Preparedness for when

Charis

pineapple wrote: »

I sometimes wonder about this but also what would happen if I had an accident at home. In fact it's not me I worry about but the dog - who could end up being home alone. She's not a barker and the neighbours might just think I had taken off somewhere.
This actually did happen to someone I worked with. In fact she died at home and was found over a week later. No one dared ask about the dog.

They are the exact thoughts I've had since living alone. (except I don't have a dog). I realised that if I died it would not be my problem IYKWIM. However what if I had a fall and broke a leg or was concussed or I simply choked on a ham sandwich - I'd be unable to deal with it. :eek: I'm too young for one of those pendant alarms and in any case you have to have at least two key holders who can investigate within fifteen minutes, before you can even enrol with them, they don't come out to you, they send someone else.

My problem is temporarily resolved as my daughter will be living here very soon, following the breakup of a long relationship. It will be a while before she is independent again and I will be glad of her company. I do smile when people wax lyrical about the quiet in the countryside. It's OK till you wake and realise that the only sound you can hear is your own tinnitus. _pale_ If you have always had urban sounds and street lights around you and other people in the house, being totally alone for the first time can be an unnerving experience. I'm loathe to move as it's a lovely home and setting, I certainly couldn't go back to an urban setting, I live a different rhythm now.

jk0

jk0 wrote: »

Most of my bulbs here at home are fluorescent/ compact fluorescents for the energy savings.

I am toying with the idea of buying LED bulbs now, but am worried about spending so much (£12 for some of them) then finding the light unacceptable in some way, and thus wasting the cash.

Can anyone reassure me?

I received a couple of LED bulbs from Amazon yesterday, and put one in the downstairs loo:

http://www.amazon.co.uk/gp/product/B00H4AC6SI/ref=oh_details_o01_s00_i00?ie=UTF8&psc=1

Amazingly, although supposed to be equivalent to 40W, it is brighter than the 60W incandescent that used to be there.

Thanks for reassuring me folks.

mardatha

Re rubbish - you'd bury it at night in holes dug very quietly, or if you have no garden then take it a hundred yards down the street and dump it. And you don't want to be carrying it in rustly plastic bags either lol

GreyQueen

mardatha wrote: »

Re rubbish - you'd bury it at night in holes dug very quietly, or if you have no garden then take it a hundred yards down the street and dump it. And you don't want to be carrying it in rustly plastic bags either lol

Oooh, you little fly-tipper, you; I'm gunna tell your local council on yer.....:rotfl:

Jesting aside (and placcy bags would be too valuable to waste if there weren't any more coming along) it's sound good sense. But if you had a fire, you'd have less waste anyway, and you'd want to hold a few cans back as essential prepping supplies, to turn into stoves, billy cans and I recall from Hovel in the Hills that they mended rusted-out sills on their van with them.

Just tweaked something in my living room to make it look even more innocuous and boring than it really is; amazing where you hide cans of food if you're determined.

lovefullshelves

Just a thought.
As you're saying, people can see whats growing on a farm etc. Thats why community is so important and its something thats mostly been lost.
Farming and growing without fuel takes alot of manpower. Alot. The huge farms around me wouldn't be able to use their massive machines to harvest without fuel. The acres of monocrops would rot in the fields.
I believe its important that everyone learns to grow something. To save seeds. And mostly to know their community.
I couldn't farm this 10 acres without fuel. We already use 1/3 less fuel than my dad did. Its all hard, repetitive handwork.
My SHTF plan includes knowing that I'll have certain friends and family turn up who will need beds and food. And in return they would need to farm too.
So far the count is 10 extra adults. I don't believe we'll survive if we close ourselves away. What if it isn't a short emergency? What if we end up with a new normal? Pre-industrial, pre oil age? Can we prep for that?
Just a thought x

GreyQueen

:T Here, here, lovesfullshelves.

