the animal's journal

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theanimal
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Re: the animal's journal

Post by theanimal »

@FC- Thanks! Good to hear about your experience. I think like you said it's just a matter of making it routine and more of a normal thing.

@sky- Port Townsend looks really cool. There is a wooden boat festival in the fall and what appears to be a strong culture of artists. Not to mention the surrounding natural features. A lot going on for a town with only 10k residents. It's in a rain shadow too so it only ends up getting ~13 inches of precip each year, while nearly everywhere else on the Olympic Peninsula is 7-8x that. It was on the ERE Cities list and I think Jacob was looking at it seriously for a while.

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Seppia
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Re: the animal's journal

Post by Seppia »

Great stuff as usual!
Happy you’re enjoying the tomatoes. Caputo is an excellent choice for flour, however if you can find it this is considered to be the very best by many:
https://pizzastories.le5stagioni.it/en/ ... letana-red
Only for restaurants like Alta Cucina but worth the hunting.
Let me know if you need any help!
(Writing also here as maybe others can also find the info useful)

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Ego
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Re: the animal's journal

Post by Ego »

theanimal wrote:
Mon Aug 01, 2022 2:06 pm
The plan now is to take it and head south after things settle down and stabilize with baby animal (ideally 4-6 weeks but we’ll see how things go). We are planning to travel south through Canada then through MT, ID, WY to Utah, then eventually over to family in Chicago for the holidays. We are loosely planning on spending just over 2 months on the road, with about half of that around southern Utah and northern Arizona.
Newlyweds move into a scamper with a newborn for an enjoyable winter road trip through Alaska, Canada and the Northern Rockies. Nothing to see here. Totally normal.

This kid is destined to have the hide of a rhinoceros.
theanimal wrote:
Mon Aug 01, 2022 2:06 pm
It seems like we are going to be spending almost all, if not the entire winter, out of Alaska. I was accepted/put on the wait list for a 3-month intensive woodworking class at a woodworking school in Port Townsend, WA.
Another Animals plot twist. Living lives chock full of adventure.

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Re: the animal's journal

Post by theanimal »

Ego wrote:
Fri Aug 05, 2022 4:46 pm
Newlyweds move into a scamper with a newborn for an enjoyable winter road trip through Alaska, Canada and the Northern Rockies. Nothing to see here. Totally normal.

This kid is destined to have the hide of a rhinoceros.
Ha! I should note that it will be much colder if we just stay home. That's a perk of living in Alaska I guess, everyone else's winter is more like fall, spring or summer to us. In fact, when I first proposed the idea of the trip, Mrs. Animal was unsure about it. Not because of any conditions we'd face along the way or that it wouldn't be fun. But rather that baby animal would miss winter in AK and all the ensuing extreme cold/darkness that goes along with it, so she may be less tough later on as a result. It's statements like that how I know that Mrs. Animal is by far the best match for me. :lol:

-----

The school emailed late Thursday informing me I was accepted and offered me a spot in the course. I haven't told them anything yet but am planning on accepting.

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Re: the animal's journal

Post by AxelHeyst »

For some reason it never occurred to me that woodworking schools exist. Is it competitive to get into? What's the selection criteria? Geared towards producing professional woodworkers or amateurs or agnostic? Terribly expensive? Really looking forward to hearing about your experience there. The few small trainings I've taken (moto, wilderness first aid) were very enjoyable and I'm interested in more.

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Re: the animal's journal

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AxelHeyst wrote:
Wed Aug 10, 2022 8:42 am
For some reason it never occurred to me that woodworking schools exist. Is it competitive to get into? What's the selection criteria? Geared towards producing professional woodworkers or amateurs or agnostic? Terribly expensive? Really looking forward to hearing about your experience there. The few small trainings I've taken (moto, wilderness first aid) were very enjoyable and I'm interested in more.
It is a vocational school, so the ultimate goal is to train people to be skilled enough to do it for pay, whether that is one's own small woodworking business or another job in the field. This school in particular has three 3 month intensive wood working courses that build on each other with the goal of ending up with a well rounded skillset and understanding of hand tool woodworking, machine joinery and fine furniture design. From reading reviews, it seems like there's a mix of people who do it for amateur purposes to further their skillset and others who do it to advance their skills for job/career purposes. It's 9-5, 5 days/week for the 3 months. There are a max of 10 students per class with 2 instructors.

