Friday, February 15, 2008

Recipes for the Collapse, Part III. Right Livelihood


from freeacre

“Primitive people see time as a circle. Civilized people see it as a line. We are about to see it as an open plain where we can wander at will. History is broken. Go!” - Ran Prier

I was raised with an acute sense of “The Depression,” due to my father having lived through it, and never being able to separate himself from it. We would eat kidney bean soup, and he would hunch over his bowl and say, “It reminds me of The Depression.” He never got over the tragedy of his father selling vegetables on the corner after the crash, despite his having been a medical student in Italy. When he got older, my father was drafted into WWII, and then again, into the Korean War. It was a tale of diminished accomplishments and crushed dreams. I felt as though I had lived through it all with him.

And, if the reports of the collapse of the dollar, the credit meltdown, resource depletion, and Peak Everything are at all trustworthy, it would seem that a Depression is about to come around again. And, that’s without taking into account disasters like war, famine, or plagues, which are distinct possibilities for us as well. This tsunami of events may just sweep away much of the way life as we know it has been. Ultimately, that could be a good thing.

We have already addressed preparations for food and housing. Next is making a living. What is it going to take, when the pink slips begin to be handed out and the unemployment checks run dry? For many people who are unprepared, it is happening already. Just look around at “the homeless.” In our county, Deschutes, in Oregon, there are 600 children in the Bend-La Pine School System alone who have been identified as homeless. That is a staggering amount! Google “tent cities” and see what you get. Large cities and suburbs are beginning to be surrounded by people camped in tents and living in underpasses and vacant lots, or squatting in abandoned buildings. These are not simply drunks or “bums,” as we used to refer to them when I was a kid. These are veterans and families, young people and old who have been financially wiped out by jobs disappearing, or medical bills overwhelming them. Or, maybe it’s as simple as missing teeth that can’t be replaced because there is no money for dental work. Once you lose a tooth or two your chances of getting hired for work go down the tubes. So, when thinking about employment, factor in dental care. That would mean preventative measures such as not eating a lot of sugars, brushing with baking soda now and then, flossing, rinsing with peroxide periodically, treating irritated gums with garlic oil to cure infections and generally being diligent in taking care of your teeth.

What do you tell a young person today? When I was growing up, it was all about getting a college education. That was the ticket to success. Period. With the predatory credit industry combined with the coming collapse, now I am not so sure. It is still just as important as ever to get an education. That should be an on-going pursuit throughout one’s life, just because knowledgeable people are more interesting and their lives are usually less lame and more fun. But, a college education in order to gain employment may not be the ticket to ride that it once was. A two year associate degree with some experience in a field you want to work in is easily negotiated into a job that requires “a bachelor’s degree or the equivalent.” And, it’s a lot cheaper, unless you are a Pigmy or a Martian or some other preferred group that can get full ride Ivy League Scholarships. Going into debt for 30 thousand or 50 thousand dollars or more will only put you into debt servitude. At the rate we are going, debt servitude might end you up in some Halliburton Work Camp, indentured servitude, or the military in the near future.

So, unless you can afford to go to graduate school and get a masters degree or a doctorate, an associate degree may be enough to parlay into something you can live with. There are also alternative on-line degrees and company sponsored schools that can give one certification to do specific jobs and trades that will still be useful after all hell breaks loose. You may not get rich, but you won’t starve, either. As the numbing world of paper-shuffling “Dilberts” fades into the past, real productive and meaningful jobs have a chance to come to the forefront again. The more you know that can be applied toward either localized food production or alternative energy or maintenance and recycling of existing resources the better.

Recently, I asked a friend of ours, George Strickert, how he broke into the field of alternative energy. My son, Micah, is thinking about cultivating a sustainable career in alternative energy. This is George’s advise:

About 30 years ago, I adopted a mindset similar to Micah's and found a way to get into the wind energy business and made a career out of it. I used what I knew and did not take any special training at that point -- though I had finished college in Economics.

I attended a wind energy conference and befriended a fellow who was looking for a couple of employees at the Solar Energy Research Institute in Golden, Colorado. Applicants must have been scarce then, for he hired me, and I was able then to move around within the industry by meeting people and picking up the jargon of wind energy.

Micah might go on-line (maybe he has already) and consult the national associations in various renewable technologies such as:

American Wind Energy Association (AWEA) American Solar Energy Society(ASES)

Solar Energy Industries Association (SEIA) International Solar Energy Society (ISES)

and find out if:

1. They are having a conference soon and, if so, when, where and how much it costs.

2. They have a job openings posting.

3. They have a directory of industry members that can be purchased.

4. Other pertinent questions (some of which may be answered on their websites).

There is a great deal of interest in renewable energy, and there may be job openings in various companies or government agencies that have renewable energy programs. Once inside the industry, there are newsletters, conferences, directories, projects and other sources of information that become available to insiders. It may take patience and luck to end up where a person wants to be, but I found it fairly easy to bootstrap myself by being eager, listening to decision makers, showing up at key places and finding a mentor to guide me along. My jobs were my schools, and my fellow workers were my teachers.

I was not an engineer or a technician but rather I became a land person -- that is, someone who leased sites from farmers and ranchers for wind projects and also helped secure permits from various county Planning Departments. I was also briefly a project manager during construction, a low level manager in a wind turbine maintenance company, and I also was a small wind turbine dealer on my own for about a year. Most of the time, however, I worked (and later consulted) for large-scale project developers who needed hundreds of acres in windy places to install dozens and dozens of giant wind turbines.

