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Category: rats

Fri. July 30, 2021 – whew, I’m beat up today…

Hot and humid, possible rain. We didn’t get the rain yesterday, and I was north, south, and in the middle. It was a bit cooler with the breeze when the sun went behind a cloud. Otherwise it was hot.

I got my morning stuff out of the way, then got out of the house to do my pickups. Shelves mostly. Then I headed to my secondary location. Set up some shelves so I can move the stuff that’s on top of the shipping containers, and chop up the containers. I also decided to just trash everything, not save the stuff with aluminum frames for recycle. Let someone pull them out of the dumpsters, if they get lucky.

I filled my pickup 3 times and filled two dumpsters. Cut up two of the containers and emptied them. I am starting to see a big space, that will fill instantly as I start moving stuff around. Still, progress, right? It is beating me up though. I can do two of the containers before I’m stumbling and starting to not be coordinated and graceful. Working alone with saws and moving stuff, not a good idea when you get weary.

Part of that is being 55. Part is that it’s very hot. Part is that each container needs about 30 trips out to the truck while carrying the stuff. Since I started with the shelves and dumping the stuff that was on pallets in the parking lot, I was ready to be done after one container. I pushed through and got the second done too. I’m starting to get pretty scratched up too. Just handling and moving around the stuff has been beating up my arms, shins, calves, and hands.

Wah, wah, wah…. ok enough whining. I also chatted with my neighbor there, and sold him a metalworking tool. He’s going to assemble it, then we’ll finalize the price. Even if it’s beat up or missing fasteners, he should be able to get it working. Walking around his space, I realized I’ve been selling him stuff for years. He gets the machines and tools he needs, I get to move some inventory. Win win! And that is how meatspace is supposed to work.

Puppy had a good day, despite being home alone. No accidents in the house! He used the doggy door and went out during the day. Hooray. That is definitely progress.

Today I’ve got the kids at home, so my tired body will get a bit of rest, but there is still a lot do do here. Maybe I’ll get some of it done 🙂

And then I can continue stacking all the things!

nick

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Thur. July 8, 2021 – flyin’ by…

Hot and humid, chance of rain. Might be sunny. Yadda yadda. Well, yesterday started cool, got hotter, got sunnier, and then ended hot and sticky. Lots of mosquitos in the yard too.

We are working on housebreaking the new puppy, which means sitting outside while he sniffs the entire yard looking for the perfect spot to NOT do his business, until we give up and let him back in the house. Then within a minute, he’ll have soiled something… so I’m getting reacquainted with sitting in the sun in the yard, swatting bugs. Joy.

Spent the day mostly not getting stuff done. I did get pickups done at two different auctions. One was half household stuff, the other half stuff for my non-prepping hobby, the other was all household. Got a tiny little dog life jacket for the new little guy. Fits him, and is even a bit big. He doesn’t like it at all, but if we ever find some lake property, we’ll need it. Got some pink safety glasses for the girls in my wife’s troops. If they’re gonna do woodworking with saws, hammers, and screwguns, they need safety gear. Got some small sized gloves for them too.

I did not get daughter two signed up for a day at the rock climbing gym today, but will get her in for tomorrow. She likes the gym and they had lots of day camps there the summer before wuflu. I will try to send the puppy to day care too. That should break me loose to actually do some work. And I REALLY need to get some auction stuff ready.

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Meanwhile, I think I’m starting to see the shape of the rest of the summer. The Dems in DC are establishing offices in other states for the DC police. Federal police force expansion cued up in 3, 2, 1 …

Chicago will ask for fedgov police or troops as the murders and lawlessness continue to get worse. They already have gangbangers trying to kill each other in the street with ARs firing 3 rnd bursts from 100 rnd Beta mags in broad daylight. I watched the video with my own eyes. Cops are saying “F this noise” and leaving or retiring on the job.

If Chicago falls, NYFC will be the next to ask for help. Cops in NYC are doing the same thing as cops in Chicago and elsewhere. Ie, leaving.

Whoever DC sends will just be more targets for the ‘bangers and revolutionaries who are already targeting cops (at least 3 that I can think of off the top of my head before the triple shooting in Chicago this week.)

