Also, Ed told me a story of a man he met at the Slabs, who has a RV that is so stealthy that it appears to be a contractor's step van, complete with ladders on the roof. But everything is not what it seems. In between the ladders on the roof rack there are solar panels, the small aluminum vents all along the top edge, fold up exposing windows. Everything is there for full timing and he parks almost anywhere level and is never bothered. He does this so he can stay in the cities as well as the rural areas.
He told Ed this story.
"Life is a bucket with many little holes in the bottom. You spend all your life trying to fill the bucket with money while it drains out all these little holes in the bottom. Most people try to adjust the tap so that they have enough flowing in to keep up, or almost enough, or just a bit more, but I, I have spent my whole life plugging the little holes in the bottom of the bucket. I have hardly any left!"

Just one more insane thought and I'm done. Rick was writing in response to the company that installs solar panels on your roof and you basically pay them for the electricity. He mentioned that they showed how much CO2 was removed, and gas saved, that in fact you could save the total fuel for 18 cars with this one system. Which got me to thinking, well then if us guys would shave all the women we love bald, that will elimate blow drying (1500 watts/12 equals, holy shit batman, 130 amps (roughly) at 12V, per woman per day. I bet that is a lot more than 18 cars worth of power. Just a thought. (do it while they're asleep). Bet there is a lot of good looking short hair after Peak Oil collapses our economy!

Sunday, December 31, 2006 5:21 PM

Almost New Year's Eve!!! I almost didn't get the cat hung out in time. Seriously, have you ever been doing something and thought to yourself, 'boy, I hope no one shows up while I'm doing this (not that, Tedd)?' Today was one of those days. I hung the cat up and then thought 'I just have to get a picture for the blog'. And then I thought, 'how will I explain it?' and then I realized -hey, it's New Year's eve, and they're probably drunk or stoned, in which case this is normal. So, I'm not going to explain this though there is a rational explanation, and no, the cat is not wet. Happy New Years all you FREE CHICKENS!

Sunday, December 31, 2006 12:40 PM
I'm working on petroglyphs and solar information promised for yesterday. Meanwhile if your clicking through you might want to look at this link: http://renu.citizenre.com/ I can see what TJ is thinking from a quick look and I want to see if you see the same thing. Rick, especially you should look at this - I have not read through to see if it is offered everywhere. More on this later - verryyy interesting. Ed Foster, a friend from last season in the desert, a co-computer nerd/guru who was a Citybuscafe regular found the Airstream and casa la blanca and stopped by to catch up - which we did for about three hours. More freechickens - I'm adding Ed to the mailing list and he used to be a serious Republikan - more coflict and opinions for my blog I'm hoping.
I forgot to put up a picture of my solar panel cleaning after the storm. Above on the left, I'm on the ladder and have cleaned one panel with a soft towel with windex. I would prefer to have sprayed them with a hose for a while to get most of the grit off, thus scratching the surface of the glass less. But in Q there is no pressurized water where I am so I would have had to had hauled it up to the roof in buckets. Not terribly safe. The second panel shows you how the water had dried on the panels and attracted the blowing dust. On the right, above, the same panel after I've cleaned it - gently, gently. Cleaning all five panels raised the output in that 5 minute period by 1.5 amps. Panels have to be pretty dirty - like above, to where you can't see the cells before they are greatly affected. It is best to mount them so that water runs off. Not a choice with my design, so they are horizontal.

Also, I've gotten some interesting feedback on the "appropriate technology" file, and I'm thinking how best to share it. Later on that, but what two people have basically asked for is a less philosophical approach to problem solving in a collapse or transition, and more of a "yes you can, and here is how" approach, starting with a box to put in your car with the tools and supplies needed for a couple of days stuck somewhere.

Saturday, December 30, 2006 9:40PM
It was a busy day full of squirrel-like activity. I am working on several projects at once and I will get the solar math, formulas up tomorrow, then show you a way just to do it in your head. What's he talking about? Looking at your electrical devices and determining how many amp-hours per day they use.
I got propane, 55 gallons of water (I used 50 gallons every 7 days on average).

I bought groceries, RO water which people down here in Q understand without thought or explanation, but my Oregonian chicklets who bath in stuff they would kill for down here wouldn't know that RO means reverse osmosis. There are machines on the street corners that dispense a gallon or five into your containers for 25 cents per gallon. I can drink the water I get at the LTVA but sometimes when I just want to chug the water, the RO water tastes better. Also today was a stop at 1010 W Main to deliver a gift to Scott for his help with my satellite switch yesterday. There I met Tom (Citybuscafe) who had just returned from Christmas vacation. Otis was nearby, having come out of the pizza stainless steel palace to work pizza dough in the middle of the driveway. Which brings us to two pictures for today!

Otis tosses PIZZA PIE!

Above: I walked by this with Scott yesterday, it is one of the vendors in his lot I think. I was trying to determine if it was originally a bus or what? Look at it for a moment and see if you can figure it out. It is homebuilt and quite ingenius. OK, time's up. It's an international flat bed truck with a fifth wheel trailer sitting on the frame of the truck. The fifth wheel trailer is mounted backwards with the overhang that usually gos over the bed of the towing truck stuck out the rear. Two large steel I-beams support the overhang and form the sides of a flat carrier for the owners motorcycles. The rear bedroom of the fifth wheel was cut to make a small overhead above the cab of the international. There is a lot of diamond plate on the rear and a paint job that ties the whole thing together. Wow. Left, Otis is an artist. I watched for about 2 minutes before walking over to get the picture. He never misses and some of the throws were much higher.