Once Micah meets someone in a renewable energy company, he should ask questions and listen to find out what that person (or his/her company) needs most -- and then try to become that needed person.

Perhaps he already has a talent for computers or report writing or on-site security or doing work outdoors (such as installing and monitoring wind or solar measuring equipment) or something else that an energy company might need.

There are many aspects to the renewable energy field such as:

!. Technology invention, development and testing.

2. Equipment sales

3. Project development

a. Energy resource measurement

b. Land leasing or purchasing

c. Energy contract negotiation

d. Legal and financial work

e. Equipment purchasing

f. Project construction

g. Project operation and maintenance

4. Industry promotion

5. Government regulation and support

6. Etc.

The 3 aspects of wind energy that most appealed to me were:

1. The whole field was intrinsically interesting to me -- and my friends and family (and some girls) were "wowed" by me knowing about it.

2. It promised to pay well -- I wasn't going to become a millionaire, but I managed to earn a good living -- and have a good travel expense account. I travelled abroad a great deal and worked in all the western states in the US. There were risks and long shots, but I managed to survive and do well.

3. It was certainly good for the planet -- I found myself "preaching" with genuine enthusiasm about no polluting emissions, abundant energy resources that were inexhaustible and not imported, American jobs in local communities, increase in local tax revenues without a commensurate demand for additional local services, support for the electric vehicle industry, growth of a new industry for kids in school to aspire to -- and so on. I got so carried away that I gave slide shows at civic luncheons and in schools as part of a promotion for the industry.”

I am so grateful to George for having taken the time to share his experience and wisdom. I think they can be applied to any form of sustainable energy – whether wind, solar, geo-thermal, or whatever.

Another factor that I think we should all keep in mind is what we find genuinely pleasurable to do. What we take pleasure in is actually a really sophisticated indicator of what to do sometimes. We just “forgot” about that while we were funneled into secretarial courses or the business school brain trust. Wisdom is not just held in your head. It gets diffused throughout your whole body. Being aware of how you feel while working different jobs may give you better information that you would get from a career counselor. Do you like to fix things? Do you enjoy working with plants or animals? How about making cheese, baking bread, or brewing beer?

All sorts of artisan skills and productive work will be needed as the financial and “service” economy bites the big one. The more versatile you are, the more valuable you will be to someone who has a home to share or a piece of land to work, or to the community as a whole.

As school systems that rely on huge central schools that require miles of bus lines are dismantled due to prohibitive gasoline costs, teachers will be needed for smaller groups of people. Teaching jobs might come with a home included as they did during the turn of the century out West. Naturopathic, homeopathic, and alternative medicines of several sorts may become more and more viable as a reaction against Big Pharma. Nurse Practitioners will be ever more valuable.

Some people may be tempted go all Mad Max and form gangs of looters and thieves. This would be a huge error. I lived in Jamaica in the 80’s, where I saw impoverished people denied the ability to put together anything at all that would allow them to get ahead. Every time someone would raise a couple of goats or cultivate some vegetables, they would be stolen by bands of thieves. It was a heartbreak that kept everyone poor.

As the financial and physical infrastructures deteriorate, traditional jobs will evaporate. We aren’t going to need so many valets, manicurists, travel agents, retail workers, truck drivers, social workers, and other employees in industries dependent on cheap oil, transportation, or big government. But, the potential for creating more fulfilling, sustaining, and meaningful work is there for those who have the flexibility and talent to let go of what is failing and embrace a future that is more in harmony with the new tune in the wind now only dimly perceived. This time, let’s dance with the earth, not stomp all over it.

34 comments:

Anonymous said...

From Belgium,

It seems to me that a fundamental problem of discussing things like this is that nobody knows what the collapse will look like until it actually happens. Up till then we can only speculate. It is likely though that a feature of collapse is that major infrastructure will cease to exist or exist in a very much more elementary form than it does now. If it turns out that a militia state is the way it goes then the only options I can see are resistance, compliance or flight. Ignoring the problem will only give temporary respite and after that the results are predictable.

If we assume that the majority of the population will escape major direct control, then cities will gradually become less inhabited or they will be abandoned quickly when food and water run out. Remember that even after Katrina, New Orleans was not cut off from the outside world. The fact that those who were in a position to do something to alleviate that situation looked at their shoes and kicked stones, only delayed a gradual bettering of the situation. This may not be possible after a widespread collapse. Local communities, in an attempt to become self sufficient will probably divide skills and those who can take part will do so to the level of the abilities that they have. We will probably see the return of the lookout or vigilante to protect the provisions and crops from marauders. Foreign oil suppliers, foreseeing that they will not be paid, and not being altruistic towards the bald eagle will withdraw their supply line. At an optimistic guess, this will leave energy needs at about 20% of present levels and guess who will have first call on these. I cannot say for sure but I do not foresee the lights in the White House being rationed out; your house maybe. The grid will probably largely fall into disuse and be replaced by very small local facilities used initially to top up on local outages, then gradually as a primary source. The Super American Highway will be a white elephant. What energy is available will most likely used to power the railways. A 200 car train takes less energy to keep going than 200 trucks. Towns, so much as they are will probably exist as distribution centres in a similar way to the cattle towns of the 18 century. I cannot imagine the Tesla stuff becoming available to the common citizenry. For one thing they may start using it against those they take exception to and that eventuality is unlikely to be in the big plan. On that subject, remember that nothing, no matter how haphazard it seems, happens without a reason.

