidate the temp card. Again, don’t go nuts with your temporary! It turns out that since Mrs. Fetched works on a farm, we’ll get a little extra gas per week. Living in a rural area got us a little more, but having an “office job” took most of it back — I’m supposed to telecommute more, I guess (which suits me just fine). 10 gallons a week doesn’t sound like much, but I use less than 3 for my twice-weekly commute, and I can pick up some groceries on the way home. Mrs. Fetched isn’t thrilled, but two trips for shopping a week won’t use more than another 2-1/2. So if we’re careful, we can get by with half our allocation and make a little extra money selling what’s left over on the exchange. But we’ll probably build up a cushion first, in case we have any problems.
Speaking of the exchange, I saw where eBay is threatening to sue the DoE, saying Yahoo had some kind of inside track to getting the contract to manage the NFRD “exchange” site (think auction with fairly tight controls). Yahoo’s response amounted to “sore loser, nyah nyah,” which I suppose is the only real way to respond in a situation like this. Either eBay can prove something, in which case the bids should be re-negotiated, or they can’t and should just shut up. I wonder how much energy they’ll waste on that.
continued…
Saturday, August 04, 2007 8 comments
FAR Future, Episode 4
Family Man brought up something I’ve been thinking about for a while: adding links so new readers can start with Episode 1 and just click to the next one in line. I’ll be doing something about that shortly. Too bad I didn’t have the extra day now…
Saturday, August 4, 2012
Smart Move
The four-day, 36-hour work week was a smart move, and the Department of Labor really got smart and slipped in the announcement at the end of a Friday to make sure the right-wing spew-bots jumped on it. That’s called managing the press. All of a sudden, all the spew-bot callers have stopped screaming about rationing and started chatting about what they’re going to do with a three-day weekend. The only people I hear complaining are hourly workers losing 10% of their paid time, and they usually stop complaining as soon as they realize they’ll be getting overtime if they have to work more than 36 hours. And Shotgun Sam was sounding a little frustrated last night; nobody wanted to talk about the latest manufactured scandal.
They’re giving businesses three weeks to make the adjustments — starting August 24, the three-day weekend begins and everyone gets Mondays off. All the Monday jokes will have to be changed to Tuesday jokes, but other than that? Most of the minor holidays like President’s Day don’t become Tuesday holidays, probably to placate some business owners. It’ll save some energy, for sure — if all the offices are dark all day Monday, maybe people will have enough electricity to run their A/C once a week.
I’m not sure how it’s going to affect me personally, yet. Monday has been one of my physical-presence days, so if the boss doesn’t have to have me in the office two days out of four, I’ll be down to one commute day a week. Otherwise, I don’t see a lot of change for me. The battery rig I’ve got set up here takes care of my telecommuting power needs, and the solar panels that I have on order (if they ever show up) will keep it charged up — so that’s eventually going to be off the grid anyway. I can see one downside: Mrs. Fetched is already planning my Mondays for me, starting with the chicken houses first thing.
continued…
Saturday, August 4, 2012
Smart Move
The four-day, 36-hour work week was a smart move, and the Department of Labor really got smart and slipped in the announcement at the end of a Friday to make sure the right-wing spew-bots jumped on it. That’s called managing the press. All of a sudden, all the spew-bot callers have stopped screaming about rationing and started chatting about what they’re going to do with a three-day weekend. The only people I hear complaining are hourly workers losing 10% of their paid time, and they usually stop complaining as soon as they realize they’ll be getting overtime if they have to work more than 36 hours. And Shotgun Sam was sounding a little frustrated last night; nobody wanted to talk about the latest manufactured scandal.
They’re giving businesses three weeks to make the adjustments — starting August 24, the three-day weekend begins and everyone gets Mondays off. All the Monday jokes will have to be changed to Tuesday jokes, but other than that? Most of the minor holidays like President’s Day don’t become Tuesday holidays, probably to placate some business owners. It’ll save some energy, for sure — if all the offices are dark all day Monday, maybe people will have enough electricity to run their A/C once a week.
I’m not sure how it’s going to affect me personally, yet. Monday has been one of my physical-presence days, so if the boss doesn’t have to have me in the office two days out of four, I’ll be down to one commute day a week. Otherwise, I don’t see a lot of change for me. The battery rig I’ve got set up here takes care of my telecommuting power needs, and the solar panels that I have on order (if they ever show up) will keep it charged up — so that’s eventually going to be off the grid anyway. I can see one downside: Mrs. Fetched is already planning my Mondays for me, starting with the chicken houses first thing.
continued…
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