Category Archives: survivalist

The vaccine controversy tied with the illegal controversy

Posted by thetinfoilhatsociety in Economy, peak oil, survivalist, the dreaded politics

Warning:  if you think that all illegal immigrants should get amnesty, if you think the Dream Act is a good idea, if the California version of the Dream Act made you stand up and cheer, you will not like this post.  At all.

Disclosure:  I am the grand child of immigrants.  Legal ones.  My husband is the child and the grand child of immigrants.  Again, legal ones.  So I see this issue from a little closer up than perhaps the average person.

I recently got into a discussion that turned heated on a forum devoted to fiber preparation, of all things.  What was the heated discussion about?  Pertussis.  Whooping cough, for those of you without a medical background.  Why was the discussion so heated?  Because I dared to connect the present epidemic of pertussis with the presence of illegals.

Here’s my take on this, or rather these, intertwined issues.  When I was a child, there were perhaps 20 total vaccines one was required to have to be fully vaccinated.  Today, there are as many as 80 (!).  In addition, when I was a child vaccinations were against true killers:  pertussis, diptheria, tetanus, mumps, measles, rubella, polio.  Today, it’s recommended that children get vaccinations against chickenpox, influenza (yearly!), pneumonia, hepatitis B, haemophilus influenza type B (hIB), genital warts (if you’re a girl) and more.  Yes, some of these are killers as well – but honestly, how many children have you heard of that have died from chickenpox??   And does a newborn infant REALLY need to be vaccinated against a sexually transmitted disease like hepatitis B?

I personally think that this increase in the number of vaccines as well as the increase in the variety of vaccines, along with the increase in sedentary activities for children, is what is contributing to the increase in asthma (and hence, influenza and pneumonia related illness and death) in children.  I am not alone in my thinking on this, but it is definitely not in the official party line to state such heresy…ah well.

All of my children were vaccinated.  Before they went to school.  But they were breastfed for a fairly extended period of time, and they were at home with me all day, and they just didn’t have very much exposure to other children until they were close to school age.  So with the exception of my oldest son, who WAS vaccinated on schedule and was chronically sick as well – which might have been pure coincidence – my other two were not started on vaccines until they were no longer getting passive immunity from my milk.  Let me state unequivocally, I AM an advocate of vaccination.  I am just not in favor of blindly vaccinating against things that really aren’t really a risk to an infant, like hepatitis B.  Or chickenpox.

So how is this related to illegal aliens?  Well, it’s pretty easy, actually.   I live in a country that used to be one of the world leaders in free access to vaccinations for the public as a social contract with its citizens.  That has changed pretty dramatically since my children were young; now the public health departments are cutting services that used to be considered absolutely vital, including vaccine programs.   This particular issue is compounded and confounded by the hoopla over the last 30 years linking the preservatives used in vaccines with autism – a link that apparently has since been proven false.  Since my mother was a special Ed teacher, and she is the one who first told me about the possible link nearly 30 years ago, I am not sure this is a closed issue, although I am definitely in the camp that calls Whatley’s study unethical and bad science.

But back to how they are related.  Well, in America we had a strong vaccine program for decades.  Most of our population was vaccinated, and most of our population, no matter what their income level, got their children vaccinated as well.  It was just what we did.  As a result, these childhood diseases were nearly wiped out by the time my children were born in the 80′s.  In 1983, the year my oldest was born, there were 2,463 cases nationwide.  I was unable to ascertain how many deaths there were out of that population; based on this website that contains Swedish data from the same year, it would be less than 1% and of those, 90% are non – vaccine preventable.

Then came the rise of corporatocracy, the rise of consumer culture, of debt culture, and of cuts to public services as they were privatized.  And with the loss of faith in the government to protect its citizens came the loss of faith that vaccinating was in the best interests of the average citizen rather than the best interests of the shareholders of pharmaceutical companies who made the vaccines.  And along with the rise of corporate greed, research corruption due to that greed, and a massive increase in factory farms as opposed to small farms came a flood of illegal immigrants both looking for an improvement in their living standards and willing to work long hours for sharecropper wages in the fields of those factory farms.

These illegal immigrants came from countries that have never had a strong vaccine tradition; they came carrying disease that, had our children been vaccinated against, would not have posed a public health threat.  However, our percentage of children vaccinated has been steadily dropping; the illegals bring their children who do not get vaccinated because the parents are afraid that they will end up being deported if they try to access something like a vaccination program; they put their kids into public school which exposes all of the unvaccinated children to these diseases.  This makes for a deadly combination, and makes for much pain and misery all around.  The ‘herd theory’ of vaccination is a good one, and it works – IF at least 99% of the population is vaccinated, the 1% who don’t are not terribly likely to be in danger.  But add in the fact that nearly 3% of Arizona’s children are not vaccinated based on religious or philosophical grounds, and those who are may not be up to date, and the fact that for some diseases like pertussis you may catch it even if you have been vaccinated – poor nutritional status and stress can contribute greatly to your immunity – and you have the makings of an epidemic.