The application process was surprisingly very simple and outside personal info there were three questions.
1.Why are you interested in taking this 12 week intensive? What drew you to this course? What are you hoping to gain?
2. What else should we know about you? Share some fun stuff about yourself. What other experiences do you bring to the class?
3.[X School] values the dignity and diversity of all of our students. How would you contribute to a supportive classroom environment?

They aren't expecting essays, recommending 250-500 words for the first and up to 100 for the second. There was also a section to share photos or links to examples of things you have built before. There was no follow up interview, phone call or anything further. I applied a week after the regular enrollment period had closed and was told I was accepted and put on a waitlist about a week after applying. Another ~3 weeks later, I had been offered a spot.

It seems based on the process they are geared towards selecting people who have some woodworking base as well as evidence of completing projects and working on their own to solve problems and are interested in actively using the skills in the future. My understanding is that if you don't have any woodworking experience, the application process would be a little more involved, but wouldn't automatically rule you out and you would have to demonstrate examples of ways you've solved problems or things you've started on your own.

It is kind of expensive. $8400 for the 3 months. This seems to be about normal cost (if not slightly higher) for these types of programs from what I've seen elsewhere. This is the biggest downer for me and there is still part of my brain that is wondering if I'm being stupid by paying more than my current annual spending on this. Though in chatting with @mountainFrugal about this, he made the wise observation that optimizing for money is only deciding for one thing. There are scholarships, but primarily catered to those with low income and of diverse backgrounds. I think I saw for the scholarship that they wanted info about income from the past 2 years.

There are similar courses elsewhere in the country. Initially, I was looking
at this one in CA
prior to @mF suggesting this one. Some of the others combine all of their coursework into one longer course. The school in CA is 9 months long. As sky said, there is also a wooden boat building school in Pt. Townsend. I've also generally enjoyed courses I've taken so I am hoping that this one proves to be similar.

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mountainFrugal
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Re: the animal's journal

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The school in California is a REALLY good deal if you are a California resident (~$1200 tuition for 9 months). 9 months of 6 days a week time commitment though. There is generally less housing around Fort Bragg for a 9 month stint (could stay on forest land), but during the summer it gets harder with all the Nor Cal tourists. This could be the hidden cost of a longer stint in a relatively more expensive place. With out of state tuition and enrollment fees the 9 months comes out to ~12k. The focus is on cabinet making and furniture.

The Port Townsend school is more intensive in a lot of ways because you are making many more pieces in a 3 month period and they have additional weekend seminars that you can attend as an alumni that are much more specialized (e.g. Japanese hand tools, tiny homes, etc.). The school also has many people in the community that host attendees for cheap or allow RV hook-ups(pre-covid when I looked into this in depth).

To add a little more color to my point in my discussion with the @theanimal was only looking at the tuition cost (of either program) was not the perfect metric. If he was going to take either course and then never use the skills again, then it would not be worth it. However, I assume he would use the skills all the time and would likely get good enough to create cash yields from it, especially in a more rural place like Alaska where he can do more detailed woodworking of his own place, or sell pieces. The ROI for a specialist skills school like this is high for practical skills and small business potential. With instructors who have taught many students woodworking who are now working professionals in the field is a good indication that these types of programs deliver value outside of some sort of credential. I am not saying one cannot technically learn all this from Youtube, but if you have only basic skills, intensives can help level up very quickly. They also offer potential for developing relationships that could turn into longer term mentorships. These are very hard to replicate if doing the youtube only route.

edit: added tuition fees
Last edited by mountainFrugal on Wed Aug 10, 2022 1:13 pm, edited 3 times in total.

