"Self-repair Manifesto"

Good stuff, found here.



{clickable thumbnail, durrr}

Water. Weatherford not has it.

Weatherford has zero water at the moment; at the time of the link above they had minimal flow. As of 6pm "all the taps in the city are dry" and "may be without water for an extended period of time."

So, how much water do you have in the house in case the normal water system is disrupted? Enough to get through a day? Two days? Three days? A useful rule of thumb is one gallon per person per day. That's enough to drink, cook, and do light hygiene like brushing teeth and doing moist cloth wipedowns until more water is available.

If you have no water preps, you can start simply and cheaply by rinsing out 2L soda bottles and storing tap water in them. Date them with a Sharpie so you know when to rotate/use/refill. Since I am a homebrewer I use brewing sanitizers to no-rinse the bottles, but that's likely overkill.

{edit s/burleson/weatherford/g}

my nonexistent pressure cooker

I bought a Presto 8qt pressure cooker (model 0128204) off Amazon a couple of years ago and was looking for regulators and other parts for it.  Apparently that model number is a figment of my imagination even though it is stamped in the aluminum pot.  As of this writing there were three (3) google hits that positively listed that model number, and none had parts.

So I called Presto and asked about it. The rep seemed to sidestep the issue a bit, but when I asked if the listed 0128202 used the same gasket, overpressure relief and regulator she said it did.  She also advised the only regulator for this unit is 15#.  I would like to have a 5# and 10# for it like I do for my 22qt Mirro canner.  10# would be a bit gentler on my agar media, I suspect.

Posting this bit of trivia here so some other lost soul with a 0128204 wouldn't have to duplicate the effort.

Seriously? Graham cracker looting?

Yes, that appears to be the case.

If we are willing to commit theft on so petty a scale I am pretty sure Dallas would look like a 3rd-world postapocalyptic madhouse if any major disasters occurred here. Plan accordingly.

A more strident Libertarian than myself would use this opportunity to reflect on how nanny state paternalism encourages the devolution of character.

"Do not sell your honor so cheaply."

seedlings 2010, LF-6

Jumbled thoughts follow.

I planted the first batch of seeds planted in the greenhouse today. My new approach is underway. The starter containers (egg cartons, toilet paper tubes lined with a sheet of newspaper) are ugly but free. We'll see how they work. I also have some of those pressed peat starter containers.

These seeds were started SFG-style, which is to say "only one seed" per spot. Makes me a little squeamish, but he warned us ahead of time.

Here's the list of stuff started at LF-6 (ie, last average frost date minus six weeks):

1. Hybrid "Delicious" Tomato
2. Hybrid "Super Sweet 100" cherry tomato
3. Heirloom "Brandywine" tomato - my first heirloom attempt
   
4. Hybrid "Jelly Bean" grape tomato
5. Lettuce
6. scrounged green bell pepper
7. scrounged yellow bell pepper
8. scrounged red bell pepper

Looks limited now but those are the plants that get started this early. More variety to come. Planting a few varieties to see what works. Who knows what will happen with the scrounged bell pepper seeds. Might not sprout, probably won't yield fruit. Hey, it's free. I've sprouted lemons, limes, and grapefruit that way before.

The newspaper mulch was down throughout all the freezes, covered with leaf mulch; the overhead bar for securing vertical twine for training is in place. Will take pics of anything that sprouts.

Vegetable garden, v2010

Here are some things I'm trying this year, based on my reading about square foot gardening (SFG hereafter) and, to a much lesser extent, permaculture:

• better timing of starting seedlings, transplanting, and planting seeds. I made a calendar with our zone's first and last frost dates, and a running tally of how far away we are from each date. This, combined with a spreadsheet that lists planting times and seed-to-seedling projections, suggests a timeline that should improve my yield.
  
• more frugal use of seeds through reduction. SFG teaches not to oversow and thin later, but instead intentionally seed the number of plants you want.
• more frugal use of seeds through preservation. Keep the seeds not sown above in a vacuum and in the fridge.
  
