I came across this on the cheaprvliving forum and decided to give it a try.
http://www.cheaprvlivingforum.com/post/Cooking-with-a-Nissan-Thermos-5995048?trail=15
I’m making a breakfast of garbanzo beans and rice cooked by that method even as I type this. Seems to me there are some kinks to be worked out, but overall it’s a shockingly easy, economical, energy-efficient way to cook up a simple meal.
Posted in 2012, America, Solitude, Survival
Tagged cooking, country life, cuisine, culture, economy, food, Human Behavior, Life, lifestyle, psychology, senior citizens, society, sociology, survival, technology, thermos cooking
Good morning readers. Thanks for coming by for a read this morning.
A nice little norther blew in here the past couple of days, cooled things down something awful. I slept in the RV, and by ones and twos the cats volunteered to join me inside for a bit of quality time, sleeping on my chest, purring and kneading claws pleasantly. They tell me, with reservations, they think they’re going to be able to hunker down and live in there.
Came just in a nick of time, too, because what? Three daybreaks ago? I noticed something coming out of the now-open chicken house just after dawn. Double-take revealed it to be a bobcat, small for a bobcat, but large enough to make a meal out of any of these wannabe toughies. Last night the cats and I played fruit-basket-turn-over, two inside alternating with two nearby waiting their turn to come up next time I got up to pee.
Got my ‘Work for RVers and Campers Newsletter by email this morning:
http://www.work-for-rvers-and-campers.com/.
Nowhere near as many listings in there for west Texas, New Mexico and Arizona as there were last issue, which had a couple I found exciting. This issue only has a couple in Texas, neither far enough west to suit me, and one in Arizona up in the neighborhood of Sedona. They want someone in an RV park up there to do various things in exchange for a place to park.
But me going to Sedona would be carrying coals to Newcastle, I reckons. Besides, they wanted applicants to send a photo of themselves, along with a resume. With winter coming on I reckons I’d have to figure out which winter pic of me to send:
I’d naturally want to throw out the best possible impression of myself I could.
And they want the resume to demonstrate how I’m a people person, which of course, I am. Ain’t hardly any more people people out there than I am, taken from certain perspectives. But I’m not sure how I’d go about conveying it to them.
Been a long time since I wrote a resume, though I used to count myself a fair hand at doing it. If I was the one doing the hiring out there, I’d jump at me.
Old Jules
Posted in 2012, America, New Mexico, NM, Senior Citizens, Survival, Texas
Tagged animals, cats, country life, culture, economy, employment, environment, home, Human Behavior, humor, jobs, Life, lifestyle, Nature, New Mexico, pets, resume, rv, senior citizens, society, sociology, travel, Wildlife
Good morning readers. Thanks for coming by for a read this morning.
Some matters, I’m finding, my mind believes it’s better if I don’t know and refuses to assimilate and process. I’ve been hearing for years about fast Internet and more recently how a person can just pull his car up in front of someplace in town, turn on the computer and have fast Internet. I just took things to be that simple without going into it further.
But I’ve been doing a lot of reading the archives of the Cheaprliving Forum, http://www.cheaprvlivingforum.com/, asking a few questions, and discovering a lot without having to ask questions.
For instance, I’ve quickly ridded myself of the popup camper notion by asking one question about it, getting two helpful answers, realizing it was an abysmally lousy option.
I’ve got this laptop computer here and it’s got things on wires to plug into the USB port on the comp. I’d assumed I could drive into town, plug one of these into the laptop and whatever it is takes a person online with wifie happens. Now I’m finding these pre-date Wyfie and are for some other kind of fast Internet the world outgrew and left behind while I was sleeping under a tree.
I’ve read on the forum what’s being said about their ways of connecting to wifi and the special antennae they use, all manner of doodads to amplify them. And I don’t understand a word of it. Don’t have a clue what it is I’m going to need to do to be able to get online.
One of the problems is that despite the CheapRLiving moniker, I gather most of these members are, either rich, or rich enough to be able to afford to go out and buy things they want. So when they talk about solutions they’re actually talking about cavalierly forking out a $100 bill, or several of them, and calling it a solution.
Today I’m going to town for groceries and I’m going to try to find someone who’ll tell me in simple terms what I need to park my truck outside the library and go on line. Then I’m going on Yahoo Fredericksburg Freecycle and Yahoo Kerrville Freecycle groups and find out if someone’s got one collecting dust in a closet they’d sooner hand off to someone who’d use it.
Then, if that doesn’t work, at least I’ll have a list of the things I need to get it done. Probably find something on Ebay.
Not much interest coming on the Nomad Farmer thing. Only two folks expressed a firm interest and one an interest for a couple of weeks. But it’s early times yet. Maybe late-winter or early spring some people will be wondering what to do with themselves next summer.