Knowledge will always be important, once it is lost it is immensely difficult to rediscover. It was not until the advent of the computer age that we managed to figure out what Stonehenge was all about. Energy will also be important, for one thing we have got used to having it. Not only that, those in control WILL want you to have a working television set in every village if not in every home. If industry of any sort manages to keep going it will be making energy generators for between 20 – 200 people. Do you remember not too many years ago when IBM were knocking out mainframes and chuckling down their sleeves at these silly PC toys.

It would be hoped that this knowledge can be used to learn lessons from the past. That Huey Long’s dream of sharing the wealth can be realised and that the manager of the distribution centre does not rise above the guy tilling the soil. It will take considerable hard work to keep that eventuality out of the plan.

Anonymous said...

Seems quite at the fire, so i guess its my chance to just flap up a storm,maybe folks are busy or it might be a time for inner reflection on the quality of our outer reflection,hummm.
Most good post freeacre,the way you write makes for easy access to this one to the pondering of new ideas,you know i was 'homeless' for many years as a matter of choice and never ever realized i was 'homeless.'some of the best years of my life actually,of course it was easy then,safeway dumpsters were heaven sent and living on a semi-clean river with the kids and watching them discover them selfs at play was both amusing and an education in itself.happy comes to mind even though now thinking about it it was not something sought after, it was just a nice carefree place to hang out without the fucked up stress filled lives of modern progessos being shoved in ones face, but alas that has all changed in a matter of only a few years to something that resembles death on a stick.
the rules as ultimatums which means 'come to an end' according to 'dick',are coming on so strong its a wonder we can even breath at this point.
nice going humans, dumb asses.

on the home front the 'tooth'fairy has removed my front teeth to make way for artifical ones that will make me look like a movie star she says,hummm just can't wait for that one, autograph anyone? w'samftd? i ask ya. fucking tooth fairys, do i look like i just stepped out of san francisco or what? never realized it kept me from getting a job though freeacre, what in gods name would that have to do one with the other? man there are some huge gaps in my upholstery thats for damn sure. what to leave in what to throw out i guess.

sats, i see the things that you speak of as future as already in place but noticeable by only such as folks that frequent places similar to this one,'is there such a place?'humm.

population, as the big square thing that people are attracted to as flies to shit is in place and doing well i think. so pooped out brains are the order of the day and god help you if you think you can disconnect the tv. big fight i'm sure. and by the gods that is where god lives and gives up the truth,just ask almost anyone, they will tell you.

hey big story on why one should think twice about eating commercial meat, ugggggg! http://www.naturalnews.com/022666.html
if this does not make you puke i don't know what will



Basically it boils down to this: our food and drink industy is making billions poisoning us, The medical and pharma is making billions 'curing' us. The politicians are making billions for practicing genocide on us. Industry is making billions by creating an enviroment that is growing cancer in our bodies for the medical industry to 'treat' and prolong, more billions to be made here too. The mortuaries and funeral homes are making their billions by eliminating all traces of us after the politicians and lobbyists and special interests groups, industrial monopolists, food and drink consortiums, and the medical mafia who own and operate the FDA get their trillions for finishing the job of population control. In the meantime we the 'public' are dumb, fat and ignorant and accept everything we are told and rush headlong into our own oblivion like lemmings to the sea. What a great future we have created for us and our children. So, why not kick back, have a diet soda, a fat mac and fries followed by artificial chemically altered dessert then light up a smoke and take a chemical cocktail to lower your cholesterol and a upper to overcome your ED so you can have the prescribed amount of recreational sex. Then gobble down a couple of sleeping pills to get your 5 hrs of sleep so you can stagger out of bed to take your stimulants so you can drive your gas guzzler to a job you hate to make govt mandated minimum wage while you eat your chemically altered artificial lunch and try to make an appointment with a 'no child left behind educated medical practitioner' to write you some prescriptions for the pills that will probably kill you before they help you. After a day of mental stress from watching the economy fail and the stock market crash you can get drunk, beat your wife and take a sleeping pill to ease your misery and get another 4 hrs sleep.. Then you can get up and do it all over again. Have a great day. Don't forget to be thankful for all your blessings.

me and b are cracking up at this one, i never even knew she had a belly.
the other day i asked her why more people didn't have spirit guides to help them sort out things and she said that people actually do have guides but they are rather crude and mostly circumvent the "what is". i says what?,what do you mean? and she says you know , books, magazines,newspapers,radio,
computers and the most famous one is TV. these are the spirit guides of most people,these are the things that guide there spiritual nature. i said are you fucking with me? she says no its true. i says but its all man made bullshit and propaganda,she says yes but thats the way of it.
so i says,is it mostly a matter of just never hearing that there is such a thing as communing with the actual living presence of spirits own creation on a personal level? she says yes. i say that really sucks,she says yes it does.i says how about church and she winked and laughed, (she winks you know).
i went on to ask her now that her physical presence has become a dream spirit if she could remanifest in a physical form and she laughed at that one too, yes she said, and i could take on any form i chose to take, i says would i know you,? of course she says.
and more then that when you see the eagle in the sky just watch it dip its wings and you will know that i am there because the holy spirit is one in all things and what you have connected with is simply one aspect of that which you call creation. it is a form you can comprehend and can help you with your longing to understand your own nature and therefore the nature of all things. i say wow.
she goes on to say that the truth is reveled through the clarity of vision and that clarity is brought about by desire which is triggered by the original imprint of and by your creator so that one day your return to that "which is" might manifest.
and la t da, there you go, i sink into happy sweetness as the lights go out and the gathering moon slides below the horizon and feel that all is as it is.
until the next risin
aho
m&langosta

RAS said...

