[Loki]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('thuja', '')$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('Lore', '
')
For what it’s worth, the best security you can buy is to find yourself a small rural community that you can become a part of.

[thuja]

@Jessi:

I'm not sure what you mean by living off the land...100% sustainable without the need of the ammenities of civilization?

Cities have been around since the dawn of civilization 6000 years ago. Are you imagining living in a pre-civilized world, a stone age hunter gather existence?

If you envision an agrarian lifestyle, that goes hand in hand with cities. Rural and Urban have been symbiotic for the last 6000 years.

So yes you may not "need" the things from the city that I've described. But if you want to live in anything resembling post stone age man, then the dreaded city is an important part of it. Doesn't mean you have to live there. But it does mean that cities won't go the way of the dodo bird.

[Crusty]

I think I sit in between Thuja and JessiRhea.

I think things will get harder and harder but 'grinding poverty' is a bit too doomer for me.

Thuja doesn't really typify the city environment, she lives close to a rural area, she grows a lot of her own food, has reduced her energy usage and knows her neighbours. I think as things get hard she will be a teacher in her community, showing her neighbours how to live a simpler lifestyle. This is a lot different to people living in the middle of a big city, with a consumerist lifestyle and believing the BAU will continue for ever. People have lived through hard times before (the great depression) and history tells us that they pulled together saving their hatred for the Government who let this happen. I see this happening in the Middle East now.

To JessiRhea may a suggest you use the last of the cheap oil to set yourself up. Get to know your neighbours. Get a Bobcat to clear some land for your Doomstead (20,000hrs manual labour for one barrel of oil) Here we use the beer economy, pay for the fuel and a slab of beer at the end of the day (which we all drink). Here if money's tight we buy a big caravan (the bigger the cheaper, and a fuel gets more expensive cheaper still I think) build a lean-to (carport) over the top with a gutter with big water tank and you have all your water (we call them 'Humpys'). Clear some land for you food/outdoor area with good drainage for flood and swales for drought. Composting toilet, shower/bath area with grey water for fruit trees. Mates have a small solar panel, and a battery and it does a chest fridge and a few lights. A pushmower and brushcutter doesn't use much fuel but are great while waiting for things to self mulch.

I know things are going to get harder and harder, and in some corners of the world great suffering, but I only have one vote which I use it wisely and compassionately (I think). Spending too much time thinking about it just paralyses me and solves nothing so I believe in prepping yourself and you local community!!

My opinion only!!

[GlynG]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('Lore', 'F')or what it’s worth, the best security you can buy is to find yourself a small rural community that you can become a part of.

[Shaved Monkey]

For me its about reducing spending
The less I want carrot the less treadmill I have to turn.
Developing my skills,(cooking and construction are important)
Growing as much of my own food as possible/practical
Reducing my wants,(while not feeling too deprived)
I have LCD wide screens TVs, FTA Sat dishes, Wii,Computers,Dish washer Washing Machines etc...even a coffee machine and a pasta maker.
Developing a network for friendship,trading and support
Giving back to the community, so it can survive too.
It has been like that even before I knew about peak oil, so nothing much has changed.
I grew up with fruit trees and a veggie garden in the backyard.
We bottled our own passata,dried,froze and bottled our excess, made sausages, had chickens and pigeons and bees all in the suburbs of a large city.
My dad still lives there and I planted him a few more trees before I left.
Every house I've owned I planted fruit trees in the backyard.
I have owned my place for 10 years and planted the fruit trees set-up a computerised watering system attached to 3 water tanks and a pump and rented the house out and worked somewhere else.
I quit a high paying job to move to the country
My income has been reduced by 90% on my previous job, so I have gone from upper-middle class to technically living below the poverty line, but my lifestyle has improved, greater than the 90% loss in income.
Less work= less petrol+wear and tear on car+ less lunches+less money spent on stress relief+less clothes= (quite a saving)
I have access to fresh organic food,have a comfortable shelter,have enough money to pay the bills, have a comfortable life,good friends and plenty of spare time.
I regularly cook on a hibachi using twigs, I find on the ground.
I like it because its free and it tastes better than cooking with gas or electricity.
By product is potash and bio-char so its win win on every level.
This year I have put in solar panels,ordered my solar hot-water,(should be in in about a month) and bought a chest freezer (turning off 2 fridges,I run 4 including a wine fridge as I only shop once every 3 months).This should reduce my power bills to nearly zero.

Next year its grey water system,aquaponics and wicking beds.
Following year may be wind turbine,batteries,another water tank and maybe a chest fridge.(use virtually no power)
I still have more fat I can trim, if necessary,this is important as circumstances change and you need to be prepared.
I am trying to constantly improve my efficiencies and reduce my out goings.
Any cent saved is an improvement in my lifestyle, if the SHTF, I am ready,if it doesn't, I have some more cash and will buy some more wine or go on a holiday.

[JessiRhea]

Thuja: When I say "living off the land", I do mean being 100% sustainable without the amenities of civilization. It's been done before, it can still be done. But I have no illusions that everyone can do this. I didn't really make myself clear on that before. When I think about how I should prepare for when things get bad, I feel that I should prepare for the absolute worst situation. Therefor, yes, I believe it is wise to learn to be completely self sufficient. Now, not everyone can go run to a remote area and live off the land. There's just too many people. But those who do, I feel, will have the best chance. And yes, I fully realize that the rural and urban are symbiotic. What I mean to suggest here is that, when chaos strikes and the world is no where near getting its shit together, the best course of action may be to live very primitively until things settle down. In the aftermath, however, when societies are just beginning to rebuild, of course there's no need to be a caveman any longer and cities and communities are bound to crop up, and going back to a nice agrarian lifestyle would be ideal.