NYC and Chicago are already blaming legal gun owners, and the gun manufacturers for the “gun” violence. The word they should be using starts with a “g” but rhymes with “bang”, and not “fun”. They’ll try to crack down even harder on the people who traditionally have just shut up and taken it. Only I don’t think they will this time.

Which should lead to even more sportiness, which the pro agitators will be sure to take advantage of. Their cadre has been blooded now, cycled away from the ‘front’ to share their experiences, and to gear up for the next wave. They haven’t gone home to tend their gardens and make war no more. They’re waiting, organizing, and equipping for the next skirmish.

Then there is the question of outside interference. Some people are concerned that China has used the foreign exchange student programs to pre-position tens of thousands of troops here already. We have a failed narco state to our south, that can move drugs, people, and guns over our border with impunity. THEIR fifth columnists are fully emplaced, dispersed to every city and town in the US, ready to provide an organized force either directly or as harassers. They are savage and have an ideological framework based on the Reconquista, and La Raza movements. If and when they are unleashed, the streets will run with blood and cities will burn.

There are many forces at work, they sense the weakness. Some of them have worked to create the weakness for decades. They’re looking at the fat, bloated, drug- addled Elvis, and they’re ready to kill the King and divide up the kingdom. My only hope is that we’ve been getting ready too, and no matter how much family fights, they all turn on the outsider.

The economy isn’t going to survive something like that. Personal violence is going to go through the roof. The economic engine of the world will stop, and then the whole world is in a world of hurt.

The elephants are dancing. I hope all the mice have a nice little bolt hole ready to hide in. If they don’t, what’s stopping you? Get to stacking.

nick

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Fri. Feb. 26, 2021 – “Timber!”

Cool and wet.   Probably raining.   All we got yesterday was dew and a very light misty drizzle.  Which was actually fine with me, but it did play havoc with the OTHER drivers on the roads around Houston.

I did my pickups, got some great deals on household stuff, and a couple of minor things to add to the “resell” pile.   Daughter 2 was thrilled with a new rug for her room.  It’s very pink, and VERY fuzzy.  I got a new in box 100% goose down comforter for my bed.   It was a bit chilly for the light blanket I normally use during the recent cold snap.  Yes, I know, we’ll probably never have the same problem again, but getting a light down comforter has been on my list for a while. $12.50.  Who would say no to that?

Before I left on my errands, I found the dead rat in the attic.    The trap got him.  First time for everything I guess.   Washing and soaking the trap with bleach hasn’t gotten rid of the odor, so I think I’ll be making another.   I can’t imagine the rat dumb enough to enter the trap if it smells like death.

Today we’re supposed  to have the tree guy taking down our half rotten pecan in the back yard.   The house will be hotter this summer, the grass will not grow as well, but my garden should benefit.   The squirrels are going to be upset.  I say “supposed to” because I don’t know what he’ll want to do if it’s raining, and the national forecast is showing rain for us.

Lots of people online talking about the coming collapse of the financial bubble, and the coming conflict between city and rural, and a lot of other stuff.   Not many talking about what to do if they are right.  One without the other is just distraction at this point, as far as I’m concerned.  LOTS of distraction out there.  FOCUS on what you need to do to get through whatever is coming.    Don’t get distracted.   Monitor, yes.  Obsess, no.

Speaking of distraction, it didn’t take long to bomb Syria did it?

You need stuff, knowledge, friends.   Stack them deep.

 

n

 

 

 

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Mon. Oct. 12, 2020 – Columbus Day.

Hot and humid.  Because why not?

Happy Columbus Day.  Without whom we might still be serfs in Europe.  And because FYTW.

The air was saturated all day Sunday, to the point that water in the driveway didn’t dry.

I worked on little things all day.  Got ready for the roofers.  Did some stuff in the house to make my wife happier.   Did a little bit of stuff in the garage.  Set another rat trap for whatever is roaming my food shelves.  There was gnawing on a bucket overnight so the visitor is still coming.  Nothing in the glue traps, so I moved them around a bit.  I’ll add more if the problem doesn’t resolve itself in a day or two.  I may add more anyway.

Spent an hour in the pool with the family.  It was a good day.

I’m starting to see stuff online that is adding to my concerns about the insurgency.  People are noticing and identifying the Command and Control structure for the socialists driving the protests and riots.  Well, not the structure, but that there is one.  Things are starting to show up in the live streams, and during the incidents that are clear indicators to people who know what to look for.   There is an organization at work.   They are training.  They are supplying.  They are escalating.  They are exploring tactics.   The latest incident is the “security guard” shooting a ‘patriot’ protester in the face and killing him.