• more frugal use of seeds through propagation. I've grown small lemon and grapefruit trees from seeds saved after eating the fruit and it was a lot of fun. I saved some apple, pear, bell pepper and jalepeno seeds to try out this year. They are probably hybrid and will not yield as expected, but no harm no foul.
• More vertical growing for tomatoes, cucumbers, squash, etc. They will be in the northernmost position in order to avoid blocking sunlight.
• lining the bed with a newspaper mulch to block weed sprouts, retain moisture, and increase carbon over time. I used a 3-4 sheet thickness, and covered with some partially decomposed leaf matter.
  
• Increased use of heritage/heriloom cultivars to increase biodiversity and increase the chance of seed scavenging.
  
• separation of similar plants to discourage pest feasting
• better planning for light preferences of the plants. Now that I've been here for 2yrs I have a better feel for how the light moves around the arable land.
  

Dreams for the future:

• some hens and chicken tractor.
• increase garden area (reduce grassed area)
  

This is what a $15 stove looks like

Here's a good example of a $15 stove. Old, dirty, but not rusted. Parts inexpensive and easily available.

It's a 413G which makes it a 1960s stove. The original manual for this kind of stove is online at Coleman (pdf) and has delightful graphics.

This kind of stove makes for great camping (NOT hiking, it's a called a "suitcase stove" for a reason). Also nifty for cooking stinky foods outside or canning. Or, for you all-electric folks, cooking anything at all if your power goes out. A camping stove means you can cook no matter whatever else happens.

Tasting: canned beef

I canned some beef (cubed) earlier this year and broke some out last night for dinner. It was tender and tasted like roast beef.

Served with mashed potatoes and steamed cauliflower. I think I'm going to try frying cauliflower sometime. I had it fried at Ali Baba and it was interesting; the high heat developed some brussel sprout flavors in the white veggie.

Speaking of mashed potatoes, have you had instant mashed potatoes lately? I'm something of a purist and use a potato ricer for my smashed potato adventures. I have rejected instant mashed potatoes as heresy, partly for their "instant" nature and partly for the horrific flavor and texture I remember from the 80s. Recently my SIL gave us a packet of them to try. I sneered for a couple of months and then we made them. Wow. I don't know what happened to the technology since the 80s but these were really good. And at ~$1/bag they are pretty cheap. And storable. The thing that's really got my head spinning is that I don't think I can consistently make homemade smashed potatoes as good as these new instant packages.

So now there are a couple pouches in our pantry and a couple in our 72hr kit.

stovie

Ok, last stove/lantern geek post for a while, I promise.

This gem of a post came from a thread called How I Became a Stovie. A stovie, btw, is a person who collects/uses/tinkers on liquid fuel stoves.

My Sainted Mother, bless her, taught me to read before I was five. I then began reading my older cousins' boy Scout books. There in print was tacit permission to have fires! I liberated empty cans from the garbage and washed them preparatory to savaging them with tin snips and straightened nails in order to contain small fires made of twigs and pine cones so I could incinerate food purloined from the kitchen. My parents saw no harm in it until I assassinated an innocent cottontail going about his lawful business in our vegetable garden. I divested the victim of his furry waistcoat and most of his inward workings with the aid of my (t) rusty pocket knife, then made some barely edible rabbit fricasse in a tin can kettle over a fire in a tin can stove. Nirvana!

Down the hill from us about a quarter of a mile was the western shore of a small irrigation dam which contained frogs, slime, hordes of mosquitoes, and an assortment of bullheads, sunfish, and perch. Some of these leviathans attained lengths approaching five inches. They were also severely retarded as proven by their propensity to bite hooks baited with bits of red bandana handkercheif. Many of these unfortunate denizens of "The Dam," as it was generally called, also came to ignominious ends on my various tin can crematoria. Since then I've had an unquenchable thirst for things "stove."

In my early teens I built a shack of salvaged (read: "stolen") lumber in the back yard wherein I and my partner in crime Joel Jensen had a stove fabricated from a 5 gallon lube oil can with a chimney made from a length of galvanised rainspout salvaged from a building being torn down in the neighborhood. We vulcanized dozens of eggs, cans and cans of SPAM, and boiled vats of bad coffee on that stove.