Or maybe I’ll just have to settle for heading for Santa Fe and take in an opera.
Old Jules
Posted in 2012, America, Communication, Country Life, Outdoors, Senior Citizens, Solitude, Texas
Tagged culture, economy, home, homesteading, Human Behavior, humor, Life, lifestyle, philosophy, society, sociology, technology
Good morning readers. Thanks for coming by for a read this morning.
Seems to me the hamburger joints almost certainly have Chinese entrepreneurs on tap this very moment designing 56 collectible toy Tibetan dolls that set fire to themselves.
Here’s hoping the program doesn’t give any ideas to the people working in back over the grilles flipping burger patties who used to have jobs that went to China.
Old Jules
Posted in 2012, America, Current Issues, Human Behavior, Politics
Tagged China, Chinese imports, economy, employment, humor, Life, lifestyle, politics, psychology, society, sociology, Tibet, unemployment
Good morning readers. Thanks for coming by for a read this morning.
I’ve said a few things about Ayn Rand on this blog a number of readers found objectionable. A goodly number found it offensive enough to cancel subscriptions, which I don’t find objectionable at all.
Fact is, I was once an avid reader of Ayn Rand. Not being a reader of Ayn Rand was a way a person could declare himself a non-pseudo-intellectual, which of course, I certainly didn’t wish to be. At the time, admitting to the shameful fact of not having read Atlas Shrugged, or Fountainhead, reduced the stature of the person admitting it to something akin to not having seen Gone With The Wind.
In all honesty I found Rand’s fiction tedious, with the exception of Anthem, which nobody’d ever heard of [few Rand admirers probably have to this day] and didn’t win any intellectual points in the 1960s. So when I came across The Virtue of Selfishness, in 1965, I welcomed the read because I thought it could provide discussable insights into Rand’s viewpoints while sparing the reader all the muscle-flexing fictional heroes.
Which it did. And having read it I quickly ceased being an admirer of Rand, to whatever extent I might have been previously.
I suspect those who read, or claim to have read Ayn Rand today probably derive opinions about her, and her work, from the fiction works and admiration for the fictional characters. The gut-level response to Horatio Algerism with a bit of Paul Bunyan thrown in.
But the appeal of Rand at the time was located in fictional characters. The Virtue of Selfishness quickly was to be found on the reduced price shelves at the book stores. Because, the simple fact is that nobody loves an ego-maniac. Nobody loves a selfish, grasping, gluttonous, greedy person when the fictional fantasies are stripped away.
And giving it a fancy name, objectivism, rationalizing the state-of-being that goes with it, just doesn’t add anything to the equation. There might never have been a culture in the history of mankind where greed was openly, admittedly, frankly, an object of admiration. In fact, the opposite is mostly true.
So today when Rand admirers are justifying their world-views by using her tepid arguments in favor of devil-take-the-hindmost, they rarely use the name of her tour d’force work, where she attempts to explain herself. They know somewhere inside themselves it’s off-putting to the listener.
So the buzzwords are used, instead. Short phrases bounced around back and forth that needn’t be defended.
Nobody needs Ayn Rand to justify selfishness and self-centeredness, but she provides an excuse, however lame.
Old Jules
Edit 8:12 am – There’s a mysterious, paradoxical side of the 21st Century fascination with Rand I neglected to mention. Today admiration for Rand is the unlikely and somewhat ironic focal point where fundamentalist Christians join hands with atheists. Both quote snippets of Rand, claim to have read her.
All of which makes a certain amount of sense for atheists of a particular sort. But it’s not easy to reconcile with Christianity. After all, lust, gluttony, greed, sloth, anger, envy and pride have been universally accepted as the Seven Deadly, or Venal, or Mortal Sins since a time long before Protestants. And I don’t recall any Protestant sect ever declaring openly to repudiate them.
Posted in 2012, Adventure, America, Book Reviews, Books, Human Behavior
Tagged ayn rand, Book reviews, Books, culture, economy, Human Behavior, humor, Life, lifestyle, objectivism, philosophy, politics, psychology, rational self-interest, Reading, Reviews, selfishness, seven deadly sins, society, sociology, The virtue of selfishness
Good morning readers. Thanks for coming by for a read this morning.
I’ve been getting some fascinating emails for the past couple of days, maybe from one of the readers here, maybe from one of the Toyota RV forums I’ve been visiting to learn about problems and solutions encountered by others who have more experience with this particular method of escaping reality.
I retired in 02. A friend happened to see a little clip about the slabs on TV one night and told me he had just heard about a place that he thought I’d like. I googled it and agreed. A couple weeks later I loaded up my old 1971 Volvo 144 and left Tennessee for the slabs. I spent a magic 10 days out there living under a bush on a hammock. Meeting people who were, like me, searching for adventure and fun. In that short time, I found everything that a man could want. And for the next 10 years I have returned again and again. I have spent winters out there in motorhomes and tents. It dosen’t matter. Every visit has been good.