Saturday, December 30, 2006 10:11 AM
I had to share part of an email that came in regarding my essay last night on appropriate technology. He seems to have found the links on the aftershock section and have been reading various collapse scenarios. One thing Phil and I covered yesterday was that finally no matter what happens, we hope we can keep a sense of humor and appreciation for the absurd with what comes this way. Reader's Digest was right. Laughter is the best medicine.

This is yesterday at about 11am at Scott's Dustyfoot compound. It has been so long since I even considered moving to a new satellite that he offered to walk me through it (well I typed, he talked, OK OK, sometimes he typed too). There were enough little side trips in the setup, to say nothing of his call to Motosat in my behalf and using his clout to get me changed. We plugged in my modem, controller and wireless inside the bed of my truck (they usually live in my Airstream)- using that tiny old (1972) solar panel that you can just see on the canopy to the left, and the one battery system and my little inverter. Then we went and sat over by his bus in the shade and did all the work from there. Wireless is soooooo coool!!!

Here is a rig in the LTVA that has the most panels of any I have seen. Sorry for the quality of the picture, I shot with the little Fuji, no zoom, through the windshield of the truck. There are what appears to be 8 120 watt panels and a one 85 watt panel for a total of just over 60 amps per hour or an unbelievable (for me) 400 amp-hours on a normal Quartzsite winter day. I use less than 80 amp-hours per day at the "Compound." I wonder what they are using it for? Big screen TV? No satellite dish. I don't even see a TV satellite dish. Last night a blog reader asked me to walk through how to know what power a specific piece of electrical equipment uses - I'll do that this morning between tasks - check the solar page a little later.

Friday, December 29, 2006 9:52 PM
I have pictures of Scott at the back of my truck this morning. We switched my satellite dish to another satellite because me speeds were terrible They are great now!!! Yeah, thank you Scott! I'll have the few pictures I took today up tomorrow morning, the technology article took a chunk out of time! Talk to you tomorrow. It is sunny once again in the desert and the solar panels hummed in harmony all day. Power is good. mcnalan from the sonoran desert where all the bunnies are smart, but the coyotes unfortunately, above average.

Friday, December 29, 2006 9:26 PM
Stop being proud of yourself for what you own. Be proud of yourself for what you can do.

I've written an article on "appropriate technology" which is actually the ideas that we discussed this afternoon in a conversation between the preparedness expert and knapping genius, Phil Churchill. In writing and re-reading it - it sounds a little survival fruitcake to me too, but be assured neither I or Phil are really survivalists. We don't sit around wondering which size bullet makes the biggest hole or how to thrive while others die. We are simply concerned that many of our friends and loved ones will simple be unprepared, even mentally, for eventual emergencies and problems that will befall us in the next few years. Phil made the comment that most of the skills that we possess in our society are useless outside of our jobs and the mall (paraphrasing).

Appropriate technology, based on a discussion with Phil Churchill. What is appropriate technology? In the 70s when I was working to make my little twenty acre farm self-sufficient, it meant a tool sized correctly for the job, for the environment, with no more negative impact on the world than needed to get the result. So horse logging for thinning was appropriate technology. A Garden Way cart was better “appropriate” than a tractor pulled cart, and good hand tools were more “appropriate” than power tools if they fit the job and made the outcome the same. There was a feeling that appropriate technology meant that we loved mother earth more than the people who didn't consider the appropriateness of their choices. Looking back I believe we accomplished little, sad to say, perhaps a microsecond slow down of the empire building, planet eating machine. Our efforts were symbolic. In the uncertain future, where the economy collapses worldwide from any number of events, each more dire and gloomy than the last to recount (see aftershock links), appropriate technology will be something very different. With that in mind, when Phil Churchill showed up this afternoon out at the compound (1965 Safari Airstream, 1990 F250 with steel canopy and my canopy tent – more often known in these pages as La Casa Blanca), I felt it serendipitous to use that time to bat around the idea “appropriate technology” especially as it applied to the transition from the energy fat and sassy “now” to the, not so much fun collapse of our civilization. We spent about two hours and I will give you the short version of what passed through our thoughts and conversation. . . continued in the document below! You can download or view the Word document here.

Friday, December 29, 2006 7:27 AM
Good morning freechickens! I'm off with my satellite modem and controller to head to Dustyfoot (Scott) to have the satellite provider change my satellite. I have been getting slower and slower speeds, and it is likely that they have oversold the gateway or transponder I am on. I'm moving to a new and hopefully less crowded satellite. Also on the agenda for today is a piece I'm writing on appropriate technology - then and now with special reference to this group.
Also today will be trying to clean up from the storm that has been going on for 3 days. The solar panels will be covered with grunge (though they are still working fine), and La Casa Blanca is a mess. I hope your day is as much fun as mine. Talk to you from the new satellite later. (fingers crossed)

Thursday, December 28, 2006 3:02 PM
I'm putting up the Human manure book link - the composting of human manure and I think it is really mandatory reading. Whatever you think if it AFTER you read it, I'll be glad to discuss. But after you read it you'll see. We really have a weird view of our output function. No wonder why we feel separate from the planet! You'll find it here, linked in the future section, as changing our view of our own shit is just one of the fundamental changes that will soon be required.

TJ just mailed pictures of the $199.95 solar panels and the charge controller dissembled. You can click here to see where we are on the smallest solar (cheapest) emergency power project. One reader, Mike, brought up the point of having more complexity - more parts - as the trade off for cheaper, and that is true. If you click on the picture of the panels you'll see that they measure 3' by 3' assembed with an output of 45 watts. Panels that put out 85 watts are 3.5' by 1.2' (I'm approximate here - need to check). So these panels are very inefficient considering the amount of space they take up. However, the cost per watt comparison . . . continued on the small solar project page Late afternoon note: Honda is going to mass produce thin film solar panels beginning in 2007

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