Arizona actually DID have an epidemic of pertussis in 2005; California in 2010, and both were explicitly connected with the Hispanic population.  Here is a link to the California report on the 2010 outbreak; what I think you will see is that poverty plays a role in illness, and that although not stated, the high numbers of illegal Hispanic immigrants plays a large role in this problem in this country.

This last is really not politically correct, but it is true.  Sugar coating it doesn’t make it go away.  We’re getting poorer, and we’re getting more vulnerable to diseases that were nearly wiped out just 20 years ago.  This can only escalate over time.  And now that it’s back around, it’s not going to go away; we let that horse out of the barn and it’s not going back in.

 

Damned javelina!

Posted by thetinfoilhatsociety in survivalist

They’ve apparently figured out a way to get into the back yard – when I got up this morning to water they have eaten every squash and plant there was.  They devastated my lima bean patch.  They trampled my swiss chard – apparently they don’t like it much.

I’m telling you, electric fence and a silencer for my .22 is in the works…

Uh Oh. I did it now.

Posted by thetinfoilhatsociety in survivalist, the dreaded politics, work

I received two job offers today, both of which were from jobs I applied for before I went out on stress related illness. So, after seeing the assigned physician yesterday and my personal doc today, I have officially submitted my two weeks’ notice to my present employer.

Scary, scary, scary. I’m giving up job security (Ha!) and benefits in exchange for sanity and flexibility. No guarantees of work from either job though; they’re both pool/on call which scares the bejezuz out of me. I know, realistically, I’ll work probably as much as I can handle, especially during the cold months, but still. Scareeee.

Now I have to go get my personal stuff from my locker, before they cut off the lock and take it. I’m not sure how that works when you go out on disability and then give notice that you’re quitting on the day you’re due back. Probably not in the best taste, but it can’t be helped that my appointments fell the way they did. I’m just glad I got my appointments, because doctors and the phrase ‘booked for a long way out’ go hand in hand.

I learned a lot in my term of employment there, about the health care system, people, and myself. Mostly myself, I think. Which may be the most important information I will ever garner, and is something a lot of people die without ever gaining. Often, in fact, they die because they don’t learn it.  I feel lucky in a way, to have had this massive breakdown, because it forced me to look at my lifestyle, my spirituality, my marriage, my goals, my career, and so many facets of each in a way that simply would not have been possible had I not run right up to the edge of that cliff and nearly fallen off.  Perhaps, in a way, I did fall off that cliff.  The Gods, however, had other plans for me and I fell onto a ledge about ten feet down.   “What’s wrong with you is no little thing” as my DH says…but what’s right with me is no little thing either, and the knowledge of that is what I really needed.

I am just another casualty of our broken health care system.  Thankfully there was a safety net for me; so very many people are not so lucky.  I can’t imagine how awful our life would be right now without that safety net.  I think perhaps I will do more letter writing, more lobbying (though I hate lobbyists!) for causes that we as a nation cannot afford to ignore, even in an era of austerity.

On my palm my lifeline is broken into three segments – one stops abruptly, the next starts right below it but not connected to it, and the third breaks off as a new line from the second.  I don’t follow palmistry, but my aunt was always amazed by that and predicted I would have great upheavals in my life.  If the last year is any proof, she was definitely right!

 

My favorite kitchen tool

Posted by thetinfoilhatsociety in Economy, home, Independence Days, peak oil, preparedness, survivalist, sustainability

IMAG0038

Originally uploaded by susancoyotesfan

This is one of my favorite kitchen items. It is my Presto pressure cooker, circa sometime mid twentieth century. It belonged to my husband’s grandmother, and we inherited it when Oscar, my husband’s grandfather died at the ripe age of 97. Yes, it’s dirty on the top because it’s cooking our dinner.

This is a life saver for days like today, when we both were busy studying and taking tests for our on line classes. Neither of us came up for air or remembered about dinner until 6 pm; so, there’s a ham hock with veggies and rice in there cooking. In less than an hour we’ll have dinner (plus prep time, about 45 min).

Wow, you say. Nearly two hours to make dinner??? Well, it beats the hell out of a frozen meal, made with God only knows what for ingredient sources, and preservatives to boot. Everything came from our freezer or our storage. And it surely beats the hell out of spending money on a take out meal.