There is evidence that the security guard/ bodyguard is more than he seems, or at least a fellow traveler.   There is some video that looks suspiciously like the event was instigated and controlled and provoked.  What happens with the guy next should be revelatory.  Spicy times are here for some people and in some places.  Don’t be there applies.

What would your life look like if your movements were constrained by real, well considered fear/concern over being physically attacked in public if you just happened to be in the wrong place?  The baying mob can make your supermarket a no-go zone.  Or your bank.  Or the mall where your kid works.  Or your block.  What if they decide your day care or private school has too much ‘privilege’ and mobs it?  Can’t happen?  There are places where the private school kids don’t wear uniforms anymore because it marks them for kidnapping.  There are places where having a sticker for your kids’ school on your vehicle can set you up for all sorts of bad things.

Do you have a company parking sticker or hang tag on your vehicle?  Does your neighborhood have parking stickers?  Do you have a school or team sticker on your car?  What about your license plate trim ring?  A school sign in your yard?  Any political slogans?  Vanity plates that are easy to remember?  How easy would it be to dox you from a picture of you or your car?  There are people on the right making note of campaign signs in people’s yards, I’m certain the left is doing so too.

I don’t want to believe that is the direction we’re headed, but I see escalation wherever I look.  We all know the end state of marxist/socialist government- people kneeling next to an open grave.  As I pointed out at dinner to my kids, it has happened within living memory and on this planet.  100 Million dead.  There are wealthy and powerful forces at work here trying it again.

Yes, resist.  No, don’t stick out.  The best partisan is the guy no one would ever suspect.  It may come to that.  I hope not, but because hope isn’t a strategy, I’ll keep working to improve my situation, and to keep stacking.

nick

 

added- note too that whenever there is an incident like this now, someone finds the pics that link X person to other protests, other gatherings.  Often it’s their own social media that provides the link.  The cops and three letter agencies are using social media as the world’s most pervasive intelligence gathering tool, even our locals mention it on the scanner.   Don’t feed the beast.  And don’t be complacent.  If your smartphone, vizio tv, or alexa can hear you talk about vacations and you start to see targeted ads, it can certainly hear political speech too.  Is anyone doing that today?  Will they be in 6 months?  6 years?  The recordings never go away.

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Sun. Oct.11, 2020 – 2020 11 10 10 11 2020 11 10 10 11 2020

Maybe a bit cooler?  It would be nice.

Despite the overcast, yesterday stayed hot and stuffy all day.

I got a laundry list of small things done, and I’m going to take the ‘baby steps’ are still steps award.

Other than taking down my 40m dipole wire antenna, very little involved preps.  Oh, I had a can of mango explode, and another bulging.  I cleaned up that mess, and washed out the bin, and the cans.  Used another can to make cobbler for dessert.  I like mango cobbler better than peach so I stock mango.

While cleaning up that mess, I found some mouse droppings and a 2/3’s empty peanut butter jar.  Another jar was gnawed and open.  F me.   Set some glue traps in the shelves.  Cleaned up the mess.  Putting the cans (everything really) in shallow lidded bins payed off.  The mold from the exploding can only affected the one bin.   All the other food was untouched by mice except the aging peanut butter that wasn’t in a bin.  Given enough time, the peanut oil seems to migrate through the plastic jar, and I’m sure that was an attractant. The cans that failed were the ‘pop top’ style and the top did indeed POP.  It couldn’t be rats because my colony of rats learned that peanut butter = death, and they wouldn’t touch the stuff.  Time to refresh the poison bait boxes too.

I did manage to go through a couple of boxes in the garage that I haven’t opened in a while.  Moved some of the contents to the trash, some to the ebay pile, some to the local auction pile, and some to the ‘hamfest’ pile.  I really hope we can have our hamfest in March.  My non-prepping hobby club is planning a meeting next Saturday in a much larger space than we used to use.  I intend to attend.    I’ve got no problem masking and staying masked, most of the guys are older than me.  Funny, my ham radio meetings are that way too.  My part of the hamfest is the swapmeet and that is all outside anyway.

