I’ve still been working on the root cellar. There were three days of rain that made a mess of everything, mostly mud and wet conditions where I didn’t try to do any work. Then when the weather broke, I finally installed the roofing on my shop. Metal roofing is now $3.25 a foot, that’s a 100% price increase over this time last year.

I got that done and moved on to several other smaller projects. I double-sided the root cellar, it now has a inch and a half of plywood for the sidewalls, probably a bit overkill, but I have the material available and the peace of mind knowing I tried pretty hard to build it the way I wanted.

There are two basic kinds of root cellars, the dry storage cellar and the “root” cellar, where you deliberately plan for high levels of humidity (80%+) to keep your root crops moist. I’m going for the dry cellar design, with low humidity, which is best for the type of food storage I sell. I have about a 7 year food supply for a dozen people or so now, and I need storage that is dry, but cool.  This will be perfect for storable food and even gives me the option of putting in some root crops later.

My cellar design is very basic, no frills, just tons of room. It will be enveloped in plastic sheeting when I’m done and maybe some tar. Right now, I’m still in the framing construction stage:

The floor has been leveled and built up, cross members installed and braced, and the ridgepole installed. It’s about 100″ or so to the ridgepole, which is pretty high as root cellars go. I intend to have as much space as I need.

Most of the cellar will still be below ground level. Vent caps will be installed (probably two), and if I want, I can divide the cellar front to back, or even side-to-side and make one side high humidity and the other side dry. For now, it’ll be a dry cellar design.

There is no one right way to build one of these things, you can do pretty much whatever you want. I’ve received all kinds of advice on how to do one of these, but if you look around and check the ‘Net, you can find dozens of different designs. They all work, just build whatever you want or need.

I conceived this one in my head, didn’t write anything down and just dug a hole and set myself to building it. It’s not fancy, but it will work. Shelves will be installed wherever necessary, but for the most part, food buckets will simply be put on pallets to allow air flow, and #10 cans put on top of the buckets.

Next come the roof ‘trusses’ that will be spiked in, more plywood sheeting on top, the front construction for doors, and finally, waterproofing and then burying. Hopefully, the rain won’t come back for a few weeks.

Lovely police state we have in Amerika (video link). Told you guys to stay home. Don’t give these thugs the pleasure of using their expensive toys on you. If you showed up, you should have been there in full battle dress ready to fight these bastards.

I have absolutely NO love for these fascist pigs. America doesn’t even remotely represent a democracy or a free country, just try to protest and you’ll quickly find out what this country really is.

It is just SO STUPID to arrive at one of these staged terrorist events by the State unarmed and expecting to accomplish anything except get your head beaten in:

Stay home. You’ll be better off. If you must go, stop playing by their rigged rules and “free speech zones” and waiting around to get your heads bashed in.

More on the protests here:

Here’s another video of veterans protesting the war at the DNC convention:

How blatantly obvious can it be? The State protects its own, at any and all costs. Once you have performed your service to the State and are either used up, dead, broken or wounded, you are cast aside like so much garbage.

Get REAL people. Protests and marches and waving flags and making signs and screaming and hollering and some of you making real fools out of yourselves are not doing anybody any good at all. America has NEVER had a democracy, stop acting like you think it does. Any history teacher can tell you that it was a Republic, representing monied interests and slave-owners. Guess who the slaves are today?

It’s going to get REAL ugly at the RNC. 50,000+ are expected to show up. Even though I disagree with the effectiveness of protests, with what the lying scumbag Republicans have done to this country, there should be 200,000,000 protesters expected to show up.

St. Paul police have prepared an open-air prison, similar to those employed by the New York City police in 2004, and the Denver police during the 2008 DNC.

Don’t even be expected to hear the truth of what happens, the fascist pigs are making sure you don’t. This last link is definitely worth watching — if you want to know how they are suppressing the news and investigating these groups, this video covers some of the latests tactics they are using.

STAY HOME. This is not the way to win this country back (too late for that). Putting your faith in politicians of any stripe is a complete waste of your life and efforts. The American “demonocracy” is in full-swing, and you’re not considered an essential part of it. EXIT THE SYSTEM and turn your back on all of them. The idea of America is OVER already.

These guys obviously don’t read this blog:

The prospect of global wars driven by climate change is not something often discussed publicly by our political leaders.

