Preparedness for when

greenbee

TheBanker wrote: »

I remember those protests. Fun days as I worked in a supermarket at the time. I remember rumours starting that a bread delivery was due. We tried to ration to one loaf each, but I remember having to help the security guard physically separate two women who were fighting in the aisle over the last loaf. There was still plenty of flour and other food in the store - I've never understood why bad weather and the like leads to mass panic buying of bread and milk!

as someone who doesn't really eat bread or milk I really found it hard to believe that people think they can't survive a couple of days without it... There are lots of other things to eat!

Caterina wrote: »

Just ordered the log splitter you suggested, thank you! We have a lorryful of logs to do before winter comes and now after one year in the garden they will be well seasoned, lots of nice fires in the winter!

And splitting them will keep you warm I need to build a second log store as my shed and log store are mostly full of chopped up floorboards, the back of the garden is full of apple logs for this year and pine for next, and I need space for a delivery of proper logs... I also keep an old plastic dustbin full of smokeless for when it is really cold and I want to keeo the stove going all night...

Caterina

greenbee wrote: »

as someone who doesn't really eat bread or milk I really found it hard to believe that people think they can't survive a couple of days without it... There are lots of other things to eat!...

I feel the same. Whole grains keep much better and it is always possible to make milk out of soya beans or almonds or at push even oats and rice, although it is not as nutritious as the other alternatives. But then, different people have different tastes. I am reminded, though, that we need to fill up the tank of our car. We hardly use it at all so we let it run down to the last "line".

greenbee wrote: »

And splitting them will keep you warm I need to build a second log store as my shed and log store are mostly full of chopped up floorboards, the back of the garden is full of apple logs for this year and pine for next, and I need space for a delivery of proper logs... I also keep an old plastic dustbin full of smokeless for when it is really cold and I want to keeo the stove going all night...

I am forever scavenging wood out of skips and my front and back garden are full of bits and pieces, a shed full, a large (and I mean HUGE! 5 ft or so tall) bag full of fruit tree choppings that a friend of mine gave me, for kindling in our front room, the back of our house practically covered in stacks of logs. We could not use them last year as they were still fresh, but this year they should be perfect, hopefully!

I might not be the one splitting them, I do the stocking cooking and preserving, so I might delegate the splitting to the rest of the family, the LAZY twins, or the LONG SUFFERING DH :rotfl::rotfl::rotfl:

prepareathome

Could some one let me have links to log splitters - cannot see them on here so guess they were sent privately as its something I to want to buy in, hoping in next few months to remove horrible gas fire from living room and get fire place and chimney back into working order although I doubt it will be used this year unless things get boing. Only ever used my trusty axe for things like that up till now. Thanks

Caterina

Prepareathome I ordered mine from https://www.logmatic.co.uk

Only just ordered it so cannot comment on performance, but it looks good on the youtube videos, and Greenbee recommended!

I am hoping to add a wood burning stove to the kitchen so we would have one in living room and one (hopefully more powerful, with cooking plate) in the kitchen, enough to warm up the fabric of the house in all but the worst winters.

GreyQueen

I've been having fun in the Wilko sale of half-price camping stuff and now have a new toy - a hexamine stove. Hey, for £1.49 how could I resist.:o It only has 4 tablets with it so I shall be shopping around for the best price on those. Anyone got any top tips, pls?

I also got waterproof bags, a big one to line my ruckie and some smaller pouches for other things.

I thought of a little tip which I picked up in the Outer Hebrides from a tourng cyclist, in case it might be of relevence to someone reading; you can get that clear plastic sticky film from stationers and use it to cover paper maps. The touring cyclists had the maps of the islands cut out from the sea (to save space) and covered like this. It has the drop on lamination for some purposes as it's bendy. Very advantageous in rainy parts of the world and as enamoured as I am of the Outer Hebs, they were plenty moist.

On the plus side, my skin had never looked more glowing and radiant than after a day out in a Force 9 and plenty of fresh water rinses.

vanoonoo

with the hex stove make sure you use it with something heatproof underneath it that can catch any drips from the fuel tabs - we didnt realise they would break down as much as they did and ended up with a hole in our groundsheet - doh! ald! occasionally do the hex tabs in their camping offers so have a rummage next time you visit one as they may have some lurking in the bargain cage

GreyQueen

Thanks for that, hun. I'll keep my eyes peeled. I intend to have a massive playabout with various forms of outdoor cookery and firemaking on my lottie this autumn when the bonfire season is allowed so would probably have it on a patio slab but it's good to be aware of all the angles. I could have it on a thick alu pie dish on top of an enamel plate; d'you think that would be a viable option if camping out? We had a bit of a play with hexa among many other things on my bushcraft course last autumn.

One of my aims is to have various alternate methods of cooking and water heating, even if it means squatting on the concrete outside my flat, and to be a dab hand at them before I need to deploy them in earnest. Well, I may never need some of my preps but I want to be familiar with them, not just be a kit hoarder, IYSWIM.

Gosh, I can well remember the "fun" we had in the 1970s trying to keep warm and fed in the powercuts...........Mum still won't part with her parafin stove from back in those days. I think some people who are below middle-aged don't have an awareness of how things can go wrong in these respects.

Evie74_2

GQ - I can remember my mum cooking on a camping gas stove in the 70s, and lots of candlelight. I don't remember being cold, but as I was a tiny tot I was probably tucked up in bed before it got too chilly.

Given that we have had two power cuts already today (it's been an emerging pattern this week - paranoia is starting to kick in ) I am sorely tempted to invest in a camping stove myself. We do have a woodburner but it's not ideal for summer cookery (although I guess the BBQ would do as an alternative).
Since DH loathes camping (silly man) I would have to slip it into the house/shed unnoticed - otherwise he might starting panicking that I had booked a camping holiday :rotfl:

Evie xx

GreyQueen

Two in one day? Gosh, do you think the heat is upsetting something in the National Grid? I recall reading that the rolling brownouts which afflicted California were attributed at least in part to the excessive demand for leccy to run air-con.

I was in a few big stores today and they were nicely chilly from the air-con, so I expect that a lot of juice is being sucked down. Plus all us OS types whose minds see a sunny day and think about bunging a few washloads thru.

Until the late 1980s, the only heat in my family home was one coal fire in the living room, so not having the leccy on wouldn't have impacted on the domestic heat, back in the day. Then we gradually went to first a gas fire then in the noughties full gas c.h.

Powercuts which affect Shoebox Towers are a darned nuisance as they upset the leccy controllers on the humungous industrial gas boilers which provide our heating and hot water. They have to be re-set after every outage. The plus side is that in the city centre we don't get powercuts very often and they're fixed PDQ (longest I've ever known here was 40 mins) as the traffic lights go down too and that caused gridlock.

Ooofff, I wanna icecream but too hot and bothered to go to the shop for one.:p:(;)

Evie74_2

I suppose it could be leccy-guzzling air conditioners and washing machines...! I live in a smallish rural market town so not exactly out in the sticks but not a seething metropolis either. I may be forced to go on a nosey wander soon and see if I can see any obvious roadworks etc which might account for the power blips - they only last about 5 mins a time at the moment. We have had much longer power outages (24 hours plus) when there has been major flooding nearby but thankfully that is rare.

Of course it could be the start of the Zombie Apocalypse...!

Evie xx