Mosby Campfire Chat

Discussion in '3 Percent' started by survivalmonkey, May 17, 2019.


  1. survivalmonkey

    survivalmonkey Monkey+++

    My dad grew up during the depression. He said they would keep enough chickens to eat through the winter until a piglet was big enough to butcher. Without a freezer they would keep the chickens as living food supply. Dad said he got tired of fried chicken in the winter. Each spring they would order new chicks from the feed store.

    This is, essentially, what we are working towards. My sow is getting ready to drop a litter, and we just brought the last of last year’s pigs to the butcher. I’d like to start butchering them myself, but that HAS to happen in the late fall/early winter around here, unless I want most of it to spoil.

    I’m currently experimenting with time frames. It’s taken roughly 18 months to get them to butcher weight, feeding them on pasture, with minimal amendments. If I fed a lot more slop, or storebought feed, I could rush that, but we run a heritage breed, and it is designed to take 18 months to get to butcher weight, so we’re doing alright, even with the little bit of slop we produce. I need to go back to putting 5 gallon buckets at all of our peoples’ houses, and having them collect scraps as well.

    The last two we have at the butcher, we told them to leave the bellies and jowls whole and uncured, so we can try curing our own bacon for a change. I’ve also go two or three uncured, whole hams in the freezer that I keep meaning to pull out and dry-cure, but….time is limited, and all that….

    Our rabbits and chickens basically stay alive until we decide we need to butcher one, then I can go out and slaughter one, and take care of business. Saves a lot of space in the freezers that way.

    Is “Savage Battles” by Steven LeBlanc, and possibly alternatively titled “Constant Battles: The Myth of the Peaceful, Noble Savage”?

    Yes. Yes, it is. Thanks for catching that and correcting my fuck-up!

    My reading of history has taught me that there is a layer which sits above the tactical operational and strategic. That layer is the political. It explains why WWI went hot, but the no less volatile cold war did not. It explains why Germany lost the world wars. It explains why Rhodesia lost its bush war.

    Essentially everyone outside Rhodesia was looking to screw them over, even South Africa, which was the next domino to fall. That wasn’t a strategic problem, it was a political problem IMO. South Africa itself fell without a shot being fired. Also political.

    “War is an extension of politics, by other means.”

    Only in cartoons and bad fiction do people fight wars JUST to fight wars. The strategic aim IS political, and the political game SHOULD be part of the strategy.

    The comment about caffeine being a “poison” and causing renal failure is nonsense. As is the case with a lot of compounds in our world that we ingest, moderation is the key and excessive intake of anything is likely to cause problems. My background: Ph.D. in Medical Physiology with extensive work (and course responsibilities covering/teaching pharmacology courses) in pharmacology. Caffeine exerts many of it’s effects by altering ionic movements across nerve and muscle cells, this is the source of the effects associated with caffeine intake. It is also a diuretic and, will increase loss of water via the kidneys so it is possible to dehydrate your system without adequate replacement of water.

    I’m not a doctor. I’ve never been to med school, and I don’t play one on television. Thanks to you, and the others, who contributed to counter the previous. I think, for the time being, I’m just going to abstain from caffeine. I’ve been having a much easier time getting my ass out of bed in the morning, going to sleep at night, and getting shit done during the day. I feel like I have a metric fuck ton more energy than I did when I was drinking a half dozen or so energy drinks per day.

    ——————–

    I’ve been harping on our guys to increase their PT for several years. Not gonna lie, some of them were really, really fat and out of shape. Some people might express surprise that I would associate with fat, out-of-shape people, and “waste” my time training with them.

    1) These aren’t just “people.” These are MY people. They are family, whether by blood or by choice. I will train them as well as I can, within their limitations, and I will harp on them to increase their fitness. I will harp on them about it…every…single…day…

    2) The good SF soldier recognizes that he doesn’t get to pick his local nationals/indigenous force. He works with the material he has available, and tries to improve them.

    One of our guys, who will remain nameless—of course—has done a stellar job of improving himself, over the last couple months. (He reads the blog, so hopefully he’ll read this, recognize the kudos, and keep up the spectacular work!)

    He started doing some Convict Conditioning, then fell off the wagon a bit. Finally, he started taking his lunch break to start doing some rucking. Now, homeslice, a former Marine, was well over 300#. He didn’t throw on a 65# ruck and go walk 12 miles. That would have been fucking retarded. He started out, just walking for a mile. Then, he added a day pack. Then, he switched that out for a heavier ruck. Now, he’s doing 2 miles, three times a week, with the rucksack, and he’s working on increasing his speed (some days, he’s sub-15:00 minute miles, some days, he’s a little slower. He’s doing the work though.). Two days a week, instead of rucking, he’s doing intervals. Now, his sprint speed isn’t mine, and won’t be for a while, but he’s working on it, and he’s doing more today than he did yesterday. He’s damned sure doing a LOT more today than he did last year. He’s added some basic 5×5 weightlifting in, and some Convict Conditioning calisthenics and kettlebell work (kettlebells and intermittent fasting makes you bulletproof, I’m convinced) back into the program as well.

    A few weeks ago, he asked me to borrow an Appendix holster for his EDC gun. He’d never carried Appendix, because his belly got in the way. Of course, I grabbed a holster and handed it to him! He instantly noticed that he could get the gun out, and into action, far faster.

    Last week, he turned to me, after shooting a drill, and grinned, “I can actually SEE the gun back into the holster! My gut is going away!”

    This makes me happy.

    Do PT. Even a little bit, to start, will make it easier to increase it later.

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