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Slevin
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Re: the animal's journal

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Entertainingly for the small size of these towns, both Port townsend and Fort Bragg are places I visit due to having friends / family in those towns. If I end up heading to Port Townsend early next year, you can be sure I'll be challenging you to a pizza bake off @theanimal. I also have a farming / tech friend couple up there I can connect you with if you are into tea / making delicious food.

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Re: the animal's journal

Post by jacob »

In my pre-Chicago "I want to go to" PNW exploration days, I looked seriously at that school, specifically the boat building school. (Pt Townsend also has an annual wooden boat festival.) I believe I found the exact course you're talking about and I'd declare myself to be self-taught to roughly that level although I've done 95% of my work in pine, not hardwoods, because I'm cheap that way.

However, learning it on my own (mostly from books, Chris Schwarz mainly) took years as it was more of a puzzle to be solved along the way. It was very much like climbing a tech-tree w/o knowing exactly what the tech tree looked like. Just one puzzle after the other. To give an example, it was 5 years before I made my first cabinet with mitered dovetails and ship lapped backing. You'll be doing something like that in three weeks! :o

I get the impression that the fine woodworking community is very much a field of nerds looking to work with their hands as well ... very much like the sentiment in the Soulcraft book, i.e. think tank analyst turned mechanic, postdoc turned knick-knack box maker, mechanical engineer turned clock maker. Neanderthals in particular are a special breed. Because of the time required, it's practically impossible to make a living this way outside haute pieces. With machine tools, you can knock off a cabinet in maybe 3 hours. After the machines are dialed in repeating that process 10 times is not going to take much more time. However, with handtools, you're looking at 30 hours and no matter how many cabinets, it's always 30 hours per unit with each unit being ever so slightly different.

There's some "cheating" going on in Neanderthal world. For example, it takes me about 15 minutes to square a board with a handplane these days. When I started, it took 4x longer. Traditionally, the master relegated squaring boards to the apprentice. It's grunt work. Often people will get it square with a powered planer ... and then finish with a hand plane. I dream about owning a planer. Yet, that's 50 pounds of tools + the expense of blades or the hassle of sharpening, so it remains a dream. OTOH, going primitive is very good exercise ;-) If you're ripping boards with a handsaw, it's about 600kcal/hour. It goes without saying that it's tough to turn that into an 8 hr per day practice: A 5000kcal/day performance is close to professional athletics. Yet, if that's your only option as an apprentice, you better do or die. Best account for the additional potatoes eaten.

The DIY approach also comes w/o the connections. After learning how to make snazzy stuff, I kinda lost interest and reverted to "good enough" approaches. I basically give my nice stuff away as gifts (I've sold one piece), but for myself I just do "good enough". I suppose it's a bit like a chef cooking fancy dinners at work but eating microwaved pizza at home.

I'm curious to see if the social/connective aspect would change that aspect for you. Seriously curious. Because insofar I'm ever getting into metal work, maybe I shouldn't apply the usual strategy of learning it myself. $8000 would be well spent for the fast-forward and the potential connections.

From an ERE perspective, the Normite (power tools) approach is tricky. ffj is mostly a Normite. Too bad his journal is gone. But for each powertool---you need some 5-7 of them---you're looking at 50-500 pounds for each piece of machinery; whereas a full Neanderthal workshop is <50lbs total.

PS: I still have your bow sitting in my basement. After you've finished the course, maybe you'd like to finish the bow :)

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Ego
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Re: the animal's journal

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theanimal wrote:
Wed Aug 10, 2022 11:34 am
This is the biggest downer for me and there is still part of my brain that is wondering if I'm being stupid by paying more than my current annual spending on this.
Once upon a time these were the skills a person would learn by helping their carpenter parent (Back in High School I worked for a carpenter friend who learned this way) or do an apprenticeship. Maybe there is an apprenticeship for this type of carpentry somewhere in the US (?) but it would be a long process and would likely involve lots more lugging than learning. If NOLS is any indication, you would get a ton out of those three months.

