I think this is the beginnings of an economy based on perpetual growth and fossil fuel energy running headlong into geological energy constraints. Basically I see an undulatory downward path for the rest of my life. From here out, I think any rallies in our economic condition are going to be met with spiking commodity prices that knock us right back down.
Posted: Thu Jul 24, 2008 8:17 pm Post subject: List of what to buy with spare cash
To save me and others trawling through this huge forum, can you please post your quick list of things to buy in preparation for the changed living conditions we shall all face in the years ahead? I've already bought the obvious ones like bicycles and some gardening equipment.
Joined: May 06, 2006 Posts: 873 Location: Tustin, CA
Posted: Thu Jul 24, 2008 8:30 pm Post subject: Re: List of what to buy with spare cash
Knowing what I know now? Ammo, Booze, and Loose Women (I'm single) _________________ Skeptical scrutiny in both Science and Religion is the means by which deep thoughts are winnowed from deep nonsense-Carl Sagan
Posted: Thu Jul 24, 2008 10:08 pm Post subject: Re: List of what to buy with spare cash
I buy things I can get very cheap at the moment in the OP shops. For example clothing, fabric, kitchenware. But tools never reach the OP shop. I think as well that the kids will need stuff when they're adult.
I buy each time a bit more groceries, beans etc than I need.
But I do not buy heaps of things. Only what we really can afford. Useless to say we don't spend in toys, cars, TV etc.
Posted: Fri Jul 25, 2008 1:23 am Post subject: Re: List of what to buy with spare cash
SILENTTODD wrote:
Knowing what I know now? Ammo, Booze, and Loose Women (I'm single)
Loose Women are rather liability than asset, so why to buy one?
Even if we assume, that you will treat one like a slave, she still has to be fed and sheltered - unnecessary pressure on your precious resources.
N. B.
My wife, who also expect civilized lifestyle to collapse would like to have a servant (as her family had when she was a child), and she was recently talking few times about taking one, should things go bad enough, that all payment will take a form of shelter and food (we could provide that, as long as deeds titles are sill honored in collapsing world).
She was a bit discouraged with my remarks that such a servant would have to be in her 20-ties and also would have some additional uses on the top of usual cooking & cleaning, though
Booze: well, I make my home wine every year and enough for me & my wife.
Ammo: If you live in America, you will never have enough of that.
Posted: Fri Jul 25, 2008 1:43 am Post subject: Re: List of what to buy with spare cash
In that long list, many of the items are almost camping items. I'm more interested in some of the things you wouldn't expect to need. An example is a SCYTHE. Growing food depends on making compost, and a scythe enables you to make compost from any field of long grass when mowers will be useless. this is the sort of thing you only realize you may need by thinking laterally.
So I'm asking if there's anything else that only comes to mind after careful thinking, rather than a list of household goods that anyone could compile? _________________
Posted: Fri Jul 25, 2008 3:45 am Post subject: Re: List of what to buy with spare cash
h2O
That woman is displaying very nice scythe technique, especially on top of the tractor. Draft horses and plows are a little more than spare cash but may prove a very good investment now.
Posted: Fri Jul 25, 2008 5:40 am Post subject: Re: List of what to buy with spare cash
h20 wrote:
This is the sort of thing you only realize you may need by thinking laterally.
So I'm asking if there's anything else that only comes to mind after careful thinking, rather than a list of household goods that anyone could compile?
Since it's pretty clear that the rest of us aren't going to think "laterally" enough and aren't using "careful thinking", perhaps you could just save us all some time and tell us what you think we need?
Joined: Sep 03, 2007 Posts: 638 Location: Sunny Virginia, USA
Posted: Fri Jul 25, 2008 6:35 am Post subject: Re: List of what to buy with spare cash
It depends on a number of issues including what you think the future will be like. Will oil simply "go away"? No, it's going to be around in one form or another for centuries. Will electricity simply go away? Probably not, and will again, be with us for a long time.
Again, your situation is important. I live on less than one acre of land, so a full sized scyth would be a ridiculous investment. So let's leave the snarking to the side and discuss basic needs as a start to this conversation.
Basic Needs:
Absolute Needs
Various Foods
Usable Water
Dry and clean Shelter
Sanitation
Food - Without getting into a long post, you need various foods in order to keep healthy. Since we're trying to discuss a sensible set of ideas, it's obvious you need to have a community working in some form of captialist production.
[rant]Please, don't argue about that, capitalism (otherwise known as free enterprise) is the only form of production that has proven to be able to provide the needs of many over a long period of time. If you can not accept that fact, you are not accepting reality. While there may be examples of villages that provide via a community, there is no way to do that for a large group of people without slavery and an absolute discount on human life and freedom. And quite frankly, if you are that kind of person, you better stock up on a lot of guns, ammo and bibles because you are going to need them.[/rant]
Will you be growing all of your food or just some of it? Most people will be growing some of their food and a few will be farmers gowing much more food than they need. So the normal person needs some basic hand tools and a lot of knowledge that most people do not have. Access to fertilizers would be very helpful and there are lots of sustainable and organic ways to do this. Compost bin? Raised beds? Any irrigation equipment used?