I think a lot depends on whether we have a fast crash or a slow crash. If it's the latter, then most people will have to keep one foot in both worlds for a while. One of the problems with not going to college is what they call requirement creep -the education requirements for postions keep getting revised upwards. For instance, most places now require the secreatary to have a Bachelor's degree -and some require a Masters! There are places that want cabbies to have degrees. And if you don't have it, you want even be looked at; the computer software will screen you out before your application ever gets a person. I think the requirements to get a job are going to get more and more stringent in the next few years -leaving more and more people out in the cold. The real unemployment rate is all ready 12.5%, or therabouts. It will get worse.

MF, you have quite a way with words! I enjoy reading your posts.

Oh, and freeacre: re, your response at the end of the last thread: some people I have talked with since say that all the theatres around here do that now, and futhermore, most of these folks see it as normal -and ok. No, I'll not be going to see any more movies, that's certain!

Anonymous said...

From freeacre,

I agree, it's just about impossible to know how it is going to be - fast, slow, catastrophic, etc. Just have to be responsive to what is happening around you, I guess. Sort of like fishing.
Back in the 70's there was this wonderful little movie theater run by a delightful elderly Jewish couple, the Feinsteins. Mr. Feinstein would great everyone with a handshake and a free cup of coffee. Movies were a dollar, and they would even take my check to get in. After the movie, people were invited to hang around and discuss the film. It was very cool.
If I could figure out the logistics, I'd love to start a little movie theater like that here in our little town.

Anonymous said...

I agree that we need to move beyond the recent tradition of advocating a college education. If I were a youngster today I would not bother with it. As you point out, the debt that ensues from the exorbitant cost of college today is simply a path to debt servitude, without any guarantee of a worthwhile job.

The future is for people willing to "think outside the box" and invent their own job, whether it be as a farmer, an alternative energy inventor, an artist, or whatever.

I've been self-employed for decades and I love it. I'm now trying to think of something else to do other than the type of computer programming I have been doing, and it's kind of exciting. I feel like there are so many things one can do, especially if they have a sense of self-efficacy.

The other thing I seek to do is check out of the corrupt and dehumanizing system that we have today. I want no part of corporatism (fascism); I don't want to support the corrupt government with taxes (one can avoid taxes legally, by not trading their labor for money, for instance, or by not buying stuff). I haven't figured all this stuff out yet - it's a learning process. I long to associate with other like-minded people.

Dave

stoney13 said...

I'm afraid when the collapse hits a bunch of people are going to find themselves buried under the rubble! Well! Too bad!

Consider Joe Six-pack and his feckless spouse, Sally Saddlebags! Dig their horrifically spoiled and untalented progeny all named Jason and Jenifer! What the fuck do they offer humanity except a 98.6 degree heat source!

Tep, Joe, Sally, Jason, and Jenifer will go the way of the do-do! Robbed of their daily ration of deep-fried shit washed down with a cold bottle of toxic chemicals, floating in gayly-colored corbonated water, they will certainly starve to death! Unless they will blindly attack their neighbors in Suburbia in a wild frenzy of mutual murder, so profound that no writer could ever describe!

Nature can be a cold bitch when she has to be! If you're not fit to survive, then you won't! End of story!

Anonymous said...

From freeacre

Well, Dave, you came to the right place, in terms of communicating with others who share many of your thoughts. Around this cyber campfire, we pass a mental "talking stick" in the way of the American Indian, and just speak our truth from the heart. Sometimes we talk on the same subject, and sometimes we just say what we have to say. It's OK to have differing views, all are valued. So, feel free to express yourself, we listen. You'll find we have a unique gathering around this campfire.
Stoney, got any scuttlebutt on the underwater cables being sabotaged?

Anonymous said...

testing

stoney13 said...

Freeacre,


Scuttlebutt? Yep! That's ALL that's out there is scuttlebutt! I've never seen or heard the likes of it!

Every site I open has some kind of doomsday scenario about these cables getting whacked, and all sorts of unverifiable gobbledygook about who is doing the whackings, and why the whackings are being done!

Everybody from US submarines, to intelligent sea life seems to be getting the finger of blame pointed at them! It's either the foil hat people on meltdown, or the perfect information overload scenario!

So far I've read that the US Military is cutting cables to prevent Iran from calling for help when the Navy invades, and goes all the way to whales biting the cables in half because they fuck with their sonar.

I've read that there were anywhere from one, to five cables cut.

I found one site that said ghosts cut the cables, and another that said extra-terrestrials did the quick snip with unearthly technology!

None of this can be verified, of course, and the whole thing seems a little bizarre, since most telecommunications is satellite- based, and the extraterrestrials flew right past those satellite to cut cables under the ocean!

What we have here is either the government using information overload to turn the whole thing into a giant cluster fuck, (which I kinda doubt, because the government types don't have that kind of imagination), or a vast quantity of disturbed individuals acting vastly disturbed, (more likely!)!