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Re: the animal's journal

Post by jacob »

Ego wrote:
Wed Aug 10, 2022 3:26 pm
Maybe there is an apprenticeship for this type of carpentry somewhere in the US (?) but it would be a long process and would likely involve lots more lugging than learning.
I think this really depends on whether the "master" needs to make a profit or not. If not, the people "in the know" tend to be more than happy---in fact overly happy---to recognize a fellow seeker and teach them all they know. The hard part is finding and connecting. Discovery.

"Lugging" can be attributed to both "proving that you're actually worthy of instruction" and "getting taken advantage off for cheap labor". It remains an unsolved problem to tell that difference and to make the appropriate connections.

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Re: the animal's journal

Post by mountainFrugal »

I learned the basics from my dad who was a trim/finish carpenter. He also did many fine woodworking projects, but never taught me any of that mainly because he was making stuff to sell/trade/gift and I would slow him down. haha. Outside of these specialized projects, he was pretty hardcore about the "good enough" attitude that Jacob mentioned, so I learned that as well. I will second Ego, you will be doing more Go-For type stuff than fine woodworking if you apprentice most places in the US.

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Ego
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Re: the animal's journal

Post by Ego »

I just thought of another possible option. Continuing education courses. We have several incredible programs here that are free except for a small materials fee. https://sdcce.edu/job-training/skilled-technical-trades

The plumber we use hires directly from this program and does not provide any additional training at all. Unfortunately there is not a carpentry program here but maybe some other city or state provides one. The continuing education welding program is much like a modern apprenticeship program and is funded by local ship builders. Is there a place where lots of carpenters are needed? Maybe they have something similar.

That said, I am not trying to talk you out of your current choice. Just spitballing.

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Re: the animal's journal

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mountainFrugal wrote:
Wed Aug 10, 2022 12:36 pm
The Port Townsend school is more intensive in a lot of ways because you are making many more pieces in a 3 month period and they have additional weekend seminars that you can attend as an alumni that are much more specialized (e.g. Japanese hand tools, tiny homes, etc.). The school also has many people in the community that host attendees for cheap or allow RV hook-ups(pre-covid when I looked into this in depth).
The school now also offers housing available on campus. $1000/mo for private room and $500/mo shared. There is a list of people in the community who offer housing to students as well, with prices generally ranging from $600-1000/mo. We are planning on staying in our Scamp at a nearby campground in town unless we discover a better option.
Slevin wrote:
Wed Aug 10, 2022 12:58 pm
If I end up heading to Port Townsend early next year, you can be sure I'll be challenging you to a pizza bake off @theanimal. I also have a farming / tech friend couple up there I can connect you with if you are into tea / making delicious food.
You're on! I'll be there from January-March. And thanks, I like food and tea, it'd be great to meet more people in the area.
jacob wrote:
Wed Aug 10, 2022 1:18 pm
Thanks for sharing. I figured from gleaning your posts that you have reached the equivalent level but I didn't know the total time involved. That makes a difference! My hesitation mainly stems from the idea that it's possible to do it myself more or less because I knew that you had done it. That said, I think it would end up being the same kind of thing that you ran into, lots of fumbling around in the dark and slow, incremental progress with plenty of uncertainty. The primitive side appeals to me much more than the machinist side. I'll have to see how that progresses throughout the course. Their next intensive course is a blend of both (machinist and hand tools), but like you I don't have much interest in having a large collection of heavy tools.
jacob wrote:
Wed Aug 10, 2022 1:18 pm
: I still have your bow sitting in my basement. After you've finished the course, maybe you'd like to finish the bow :)
Ha! I was wondering what ended up happening to that. I'll have to finish that, I still have the interest in making a wooden bow.
Ego wrote:
Wed Aug 10, 2022 3:26 pm
Maybe there is an apprenticeship for this type of carpentry somewhere in the US (?) but it would be a long process and would likely involve lots more lugging than learning. If NOLS is any indication, you would get a ton out of those three months.
The substack post you made in your journal the other day seems like the ideal scenario of the apprenticeship/mentor model. The guy started building a timber frame shed(?) without knowing anything and his neighbor happened to walk up, have a ton of experience timber framing and the desire to be a mentor. That seems really rare. I'm sure like @jacob suggested, there are plenty of people who would be interested in mentoring. Finding them is the tricky part. Maybe the continuing education route is another way to find those people. Thanks for sharing the resources, I'll look around and see what I can turn up.