Usable water - A well, a means to dig the well, and some form of pump. Will there be plumbing? I'm afraid you are expecting a very far slide down in a very short amount of time if you are discounting the use of plumbing. In that case, grab a pail and plastic sheets to create a rain collection system, that's all you'll be able to do unless you get really ambitious.
Shelter - Will you need to build your shelter? Repair it? Add on? How are you going to cut the wood? Without an energy slave, there are lots of hand tools needed along with a lot of extra hands. However, I seem to remember that steam engines were used quite successfully in saw mills. So I think getting the supplies to your location is the important issue. Basic hand tools should do well for most people.
Sanitation - A shovel if you don't care too much, an outhouse if you care a bit, and an indoor system if you care a lot. Composting toilets seem pretty cool, but I don't know much about them and it would be very nice to have one that does not have a lot of plastic and moving parts. A bidet with warm water would be beyond belief and warm water for a shower or bath will do wonders for the spirit. How's the water going to be heated during each season?
Very Imortant Needs
Clothing
Defense
Food preperation
Food Storage
There are tons of threads that discuss each and every one of these points. For clothing, again, we'll be quite a ways down the right side of the curve to be without access to clothing made by somebody else. Defense, check out the gun thread. Food prep, again, basic stuff plus a means to heat/chill and optionally freeze things. My grandchild will be an old lady before she no longer sees any form of refridgeration unless the literal end of the world comes first.
High on most peoples list
A nearby doctor
Transportation
Lighting
Entertainment
The medical thing is again, someone in the community who hopefully went to school and can do anything but major surgery. Transportation, bikes are great as long as you can repair them so a stock of parts, tools and knowl-how is required. Lighting, same issue. Entertainment is another "some will do this" issue.
After looking through this post so far, I realize that there are two things that can not be replaced, can not be put aside, can not be discounted. Can you guess what they are?
Hidden:
Knowldge and Experience
Without the knowledge of how things are done, tools become paperweights. Without actually getting hands on experience, you will have a period of adjustment and fail, at first, in some of these things.
I'm in the process of teaching myself how to grow and store food all year long. I know basic wiring, plumbing, and building and have experince in all of it. I've repaired and tuned my bicycles for years and have experience in lots of other things considered "crafty" by others.
However, I for one would never consider getting any livestock bigger than a rabbit or chicken, because I do not have the knowledge or experience to keep large animals and would hate to see them die from my ignorance.
And that in the end, is perhaps the most important thing of all:
Knowing what you don't know.
_________________ When somebody makes a statement you don't understand, don't tell him he's crazy. Ask him what he means. -- Otto Harkaman, Space Viking
Joined: Aug 11, 2005 Posts: 819 Location: Eastern NC
Posted: Fri Jul 25, 2008 6:44 am Post subject: Re: List of what to buy with spare cash
Get a soil sample asap. Buy lime or sulfur to set your ph right for a garden. My 1920s gardening books handed down note difficulty with this issue and nitrogen sources.
Consider a pressure canner and supplies also.
Posted: Fri Jul 25, 2008 7:24 am Post subject: Re: List of what to buy with spare cash
Our priorities began with getting rid of debt, including the credit cards we always paid off monthly. I don't want a bank failure to make it hard for us pay last month's bills. Our one rural acre is paid for, and developed into gardens, orchard, and a farm repair business.Next is cash on hand, and reduce bank accounts to minimum operating level. Since we can't get out of direct deposit of my wife's paycheck, we get that out regularly too.
First to buy is food, in all forms that you can store. We have a lot of home canned and tin canned and dry foods, including grains and a burr mill. We have a freezer that is solar powered, and enough solar to run computers, phones, and lights. Then fuels as they apply to your situation. For us, that is several 5 gal. cans of kerosene (many uses), a farm tank of 100 gal. of gas, some gas cans, all of which is rotated to keep fresh, out of sight, and unknown to others. This is intended for our garden tractors, chainsaw, wood splitter, and grain mill. A small amount might be used in our small pickup, for hauling grain, wood, etc.. We have a gas stove in a summer kitchen with a 500 gal. LP tank for it alone, full. Have a full woodshed. Have a new bicycle and spare tires and tubes, and a machine and welding shop to support our own repairs. A spare portable LP cooktop with several 20 lb. bottles for it. Lots of stainless steel and cast iron cookware. Homemade soap, and enough lye and stored grease to make another 100 lbs., plus laundry detergent, bleach, some swimming pool pellets to disinfect water, and a cistern with a hand pump, being repaired.
We have stored clothing, for all seasons, mostly buying at thrift stores to stretch that money. Lots of spare food canning jars, lids, flats, gaskets for pressure canners, pectin, sugar for jams and jellies. Spare sewing supplies, lots of plastic tarps, 55 gallon plastics barrels with sealing lids, bales of straw for mulch under a tarp, 3 of the same garden tractors for spare parts, one with a 42" tiller, lots of hand garden tools with spare handles, rolls of fence wire, piles of steel posts for fencing the gardens and chicken lot, fence staples, some spare lumber, buckets of nails, screws, bins of nuts and bolts, and spare parts for everything on the place.
