We were gonna change the world...what happened?

yeah Bamboo,
I recall and couple years back when these gas prices started going nutz...the truckers would block traffic behind them and go about 30 mph down the interstates.

I say if you're in a populated area...mass transit is good. Bikes are great, feet rock.
If thats not possible...carpooling is a grand idea.

I run auctions and have to travel 30 miles round trip to ship paintings, we have in our auctions that we only ship once a week.
On that weekly trip we hit the post office, the grocery, the library,the local spring if our well is down and anything else we must.
If we forget anything we do without till next week.

We also heat with wood,I make what we need or grow it. If I must buy something I check thrift stores or yard sales if I can first.
We have a compost toilet, and dug our own well.
We have 2 garden areas and compost our waste, kitchen and yard waste for th food garden and poop waste for flower beds.
We bought rough cut lumber for our house and planed all interior trim and boards ourselves so we use the saw dust for our compost toilet.
We use kerosene lamps or candles when we are not doing anything that requires a stronger light.
Larry put in shop lights with flourescent bulbs in the kitchen and my studio. Other lights have small flourescent bulbs.
We also use solar panels, and have 6 batteries to store energy from them Larry built a generator from a car altenator when we first got out here for low light days.
We don't use the generator anymore, due to gas costs and he needed the altenator for the truck,,haha

He knows how to fix any and everything. He wired our house.
He has built tube amps and recording equipment for his studio....this kind of stuff is key, we feel...learning to fix and build things yourself.
The sons a bitches stay up at night while we're asleep coming up with more ways to get your money.

This is how we run our own revolution right here on our land.
We don't buy into the 'bigger, better,now-improved' bullshit that is constantly being thrown in our faces.
I do my best not to be part of this "throw away" society...
Now, if I could just find a good old wringer washer....

 

Just about ditto, except we never quite got to solar before we ran out of $. But our place is set up so that if the power goes out, which it does regularly, our only concern is the refridge. 'Course in the winter THAT'S not a problem! We've been as much as two weeks without electricity at a time and the only thing we really missed was the computer! And this coming from someone who lived without electric for years!!! Spoiled!!
We also invested in bicycles, so we could afford to go visiting more...
I think the thing that has helped me live pretty much beneath the systems notice for all these years is that so far, I have "owned" nothing on paper except a car or two. The less they think you have, the less interested they are in you. So far, I have managed to keep from paying any taxes, except the kind you pay on your car, and when you buy something at the store. Soon, that will end, as I'm about to officially "own" the land I live on once the will is settled... Guess it's time to either "grow up" or figure out a NEW way to not "own" the land... Anybody have any experience with this? Is there a "legal" way to actually own land without actually owning it on paper?

 

There may be a way to have a living trust...deed your land to a not-for-profit shin dig or church and stipulate that you work it,live on it, whatever for all the days of your natural life then it automatically revertes to them.

But of course there is the subject of land taxes....

We are buying our land from a friend of ours, we pay 167.00 amonth and the taxes.
Its on land contract. The land was all forrest, till we cleared a bit. We left up as many trees as possible around the house.

Our dream is to get a wind generator...there is an Amish community a few miles from here and they have a bulk food store where we get a few things, we shop then sit out in the parking lot and stare at the wind generator on top of the building...we look nutty...but its entertainment to us.

You can get used solar panels. i will try to dig up the name of the guy we have dealt with.
And you need deep cycle batteries, like what they use on golf carts and an inverter or 2..we bought ours at Target..I think they were about 35.00 each. The batteries were 54.00 each.
So it is an outlay of money.
Also there are alot of days that are very overcast here...thats where the generator comes in. To charge the batteries...and yes the fridge is a problem...the DC ones or even the propane ones are very expensive.
We did without electric for about 1 1/2 years when we came out here. They had to run lines out.
But I was so damn happy just to be back out in the woods with my sweetie that it just was paradise....I'd have lived in a cave if thats what it took...hahaha

 

You can set up a non-profit organization and donate the land to it, or you can get a couple of cows and claim it as farm/ranch land in order to get the tax relief.

Taxes! Now there is an issue. IRS reform and/or the elimination of the IRS altogether.

"What final price will I pay
For all my forgotten failures
How high will be the cost of my fleeting fantasies
Will I ever bleed enough
To quench those thirsty demons
What will be the final price exacted on my head

How long must I suffer life
As an indebted prisoner
I pay pay pay and still come up with a negative net worth
What you see is what you get, but I don't see a thing
Oh tell me why must I suffer life
With nothing to show for the blood I've sweat

When will the daily torment end
Trying to make ends meet
I get more calls from creditors than friends
And I'm sure the IRS has the CIA checking my FBI credit report
They're planning to freeze all my future assets
I won't be able to buy or sell, I refuse to take the mark of the beast

In God we trust on our dollar bills
Pledge of Allegiance and AA too
Hell, even the papacy needs a buck in the plate
Do you want some of my cash to
Give to Ceasar what is Ceasar's, go ahead take all I got
But tell my what will be the final price I will pay
When all that is owed is due?"

hehe, just thought I'd throw that in for effect.