I am looking forward to doing the course. Like NOLS, it's hard to see the benefits and opportunities beforehand that this will open up when it seems more like a black box from my current position. NOLS was certainly worth every penny, hopefully this is the same.

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Re: the animal's journal

Post by candide »

jacob wrote:
Wed Aug 10, 2022 1:18 pm
OTOH, going primitive is very good exercise ;-) If you're ripping boards with a handsaw, it's about 600kcal/hour.
I've always thought that the tired feeling I got from sawing was all in my head. Though I would take my breaks, I would through a lot of negative self talk about how weak I am. I would still take the breaks, since making things has always been a hobby I have pursued for pleasure since I have started it, but the exasperation with myself would still be there.

Related, only a few days ago I learned how to use a jigsaw properly. I thought the reason it bounced on me was because I was just not holding it strong enough, and that YouTubers who were working with a jigsaw and making nice things were just real men with real strength. I now know that the problem was I didn't understand that the cutting edge is the only real pivot point and that I was forcing the damn thing forward with too much pressure.

If you think all of this reflects on how I was raised, you would be correct.


@theanimal

Courtesy apology for hijacking your journal.

I think it is awesome -- like a hotdog! -- that you are going to acquire resilient skills (no grid needed) that will also be just beautiful. Pura vida, mi amigo.

I was walking today and had a stray thought that you are my higher WL role model. I try to think "what would theanimal do?"

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Re: the animal's journal

Post by DataLaborer »

Hey Animal,

I started following your thread 9 years ago when it started.

Just wanted to say I’m thankful you continued your thread all this time.

As someone who saw you 9 years ago and today (and little in-between), it’s mind blowing how far your skills have come. Also, it’s amazing at how mature you have become over the years.

One question I had catching up on your thread is: Are you planning to spend extended time outside of Alaska in sunnier locations each winter?

Your experiences have made Alaska seem almost like an Eden-like world in an increasingly confrontational world. However, I have heard the darkness of winter can drive people to depression. Thus, was wondering if you were planning to hack this by spending weeks each winter outside AK? Just noticed you have been going to California and Mexico in years past. If you can swing it, seems like a great strategy to enjoy the benefits of Alaska while minimizing the downside.

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Re: the animal's journal

Post by theanimal »

@Candide-No need to apologize. Thanks for the encouragement!
DataLaborer wrote:
Sat Aug 20, 2022 11:10 am
Thanks for following along and the kind words! You hit the nail on the head with both your statements. Alaska is more or less my personal Eden/utopia and the darkest periods are really hard mentally, everyone kind of lags from late Nov through mid January or so. But, the landscape really opens up during the winter with the snow and ice allowing for a lot more opportunities for easy travel via the plethora of trails via foot, bike or ski. There is lots of fun to be had. Since moving here full time, I haven't left the state for more than a month so this upcoming winter will be an interesting experiment in that regard. Mrs. Animal and I have things we'd like to do outside of the state that would pair nicely with the darkest periods of winter (living in Mexico for longer stints is one such example). As of now it's hard to say if it'll be an every year thing. We both really like Alaska and don't desire to live elsewhere full time. Recently, we have considered moving back to the Arctic. If we do that or move somewhere else more remote, I could see a barbell strategy, of living there for the bulk of the year and going elsewhere for the ~3 toughest months of the year, working out well

