by Woodsbum
I ran across this video a while ago and thought you guys might like it. It is put out by the US Forest Service and is about logging, axes and shows some really amazing old growth video. The great part is that it covers about anything you ever wanted to know about an axe and didn’t know how to ask. This truly is a great instructional video.
Enjoy!!!
by Woodsbum
My last post talked about what Wyoming was like when I was there in the early 80’s. It was a very difficult time and it caused us to live through what some would consider a SHTF type scenario. I know it really forced me to make changes in my life to cover my family if something like this ever happens again to us. Luckily, we were able to make it through by simply adapting and overcoming things as best we could. Eventually we did have to move to Texas with whatever we could salvage, but lasted for about 5 years before we lost our home. Considering how bad it was, we did pretty well.
This is how our family ended up making it through the ordeal.
Many of our friends were Mormon, which really saved our rear ends. My father would get me from school and take me out to go shoot wild game. I would bag a deer, antelope, rabbits, grouse, or some other wild meat, clean it, bone it, and bring out the meat in garbage bags and a backpack. We would use much of that meat, but would trade what we could to our Morman friends for canned items and other food stuffs. The one year I know I had to have harvested a couple dozen large game animals just myself. This was when I was in my later years of grade school (5th and 6th grade).
We were literally so poor, but still holding on, that I had to make and wear moccasins because we didn’t have the money to buy me new shoes. They were double hide buck skin that I had shot previously and ugly as sin. To this day I have a weird thing where I have to keep several pairs of shoes around me, even in my truck and under my desk at work. It just really messed with me and I still freak out when my kids (now grown) don’t have several pair as backups in case something happens.
At that time there was a bounty on coyotes. My father would get me from school and we would head out during the week to go get enough to make the difference in our house payment or electricity bills. I remember that the bounty was up to $75 per set of ears at one point. We would go out early in the morning and harvest a few rabbits that we would “fillet and release” back into the wild. In another words, we shot them and then spread their entrails around the fields after we cooked up the meat for breakfast. We would then call in the predators and shoot whatever had a bounty. Every once in a while we would get a fox. Those didn’t have a bounty, but we could sell the fur for over $100 if we didn’t mess it up too badly with the rifle.
My father and I would also hire out on farms and ranches to repair different equipment. I was only a kid, but I was very capable and proficient with driving different types of heavy equipment. Since my dad could fix almost anything and was an excellent welder, I would get a few extra dollars for us by running a tractor for such things as haying crews, mowers, etc or crane for scrappers pulling old oil gear. It was bad enough at times that I actually missed a few months of school here and there to help my father out on the road while he did mechanical work or welding.
Now what all did I learn from this 5 years of hell? That is a good question. I can tell you what some of the skills I know possess are and what changes in my life are a direct cause of this time growing up:
This really felt like a long post and I hope that this fulfilled my friend’s request that I put down some of the crap I had to deal with during that time and some of the lessons I learned from it. If not, I might be adding things here and there until it seems as complete as possible without giving away too much personal information…..
I was talking to someone who mentioned that I should share a bit of my story as a way to help educate others, so I figured I would do a quick two part post and see if this helped anyone out. If nothing else, it helps give me a link to our family’s ordeal if I decide I need to pass this information along at a later date.
This first part will cover how I see myself and how things suddenly changed for us as a family. Of course we were not the only ones that had our life change, but considering my age at the time I will have to keep everything related to how I saw events unfold. This did change how I look at things as an adult.
The reality is that I have never considered myself a “prepper” in any stretch of my imagination. The whole idea of “prepping” brings up mental images of the people on Doomsday Preppers that are “prepping for the upcoming EMP due to ticking off X country and the ensuing volcanic eruptions because of X.” Their unsubstantiated fears have always bugged me thus I never wanted to be stuck with the handle of “prepper.”