I seriously doubt we will EVER find out what happened, because the water is so muddy with everybody stomping around looking for the magic kernel of truth nobody can see anything!

The "Secret Kennedy Files" they found in Texas, will give the conspiracy types something else to speculate about for a while, so maybe things will clear up a bit.

After that, it's time to drag out the old "Bullshit Detector" and run each scenario under it's all-seeing eye. Gotta be careful though! My Weird Shit O Meter overloaded last week and blew up in my hand when I was scanning the Huckabee campain! That shit REALLY stings too!!!

Anonymous said...

From rockpicker,

Fact of the matter is, war with Iran began end of January. Nobody knows, 'cause the press won't say it. What else can a reasonable person conclude?

Stoney, you read willthomasonline.net?

What's the real scoop on the satellite shoot-down? That fits in, but how?

Anonymous said...

Spitzbergen
will keep
our children's hope
alive. Deep
in rock and safe
from the viscious winds
of men, cowpeas
and maize sleep
modified dreams,
waiting.

Anonymous said...

ok here comes crazy, yesterday at 6:30 a.m exactly, (i looked at the clock just inside the kitchen) i was standing pissing off the back deck looking to the south west and behind the low lying mountains which are a short walk away to there base ,the sky lite up coming from behind the mountains up into the sky straight in front view and extending to the right and left to a degree of about 45 degrees!!! it lite up the sky like a gigantic lighting bolt but with no bolt, folks this freaked the living shit out of me, get this, there was no sound!! i mean it was just the other side of the mountain range, not far also get this,, there was not a cloud in the sky in any direction, totally clear except for the stars. it was more like a flash bulb going off,but bigger then any lighting storm i've ever saw in my life, and i've seen a bunch, i am still in a state of unbelief,because i have never in my life seen such an event.
i was not stoned, drunk (have not drank for almost a year) or on any type of meds. it was cold and clear and so was my head, folks this was straight out of the twilight zone, i told my good friend about it and realized that in the description it was useless because there are just no words to bring it home.goddamed freaky is all i can say about it.sure as hell wish someone else had seen it too, but the fact is is if i had not been standing there at just that exact moment i would not have seen it and being it was that time of day its going to be pure luck to run into anyone else that might have been witness to a once in a life time event of this nature, no sound, goddamn it, no sound and there had to be some sound for something as big as that. no trail coming down out of the sky and further more there is nothing on the other side of this ridge then some sparse houses and state forest,
anyone else heard of such a thing??? man this is straight out of E.T. thats for sure. maybe you can tell its really fucked with my mind and thats a real understatement,

rockpicker you are just down south did you happen to be outside yesterday at 6:30 a.m.?? and looking to the south west?

well thats the happenings here in western mountain, my mind is just going crazy trying to come up with something that makes sense and it just ain't working.

dave,you really came to the right place here my brother , your words pretty much sums up a bunch of the stuff that works at this campfire as near as i can tell, thinking out of the box is really at the top of list as far as i am concerned because the contents of the box so far for the most part wouldn't even make good fertilizer.
and you know what? it feels good to head down that trail just because of all the energy that becomes available, i mean its unlimited or at least seems to appear that way, and its going to take an uncluttered mind freeing itself from the manditory bullshit that most people find so amusing. also stoney is right as rainwater i think in regard to some of the people that are just to fucking inbred to realize whats going on, not to be mean about it but fuck its true, no judgement intended, i've been in such places and all those jokes about hillbillies and rednecks are closer to the truth then people actually realize i think,i mean it doesn't really mean anything as far as a person being a spark from the great spirit but in the real nature of things some are just plain to stupid at this point to realize whats going on for what ever reason. also have you ever wondered about whether it might be that in some circles it might actually be a tradition to appear retarded? i mean look at the way smart people are treated in schools as if there is something wrong with them, hell in my day they use to call them four eyes,geeks,freaks and other assorted put downs to prove what?? ras would know about that kind of stuff i think, she works in that field.
so anyway creative thinking if you can call it that, and sometimes i wonder if there is such a thing as creative thinking, or maybe its the suspension of thinking that brings creativity into being.
everyone here has probably beat there head against the wall more then once and finally just said fuck it and go do something else and at some point a solution will just pop into being, i know that happens to me a lot.

stoney, i loved your descriptive vision of some of the areas of the south and other places to for that matter, that a certain segment of society inhabit.
but some of those tobacco spitting rascals could shoot the eye out of a squirrel at fifty yards,man i seen um. so just another thing to consider i guess,

but its a little unsettling to see a 12 year old girl, barefooted,teeth rotted out and knocked up by her brother or cousin swinging from an old tractor tire in the front yard.
o fuck it we're all gods chillin i guess.

Anonymous Anonymous said...

Spitzbergen
will keep
our children's hope
alive. Deep
in rock and safe
from the viscious winds
of men, cowpeas
and maize sleep
modified dreams,
waiting.

February 19, 2008 9:51 PM

would love to see this place,why now? is this just one of the signs that its time to kiss our asses adios?
this comment rings of rockpicker. right?

the 148 million lbs.of recalled beef by the fda after it had been eaten by school children,other institutional places etc.? sweet, got to love this fucked up world.
watching a sick cow being tortured by a forklift? its in southern califorina at this site.

http://www.naturalnews.com/022666.html
peace and love
aho
mf

Anonymous said...

mf, rockpicker here.