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Re: the animal's journal

Post by theanimal »

We escaped August with no frost, only 2 nights in the 30s. A boon for the garden. We actually have a decent crop this year and have harvested nearly all the sugar snap peas, turnips and rutabagas. Mrs. Animal went to work pickling about a third, I blanched some of the rutabagas, and the rest we have in dry storage. I am going to wait to harvest the potatoes until just before the first possible frost, which is nowhere to be seen on the near-term forecast. Other major remaining harvests will be carrots, beets, cabbage, kale and some late surging zucchinis. We are very happy with the progress this year and are well on our way to our goal of 80% own food production by 2026. This year we ended up using only ~70-75% of possible garden space due to things like crop failures and slow growth. Slightly lower if you include our experimental/marginal plants that didn’t produce but took up space (ie muskmelon, brussel sprouts, zuchinni, squash). This bolsters my mood for future years. After harvest, I will be placing biochar and our humanure on the beds (first round finally ready after one year sitting) and will call it a wrap for winter.

Image

Image

I have mostly finished up my work in my food forest for the year. I dug the swales out deeper, so they should be able to hold more snow melt and promote drier ground during late spring/early summer. I planted hundreds of blueberry and raspberry seeds from berries that I gathered from multiple spots locally. I picked from all different microclimates so I’m hopeful that I am well diversified with each berry. All positive on all the trees, the black walnuts took off more than I figured and I will be moving them so they don’t kill the rest of the trees/shrubs/berries.

Leveled up in some mechanical skills last month. I helped Mrs. Animal change the spark plugs on her car. Then I did the same on my own. I also replaced my brake pads and bled the lines, all things I hadn’t done before. I am now confident that I could replace the rotor as well. Mrs. Animal’s car is beyond the point of repair, so she is looking to sell it and we will finally move to a 1 car household. The auto market is very tight up here and used cars are still fetching a premium, so she will hopefully be able to come away with a decent amount.

Hardly any hunting last month. Most of the caribou are far from the road so I stayed home instead of going out on slim chances. DW had work for a few days in Denali last month so I tagged along and spent my time hiking and hunting down there while she was working. One day I went up and explored a ridgeline that usually has sheep. I saw lots of sign initially but couldn’t find any, despite glassing 4 major drainages. I eventually came across a band of a dozen ewes with maybe one ram. It didn’t look legal from the glasses but was hard to tell from so far away (~1 mi). I had a late start that day and they were much further than I had time for so I contented myself to watching them for a while before following the ridgeline back. Before I dropped down back into the valley, I took one last look to see what the sheep were doing. But where they had been, there was nothing but rock to be found. That was odd, so I dropped my pack, took out the binos again and started scanning, figuring either a wolf came by or they scurried behind some rocks. I scanned the slope until I came across 3 large bumbling grizzlies, a sow and 2 yearling cubs, moving along the slope no more than a few hundred yards from where I had last seen the sheep. I watched them ramble around the rocks for a while before they dropped out of sight on the ridge beyond.

Image
The sheep were on the lower slope of the mountain on the left side of this photo between the ridge in the center and the one off it's right side.

We continued our tradition of blueberry camp this year, heading up near the Arctic to pick blueberries and do some set net fishing on the Yukon River. Unfortunately, the Yukon salmon populations have more or less completely crashed the past 2 years due to years of overfishing/poor management, but there are still healthy populations of year-round species like pike, whitefish, grayling, arctic char and burbot. The water was higher than I anticipated, resulting in poor fishing, but we were still able to catch a large pike and a whitefish. Blueberries have been scant all throughout Interior Alaska this year. The place we go to is one of the (if not the) best places on the road system. The picking was far better than everywhere else, but still very slow and we left with only about a gallon of berries.