Motor oils, greases of several kinds, hydraulic oil, filters, spark plugs, plug wires, water and fuels line hoses, clamps, belts, spare tires and a manual tire changer. Inner tubes, and patches, and tubeless plugging supplies. Hand tire pumps, and a big compressor. Working on a bike trailer.
Concrete blocks and bags of mortar to build a root cellar, and barrles to bury for temporary root cellar until that is complete. A ton and a half of wheat, a few years worth of garden seeds, bags of Rotenone dust for potato bugs and bean beetles, and save seed each year of all we can. A couple hundred lbs. of ag lime, and several 50 lb bags of fertilizer. 100 lbs. of plain salt (gotta get more) for meat preservation, along with sage growing, and red peppers to make sausage. A lard press, and kettle for rendering, with outdoor tripod, buckets for lard, and gallons of olive oil.
Maglights, rechargeable batteries and solar capapbility for that. Laptop running on 12 volts with a wireless connection to the local ISP for it and the phone. CB's, shortwave, AM-FM radios, weather radio, and TV, all solar. Need some long range walkie talkies-EBay, this weekend. Lots of electrical supplies, parts, wire, fuses, etc.. Plumbing tools, pipes, supplies, drain snake, etc.
Gravity tank to water the garden, not installed yet. Outdoor porta-pottie, to use until I can put up a privy if needed, but need to buy slaked lime to treat it.
Tons of repair business supplies, a gasoline powered welder (bring your own gas), tons of steel, aluminum, brass, copper, stainless, in rod, bar, sheets, I's, angles, etc., and a generator to run the shop (again, bring your own gas). I expect a lot of security-related business coming up, so I have materials for window covers, door bars and such. I keep a lot of small parts, like o-rings, cotter pins, grease fittings, snap rings, roll pins, steel dowels, gasket materials, and thread repair kits. If it's mechanical, hydraulic, or electrical, the odds are we can fix it.
There is a river over the hill, deer in the woods across the road, and the neighbors have dairys, beef farms, chicken farms, sawmills, hog farms, and hay and grain stored. We do business with them, so we rely on each other now, and thus are to be included in our preps.
I think everyone must make their own lists, varying with their situation.
edit: I forgot the herb garden, and a host of medical preps, including a resident herb expert. Also, a complete assortment of hand tools for wood working, including some antiques that can start with a tree and make beams, tool handles, furniture, whatever. Used to restore antique furniture, and learned to processes. This will be more important as plastics and transport get more expensive, and can provide everything from tools to baskets to looms, ad infinitum. _________________ Local fix-it guy..
Last edited by patience on Fri Jul 25, 2008 7:32 am; edited 1 time in total
Joined: Jun 13, 2007 Posts: 3869 Location: Minniesotuh
Posted: Fri Jul 25, 2008 7:29 am Post subject: Re: List of what to buy with spare cash
I buy based on this theory: If I can't make it, buy it.
Sewing needles, canning jars, tools, TP, etc. There are lots of lists here in PFTF. _________________ "RRrrruuuunnnn!!!" ~Apocalypto
Joined: May 25, 2008 Posts: 158 Location: North Idaho
Posted: Fri Jul 25, 2008 7:58 am Post subject: Re: List of what to buy with spare cash
Soap...storing the stuff to make soap??? Now why would you do that???
Buy the raw materials to just stored it....to later use energy and labor to make soap?
We have years of stored already made soaps for all applications. Funny thing is it takes up about the same space, requires no processing later and frees up my time making it. It is also cheap as dirt..as a matter of fact a good bag of compost costs more than a years worth of body soap for two....
Point is thinking it is so wise to make your own stuff is sometimes short sighted. Many things are flat cheap to buy premade.
We bought several 55 gallon barrels of wheat once so we would not need to grow and cut and store our own. That all takes a lot of time and energy. More free time to do important things. Most parts of our country are not wheat growing regions. If things aren't better years after we get to the bottom of the last barrel...we will just plant it then and do what some folks are thinking they need to do right away.
Bottomline...balance out what you can pre stock in a ready to go form as later if we ever do suffer through a crisis, our lives will become much more labor intensive, just like it used to be long ago when most everything was done by hand. There will not be enough hours in the day to do it all. Besides who is on gaurd duty the whole time?
Posted: Fri Jul 25, 2008 8:07 am Post subject: Re: List of what to buy with spare cash
Here's some lateral thinking.
Stockpile a large amount of lard and carry some in your pocket at all times in case you need to grease behind your ears after getting your head stuck between fence railings. The lard will enable you to remove your head easily.
Also empty cornflakes packets which can make handy door stops or paper weights when filled with soil or gravel. _________________ www.askaboutenergy.com
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