Crusty: I'd love to do just as you suggest. But another reason I'm learning to do what I'm doing is because I don't have two pennies to rub together. A Bobcat and some other setups would be great, but as it is I just gotta make do with what I can build with my own two hands. Good advice for someone who has the means, though.

[Skinner]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('Lore', 'A') sailboat “get out of dodge” escape is a totally ignorant tactical plan.

[thuja]

@glyn:

Indeed some cities will indeed become awful places to live...as will some rural areas. That is the case already throughout the world. Again being in a rural enclave is no panacea. Here is a list of most likely reasons rural living could become a nightmare...

1 You lose your job and there are few to no other jobs available
2 Your county funding gets cut and you lose road maintenance, fire, police and school services.
3 Due to high unemployment remaining businesses fold up including the grocery store and the gas station in the main small town.
4 you know have to drive very far to get gas or provisions and are getting low on money to pay for your land/house.
5 Any side business like farming or raising animals costs a lot for capital investments and it's getting more and more expensive to sell what you produce at the far away town.

OK..I could easily describe a lot of bad scenarios for those living in a city envirronment but many here want to gloss over the economic problems of living rurally as we likely go through cascading and punishing recesions. it's important to see things clearly and not just embrace a pollyana statement such as living rurally is the best prep for a post peak world.

[Ibon]

I have a 10km drive up a 4WD road to get to my homestead here in Panama. There is a spot on the way up off of a steep embankment that the locals use as an informal garbage dump. There is no trash collection here. Anyway, today coming up the road I came upon a group of guys who where hauling up the embankment all sorts of metal trash; old car battery, rusty old electric stove, old saw blades, etc. etc. They had hiked up 4 km from where they parked their 2WD pickup that couldn't make it up the road and where going to haul all this trash back down the road on foot. I asked them what they sold the scrap for. They told me 6 cents a pound. This was a about 8 guys with maybe 800 pounds of trash. They might earn $50-60 divided by 8 totaling maybe $8 per person for an extremely laborious effort. And recycling the trash of our modern civilization. That was a real scene on that jungle road. Kind of a post peak oil scene for sure. I couldn't just drive on and ended up letting them load the whole heap of scrap in the back of my pick up and they piled in afterwards. I took them back the 4km to their truck. They wanted to pay me something at least for the diesel I burned getting them back to their truck with their scrap iron but I told them I was happy to see them haul away the trash.

[Shaved Monkey]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('thuja', '@')glyn:
OK..I could easily describe a lot of bad scenarios for those living in a city envirronment but many here want to gloss over the economic problems of living rurally as we likely go through cascading and punishing recesions. it's important to see things clearly and not just embrace a pollyana statement such as living rurally is the best prep for a post peak world.

[Newfie]

Out of curiosity...how many folks here live in a center city location, in a city of 1 million or more?

[Skinner]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('Newfie', 'O')ut of curiosity...how many folks here live in a center city location, in a city of 1 million or more?

[AusJake]

I live 12 miles from my city's CBD which is a population of 4.5 million

[thuja]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('Shaved Monkey', '')$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('thuja', '@')glyn:
OK..I could easily describe a lot of bad scenarios for those living in a city envirronment but many here want to gloss over the economic problems of living rurally as we likely go through cascading and punishing recesions. it's important to see things clearly and not just embrace a pollyana statement such as living rurally is the best prep for a post peak world.

[Shaved Monkey]

I own the house,have 3 water tanks collecting water of my roof can access the water through gravity if power goes.
I can cook and build and fix things,I have a very good knowledge of permaculture, I have heaps of tools, I have a veggie garden,heaps of seeds, a worm farm and food forest and access to more through the community garden.
There are kangaroos in the paddock next door,hares down the road and fish in the sea (10 minutes walk) if I want meat.
I cook on my hibachi from twigs on the ground.
The main reason I need money is to pay the government their rates.(its my biggest yearly expense)
If the SHTF big time I wont need to pay the rates or the power bill or the registration or the insurance and there wont be shops so I wont need as much money as I do now or a job.

[mos6507]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('thuja', '
')You need water, food and shelter...and a regular income to make sure you keep those things. That's harder to do in a rural setting. Take away social security checks, federal and state government grants to rural counties...and you will see a more realistic picture of the rural future. That is one of severe unemployment, foreclosurre and poverty. Wait that's already happening rurally.

[Skinner]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('mos6507', '
')The people who have it made are those who keep their jobs and maintain a bugout in the country. The trick is knowing when things are bad enough to actually bugout for good.

[davep]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('mos6507', 'T')he people who have it made are those who keep their jobs and maintain a bugout in the country. The trick is knowing when things are bad enough to actually bugout for good. I don't particularly like going this route because you can't be a stake-holder in the bugout area if you aren't a fulltime resident. People are going to see you as the opportunist that you are if you mosey into town only after TSHTF. But in the end, not many would walk away from established careers willingly.

[mos6507]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('Skinner', '
')This works as a great scenario if you believe in "Doomer as hypocrite"

[mos6507]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('davep', '
')Or you could do what I did. I bought my doomstead with the profit from my suburban house near London.