Image

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@Mountainfrugal, @Jin+Guice and I had a thought-provoking discussion on the idea of outsourcing when it came to services. On materials we agreed that the process was fairly straightforward, ideally engage in non-consumer tendencies, but if one is going to use complex things like a phone or iPad, it would be foolish to always DIY your own model. Using services, the equation becomes a little trickier. On an absolute basis, is it possible to justify eating out? What about things like skill workshops? We settled on the heuristic that a higher WL approaches outsourcing contextually and as a possible means of advancement for one’s web/skills/community. Outsourcing for a high WL individual is used infrequently and focuses on things that have more than one function and can serve as a springboard into more advanced skills, social connections or other intangible assets. Whereas the lower WL individual will outsource frequently, without much filtering and often without any advancement of one’s longer-term web goals.

This discussion made me think of how companies approach mergers/acquisitions and manage their balance sheet is more or less the same thinking (at least from my understanding). Typically, successful companies make sure they have a strong foundation of organic growth (skills) and a solid balance sheet (net worth) before trying to find companies to acquire for inorganic growth. Generally, companies operating from a strong position hope to use inorganic growth as a multiplier effect to improve their long-term aspects and ideally increase the company’s position in the market going forward. Companies that have a poor balance sheet , tumultuous operations, or pursue growth for the sake of growth (no skill/debt/inefficient to do tasks below hourly wage) but pursue acquisitions (eating out frequently, outsourcing services, consumer vacations, Uber rides everywhere) can work under ideal circumstances but often will overstretch the company. Overstretching can be a result of not focusing on core business (skills) and expanding too fast (living beyond your means) and under any stress or adversity (job loss, injury, unexpected bills/payments), the whole business (web) breaks and can come crashing down.

Along similar lines, I am coming to the conclusion that there is hardly a reason to buy material goods anymore. There is so much stuff that is just offered for free. We recently have been giving a pair of dressers and a custom-made porch swing by friends that were looking to be rid of them. A few months ago, I set up a notification so that I get an email every time something is posted in the Craigslist free section. Usually about 2-3 things a day. This way I am able to act quickly if there is something we could use and almost always I am the first to respond. I have seen all kinds of decent to high quality free furniture including most recently, a white oak piano and a handmade cherry wood bassinet with dovetails, that we obtained for baby animal. There are also the usual posts of free firewood as well as multiple sets of posts over the past couple months offering chickens and goats. But the ultimate was one a few weeks ago that offered three 800 lb black angus cows. Yes, for free! So it would appear that you could largely feed and heat yourself by the current offerings on the free market. Then there are the waste transfer stations which often have free clothes, books, and all other kinds of things that people throw away. It’s not California waste riches, but it’s not terrible either. It is amazing that you could live off the waste stream.

PFD Year-Month 8
Monthly Total-456.52
44% above goal
YTD 3393.5

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Re: the animal's journal

Post by MBBboy »

Interesting and thought provoking post, thanks for sharing! Our own adventures in homesteading are far less advanced, even though I'm on easy mode compared to you from a geographic perspective. We eat a bit from what we grow each week, but not nearly enough excess to consider storing.

The waste stream stuff was particularly interesting - experiencing some of this with our son just from a friends / family perspective. We get way more than we need, without asking, without even considering what strangers are giving away in our much more populated area. Did you know that there are electronic, handheld snot suckers for kids?! No need to use the FREE bulb thing the hospital gives you or the much more effective (but gross to think about) contraption where you get a tube thing and suck from one end of a hose (no worries, everything is captured in a container before you inhale it!)

Scott 2
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Joined: Sun Feb 12, 2012 10:34 pm

Re: the animal's journal

Post by Scott 2 »

Is it a waste stream? Or is it informal charity? At what point is camping FREE taking from those with no other option?

I gave a lot away while working. I knew there was value remaining. While capturing it wasn't worth my time, I also hoped to help someone in need.

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