But according to one of America’s top military analysts, governments in the US and UK are already being briefed by their own military strategists about how to prepare for a world of mass famine, floods of refugees and even nuclear conflicts over resources. Analyst Warn Of Looming Global Climate Wars

But maybe they should. The data is readily out there, available for anyone to read and pay attention to. A definite, “I told you so” moment.

Refugees, floods, starvation, crop failures, nuclear missiles, melting ice, it’s all there.

“And it’s not just the analysts. I spent the past year doing a very high-speed self-education job on climate change but I think I probably talked to most of the senior people in the field in a dozen countries,” Dr Dyer said.

“They’re scared, they’re really frightened. Things are moving far faster than their models predicted.

“You may have the Arctic ocean free of ice entirely in five years’ time, in the late summer. Nobody thought that would happen until about the 2040s - even a couple of years ago.”

It’s dead-clear that we already well on our way to this “runaway” scenario everyone is terrified of. Here’s some more proof: Arctic Sea Ice Drops to 2nd Lowest Recorded Level

Don’t believe the pundits that claim we’re recovering ice, what little there is, is very thin and rapidly disappears for this reason. September is when we receive the final results of this year’s “melt”. But I can already tell you what the results will be…. (Admin wets finger in mouth and raises it into the air ….) We’re toast!

Don’t forget — we are only now measuring decades past of human industrial activity. What do you suppose this is going to mean when our recent explosion of global greed and gluttony and planet raping activity catches up to us? Doesn’t take an analyst to figure that one out, but for whatever it’s worth, “analyst” is what I used to be.

All we’re doing now is sounding the alarm bells — about 20 to 30 years too late.

Lonewolf sent me a bunch of links. Peter Goodchild has a long article that basically say’s “it’s all over folks”. Sorry No Gas is a lengthy read, and I think most of the points he covers have been written about here.

I remain absolutely convinced that a) nobody is listening, and b) almost nobody truly understands the severity or the magnitude of the problems headed our way. Goodchild tries to explain that, but only fails in a couple of areas (imo).

Don’t sweat 2030 when oil production is down by half. We definitely will not make it that far. Collapse will have happened much sooner then that. The desperate race to secure energy supplies will spawn all types of wars and widespread death and destruction. Goodchild also failed to cover the severity of the issues with climate change, which will also ensure our demise on a global scale. Otherwise, it’s a good read, just too long.

Other links that are definitely related: Syria Becomes Oil Importer and Peak Oil Is Past. And there’s this from another superpower nation: Russian Oil Declines 1% Per Day and Mexico’s Cantrell Field Falls 36%. Then there is the trapped C02 that is going to be released in the Arctic, Global Warming Time Bomb.

I know I’m all “doom and gloom”, but it is the consistent failure of the sheeple and their talking pundits to appreciate the sheer magnitude, severity and global consequences of a world without energy, or a livable climate that makes me so.

Goodchild also has an article that mentions “Eco-Silliness“. I agree, my position on Ecovillages has been crystal clear — don’t bother. Don’t even bother with alternative energy either, this is already a waste of time and effort with diminishing returns increasing over time. The Industrial Age is already on a permanent decline, it was all supported and built by oil, and when that is gone, so is all of the alternative energy “solutions”.

“The quest for alternative sources of energy is not merely illusory; it is actually harmful. By daydreaming of a noiseless and odorless utopia of windmills and solar panels, we are reducing the effectiveness of whatever serious information is now being published. When news articles claim that there are simple painless solutions to the oil crisis, the reader’s response is not awareness but drowsiness. We are rapidly heading toward what has been described as the greatest disaster in history, but we are indulging in escapist fantasies. All talk of alternative energy is just a way of evading the real issue: that the Industrial Age is over.”

Goodchild also hits the nail again here:

… “At one point, the money problem will be everything. A few decades later, the money problem will be nothing. Money is only a symbol, and it is only valuable as long as people are willing to accept that fiction: without government, without a stock market, and without a currency market, such a symbol cannot endure. Money itself will be useless and will finally be ignored. Tangible possessions and practical skills will become the real wealth. Having the right friends will also help.”

Only those “things” that will help keep you alive, warm, safe, healthy and fed are going to be considered “valuable”. All the rest is just dross and will be considered useless. Yet I am surprised at the lack of awareness of this fact. Value is intrinsic to usefulness (and demand); in a oil-saturated world, even a jet ski has value for entertainment value, but will be absolutely useless without oil.