Jeff Rense has had a story up for about a week about a cyclinder of light and a big explosion in Siberia. Video. I'm having trouble getting that site to respond right now. Open
http://www.rense.com/
and page down to strange event in the left column.

Also, there's a headline on Rense about a meteor being reported in Spokane. Haven't been able to read it yet.

Palooka's Revenge said...

ahhh shucks... you guys know its just swamp gas!! rear admiral told me so.

hummm... wonder why they call em real admirals... couldn't be because their assholes could it?

sorry... no intent to offend. but these military brass get up my ass. ha!!! ...maybe thats it!!!!

the pie monks call it space goat farts. now that i can buy!! i just wonder who lit the match.

Anonymous said...

Well, I think it's a good think to keep our attention on the skies today. We've got the shuttle landing, the eclipse of the moon, and the shooting down of the spy satellite...who knows what else could jump off. Good night for another space movie. We watched "Alien vs. Predator" last night. Just gettin' in the mood...

Anonymous said...

Hey, CNN (via rense.com) had some video taken from outside Spokane, WA of a HUGE fireball hitting the grownd. Looked pretty cool.

I hope it is ET, man. I'd like to ask 'em for a ride outta here -yeah, baby!!!

Later -

Dude

Anonymous said...

From Belgium

Mf Your stuff inspires me, too much to reply to now.

Dave, Welcome to the campfire. Draw up a squaw and sit in.
(Boy was that a sexist comment or what).

Hey, had a look at the event over Siberia and also the frame by frame vid of the one over Spokane. This was interesting because there are a couple of other events that show a similar phenomenon. As the roughly circular object is within a couple of frames of impact, an elongated torpedo of light suddenly extends vertically out of the top and bottom of the ‘fireball’. It lasts for two frames then it is gone. Two other internet videos I have seen show this same effect. The first is when the US fired a missile into the Tempel-1 comet to analyse its structure and the other was the frame by frame impact of the second WTC tower where for a fraction of a second light came from the tower towards the plane. The light over Siberia shows a longer lasting vertical light which is more intense towards the centre of the lozenge. I have no idea what this is but it is a characteristic we are becoming accustomed to seeing. Maybe it is an electrical disturbance which acts in a similar way to lightning. Did anybody else notice this?

Anonymous said...

Peggy Basinger, Kuna, Idaho

I live near Kuna, Idaho, which is near Boise. I saw a very bright light this morning while I was out doing farm chores. It was like as if a car had driven around near the barn and the headlights flashed if it had been turning around, but it was much much brighter.

Bernice Akaki, Snohomish, Wash.

I did see the meteor as I was driving to work on Highway 9 in Snohomish, Wash., around 5:29 this morning. What I saw to the east of me was a large ball of fire and then smoke trailing behind. It did not have any blue or green trailing behind and it looked like it was going to hit the ground as it appeared close to earth.

I am glad to know just where it came down as I was sure that it did not pass us through the atmosphere.

Steve, north Spokane

Big flash like strobe on camera that lit up the whole sky instead of just an area. Very, very quick. Wife and I both asked "What was that?" Guesses: transformer, flash from camera.

Don Hanlon, near Mead

Driving to work this morning at about 5:35 I saw a bright flash, a white ball with blue outline falling. It turned red and tailed off toward the ground and then disappeared. No sound. I was on Highway 395 driving south at Hatch Road near Mead. The object was to my right so it seemed to be toward Grand Coulee.

ok so i'm not nuts after all, get that white coat away from me before i bitch slap ya a big one!!
aho
mf

Palooka's Revenge said...

on a bit more serious note, the EU people use the comet flash seconds pre-impact to argue such phenom are elctrical discharges. i think they're right.

some form of that coulda been exactly what mf witnessed. the question is, what caused the discharge and why no sound? in the case of the comet it was the space craft. here we have atmosphere and it's charged. so's the earth. that there was no sound is stange since there was significant light discharge. shoulda been some boom one would think. but light desn't make a sound as it passes through earth's atmospher. or does it?

s of l was determined in a vacuum. its pretty dam sure by now that space isn't a vaccum. so i don't know what to do with that clusterf--k

on a similar note a coupla pretty interesting photos shot over dublin tex posted on linda moulton howe's site. scroll down to 2/22 and 2/14. is that a happy valentine's card?

also, symbols reported with a related story this morn.

and a story on the meteorite. likely to be follow up as the chasers go into action. m frags can bring big money....
http://www.meteoriteman.com/

interesting story how one way these guys work. its a mad dash to see who can get to the local bar first. put a stack of cash on the table and wait for the locals to come runnin with the goodies.

bot boyz say listen for earth rumblins to begin to mainfest.

RAS said...

All: you won't hear any sound from a meteroite until/unless it goes through the sound barrier and produces a sonic boom. Some people heard that right before it impacted in Washington.

It's really cool that you saw it, mf. I've never seen one that big. A lot of ancient cultures thought falling stars portended big events.

The city hall in the city whose 'burbs I live in (for now) has just implemented some new, rather draconian security procedures. I heard about them and shook my head in disgust. I'm turning into one of those people who goes around mumbling under my breath all the time in outrage. Only I'm not crazy -it just feels like it sometimes. Hopefully no one else will decide I am!

Palooka's Revenge said...

mf... here's something from blue feather and tara-sotu to put in yer pipe and smoke...