It was about that time I found a discarded REI catalog in the neighbor's trash. In it there were pages and pages of forbidden camping and stove porn ! ! Joel and I caught a bus to 11th and Pine in Downtown Seattle, where perverted enablers actually encouraged us to light up! We learned words like: "Svea 123", "Optimus 8R", "Primus 71L" and the delights of Army Surplus dried squash, spinach, and chemically mummified lemon type flavored drink powder. It would be many more years before I could actually buy any of 'em. I've never looked back.

Gerry

fettling

Fettling = working on an old pressure lamp or lantern. In Europe this might mean Primus, Petromax, Optimus, Tilley, etc. In America this means Coleman.

I have a ratty old 1961 lantern (red one on the right) that burns great but has been difficult to light. Hey, it's older than I am and start a little slow in the mornings, too.

Should work like this:

1. fill with fuel
   
2. pressurize with the pump
   
3. crack open the fuel valve about 1/4 turn and listen. You will hear air hissing. Then after a few seconds you will hear fuel start to make a delicate gurgle sound. Close the valve.
   
4. get your match/lighter/torch in there
   
5. re-crack the valve 1/4 turn
   
6. gentle "foof" as the fuel ignites. The mantles start to glow.
   
7. when mantles glow gentle, increase the fuel delivery
   
8. the generator gets hot enough to vaporize fuel efficiently and you get a soothing hiss and brilliant light. All is well with the world. Or the back porch, at least.
   

But it has been working like this:

1. fill with fuel
   
2. pressurize with the pump
   
3. crack open the fuel valve about 1/4 turn and listen. Just air. No fuel.
   
4. wait. wait more. Still no fuel. %&^#*&^!
   
5. Get annoyed and open the fuel valve a couple of turns until fuel does begin to flow.
   
6. floods or semi-floods the lantern as fuel at the 1/4 turn position is metered differently on purpose.
   
7. get your match/lighter/torch in there
   
8. dramatic "BOOF" as the whole top half of the lantern ignites. The neighborhood start to glow.
   
9. if nothing (important) nearby is on fire, attempt to regulate fuel delivery until the generator warms up and things normalize.
   

The part that I needed to work on is hidden inside the fount (the metal base where the fuel is held/pressurized). This part, the fuel/air tube, serves partly as the fuel pickup mechanism and as a kind of crude carbureter. I cleaned the f/a tube and re-stretched a small spring that's part of the carbing process. Starts immediately now.

Here's a pretty good explanation of how it works.

First light: Dietz #2 D-Lite streamliner

This is the lantern I picked up on our daytrip to Gladewater. It was grimey and full of dirt dauber nests but not rusted. Used a nylon brush on most of it and replaced the wick. Ran the globe through the dishwasher with the last batch of dishes.

The lantern is 18" tall with the bail up, 13" with the bail down. It uses a 7/8" wick and yields about 10 candlepower according to a contemporary ad. This stepped-fount "streamline" variant was made from 1938 to 1956 and there is no way to date it more closely than that.

I was going to repaint it but Dear Wife likes it in the current incarnation.

lanterns chasing the darkness

Tonite I sat on the back deck and cranked up a couple of lanterns:

1. Kirkman #2 Champion kerosene lamp. Mr. Kirkman builds lamps from rebuilt/restored Dietz machine parts for that authentic feel. He also has a real understanding of how cold-blast tubular lanterns work. You've seen his work on Lost, in movies, at Disney parks, etc.
2. Coleman 200a single-burner lantern, vintage 1961. It's older than I am, and probably in better working shape. We're both a bit cranky when first getting up.

I am not a maudlin person but there is a tradition among Coleman people that I want to share. It comes about because Coleman collectors and fans are much older than the average 'net user. When a Coleman forum or mailing list member dies the other members light a lantern in his or her memory. It's fitting. It's quiet. It's absolutely the right thing to do.

Pickled eggs

Made some pickled eggs today. I was trying out an internet tip that fresh eggs hardboil easier if you steam rather than boil them.

I threw a dozen in the black and decker steamer and steamed for 20mins. They peeled easily, no breakage or waste.

The eggs should be ready after 10d in the fridge.

Canned some ground beef

This is what passes for excitement at my house these days. Canned about 7# of ground beef from costco in pint jars.

Last month I bought 10# of potatoes (on sale for something stupid like $2) and canned most of them. They are unexpectedly ugly and tasty.