My father's rural family have followed a fairly typical trajectory in the twentieth century; from small uneconomic farms which were wiped out in the depression and are long-since part of much larger concerns, to smallholders and agricultural labourers. My 'people' inc my parents, left farmwork and village life in the 1960s for town life and factory and office work. With most of us not owning our own homes or farms, our family's economic toe-hold in villages where we'd dwelt for centuries as a matter of record, and probably for centuries prior to reliable record-keeping, was precarious. Our oldsters are mostly in council homes and these will revert to the pool when they die; no one under 40 in my entire family lives in the villages, we're all in market towns or cities, for the work.

The reasons for the drift into town life was the absence of employment on the farms due to mechanisation. If this reversed, even partially, you could see the reverse trend. The enticement of bed-and-board in return for your labour would be very real.

In terms of EROEI, I can feed myself off my 300 sq m allotment plot, thanks to potatoes, and manage to do so in return for a few labour-hours a week. If it was a garden rather than a mile and half away, I'd be having a few hens on there for eggs and the very occasional chicken dinner of an old hen permantantly off-lay.

What I wouldn't be able to do with that square-footage is create a surplus to barter or sell, or textile crops, or graze animals, so it would be a bare subsistence.

Can I be nosy and ask about the reduced fuel consumption? Is this due to changes in the way you farm, a deliberate policy of using less or driven by sheer necessity to keep your costs down?

I once saw an ariel photograph in a newspaper, think it was of somewhere in east anglia, and it outlined one very large rectangular field and pointed out that this one field used to contain three whole farms.

That blew me away, frankly, as a way of showing how farms have got super-sized compared to the old days.

[Deleted User]

Oh yes you can, learn,learn,learn as many old style skills as it's possible to find courses for, learn shepherding which will give you meat, milk, which will lead to cheese, shearing and processing wool which will lead to spinning, weaving, felting and learn to make clothes, knit, rugs, blankets, learn to cure sheepskins which will give you footware, warm clothing, floor coverings and bed coverings let alone hats, gloves, scarves etc to keep you warm. Learn how to waterproof leather with tallow and beeswax (keep bees for that and the honey they make) and you'll stay dry during the autumn/winter when you need to be out and about dealing in the wet. Learn to grow, harvest and work wood, it will give you boats(even dug outs will let you catch fish) sheltering homes, furniture, bowls and spoons for cooking and eating, firewood, defensive pallisaides if you need them etc.etc. Learn what to grow and how to grow, tend and harvest the crops and then how to keep it fresh and safe through the fallow season. Learn self defense and how to make and use what weapons you feel able to wield, learn as much medical knowledge as you are able and learn herbs and herbal cures and old fashioned ways of coping with traumas (honey and cobwebs were used on deep cuts in the past as the honey is a healing agent and the cobwebs trap blood platelets and help form a scab), so much you can do, do it now while there are still people who have the knowledge to pass on and that's only the tip of the tip of the iceberg, I'm sure others will add many items to the 'to learn' list.

Possession

Interesting water filter invention: http://www.ted.com/talks/michael_pritchard_invents_a_water_filter?utm_campaign=&awesm=on.ted.com_d0BAL&utm_content=awesm-publisher&utm_source=direct-on.ted.com&utm_medium=on.ted.com-facebook-share

charlies-aunt

Sounds like an excellent idea for a new thread Mrs L-W!


Maybe it would be good to add learn to prepare animals caught for food? I learnt to hang, skin, pluck, gut and joint up a variety of game whilst I grew up in the country . . . . I still help out friends who acquire rabbits, pheasants etc from local shoots - its not a difficult job once you acquire the knack

pineapple

Sorry if this has been posted but imo giving a government department the power to take money direct out of your bank account is the thin end of the wedge
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/finance/personalfinance/10818323/Taxman-has-power-to-raid-your-bank-accounts.html
Anyone who has been on the wrong end of an error from a government department has to worry about this - plus it sets a precedent. Slippery slopes and all that.:(