Frank.... I kept sensing & seeing ENERGY WAVES : I could feel an Energy Wave coming and then a few seconds later i could actually SEE the Energy Wave; It was huge and directly in front of me no matter which direction i was facing. It was like seeing a different dimention. The height was aprox six feet to 8 feet tall and the width was aprox 4 to 5 feet. The back ground color inside this port hole was milk white with different sprinkling of colors inside it: blue, green,rose, and several other shades of colors. The Energy Wave would appear and stay for about a full minute to 2 minutes in length. The outer shape was smooth and rounded, yet it was not a circle.

from Seal Beach, CA
***************************
frank's response...

Hi Bluefeather:

A strong MT Pulse was detected at 02:07 UTC. We should expect to see more of them while this settles into a seasonal pattern with increasing global seismic activity, and volcanic unrest for the near future.

**********************

HI FRANK :

RE: ENERGY WAVES = ATMOSPHERIC EARTHQUAKES

Energy Waves or Atmospheric Earthquakes come from the harmonic waves. Harmonic waves come from the earth and some are deep and some are shallow. Then there are UPPER ATMOSPHERIC EARTHQUAKES. The harmonic waves for upper atmospheric earthquakes come from the earth and goes upward into the atmosphere, some are strong and some have a thrust to them just like earthquakes do. These atmospheric earthquakes are most likely to increase starting next month of March 2008 due to the solar cycle #24. I see and feel & hear harmonic waves, energy waves, atmospheric earthquakes, earthquakes and volcanoes.

TARA-SOTU ( Earthquake Mary )
******************

franks response...

It just begining. I expect it's going to be much larger and longer in duration than last season was. Now the stronger earthquakes are going to become even more common as this progresses with remote MT trigger pulses in charge of stress across the entire circum Pacific's Ring of Fire.

http://www.geo-seismic-labs.org/GSL/gsl_live.htm

The energy pulse (MT) occurs on a semi-diurnal basis, or once each 12 hours. The timing for this remote MT trigger pulse is between 17:00 and 18:00 UTC, and again between 05:00 and 06:00 UTC. The convective currents coming from the Pacific Plate's Stress Center are now in much anticipated seasonal control of it.

The dangerous period has now approached us. The time to get prepared is extremely short. Watch the South Pacific, and you'll see it increasing each day.

***********************

so who's blue feather and tara-sotu? they're sensitives from jim berkland's syzygy site. specifically the forum. i keep much closer tabs on these weird folks now. the sensitives are havin a cow! they're always at it with an ear ringin or an elbow twitch or some such marker. but i've never seen them so prolific... http://www.syzygyjob.com//index.php?option=com_smf&Itemid=35

and who's frank?

one guy i watch is the enigmatic jack coles. but the one i watch most closely is frank condon, the self-proclaimed fault whisperer. the guy is GOOD. he's using off the shelf hardware to monitor ULF's, MT's, and infrasonic harmonics among other things. infrasonics is what some believe some animals use that makes them sensitives. if you wanna know what's going on in cal, and to a large extent around the world, watch the animals. and watch frank.

we reach a hand out in front of our face and touch nothing so we assume nothing's there. well, check this out...

Hello all:
As mentioned yesterday, a significant change was about to occur in the magnitude of global earthquakes, which is related to an increase in convective currents at the core-mantle boundary, within the Equatorial Pacific Plate's Stress Center located in Polynesia. The inference was made after the detection of a remote MT trigger pulse, which occurred between 05:00 and 06:00 UTC on 02/19/2008. The seasonal change in earthquake stress is being driven by the arrival of solar energetic particles at the core-mantle boundary along the magnetic equator, which also affects the Equatorial Electrojet, an ionospheric based current that travels along the magnetic equator, which is unattenuated and detectable at great distances across the Circum-Pacific's Ring of Fire.... Frank Condon


OK, EQ's happen all the time. its normal. and cyclical. with high activity periods and low. is there such a thing as a "normal" extreem of events? like a 500 year flood? dunno! but we may be about to see what one looks like within the next year.

Anonymous said...

We interrupt this program to bring you this special news bulletin:

The moon is up. Go look.

Now, back to your regularly scheduled programming.

-rp

Palooka's Revenge said...

annimation...

http://shadowandsubstance.com/

Anonymous said...

Hey, RP here.

There's an article on Jeff Rense right now from Ted Tweitmeyer about wierd anomolies with yesterday's sun-emitted x-rays. It's called 'Smoking Gun.' I can't get it to open now. Something to do with falsified data, or manipulation of sun's energy output, or something.

Anonymous said...

this has surfaced many times as something lost in this one and today a friend sent me this. some of the things that appear to me are from the depths with vague or very little meaning,maybe its just because these things interest me as to just what in the fuck happened to us, because deep down what we are has never made a goddamn lick of sense.
this is kind of something, i do not know.
mf

OUR REPTILIAN BRAIN
excerpts from "Children of the Matrix" by David Icke

Carlos Castaneda

Don Juan, the Mexican Yaqui Indian shaman, tells Carlos Castaneda the following:

"We have a predator that came from the depths of the cosmos and took over the rule of our lives. Human beings are its prisoners. The Predator is our lord and master. It has rendered us docile, helpless. If we want to protest, it suppresses our protest. If we want to act independently, it demands that we don't do so... I have been beating around the bush all this time, insinuating to you that something is holding us prisoner. Indeed we are held prisoner!