Believe it or not, a pressure cooker can use less power than a crockpot or regular cooking. That’s because the pressure makes the food cook faster. I could make it even more efficient by cooking on my rocket stove, or by bringing it to pressure and then putting it into my haybox cooker to finish coming back down to atmospheric pressure. In the summer this may well be cooking on my firepit outside, or on my campstove.

My haybox cooker is a wine case with styrofoam glued to the outside, and nested in a cardboard box.  I use an old felted wool blanket folded in it as the ‘hay’ because it’s neater and holds heat really well.

All in all, this has been a lifesaver for two college students trying to maintain honors gpa’s while still working. If only I could find a lifesaver that would help us out that much with laundry and housekeeping.

Big Brother is Watching You.

Posted by thetinfoilhatsociety in common sense, Economy, survivalist, the dreaded politics

Big Brother is Watching You Been telling my husband for years that Facebook is a tool of the CIA.  He laughs.

I would laugh the last laugh if it wasn’t so very sad.

In another story, Arizona AHCCCS residents lose preventative care coverage. Well, isn’t that short sighted.  So now we’re going to pay millions more for crisis and debilitating illnesses when we could have just paid for the preventative care instead.  And we’re going to pay for hundreds of thousands of children, long term, who will not have the benefit of having their parents be productive, or even alive.  Greeeaaat.

Why is it that the low cost, easy things to cover are the ones that get ignored and pushed to the wayside?

So, why is an English paper covering this but not any American outlets??

Posted by thetinfoilhatsociety in Economy, home, peak oil, preparedness, survivalist

The Guardian has this happy article posted that has been linked to by many in the Peak Oil movement.  I haven’t seen a single American news outlet cover this yet though.  Why not?  It’s research done by our own military, for cripes sake, and it affects national security in a big way!

What does this mean for me?  Well, for one thing I think it means I’m screwed no matter what I do.  Get out of debt?  Not a chance.

And I’m still fighting with Mr. Tin Foil about getting a wood stove.  He’s worried that putting the pipe through the roof might make it leak.  I’m worried that I might not be able to cook!  Let alone heat; we have done without central heating for two years now, but we do still use space heaters in places like the bathroom, and a heated mattress pad on the bed.  We are signed up for the program with our utility company that gives us 100% of our electricity from wind and solar, but if they have problems we’ll have no electricity regardless.

Water.  Still our biggest concern.  I don’t have nearly the storage capacity I need, nor do I have the solar pump or hand powered pump I need to use it.

I drive 60 miles one way to work; getting a job closer isn’t really an option at this time.  DH drives 75 miles one way.  We have a Prius, but only one of us can use it, and it still uses gas.  Big problem no matter how you look at it.  No gas = no money.  And no house ultimately.

It seems I’m always a day late and a dollar short, no matter what I do.  Guess I’ll go finish knitting my sock.  At least that I can accomplish.

Rocket Stove. Ripping Success!

Posted by thetinfoilhatsociety in preparedness, survivalist, sustainability

Well, the title says it all.

DH thought I was insane (what else is new?) when I made my model of Vavrek’s rocket stove (link to the Google video is on a previous post).  I put off using it, and put it off, and put it off until I forgot about it in the summer heat.

I brought it out to our campsite with us, and we fired it up.  Lo and behold, it worked amazingly well!  Not only did it burn clean — like no smoke smell at all — but we grilled burgers on it.  Which was a mistake as they  dripped grease on it, and that smoked.  And I had a mess to clean afterward.  But, converts were made.

DH was even so impressed with it that we fired it up in the back yard for our neighbor to see, and gave him some links on making a bigger one.  He was quite fascinated and I think my tinkerer neighbor will be making his own for experimenting with as well.  DH wants to make a bigger one, and use one instead of buying a wood stove or use it for portable heating.  I would also like to do that — I have seen stoves with the pipe running out a window (top pane) with the pane seasonally taken out in favor of insulated plywood.  I don’t know that I would feel comfortable doing that with a regular wood stove, but doing it with a stove where the main by products are CO2 and water vapor would probably be OK.

I’ll post pictures when I get a barrel and work on a heat circulation chamber.

A little research.

Posted by thetinfoilhatsociety in common sense, Economy, preparedness, survivalist, sustainability

I live in kind of a unique area of the Southwest.  We have a climate that is only about 5 – 10 degrees cooler than Phoenix in summer, at least during the day, but cools off markedly more after dark.  This means that for most of the year, we have our windows open for some portion of the day before it gets hotter outside than in, and they are open at night for all but the very hottest nights.  We purchased a swamp cooler that has reduced our utility usage compared to A/C rather markedly, and judicious usage will improve that even more (after learning to live without A/C unless it was over 85 in the house, the delicious 75 of the swamp cooler was a luxury we probably waaaaay over used our first season).  We get frost by Halloween every year, though, and can expect freezing overnight temps right up until the end of April.  During the day however, for most of the year, it’s pretty nice.  It was about 75 outside today, and believe it or not I have tomatoes that are ripe.  In November.  A week before Thanksgiving.