There are several clubs on the slabs. I belong to the Oasis club. There is also the Traveling Pals Club and LOWS, Loners on Wheels Club. Everybody fits in somewhere. There is no mayor, There is no law. (The imperial county sheriffs and CHP do come onto the slabs if there is a problem.) There is an anarchy that functions, a collective justice system that operates that seems to do the job. If someone is behaving in a manner that is unacceptable, a group pressure will build and build until that person decides to change or to go elsewhere.
There is the Range, a magic spot on Saturday night where musicians come and people come and best of all it is free.A big party under the stars. It is hard to describe. When you are there and the music is playing and people are dancing and you just know that you are in the best place that you could be even if you could be anywhere else. Magic.
The 1 mile square abandoned military base that is the slabs has been settled in different areas. East Jesus, an art colony, is situated in the NE corner. The LOWS in on the opposite SW corner. There is a Canadian area on the south central side. After a while you will know it like a monopoly board. And wait until the first time you find yourself lost at night walking across the slabs in an endless maze of campers and cresote bushes. You will soon learn to recognize the local landmarks, the blinking lights on the towers in nearby Niland, or the lights of the prison located about 6 miles south of the slabs..
Many people hear of the slabs and drive into it for a look see. You can spot them a mile away. Eyes wide, windows up, they’ll circle a few “blocks” and then drive out, never stopping and speaking to a “local”. They can’t get by the the ultra casual dress “code” of the slabs, but appearances are misleading. There is no average person at the slabs. Everybody there is special with a story that is usually bigger than life. At night, by the campfires, the stories gradually materialize until you begin to know these individuals. And then you are hooked.
Just from the litle we’ve talked, I feel that you would find that you fit in there just fine. Its not perfect. There are some bad people there. Outlaws, fugatives. But you can be sure they are keeping a low profile. Amazingly, there are plenty of women there, too. Its really hard to describe, it would take a book, and it changes every year. We will be going out there again this winter (my new wife and I). This time we are going to rent a motor home that is parked out there and just drive our car out-which should save enough gas money to pay for the rental.
Oh ya, forgot to mention the nearby town, Niland. It has a lot of support for the winter campers. There are 2 stores in town, May’s that has about everything you might need. food, meat counter, beer and liquor, drinks, bread, toilet paper and even some hardware, and Mike’s Store, he has less but also has shorter lines. I go to them both. There are 3 restaurants in town. Balestero’s that serves great mexican food, and pretty good hamburgers. They also have a bar and a pool table. Across the street there is Uncle D’s Pizza Shop that also serves breakfast. And there is a new restaurant further North on rt. 111, Buckshot I think, that serves pretty good stuff. . There is a laundromat. And a flea market at the “fair grounds” that operates on the weekends. Vendors are moving through every so often so its good to run by there once in a while. There is also a public health building there that treats less serious medical problems. And a gas station that fills propane tanks, too.
8 miles south of Niland is a town names Calpatria. It has a library with internet, a donut shop, and a great hardware store. Also auto parts, and more. You will have to drive another 10 miles south to get to Brawley and the nearest walmart. You can get just about anything in Brawley, but if all else fails, another 10 miles south to El Cantro where I think you could find anything.
Being California, there are a million nearby things to do. trails to hike, roads to drive, hot springs to bask in. It just occurred to me that you might be more interested in this than my earlier description.
If the distance weren’t so great, the money so dedicated to various other priorities I’d be sorely tempted to spend some time there. But Slab City’s 1250 miles from Kerrville, Texas. At current gas prices I could spend half a months pension check getting there. And there’s no telling what manner of bowling balls the Coincidence Coordinators would throw into the route to distract me along the way, have me taking all manner of routes elsewhere.
Old Jules
Slab City links:
http://www.dogpile.com/search/web?fcoid=417&fcop=topnav&fpid=27&q=slab+city%2C+ca&ql=
The Slab City Library entrance
Inside the Library
Internut Access
The Doooooowey Decimal System
Reading area
Posted in 2012, Adventure, Country Life, Homesteading, Human Behavior, Solitude, Survival
Tagged anarchy, community, country life, culture, economy, humor, Life, lifestyle, philosophy, psychology, senior citizens, slab city ca, society, sociology, survival
Good morning readers. Thanks for coming by for a read this morning.
I spent an unanticipated lot of time yesterday learning about leaf springs on 1983 Toyota Motor Homes. I knew I’d have to do something about those sagging springs and began the day knowing pretty much what it would be. Namely buying some helper springs or spring supports from JC Whitney, installing them, then going on about my business.
Except JC Whitney doesn’t have them.