Now why do I put things back for possible bad times? It was learned after the bottom fell out of the oil industry while living in Casper, WY. I was in grade school at the time and still remember the initial impact and what it was like for everyone after the fact. Let me start with the first time I truly understood how bad things were:
My first realization as to the impact of oil and fossil fuel slowdowns was when the richest kid in school was pulled out and moved away. We all hated this girl because her family had everything. This was the early 1980′s and her family had cable TV in several rooms, Atari consoles, an indoor swimming pool, hot tub, and the girl seemed to have every new product that had come out recently. She was always dressed very well and on her birthday our entire class was bussed over to a pizza place where all our expenses were paid to play games, eat, and “kid party” with her. Both her parents were geologists for oil companies and I remember both of them having new “his and her” Corvettes. Well, when per parents came and got her things had changed. They were in a newer station wagon that was pulling a trailer. She had been crying at school for several days and she told us that their parents had lost everything because the company that their parents worked for had closed down the local offices. That day they had put all their remaining posessions (after selling as much as they could) into this car and trailer and were headed to a small piece of property they owned that wasn’t taken.
I also have vivid memories of the local banks just pushing mobile homes into a landfill at the edge of town because they had been reposessed/forclosed upon and taking the loss was less of a financial impact than letting the mobile home sit. A large group of oil field workers has actually built a tent city just outside of town in a multiple acre park. We are talking about something that looked like an overfilled KOA over Labor Day. It was crazy.
Then there was the grocery store. Another vivid memory I have is of the young families that were walking around in an attempt to somehow get all the items they needed for the little money they still had left. Several years later we ended up having to go live with my grandparents in Texas and I thought it was odd that no one was crying at the store because they couldn’t afford food.
This change in the economy seemed to drastically affect everyone I knew and it really made us change how we did things as a family. The next part will cover some things that we did as a family to be able to make it through this hardship.
by Woodsbum
Due to the extra money I have from my second job, I decided that I was going to buy some things that can only be classified as SHTF, prepper, EOTWAWKI, survivalist or waste of money type items. I have have never thought of myself as a prepper. Being a strong patriarch of our family has made me put things back in case something does happen, however. Things like food, water purification, ammunition, generator, fuel, etc all have found their way into every nook and cranny of my home just in case something bad happens. If you watch Doomsday Preppers, I would never be of enough of a prepper to be allowed onto that show. Our family also isn’t living in fear of a supervolcano, impending economic doom, or an EMP attack. This being said and stated, let me add that I do believe that any responsible family should take their family’s safety seriously. If this ends up including gas masks with different filters so that you don’t have to breath in volcanic ash (since we live between 3 volcanoes – 2 of which are steaming more often than I like) or put back 6 months of food so our family won’t go hungry if any multitude of things happen (to include unemployment or hard financial times). Enough with the disclaimers……
I learned through experiencing all the tough times we lived through in Wyoming that we needed to put supplies back. We lived in Casper when the bottom fell out of the oil industry. There were times when I we were forced to shoot deer or antelope to feed ourselves. My father ended up working all sorts of odd jobs for cash and trade just to keep us from being homeless. During trips to the grocery store I distinctly remember families trying to figure out how to feed their family and mothers crying in the isles because there was not enough money to get everything that their family needed. It was horrible, but I learned a lot from both living it and from all our Mormon friends who seemed to have everything they needed. The LDS church there in Casper had all their members put back at least 1 year supply of food and daily necessities. Their ability to make it through this time when no one had money or a job really struck a nerve and made me realize the brilliance of this lifestyle.
Now let’s fast forward enough years that I will not admit to a specific number…… I have really put what I learned in Wyoming to good use. We keep all sorts of things stored up in case we need something and can’t just go to a store and buy it. As our stockpiles of “stuff” grew, I realized after watching the news that having a way to protect the bodies of my loved ones was not a bad idea. This was when I decided to just bite the proverbial bullet and buy some body armor.
Now here is the problem. This stuff almost requires that you spend a substantial amount of time just to be educated enough to buy yourself something. It is actually quite complex. Features that allow you to move the armor out of the way for medical access, rip cord things to drop the armor if it seems to be dragging you down while swimming, MOLLE vs laser cut attachments, polyethylene vs AR500 steel plates, ceramic plates, protection levels, price, color, fit, padding, whether Venus is in Scorpio during a full moon… The list goes on and on. It is seriously crazy. To help myself and to help you readers, I am going to pass along a few things that I have learned thus far and point you toward the items I plan on purchasing next week.