We get snow every year, but it usually doesn’t come until April in our little corner of the world, even though 40 miles (and 100o feet higher) up the road it snows several times a year; it usually doesn’t really stick for long though. Like any desert area anywhere, the extremes of temperature make it challenging to grow food.  But it also helps me point my eyes toward what I should be trying very hard to grow — if it can grow in Cairo, or Greece, or Southern Italy, it should grow here.  Theoretically anyway.  That’s part of the challenge of this area; the temperature extremes are such that what should grow, often doesn’t…or well, anyway.

Mr. TF and I went to Sharlot Hall museum a few days ago.  I was happily surprised at the amount of information that was available there regarding the traditional foods, farming methods, and lifestyles of the local Yavapai tribes.  That was invaluable information!

For instance, one of the chief staple carbohydrate foods of the Yavapai was agave.  They would cut the spiny ‘leaves’ off after they dug up the entire plant, roots and all, and dig a pit.  In the pit they would build a fire, then when there was a good hot bed of coals, in went the the shorn root ball.  I forgot how long it said they cooked it, but it is supposedly mildly sweet, and is a rich source of carbohydrates and trace minerals.  I would have never thought of eating that!

We had to leave before we were done looking around but we plan to go back and I want to find out where I can learn more about the traditional foods and methods of farming.

I am coming to realize that gardening here while challenging, can be done — with modifications.   What the modifications are I need to have a much better understanding of.  What works in Tucson, or Phoenix, may not work here I’m finding.  Or not nearly as well.  What does, and can be maintained, is what I want to learn more about.

I DO know that the typical ’5 acres and freedom’ type of small holding is NOT a sustainable use of land and water here.  You need a lot more land than that if you’re going to raise cattle on any scale.  Sheep and goats are the way to go here.  It’s no wonder that they are so common in the same areas I look to for gardening inspiration; they can eat scrub, they don’t eat much in comparison to their body weight, and they produce multiple uses:  meat, fiber, and milk on a time line that is much better suited for living on marginal land.  Cattle on the other hand just aren’t a productive use of the land here.  Too much water need, too much grazing need, too much time between calving and maturity.  Pigs on the other hand can adapt to pretty much anywhere; they like humans will eat whatever is put in front of them as well as whatever they can forage.  They are definitely worth considering on a sustainable basis, as long as they aren’t rooting in sensitive ecological areas.

Now, in defense of cattle I must also say that our native vegetation co-evolved with large herbivores (mammoths/mastodons) to have the fruits be eaten so that the action of the herbivore’s gut would help prep the seed to grow, and the dung would fertilize the seed where it landed.  A true ranching model, with beef on many many acres and being rotated through the land via portable fences, is sustainable and is also environmentally true to the evolutionary model of the area.  Feed lots though are a bigger disaster here than in the Midwest if you can imagine it, simply because the environment is so very fragile compared to a more robust Midwest grassland with rivers and streams.

My friend Animal says that goat tastes like antelope.  I’m going to have to find a source for goat and try it to find out.  If it’s at all palatable and not an acquired taste, I may have a source for them.

New blog links

Posted by thetinfoilhatsociety in home, peak oil, survivalist

I finally decided to add the blogs that I read that don’t have a lot to do with peak oil, financial collapse, doom and gloom.  And some that do, but are funny in a guffaw, laugh out loud sort of way.

As you might be able to tell, I’m a fiber nut as well…I literally have a room full of alpaca fiber, angora,  unwashed wool from various breeds, nice roving, silk fiber, yarns of all sorts in bins boxes, and bags, cloth scraps saved from previous projects as well as cloth purchased for future ones, embroidery thread, …well you get the idea. Some people collect shoes or purses.  I collect fiber.  Scrooge had his vault of gold coins; I have my bags of alpaca.  We both feel wealthy when we spend time with our loot.

Anyway, if you click on any of the links for crafting type stuff, I think you’ll find that they are a good read even if you’re not a fiber junkie like me.  And the photos are luscious.  Some people dream of flat screen TV’s.  I dream of silly things like spinning wheels, time to use them, faster knitting, the pure sensuous pleasure of natural fibers sliding through my hands and the beauty of the colors as they form the finished product.