[Flowerr]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('pup55', '')$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('', '1')238 (traditional founding date; never colonized)

[MrBill]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('I_Like_Plants', '')$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('MrBill', '
')Hmm, I am sure how I could have put it otherwise? I mean if you're a shut-in - for whatever reason - then of course the Internet can be your window on the wide world. Nothing wrong with that.

[Flowerr]

If you havn't picked the Banjo up yet, just sell it, you just don't have it.
It is obviously something you don't like and there is no need to waste your time on it. You therefore won't be good at it.



$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('Aaron', 'R')aid rich guys enclaves?

(I just like writing "enclave")

[Flowerr]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('RedStateGreen', '')$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('Revi', 'I') suppose the way not to be poor is to live on what you have. Spend less than you make. Even if you have to cut your budget, if you are spending less than you make you are still not that poor.

[MrBill]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('Flowerr', 'I')f you havn't picked the Banjo up yet, just sell it, you just don't have it.
It is obviously something you don't like and there is no need to waste your time on it. You therefore won't be good at it.

[vision-master]

My fathers accordion just sits. Been that way since 1995. Can I sell it? I don't think so. I gotta admit, the best thing he handed down to me is one of his pipes from the 50's. I light it up about once a week. We all need to smoke pipes these days, just like the old days!

[MrBill]

In terms of peak oil preparedness I am not sure which is more valuable? The handtools or my father's library of how to books including all the back issues of Mother Earth & Harrowsmith magazines. A great offline reference for do it yourself projects! ; - )

[I_Like_Plants]

Mr Bill you should keep that-there banjar and not let anyone tell you you can't play.

Couple of decent banjo players show up downtown and they're good, but not anything that can't be learned in say a year or so.

Trumpet's hard, and here I've decided to do that. Lucky me! But I like the sound the best, maybe if I get really good I can consider the French horn, which really wins people over and is in demand, but those are expensive. I have a trumpet and a cornet right now. Planning to buy a book called "My first Arban" in a few days, and my range is growing slowly but surely. And learning notes too!

The thing with drawing caricatures is, it's a good parlor trick, something people will always pay a couple'a bucks for. I LIKE music, I can DO drawing if I have to, is about how I feel.

Don't give up any cool old instruments or tools or anything like that. And I don't think age matters THAT much, it's just that it's usually kids who aren't working long hours and supporting a family, so they have the time w/o distractions to learn an instrument.

As for the accordion, I remember seeing, in Los Angeles, an old guy playing accordion, sitting outside a supermarket, and people dropping coins in. I was astounded - here I was going through all these steps to do this that and the other to make a living or try to, and all this guys had to do was play music fairly well and show up.

The Empire hates stuff like this - all the more reason to do it.

[FourOfSwords]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('pup55', 'W')hat a great forum topic. Plus, I have been around a lot of different types of people, from marginally starving all the way up to the Hoity Toity, and I have a bounty of advice for poor people.

But, we need some more detail. First of all there are the "global poor", which is most of the people on earth, including most of the population of a lot of these idiot countries we have studied lately. They can't help where they were born. There is some beneficial advice we can offer them, though. If you want to confine the conversation to the "OECD Poor", there are plenty of subtypes within this group too, some of which will continue to be poor no matter how much advice you give them.

There are a whole lot of "Nouveau Poor", who are the people who live in a big house full of plasma TV's and a lot of gadgets, but have negative net worth, so technically are poorer than a lot of the urban campers.

There are the "perma-poor", people who were born into poor families, and for a variety of reasons, cultural or otherwise, stay that way, and will not take any advice you give them.

There are the "intentionally poor", that is, people of normal capabilities that choose a low production/low consumption lifestyle. These people are actually, in a sense "wealthy" by the standards of some of the forum dwellers. They should give us some advice.

There are a few other types, who made terrible life choices (dope, unplanned reproduction, other) and ended up with the short end of the stick. A lot of the "EuroPoor" fall into this category.

I am sure we can think of some others.

You also have to think about the relationship between education and intelligence (not at all the same thing), and the corresponding relationship between stupidity and poverty, as well as the relationship between physical attributes, such as skin color, weight, height, and bad dental hygiene on poverty.

Also, I am practically an expert on the fact that there is a really fine line between being highly intelligent, creative, and being a successful risk taker, and being crazy as hell and ending up in mental treatment. A lot of entrepreneurs are like this, and end up with offspring that are over the line the other way.

There are abundant examples of poor people who win the lottery, end up temporarily rich, but blow it all and return to poverty.

Similarly there are people that are "poor" but defer consumption to a sufficient extent that they end up in the end "rich" but never fully appreciate it.

Good topic.

[FourOfSwords]

'I'm even going to maintain that the poor in the US are not THAT poor. For instance, actual starvation is extremely rare in the US. What it takes to live well on little money in the US though, is becoming a freak. You have to adopt the standards of some alternate universe where money doesn't matter, a person's skills and loyalty and things like that do. And you have to adopt a very Un-American standard of discipline in mending clothes, keeping yourself shipshape, etc. Very very few are able to do this, but now we're all in the race to the bottom, or 90% of us are anyway, so these 'freak' values are now winning values'.
I Like Plants ~well said! I have recently been doing alot of reasearch on the last 'Great Depression' all these things you mention were commonplace back then. Oof course the world was a different place back then, as were the people.
Alex

[FourOfSwords]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('FreakOil', 'I') just had the post the lyrics to an old Sinatra song that I love:

I got plenty of nothing
And nothing is plenty for me.
I got no car,
Got no mule,
Got no misery

Folks with plenty of plenty
They got a lock on the door
Afraid somebody’s gonna rob them while
They’re out making more

What for?

I got no lock on the door
That’s no way to be
They can steal the rug
From the floor

That’s OK with me
Cause the things that I prize
Like the stars in the sky
Are all free

Say I’ve got plenty of nothing
And nothing is plenty for me.
I got my girl
Got my song,
Got heaven the whole daylong.

Got my girl
Got my lawn
Got my song

I’ve got plenty of nothing
And nothing is plenty for me.
I got my girl
Got my song,
Got heaven the whole daylong.

Got my girl
Got my lawn
Got my song

I live very simply. I'm saving money and making huge student loan payments so that I can rid myself of debt forever. Bread and butter is good. Long walks along the esplanade are fun. Fishing is fantastic, if you can get to a good spot without an automobile.

Find a good used bookstore. Fruit vendors sell bruised items for super-cheap; just cut the crappy part off and enjoy! And you most definitely do not need a fancy gym membership to get in shape. I used to go to a gym, now I jog and do push-ups and pull-ups. I'm in better shape than I've been in a long time.

Thanks Pup55 for the China post. I think half of the time I spend on this site, I say something similar. It must really annoy people. Did you hear about the guy who got killed by molten metal? Apparently, a whole vat of some sort of molten metal just broke and fell on him. What a horrible way to go.

[MarkJames]

We see many people that I would classify as "intentionally low income". They're fat, happy and don't save, invest, look for better jobs or try to improve themselves or their standard of living. Between their wages, tax refunds (rebates) and sum total of government, state, local and private freebies and subsidies, they're doing alright. Many don't want a better job, don't want training, won't educate themselves, won't relocate, won't work overtime, won't work weekends, won't work outdoors, don't like hard manual labor and don't want a second job since the additional income will disqualify them from receiving freebies and subsidies. Many work lower paying primary jobs, but work second jobs or perform services that pay cash which allows them to receive other benefits. Many low income households also claim benefits although they have other wage earners working off the books, or they rent rooms to people paying cash.