First off, let’s hit up some vocabulary and nomenclature:
Just those terms alone will help you enough to start looking around. Just know that a plate carrier is USUALLY not made of a ballistic material. In another words, your plate carrier needs inserts or plates to stop a bullet. Otherwise it is just a very expensive vest that isn’t very fashionable.
So the first step you need to do is decide upon “soft” or plate armor. I have not done too much research on soft armor other than lifespan. You will have to eventually replace soft armor. It only lasts for a finite amount of time due to fiber breakdown from heat and moisture. Since I want it to stop rifle calibers, this was an easy choice for me. I may get some soft armor later on for concealment reason, but at this point I am just getting something that will save my bacon if shot with an AR or AK.
The next step is to look at your bank account (and in my case cry a little) to decide how much you want to spend. The plates are going to really eat up a good chunk of your budget. AR500 plates are the cheapest and cost around $100-$200 per plate. Sometimes you can get package deals where you get front, back, and side for around $250-$300. This is on top of the plate carrier cost so a simple setup will run you around $400 as a baseline cost and can go up from there. If you go for the polyethylene plates that are much lighter and float, you can see prices around $400 for a single plate. Ceramic plates seem to be all over the place in price from $350-$500 per plate. Either way you are doubling the cost of your armor if you use anything other than the AR500 steel plates.
Lastly, look at the attachments and accessories that you can get for your system. There are all sorts of different items that can Velcro on such as ballistic shoulder/arm protection, ballistic groin protection, ballistic neck protection, shoulder straps, magazine pouches, bags, holsters, the kitchen sink…. All sorts of stuff is available for your pack animalistic pleasure. The price and strength of your legs to carry everything are the only restrictions.
Ironically, the hardest part of the whole body armor purchase has been finding a plate carrier that will be big enough for me. I suspect that most people will have similar issues finding something that fits comfortably. My problem is that I am tall and big. We are talking about someone the mid-sized professional wrestler. Most products I find are too small around the chest if they fit my waist, are too short, or are too big around my waist to fit my chest. There is little middle ground with products so sizing me is always difficult. Since we are talking about carriers that can range between $70 and $700 for those that I looked at, just to get one in for size comparison is an expensive proposition. I think I have found one that will work and isn’t too crazy in price. If it works, I will post about it when I get it. Now, I am not sure how many of you can get a chance to find a vest to check its size. I have been trying to figure that out myself. My best guess would be a LEO outlet or trade show, but I am not sure how that stuff works. I am basically checking YouTube and crossing my fingers.
So here is what I plan on buying as of next week (after this weekend’s 2nd job money comes in):
This will run me about $400 for the set. It will also be about 25-30 lbs of weight. I guess my rear end needs to get less weight lifting time and more cardio to carry this crap. No matter what, I will show you guys what I have picked up when it comes in as well as my thoughts on it. I will not, however, go shoot it and see what happens. There are more than enough videos online that destroy these expensive plates.
Good luck people and I hope none of us actually has to use this stuff.
by Woodsbum
A while ago I ran into a very neat little product called the Arrowcard. They come in several different configurations to include a dogtag style and a card style that fit into the bottom of a tin, such as an Altoids tin. In essence, these little cards are multi-tool devices that incorporate an actual arrow/spear head into the card.
Being the tinkering type individual that I am, I had to get myself several of these little gadgets to play with and see how they worked. All in all, I ended up getting numerous more and have them laying around the house now because I can’t break them, lose them, or wear them out. Way to go Primalware!
Here is what the dog tag style look like.
Dual saw arrowtag
Knife/saw arrowtag
Arrowtag necklaces
Arrowcard in an Altoids tin
Spear tip arrowcard
Arrowtag as a broadhead
My overall impression is as such: I would not hinge my very existence on one of these cards or tags, but to carry one as a backup or “ah crap” tool I could not see any better use of $15-$25. They really are a neat little product. Not only that, but Erica (the lady you contact to purchase them from) seems really nice via email……