"This was an energetic fact for the sorcerers of ancient Mexico ... They took us over because we are food for them, and they squeeze us mercilessly because we are their sustenance. just as we rear chickens in chicken coops, the predators rear us in human coops, humaneros. Therefore, their food is always available to them."

"No, no, no, no," [Carlos replies] "This is absurd don Juan. What you're saying is something monstrous. It simply can't be true, for sorcerers or for average men, or for anyone."

"Why not?" don Juan asked calmly. "Why not? Because it infuriates you? ... You haven't heard all the claims yet. I want to appeal to your analytical mind. Think for a moment, and tell me how you would explain the contradictions between the intelligence of man the engineer and the stupidity of his systems of beliefs, or the stupidity of his contradictory behaviour. Sorcerers believe that the predators have given us our systems of belief, our ideas of good and evil, our social mores. They are the ones who set up our hopes and expectations and dreams of success or failure. They have given us covetousness, greed, and cowardice. It is the predators who make us complacent, routinary, and egomaniacal."

"'But how can they do this, don Juan? [Carlos] asked, somehow angered further by what [don Juan] was saying. "'Do they whisper all that in our ears while we are asleep?"

"'No, they don't do it that way. That's idiotic!" don Juan said, smiling. "They are infinitely more efficient and organized than that. In order to keep us obedient and meek and weak, the predators engaged themselves in a stupendous manoeuvre 

stupendous, of course, from the point of view of a fighting strategist. A horrendous manoeuvre from the point of view of those who suffer it. They gave us their mind! Do you hear me? The predators give us their mind, which becomes our mind. The predators' mind is baroque, contradictory, morose, filled with the fear of being discovered any minute now."

"I know that even though you have never suffered hunger... you have food anxiety, which is none other than the anxiety of the predator who fears that any moment now its manoeuvre is going to be uncovered and food is going to be denied. Through the mind, which, after all, is their mind, the predators inject into the lives of human beings whatever is convenient for them. And they ensure, in this manner, a degree of security to act as a buffer against their fear."

"The sorcerers of ancient Mexico were quite ill at ease with the idea of when [the predator] made its appearance on Earth. They reasoned that man must have been a complete being at one point, with stupendous insights, feats of awareness that are mythological legends nowadays. And then, everything seems to disappear, and we have now a sedated man. What I'm saying is that what we have against us is not a simple predator. It is very smart, and organized. It follows a methodical system to render us useless. Man, the magical being that he is destined to be, is no longer magical. He's an average piece of meat."

"There are no more dreams for man but the dreams of an animal who is being raised to become a piece of meat: trite, conventional, imbecilic."

Castaneda, 1998

an enormous amount of relief flooded over me when i read this, forewarned is the key it seems, bug just smiled when i read this to her. it may just all be bullshit but one thing that is indisputable is the fact that we humans have fucked up the most marvelous place in our known universe and treated it as a goddamn garbage dump,including our own bodies.
sw'samftd?

Anonymous said...

on a lighter note, watching the eclipse last night in the shivering cold was the most delicious treat, tried to take pictures but my lenses were just not good enough for that, but did any thoughts surface during the watching to anyone about the people,?
you know if it is ones intent many things are available to the mind i think, last night after gazing for awhile i got the distinct impression that the longer i gazed the more anxious i got that maybe the moon will just stay this way and not come back, so i watched and watched and the more i watched the more antsy i got and could actually feel the fear arising as from long ago when these events were not understood, maybe it was just the cold clear night, and not being dressed suitably, i do not know but as the light started to revel itself finally there was a distinct feeling of warm that arose from within and
a relief to the brain that all would be ok again, i mean to actually allow the experience of letting go of our current knowledge and experiencing this phenomenon directly,
i think we stand on the brink of something that will shatter all that has been, whether we desire it or not. and the funny part is this, there may be no way to prepare for such an event, how scary is that?
moon madness? maybe who knows,? not this one, not yet but soon i hope. the suspense is just intense.
peace and love brothers and sisters

mf&bug

ps a shooting star also passed over the moon while it was dark, anyone else see it?

Anonymous said...

from rockpicker,

Ooh. Another little synchronicity.

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20080221/
ap_on_re_eu/norway_arctic_earthquake

Anonymous said...

mf,
rp here.

I saw a drop of molten ore
fall from the lip
of a tipped pot of moon.

Anonymous said...

That's just perfect, RP. I loved it, too, but didn't have the words. Thanks.

Anonymous said...

i for one am glad our chickens are coming home to roast, i mean roost!
in the interim it is good that we find a little fun along the way, after all what are we but fiddlers smoking grass and watching the love gravitate along its chosen path,will the long goodbye be less then a kiss on the lips? of dew on the figment of imagination? and will we find the thing that we long for lying close to the bosom of night flying stars? and the occupant riders looking for a place to land?

w'samftd?
we are just so beautiful and laying on the beach of life gets easier and easier as the smoke filled days drift one into the other, and the little deer eating spilt sunflower seeds that the squawky mini chickens kick from the swinging feeders.
we are really truly one in the spirit.
aho
mt&b

Anonymous said...

damn, mf! wax on!

Palooka's Revenge said...

maybe that flash of light the other mornin lit up more'n the sky!

Anonymous said...

Palooka,

You got a count on all the volcanoes going off?

-rp

Anonymous said...

http://afterdowningstreet.org/
node/31257

I LOVE IT!!!


-rp