Food and water is one of the most valuable commodities there is, which is why the current food situation remains so grim for billions of people. We CANNOT produce the amount of food we are going to need without oil, it’s a categorically impossible. Factor in that human populations are at least 100 times naturally sustainable levels and we are facing a global catastrophe of unimaginable proportions.

Nobody needs a jet ski or a yacht or even a second home or a HumVee sitting in the driveway, but you will need those thing that are intrinsically valuable to keeping you alive.

Go deeper, look harder and ponder more. If you have even the slightest hope to securing your future or that of your children, you absolutely MUST start preparing and planning for post-oil survival. All these “escapists fantasies” are illusions, and they will KILL YOU in time. Failing to adapt NOW to a post-oil world is going to be catastrophic for billions of people. Don’t be one of them, look ahead now and build your crashstead while you still can. What you are doing is not only for yourself, but for your kids too. They are the ones who are going to need it more then you did.

Here’s a photo essay of one of my summer projects.

This is a root cellar that I’m building, albeit slowly. Moving all of this dirt (several times) is hard work:

This thing is pretty big as root cellars go, finished dimensions will be 13 x 24, but the hole is quite a bit bigger. It’s at least 35 feet long right now and 15 wide. I had to go oversize so I had room to install posts and sheeting.

I didn’t like this first “dig” attempt for several reasons. I could not auger in the post holes I wanted no matter how much I tried, the PTO (power take-off) unit on the tractor worked just fine, but the ground was too hard. Basically, I had no way to set the cedar posts I was planning on installing.

So, try #2 had me doing a little trench work. I also located a bunch of cedar posts, which I plastic wrapped the bases to help protect from moisture.

The posts were already limbed and mostly dry, but some of the ones I’ve put in were pretty heavy.

A center post was installed, for a ridge pole, this is the first of several to come:

Looking down from the top with the side walls going up:

Sidewall posts nearly done. The top log was spiked in to each post with galvanized spikes.

I decided to speed things up by lifting the top logs onto just three posts, which was a balancing act challenge, but it worked. I then simply spiked in the remaining posts, clearing out just enough dirt underneath to let them fit:

Compression from the weight above (tons) will push all the posts down more or less evenly, but it doesn’t have to be completely level. Center height will be fairly tall I think, over eight feet, but we’ll see if I have to make any changes when I get to that point.

The uneven ground above has all been removed now and the floor is almost level.

Sidewall posts and top “plate” installed, nearly there now with the basic sidewall construction:

This took several days, working by myself. It’s hard work, and I’m nice and sore now. I’ve got more done, the sidewalls of plywood are installed, but forgot to take pictures, more to come.

I just read this and can’t make any sense of it at all:

Uncredentialed activists are to be fenced off and kept away from the Pepsi Center in Denver by parking lots the size of football fields. The protesters descending on the RNC will be cordoned off into designated “free speech zones,” guarded by thousands of police officers to the tune of $50 million at this “National Special Security Event.”

Is this a permission slip that says you have permission to protest? If so, what’s the friggin point?

Every single one of these protesters is wasting their time.

“past the security fences and the legions of taser-toting police and private security guards, they will see the other America spilling into the streets of St. Paul, Minnesota.”  Crashing The Party

You’re not even allowed to approach anywhere near those that you are protesting against, which makes your entire effort totally useless, and that’s just for starters. Being surround by “thousands of police officers” is ridiculous. Protests you see, are really terrorist events in Amerika.

Some party crashing, more like auditioning for seats in the far, far bleachers.

This (s)Election season is already shaping up to be a fascist conventioneer’s wet dream. Stay home, don’t even bother giving any of these thugs and creeps and fascist freaks the time of day by gracing them with your presence, you’ll be better off.

I still don’t know what an uncredentialed activist is, but to be honest, I don’t care either. The very idea is reprehensible. Kind of like having a State-authorized blog so you can regurgitate State-sponsored lies and media spin.

Imagine if this happens in Amerika:

How to get hold of petrol is one of the hottest topics in Nepal ever since its sole supplier, India, began refusing to sell fuel on credit a year ago to Nepal’s state-run fuel monopoly, which owes it millions of dollars.

The ensuing shortage has led to rationing and pump queues of several kilometres.