 

I am kind of like some of the other folks here. I build everything from the ground up, from the concrete to the wireing...the whole schamoley. I built a green house out of caste of trampolines (big laugh from some) I used the 14' round kind, took the individual pieces and re-welded them together into half hoops. Worked great. Now I have a solarium on my out building using lexan panels that I use to grow vegies in the winter and it heats the building (a lot!!!) in the day time. I am going to try to build a south facing one on my house this spring and use passive ventilation to heat the house in the day time with that. I am also exploring the possibility of using the ground bamboo mulch to grow gourmet mushrooms. I already have more bamboo shoots in the spring than i can eat in a lifetime it seems like. There is little market for that in this part of the world however (kansas)

renewable, reusable, and think put of the box

 

Guns and dope,i can live that life any time i want,i just have to drive into L.A.Somalia would be another place.You just end up with gangs.Someone always wants the power.Washington didn't fight the Brits so we could have our freedom.He did it so he could have things his way.Guns only take away my freedom.They are just another material quest.They keep me "in my place"They're why i can't cross property lines,why we no longer have the voices of Dr. King and Bobby Kennedy.They're why people are afraid to speak in public and let their true feelings be known.All this said i do not advocate government forced disbanning.How would they do it put a gun to your head?No new ideas need to be advocated not the same old tried and failed ones.Maybe thats the problem with hippie.we are no longer new.GGGOOOOOOODmorning

 

We can't boycott gas,but we can boycott individual companies.One stick at a time.

 

To bring forth change, we must be the change..By example we must set a new attitude, a new and more developed approach to bring change about.
Our exsistance is taught us in theary and not realities. One being more excepted then the other. The Judge says NO, the People say Whoa. We came to be free in our beliefs.. where is our freedom.. The wires are being tapped as we speak, Who is accountable..There is no GOD, we evolved from Apes. Africa is diying while the money pours in, from our sweat and blood. WE pay too much, we barely have any left to provide for our families, as the money is taken from your check and you go in debt to survive. Lost children are ravaged in the brutelness of society, and the single parent cry without food for their table. More and more come, looking for the american pie, they came and they come with different tongues, casting glances of hatered as they spend their food stamps at the store we cannot afford to shop at. Waiting with our wallets open as we wait our turn in the doctors office, while the illegal ones wave their medicade cards at us, smirking. Taking all the jobs for cheaper pay that they send the money back to their families in other countries as they grow fat. What few dollars that may be left the Taxes gobble up at the end of the year, Where homes and lives were lost they build new and bigger casinos, Alcohol is legal Pot is not. Prices go up paychecks stay the same. Cars poulute and factories continue to distroy our water and air, Pharm Cos and Politics sleep in the same bed. The music has lost it's message of love and peace and is all about killing and sex. The Indains are wearing boots and cowboy hats and the white man is wearing beads and moccasins. Posted Keep out.. No Hunting, No Fishing, No Swimming. Save the Whales, Save the Rain Forest, Stop smoking, don't eat meat and don't drink the water from the faucet buy in in a bottle. Christmas is about Santa Claus, you can't pray in school or in public places. Take Jesus out of the bible, kill faith, kill hope and kill your neighbor.

Where would you like to start.
sh

 

The Farmland thing already done. We've also got a business license (or at least the farm does) 'cause this place is a legal CORPORATION. I am THE only shareholder. No one has ever quite explained to me how this works or why it was done, so I'm still figgurin' on this one... Got any ideas how this could be used to benifit us?

 

Some interesting ideas for alternative energy sources and conservation. I've thought about wind power since I live on a hill, if I could generate AC power and somehow synchronize it so I could pump it back into the grid, I could actually make money on it. I also signed up for an option with the power company where 100% of my electricity comes from green sources like wind and hydro, it's a little more expensive, but I like to support the cause, and if enough of us do, maybe the cost will come down to where it's competitive with "conventional" sources (though I doubt that'll happen, they'll probably artificially boost the price to keep fossil fuels in the loop if they don't already). Incinerating junk mail might be an option for heat if you could make it environmentally friendly, then you just actively seek out mailing lists, and you're set (I wonder what they do with that stuff after they pick it up in the recycling bin on the curb, that might be worse than burning it). Where I live in the Northeast wood is plentiful, I get crooked treelength stuff from a lumber mill that they can't use, but I agree that corn might be more feasible, or bamboo (that's interesting BTW), if the renewal rate is higher. Corn is also the major ingredient in bio-diesel, farmers have been using it for years in their equipment. I've heard the government actually pays farmers not to grow corn in this country, they claim it has something to do with trade, but I think there's more to it than that, like they don't want a feasible alternative to gasoline to emerge. Incidently, Diesel, the guy who invented the diesel engine, was assassinated, it seems the engine he designed was made to run on corn oil, and that didn't go over so well...

 

We're planning on instaling a windmill to generate power and bring up the water. We would then go all eletric and have free water too. That would solve a lot of issues as far as paying through the nose forever for water and energy. We have three houses on our property, plus a large coverted dairy barn and a couple of storage units. It would save us almost 7,000 a year on water and energy. I think it's worth the investment of a couple of thousand to do it. But of course we have to pay off our bank note before we can borrow the money to do it with.. sigh.. that will be another two years, unless we get lucky and win the lottery..

