Topic of the Month February 2015- Cabin Fever/Winter Hardships

It is very windy here right now. Started yesterday, supposed to stop this afternoon/evening. Kept me up most of the night...that and somehow I got a bad case of the runs which I don't understand because I didn't eat or drink anything I haven't before. It is slowing down, hopefully by this afternoon it will stop. Not the best way to pass the time in bad weather...but hey whatever works I guess...

 

Darn V, that is a hardship and makes for along day. replenish your fluids.

 

True story. You definitely don't want to dehydrate.

 

Been drinking apple juice and green tea. And my usual daily amount of coffee. I know coffee isn't good for staying hydrated, but if I don't have it, I have withdrawals that involve a horrible headache and throwing up whatever I eat, so I don't need that extra stress.

 

I feel for those that get cabin fever. I never have. There has always been to much to do and if I can't bring myself to do some of the work (until later) I have many things I want to learn and so I have . I also love writing when that is possible. Here is our blog if any what to take a look of what we have been up to: Sallys Country Home

 

PS4, X-Box, lots of single player games that don't require internet.If the Power goes out solar panels will still be able to power these for a while everyday!

 

Winter time is a busy time as I am a fishing lure manufacturer. January through March are my busiest moths as there are sport shows and stores are placing orders for spring. If life as we know it ends we are already prepared for the long haul as in priorities would change to long term wood cutting as we need wood for both heat and cooking. Living on this lake gives us tons of things to do. Fishing from the boat or like today out on the ice. I do play some old retro video games. For about 5 years I bought old game systems and refurbished them. The old Nintedo NES systems were some of best ever built as the 72 pin connectors just plug onto the circuit boards. I rebuilt hundreds of them and sold them on ebay. they still go for over 100 bucks with a few select games. I still play Sega Genesis games as well. Recently my local general store has started keeping old board games and doing buy sell and trade on these games. Pretty cool. buy clue and later trade it in on the game of Life. All used games.

 

Read read read. You just can't go wrong with a shelf full of books. I keep a hoard at my hunting shack. Board games ; risk, trival pursuit, and the like. I like to plan home improvement project for the winter. Remodeled the main bath at my folks house last winter. I imagine if the world turned upside i think i would be too busy for board games , but i could see great value in having books, dvds,cds, and board and card games.

 

Having spent many winters in a 30' RV in the mountains of CO and the openness of ND, I can say the winter blues are a very real problem for many. No matter what, only so much a person can do when it's -40 or colder. I'm a person that does not do well with nothing to do-I need to be active. Being cooped up in a RV or a hooch in a mancamp takes its toll. I honestly didn't notice it in myself but my wife sure did in our conversations-this was back before we were even dating, just good friends. LOL, we had quite the conversation about that-"WTF is wrong with you?! Yer being an #@$*^%! for no reason!" AND I WAS. Like all reasonably smart men, I took the lady's advice..

1) Open up the blinds on the windows during the day even if it means losing a little heat-Let the sun in even if its overcast. I had all the windows covered to help with heating but took the insulation down off of a couple during the daytime when I was stuck inside.

2) Get outside EVERYDAY even if for just a few minutes, or a couple of times a day. Don't sit there inside the same 4 walls for days on end. I made it a point to walk around the RV park after my morning coffee and before dark whenever I could.

3) Turn off the DAMN TV/DVD and do something else. If you don't have anything to do, FIND something to do. If its not important to you, MAKE it important to you. I love to cook, always have. But cooking for one isn't much fun, so I started cooking these large meals and bringing them to the folks in the RVs around me. LOL think its safe to say that all of us got something out of that! One of the welders I had working for me had his wife staying with him and she HATES cooking. He sent her over once a week to get my shopping list and go get groceries. She LOVED it, HE loved eating something that wasn't out of a box and I ate for free except for the "labor" of cooking. Turned out to be quite the social gathering that continued on as long as we were there.

Just my

 

Hi, I'm new. I guess I am more of a nomadic survivalist and my legs are my transportation. Consequently, winter can be a nightmare for me. Frozen water, complicated mobility, strictly fire or movement generated heat, some places have greatly diminished game options in the winter, edible vegetation is less available or harder to obtain , reduced aerial perspective cover, and the obvious low temps ( hypothermia and frostbite).

 

One therapy for cabin fever may be as simple as getting outside, even in the ice, snow, wind and darkness of winter, to interact with nature. Research has proven that even brief outings can improve cognitive functioning and overall well-being.

Now that the days are getting longer, I am starting to feel like Spring is truly around the corner. During the deepest part of the winter, I think the hardest part is I work during the daylight hours. I go to work in the dark and come home in the dark. Now that it is light when I get home, I walk in the door drop my bags and go for a walk with the dog. It truly makes me feel lighter at heart that I can now spend time outside without carrying a flash light.I often wonder what I will do when I retire. Maybe that is why many of the elderly migrate South during the winter.

I was reading this Farmer's Almanac article Beat the Winter Blues! - Farmers' Almanac

and realized unconsciously I have been battling my own cabin fever year after year without realizing it. I think back and see that every year around Jan/Feb I upgrade something in my home. Last year I painted the bathroom orange/peach. This year I just painted the kitchen a lighter brighter.

 

I spoke to my Mom who is in the NE. She has feet of snow and currently it is snowing again, blowing and fridge cold. She said she feels claustrophobic. The snow is high piled and she is feeling shut in even when outside.

 

My favorite cabin fever story came to me by way of Bill Cunningham's brother, John. John used to work for the Feds up in Alaska. He said that one time back longer than 20 years ago the USGS decided they needed some surveying done on the far side of the Brooks Range in November. They assembled a team and sent them out on a Snow Cat to a distant cabin to perform the work.

In fairly short order the radio transmissions started getting worrisome. It seems one of the team had gone completely off his rocker and retired to his bunk with a loaded .45 claiming the others were trying to starve him.

Finally the bosses decided to pull the plug and sent the Snow Cat back out to retrieve them. The rest of the party had instituted their own form of Olympic Games. They had begun peeing in the same spot outside the cabin door. Pretty soon they had a frozen cone of urine over 10 feet tall, and had instituted a series of Winter Games, trying to see who could scale it the fastest and other games of athletic prowess.

 

I used to like cross country skiing in the winter. I could not do it if the temp or windchill was -15 or below. Recently I took up, snowmobiling. But unfortunately the East coast is getting our snow. I feel bad for them as they are not used to it and it is more snow than we get most years. Anyway I can't get on the trails but I can get out on a lake nearby.

 

You can have it back if you want.

 

Always have a winter project or two, right now is rebuilding an old Dynaco Stereo 400 power amp I built from a kit when I still lived with my parents..
Caps, better resistors, power transistors and other transistors a guy on Ebay assembles rebuild kits of transistors, caps and resistors which is very handy. Items in QUA-CO AUDIO store on eBay!

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Picked up a Sony PS 3 (CECHE01 or CECHA01) and a ton of single/mutiple player PS 2 & 3 games at Game Stop and on line for pennies on the dollar.
Along with board games.


BTW.... -17 this morning

 

If it were that easy sneaky. Now it is miserably cold but not much to do outdoors without snow. I am getting real tired of this winter. I suppose I speak for much of the whole country.

 

Today the predicted high temp should be around 37 degrees the low for tonight is expected to be minus 11.