All these fuel consumers are already out of business, but they don’t even realize it yet. Nepal Fuel Lines

There might be some relief in sight for the Nepalese, but I don’t know when. If not, they’re done. All of them. This will have a gigantic backlash on food prices, already up 30%.

Here’s another example of asinine stupidity by the State. Interference in the efforts of two children, who were trying to sell some family garden produce:

“They may start out with a little card-table and selling a couple of things, but then who is to say what else they have. Is all the produce made there, do they make it themselves? Are they going to have eggs and chickens for sale next,” said Manning. California Town Shuts Down Food Stand

Somebody should bitch slap this fool. These 11 and 3 year old KIDS are selling naturally grown FOOD (see the video), and he’s having a conniption fit over the issue.

This is a perfect example of why the State is inept, incompetent and incapable of handling even the smallest issues with finesse, intelligence and fairness. Protecting the vested interest of real commercial enterprises has always been the baliwick of the State and its myriad of laws, ordinance, regulations, permits, fines and fees. And that’s what the cops enforce too, backed up with the power of the gun, intimidation, arrests, fines and imprisonment if you don’t “obey” the whims of the State.

Well, fuck ‘em all I say. I’m dead serious. This is ridiculous. Let them arrest me (them) or whoever. Make the State spend hours and hours prosecuting the case, with tens of thousands of dollars expended “defending” the so-called “law” that says you can’t sell some home-grown food.

This is one of those terrible stories with insufficient details, but enough so to make your hair stand on end (sent in by logrithmic):

WASHINGTON — A Justice Department plan would loosen restrictions on the Federal Bureau of Investigation to allow agents to open a national security or criminal investigation against someone without any clear basis for suspicion, Democratic lawmakers briefed on the details said Wednesday. Deciding Who’s A Terrorist Just Became Totally Arbitrary

Of course this is terrifying and unnecessary and nothing will or can be done about any of it. This is really no different then what is being done by cops all over the country, who using their positions of paid terrorism in service of the State, can target anybody (and do) for personal gain or vendetta.

There is a new movie coming out, forget the title, with Samuel Jackson, who plays the part of a neighbor. Not just any neighbor, but a neighbor who is a cop. Jackson takes it upon himself to dictate what his other neighbor does, who just happens to have a black wife.  The usual drama and escalation to violence takes place, with Jackson becoming increasingly demanding and violent (just like it is in real life in Amerika).  I saw the trailer, maybe somebody could post a link if there is one.

But this is a reminder of what I’ve seen — “law enforcement” doing whatever the hell it wants to do, never holding itself accountable and doing nothing more then offering an apology after ruining somebody’s life. This happens tens of thousands of times each year in this country. We’re not suppose to notice these crimes, until it happens to you.

This Just(us) Department plan will only make things worse. I still maintain that there are NO TERRORIST in our midst that cannot already be dealt with by existing laws and law enforcement already long in place. The “terrorist fear mongering” that is such a gigantic part of the Bush / McInsane bullshit in this country is disgusting.

Let me tell you something — we need more terrorists to justify what these freedom destroying fools are doing to this country, which is turning this place into an armed police state, where you can’t even take a shit without running into some goon sniffing up your ass for a explosive device.

I am sick to death of this. Absolutely disgusted and angry and ready to pack my bags and leave this god-forsaken land. America has become a land of death and destruction, full of evil machinations and exploitive, malevolent, murdering monsters who allege to “govern” us and declare themselves our masters and slaveholders.

YOU SHOULD BE ENRAGED. I know I am. I am absolutely fed up with this kind of crap. When you fear your government, you are ALL IN TROUBLE. When you fear law enforcement or the fucked up Justice system, you have NO FREEDOMS left, all you have left is illusion. And this is EXACTLY where we are at today, I have posted countless links and stories and commentary demonstrating this fact, and many, many others have done a much better job of it then I have.

But nobody is listening and nobody cares. This I know. This many of you know. This is why this kind of thing has continued to creep upon us all. We are all dead men walking to the gallows. Freedom lost — forever.

Dissident Voice has a good article on the anthrax coverup. Remember those conveniently timed attacks after 9/11?

The recent “suicide” death of the chief suspect Bruce Ivans was more then a little suspicions, but like all coverups, we’re not supposed to be paying attention. Loose ends have to be tidied up.

The lengths which the rogue elements within the US government will go to kill people and promote their fear agenda is unbelievable. I also suggest you read If We Could Speak to the People, What Would We Say?