My plan for today is the same as always.  We’ll see how the plan does against reality.   Keep stacking.

nick

 

 

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Sun. Feb. 16, 2020 – got a few things done, SO MUCH more to do

Cool and slightly drier than most days.

Nice day yesterday, although it did get cloudy and overcast in the afternoon. Wife got some yard work done. I got some yard work done. I did a little ebay and storage reorganizing, and packed an item for shipment. I met with a buyer for a hand delivery on some speakers. Saved me the effort of packing them well. He was on time too, which was nice.

I’ve got ONE thin little stalk of asparagus poking up. The broccoli I planted ran directly to flower. The limes are heavy with flower buds. Peach still hasn’t quite budded. I’m still getting some peppers from the two year old plants but will get some new ones in the ground soon. I cleaned out (well, started) some of my fence “window boxes” and will get some root veg in there ASAP. Turnips, radishes, and beets are all on the calendar this week and next as a good time to plant.

I spent some time cleaning leaves out of the area around the garage and fence, and the driveway. I’ve been working on it for a week or more. It should help get rid of some of the damp, and maybe help with the critters too.

I bought a couple of rat trap poison feeders, and put one in the driveway, and one in the attic. I re-baited another. Something has been eating the bait in the attic, mice probably, and the dead rat on the lawn says that there are still rats here somewhere. Even if they’re not eating my preps, I don’t want them around.

Rats, garbage, and sanitation issues are problems in quarantined china. Pics show people throwing trash and worse out their windows into shared courtyards. If you haven’t already learned from my saga, get some traps and poison so you’ll have it on hand when needed.

The virus is spreading and turning up in new places. The chinese continue to crack down harder- as that’s what oppressive governments do. Gotta stop the trucks from moving, even if it means dumping food on the ground while people go hungry. Gotta keep people from gathering, even if it means wrestling with them hand to hand.

Prepare for the virus to get loose here, and celebrate when it doesn’t. Prepare for the economy to tank due to the loss of China and chinese goods. Maybe we’ll dodge the effects, but I don’t think so.

I know what I’m doing. I hope you guys do too.

nick

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Fri. May 11, 2018 – again?

72F and humid, but clear skies. Should be another hot sweaty day here in Houston.

Friday again. More school activities. More stuff to do around the house. More, more, more…

This week I ordered (and received some) parts to rebuild the Portacool cooler I pulled from the trash. It should help me work outside in the heat, so I’m calling that a prep. It’s the reciprocal of making sure you have heat in the winter for those of us in a warm climate.

I think I won this round with the caterpillars that would eat my grape vines. I’ll keep an eye on them. Not sure what to do if you don’t have the right pest control. Soapy water and picking them off by hand seem to be the recommendation. Growing food takes a lot of time and effort if you don’t have access to modern tools. There’s a reason farm employment is down to like 1% of the population here.

The rats continue to make their presence known. I’m VERY reluctant to re-establish my shelves of food while I know there are some around. So the food sits in big black bins in stacks in the driveway. Even though it’s not as much food as I’d like, it still takes up more space than you’d think, stacked in the driveway. It’s also more difficult to USE the food when it’s in random stacked bins.

What have I learned from the rats? For canned food, a simple sheet of cardboard on top of the flat of cans would have kept the rat ‘debris’ off the can tops.

For boxed food, I’m not buying any more unless the contents are in plastic bags. The packaging can get ‘wet’ or otherwise damaged, and the food stays usable. Cheap pasta seems to be the biggest issue, with the pasta just in the treated cardboard.

For cases of plastic containers, like fruit cups, rotation is key. The damnable rats ate into the case from the rear, ate out the contents, and I never saw an indication… but when I went to pick up the case, it was nothing but an empty box, filled with empty cups and ‘debris’.

Rats are smart, adaptable, and seem to communicate. You probably won’t be able to get them with the same trick twice. This means lots of different control strategies.

Be aggressive in your response. I was tepid, let them get established, and they ate some very expensive food (and a ton of cheap food too). I’m still fighting them. They will eat your cooking oil, flavor packets, sauce mixes, shelf stable, pouch meals, boxed food, and anything else they can get their teeth through. They will ruin you cans if it goes on too long, even if they can’t eat them. Man up and KILL the little thieves.

So, what have you done or learned this week?

n

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