So I visited the Toyota RV Discussion group with the intention of finding out what others who don’t know as much as I do have handled these problems I’ve never handled. Got a lot of knowledgeable, helpful suggestions gradually indicating the problem isn’t so inexpensively solved, the solution so patently obvious as I’d originally believed.
But before any solution a person’s got to know what’s under there now. Airbag spring supports? Retrofitted helper springs?
None of the above, turns out.
But new springs, helper springs, or airbags are clearly the way to resolve the issue. On the forum there’s disagreement as to which. As time allows, today I’ll spend more time at non-JC Whitney sources for the options, learn as much as I can with a head full of already knowing so much at dawn yesterday I thought it unlikely I’d be learning much else between now and dying.
But sometime soon I’m going to have to lift that house up and get under there with a tape measure and find out how long, how thick, how something else I can’t recall at the moment, those springs are. Then spend some time on long distance phone calls with [probably] people in China or India who answer technical questions for suppliers in the US.
Meanwhile, it’s quiet outside these batwing doors. Too quiet.
Poor old silky rooster outsmarted himself yesterday, missed an adventure a lot of chickens would pay the poultry equivalent of good money to experience.
Old Jules
Posted in 2012, Adventure, Country Life, Education, Senior Citizens, Texas, Transportation, Trucks
Tagged 1983 Toyota motor home, animals, Chickens, country life, economy, Life, lifestyle, society, sociology, springs, suspension, technology, transportation
Two political parties, or thrice,
Patricians are fatter than lice.
When bones are scraped narrow
They’ll suck out the marrow,
Turn knuckle-bones into dice.
Old Jules
Posted in 2012, America, Gambling, Government, limericks, Politics
Tagged economy, Human Behavior, humor, Life, limerick, limericks, parasites, philosophy, poems, poetry, politicians, politics, society, sociology
While a peasant ponders
An insect in amber can last
Long after its species is past:
Urge you to clamber
Avoiding the amber
And eat extinct plants for repast.
Old Jules
Good morning readers. Thanks for coming by for a read this morning.
1919 American Legion Post – Now Kimble County Historical Society Museum
I’ve poked a little fun at Junction, Texas. Partly because they were there, I was there, and it’s an easy target, standing still gazing into the headlights. But the stark reality is the people of Junction aren’t significantly different from you, me, and all the people living around us. They’re trying to scratch out a living in a country that’s caving in around them, trying to hang on to what hasn’t caved in yet.
Trying to find something that works by throwing grappling hooks into things that worked in the past. And when they see it’s not working, blaming the failures on people who are trying to reconstruct different things from somewhere else in the past.
That $3.50 per gallon gasoline sign is a disaster in rural Texas where the nearest somewhat large town’s a $20-$30 round trip. Same as everywhere else in the western US. It means the price of having groceries delivered to stores in town will skyrocket over time, and driving to the larger stores in larger towns will skyrocket alongside what’s happening locally.
Aside from some agriculture, nobody in Junction, Texas, is manufacturing anything anyone wants to buy locally, anyone would want to buy elsewhere in the US, or overseas. Same as where you are, only in Junction it’s more obvious.
But their toasters, microwave ovens, automobile parts, refrigerators and computers are manufactured in Asia, same as yours. There’s nobody in town can repair most of them when they fail without obtaining parts manufactured in Asia.
So they fantasize about seceding. Pretending they could go back to the independence of the past. Pretending that would bring back ways to make an honest living. Celebrating their tough, Comanche fighting, Confederate ancestors, pretending they have something in common with them.
While on the other hand, they try to imagine they have something in common with people a decade ago who died when an airplane crashed into a building a quarter-mile high. Grasping for some abstraction of solidarity with the people there, some anchor that pretending they remember those people might provide to help them deal with a world collapsing around them.
In a real sense, they do have something in common with those 9/11 dead, beyond them all being human beings. The people who jumped out of those towers weren’t manufacturing anything anyone would want, either. If they were living today they’d be paying big bucks for gasoline, groceries, toasters, manufactured somewhere else, too.
But there’s nothing else meaningful those unfortunate people in New York could have to say to people in Junction, Texas. If asked, I suppose they might suggest, “Build higher buildings.”
The road from Main Street to the graveyard is easier to follow in Junction, but nothing else is less complicated than anywhere else.
Old Jules
Posted in 2012, America, Current Issues, Government, History, Politics, Texas
Tagged 9/11, Confederates, culture, economy, government, History, Human Behavior, humor, junction texas, Life, lifestyle, philosophy, politics, psychology, society, sociology
74 years old, a resident of Leavenworth, KS, in an apartment located on the VA campus. Partnered with a black shorthaired cat named Mister Midnight. (1943-2020)
Since April, 2020, this blog is maintained by Jeanne Kasten (See "About" page for further information).
https://sofarfromheaven.com/2020/04/21/au-revoir-old-jules-jack-purcell/
So Far From Heaven 