 

"Warning: All email may now be read by law enforcement agencies,
as NONE is PRIVATE since the passage of the USA/Patriot Act.
Remember the Miranda warnings:
You do not have to send email.
Anything you email may be used against you in a military tribunal.
You have the right to have an attorney present while composing email.
If you cannot afford a full-time attorney, you're fucked."

Copied from the Guns and Dope party site--

 

A newspaper I worked for tried to set up a not-for-profit 501 and had a hell of a time.


usually corporations are set up to protect your own assets.
If the corporation fails or goes into bankruptcy they cannot attach (lien) on your personnal assets.ie: home,car,bank accounts etc.
Creditors can only attach to the assets held by the corporation.

 

i ain't sceered a nutin'...ain't much can be dun to me that ain't already been did.Does u mean linked like Linc from mod squad?ouch

 

I must be a real putz because I still can't get the "quote" thing to work but anyway...Hey Mellow Yellow, the corn stoves cost around two grand and they are usually back ordered. The stoves burn more efficiently and cleanly than wood stoves and with corn around two dollars a bushel they are real cost effective. The burning food thing still bugs me, though but I guess termites probably have the same feeling when I burn wood. I think that I can rig the solarum that I plan on adding on my house to also pre-heat my water or use a seperate storage tank and use it for a hot water source. Regardless, I hope to heat water tanks in my basement to stretch the heat through the night. I am using the one that I built on my out building as a test bed for other ideas. What triggered all of this was when I built the green house I quickly discovered that on a sunny winter day I had to dump heat...and massive amounts of heat to keep my plants alive. I didn't even try to grow in it in the summer as it wasn't cost effective to COOL the thing.

 

and the bamboo thing...bamboo is the round peg in America's square hole. The plant has almost limitless possibilities and yet...

The first successful light bulb fillament was made of bamboo fiber. Eddison was a bamboo nut. The guy that invented Tobassco sauce was a bamboo nut. It is stronger than steel by weight, renews itself AGGERESSIVELY and America has never been able to get a good handle on it.
Oh yea, there was a bamboo commission during WWII to find replacements for it because the Asian sources for it had been overrun.
Now that that is out of my system I'll shut up and promise not to do it again.

 

bamboo, I have a BIG bamboo patch near my garden. BIG MISTAKE. I struggle every year to keep it far enough from the garden to not compete. We have a hidden "retreat" in the center of the patch with a winding tunnel-like path going to it. It is a whole different world in there. Something about the way the wind sighs thru and the crickets like to hang there. There is also a huge flock of birds that roosts in there at night. They'll sit and sing right before dark if it's gonna be a nice day the next day.
Do you know if there is a variety of bamboo that would work up in New York State? We still own the family farm up there and we were thinkin' about a living privacy fence between us and the conservative right-wing republican neighbors... We have the type of bamboo that only gets big enough around for fishing poles and bean poles. I know where there is a patch of the BIG bamboo that they make didgeridoos with too, but I wonder if either of those are hardy enough for New York in the snow belt?

 

yellow groove and nuda (types of bamboo). There are others but those are real common and easy to come by. both get 26-30 ft tall and 1 1/2-1 3/4 inches in diameter and both taste great if you like bamboo shoots in the spring.

If it rarely gets to -5F then you can look into Vivax or viridis. Both get huge but bottom out at about -5F for top kill. I currently keep thirty varities.

 

30 varieties??? And have they swallowed up your house yet? When I planted my 3 little starts a few years ago I had NO IDEA how they would take over... I want to start some of the larger variety here too, but not sure where to plant it where it will cause the least amount of trouble! I think I've got one of the cold hardy varieties... It stays green all winter, and the leaves turn brown in the early spring when we have our last few frosts. And the shoots are ADDICTIVE! Thanks for the info.

 

We had Bamboo growing at the house I lived in in Anahiem. It grew along the 6' back fence. We had a concrete patio that seperated the back yard into two yrads. The north yard was where the bamboo was. It grew over 6' and we dared not walk through the yard with out shoes on and I aint talkin' flip flops. Them little shoots comin' up outta the ground are as sharp as a sharks tooth and it smarts to step on one. The old shafts up against the fence were 3' around at the bottom and made great pipes and walking sitcks and man o man did they multiply.
My 2nd X made hundreds of pipes, lamps, walking sitcks and a few tables with the bamboo. Cliff made a bamboo walking stick with a machette inside, he use to walk the streets of Haight with. He pulled it on a dude on Haight St. in front of Diamond Lou's one sunny afternoon.
A few weeks before I had a run in with this dude and he raped me. Cliff was gonna kill him right there on Haight St. in broad daylight. I was FREAKING OUT.. I did not want Cliff to go to prison for murder, altho I wouldn't have minded too much if the dude died right then. I pulled Cliff away begging him not to whack the dudes head off and dragged him around the corner to Sharder St. We sat in a doorway for about 15 minutes and then went over to Downy St. where we lived. Whew.. what an experience that was..
Well that's my memories on bamboo..
sh