"When it starts dying, get electrifying"

It's been interesting to watch the so-called "green revolution" advanced by the current administration, which is largely a push to electrify everything.

Consider this NPR article that appeared in early October, innocuously titled  "These 5 big purchases can save energy – and money – at home." I clicked on it because I'm always interested in frugal suggestions.

I should have known better. This being NPR, their agenda is clear and their logic mediocre. The article begins: "Driving a car, making dinner, heating water and turning on the air conditioner – our everyday actions emit some of the greenhouse gases that contribute to climate change. But sustainability experts say there are ways we can make these daily tasks more climate friendly. By using home appliances and vehicles that run on electricity, we can help reduce our carbon footprint and leave more fossil fuels in the ground."

The article promotes a book entitled "Electrify Everything in Your Home" which, as the name suggests, wants everyone to convert to the wonders of electric everything. Forget wood. Forget propane. Forget natural gas. It's electricity all the way, baby.

The article says, "Making these upgrades to your home and lifestyle will cost money – and you will need to plan ahead. ... So don't feel like you have to change out your appliances overnight. Instead, buy them as your existing machines wear out. [The book's author] offers a catchy phrase: 'When it starts dying, get electrifying.'"

No. I refuse. I refuse to make ourselves more vulnerable.

The article touts the "dangers" of any other fuel option except electricity (even though these other fuel sources have been used anywhere from generations to millennia), and promotes such things as induction stoves and electric vehicles.

But all their persuasive arguments fail to address the one logical question, the ginormous elephant in the room they refuse to acknowledge: What happens when (not if, but when) the electricity fails? It doesn't even have to be a big event, but merely a winter storm or a high wind that can take down power lines and leave people unable to heat, cook, drive, see, or otherwise function in the modern world.

And make no mistake, America's grid is frighteningly fragile. California's grid alone is so delicate that the logistics of plugging in millions of new electric vehicles being pushed by government mandates would be enough to topple it irrevocably. Yet this logic eludes the bureaucrats.

We ourselves are far too dependent on electricity for my comfort, even though we heat with wood, cook with propane, and never use a clothes dryer. My quest is to continue to look for ways to wean ourselves further off the grid, rather than depending more on it.

So this catchy slogan ("When it starts dying, get electrifying") makes me laugh. Nope. I refuse.

Empty drawers

Remember the hilarious snark I received a couple weeks ago, accusing me of overspending on feminine weaknesses such as clothes, shoes, and jewelry? You might say this is a follow-up post.

I've been on something of an organizational kick lately, a kind of reverse spring cleaning (fall cleaning?). I've been doing a lot of straightening up in the barn. I've tackled parts of the kitchen. And yesterday I decided to turn my attention to my dresser.

It's been a long time since I'd even opened the drawers of my dresser, except for the top three (where I keep socks and undies). The rest of the drawers had a mishmash of older and newer T-shirts, shorts, and sweat pants. I decided it was time to sort through and toss the ones that were too holey for decent coverage.

Also, I did something absolutely unprecedented while vising my parents last summer: I bought two packs of new socks. Two brand-new 10-packs of crew socks. Woot! Seriously, I haven't bought socks in about 10 years, and my old socks were stretched out and holey. Why am I so stubborn about stuff like this?

Anyway, one by one I removed the drawers from my dresser and emptied then. I sorted old from new, holey from whole, and made a pile of stuff which will get tossed in the burn barrel (including my ten-year-old socks).

Then I folded my T-shirts...

...my shorts...

...and my sweat pants, and put them in their own drawers.

Now this is where things get funny. You see ... I had three drawers left over, and nothing to put in them.

This, folks, is why Don and I laughed so long and so hard over that snark about how much I spend on clothes, shoes, and jewelry. Aside from my one linear foot of closet space, this is the sum total of all my garments. Clothes just don't interest me. I have enough to get by and provide for my needs, and that's it.

Now ... what should I put in those three empty drawers?

Pet update

Some time ago, a reader asked how our pets are doing. In a word, fine. I thought I'd post pix of the three animals we have right now: Mr. Darcy, Lihn, and Frumpkin.

It's hard to believe Darcy is six years old already. Where does the time go? Here's some recent photos of him:

Frisbee wolf. Darcy "hides" behind a cart, waiting for Older Daughter to throw a Frisbee:

Here's another picture:

One of his favorite perches, surveying his domain while resting his chin on the rail.

Milking some attention for all it's worth.

Evening walk.

Playing in the yard.

Hiking in the woods.

Watching me rake leaves in the side yard.

Dozing with a rope toy.

Enjoying fall.

Snoozing in front of the woodstove.

Now on to Lihn, Younger Daughter's Quaker parrot. This lady is now nine years old.

Lihn gets out of her cage for a couple hours in the morning and a couple hours in the evening. Here she's on the floor, exploring some tankards. (Older Daughter is working on them in the background.)

Don finished a sandwich one day, and it had a few bread crumbs left on the plate. Lihn loves bread. We seldom let her have any, but a few crumbs are fine.

One evening she sat on the perch near my desk and proceeded to groom herself, contorting into amazing shapes.

Every so often I'll send photos to Younger Daughter (currently stationed in Europe) to let her know her pet is safe and sound.

I also periodically schedule vet appointments to get her beak trimmed, since it has an annoying tendency to get overlong very fast. Her next appointment is in early December.

Now for the World's Most Spoiled Cat, Frumpkin (Older Daughter's pet).

Frumpkin was a stray who adopted us several years ago, long before we moved. Older Daughter took him in and spoils him rotten. We don't know his age, but he's in the prime of life and in excellent health.

As you can imagine, he's sticks his nose into all of Older Daughter's business.

Changing sheets is a challenge.

He's strictly an indoor cat now.

Fortunately he has his own "catio" outside Older Daughter's door where he can sit in the sun and survey his domain.

Plus his cat tree is right by the window.

On a chilly rainy morning, Frumpkin cozies up on Older Daughter's bed:

Here he's getting "into" Cat TV (he loves the squirrels!).

So as you can see, all our animals are doing fine.

Matters of firewood

Early this summer, we participated in a county underbrush cleanup program that cleared out a lot of debris from a wooded portion of our property.

At that time, we also asked the workmen to drop two large dead trees (one pine, one fir), a service we paid for separately.

This past week, Don got started cutting the trucks into rounds. It's fall, you see, and firewood is on our minds.

We stacked the rounds, temporarily, near the barn.

We haven't split them yet, because the log splitter had a horrifically flat tire and we couldn't move it around to the back. Don removed the tire and ordered a spare.

The wood is still a bit too green as well. Our plan is to split, stack, and tarp it in a different location from our primary woodpile, and let it cure for a longer period.

Another reason for separating this year's wood is we're going to use up the existing woodpile as much as possible this winter.

Whatever is left over at the end of the season is going to be moved to another location, a permanent woodshed. We don't want to build a permanent woodshed in this exact spot, but instead about twenty feet away (we have a better use for this spot which will be detailed in a future blog post), so the more wood we can use up, the less we'll have to move later. That's why we don't want to stack this year's wood in this spot.

However we did need to replace the tarp over the woodshed, as it had ripped over the last year. So we pulled off the tattered remains of the old tarp, exposing the temporary structure we made with horse panels.

We laid some cattle panels over the top of the horse panels to add extra support under the tarp (for snow and rain loads).

Then we spread out the new tarp...

...and carefully pulled it over the top of the structure.

We tied the tarp snugly in place. The wood is now protected for the winter.

It was also time to bring a load to the house, so I filled the gorilla cart a couple of times...

...and stacked it on the back porch.

Little by little, we're getting ready for winter.