Author Topic: Shortages & JIT Problems  (Read 4627 times)

Digwe Must

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Re: Shortages & JIT Problems
« Reply #15 on: August 22, 2021, 11:31:17 am »
"The good news being, it is unlikely that conditions are going to go from "now" to "Amish" without seeing it coming in the developed world. It certainly isn't there yet. Folks have been fighting for Amish living standards since the glory days of the hippies, and for the same reasons, Eco doom, authoritarianism, bad US government, end of resources, and on and on. And yet...here we all are...half a century later...and we ain't Amish yet."



I see this a lot. People seem to think if something requires increased human physical effort it's either Amish or primitive.  Why? 

When I was young (we wrote on clay cuneiform tablets) stevedores unloaded ships handling cargo by hand, with nets, handcarts etc.  It wasn't Amish. There were more than 4 meatpacking companies in the US and much of that work was done the old fashioned way.  Some places still split lamb by hand with a "lamb splitter" - a giant cleaver - while other outfits were running power saws.  Neither was primitive or Amish, it's just that the work took a team of men with skill and more physical effort than the same work requires today.  The building of a good house required far more skill than it does today.  Many different trades were involved and people had to know their sh*t.  And I don't mean they took a picture of their lunch.

This year I had to make our own fence posts and rails.  They were unavailable at the farm supply store or VERY expensive. Luckily I had cedar available that had to be thinned anyway.  I did the cutting with a  very non-Amish chainsaw and paid a local guy $15 an hour to peel them (sharpened shovel and a drawknife.)  The posts cost me about 1/3 of what I would have had to pay at the farm store and there is no toxic residue or huge energy footprint in manufacturing or distributing. I'm the supply chain.

Gas and oil do not have to disappear for alternatives to make sense.  They just need to be expensive.  Cutting and burning firewood for heat beats the hell out of going broke trying to pay heating bills.  A guy can make a living selling firewood.  I've done it in hard times.  We are already seeing people - more all the time - who are successful at raising real food on small acreage with labor intensive methods.  They make a good living but it takes real work.

People are going to need to be adaptable and innovative.  What I see are a generation of folks who can't find their way out of a mall without their phones.  They can't use a compass or map and are only vaguely aware that the sun rises in the east.  Hardship is not getting a parking space close to the entrance.   I don't believe in generational blame.  These folks have been programmed to be skilled consumers.  The programming has been successful.  These people are excellent at consuming and they feel entitled to it and must share it with the world. The future will require more of them than that.  Unfortunately, many have physically handicapped themselves with obesity and related illnesses, making adapting to a more demanding future problematic.

We disagree about the pace of collapse.  I am surrounded by the evidence of an accelerating downward spiral.  I think the current crises of general shortages and supply issues are just the beginning. I don't know how agricultural production is in your area - but in Washington State the spring wheat crop is graded 88%  poor.  This isn't the thread to talk about the climate or ecological disaster - but it is here now.

The future is not going to be Amish. (except for the Amish) For one thing that would require religious conversion and pacifism.  However, a closer connection to nature is certainly desirable for many reasons.  One does not have to be dipped in patchouli oil to see that.  By the way, the Amish make a hell of a good wood fired cookstove and wood fired water heater.


The descent will be uneven and unequal.  Traditional skills will be of value. 

Innovate. Mitigate. Adapt. Evolve. Survive.  Pick up a shovel.

 

Digwe Must

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Re: Shortages & JIT Problems
« Reply #16 on: August 23, 2021, 08:05:38 am »
Buddy J
 
Thanks for your reply.           

I started this last night but lost it when I tried to copy a graph from Limits to Growth.  I decided to try again this morning and it magically re-appeared.  (reappeared mostly in bold face ??) In a way it's good that I lost it because following that I realized that I wasn't going to convince you of anything anyway.  No need to drag out graphs, charts and relating anecdotes.

As long as the current system works for you and yours it is unlikely that you will recognize and acknowledge collapse or even serious disruption of that system.  If your idea of real crisis was the 70s oil embargo then God bless you.  There is that old-standby quote from Upton Sinclair:  "It is difficult to get a man to understand something when his salary depends upon his not understanding it."


Last night:

Thanks for the well reasoned response. you make interesting points and I'd like to respond.  Hopefully I can be coherent.  It's been a long day.

By the way, I can't seem to make the quote highlight doodad work - so you'll have to put up with my ineptitude.

Do you recall "Limits to Growth" put out by the Club of Rome back in the 70s?  Donella Meadows and company did some pretty good work.

From Wikipedia:
In 2008, physicist Graham Turner at the Commonwealth Scientific and Industrial Research Organisation (CSIRO) in Australia published a paper called "A Comparison of 'The Limits to Growth' with Thirty Years of Reality".[12] It compared the past thirty years of data with the scenarios laid out in the 1972 book and found that changes in industrial production, food production, and pollution are all congruent with one of the book's three scenarios—that of "business as usual". This scenario in Limits points to economic and societal collapse in the 21st century.[43] In 2010, Nørgård, Peet, and Ragnarsdóttir called the book a "pioneering report". They said that, "its approach remains useful and that its conclusions are still surprisingly valid ... unfortunately the report has been largely dismissed by critics as a doomsday prophecy that has not held up to scrutiny."[3]

In 2020, an analysis by Gaya Herrington (Sustainability and Dynamic System Analysis Lead at KPMG in the United States but in a personal capacity) was published in Yale's Journal of Industrial Ecology.[51] The study assessed whether, given key data known in 2020 about factors important for the "Limits to Growth" report, the original report's conclusions are supported. In particular, the 2020 study examined updated quantitative information about ten factors, namely population, fertility rates, mortality rates, industrial output, food production, services, non-renewable resources, persistent pollution, human welfare, and ecological footprint, and concluded that the "Limits to Growth" prediction is essentially correct in that continued economic growth is unsustainable under a "business as usual" model.[51] The study found that current empirical data is broadly consistent with the 1972 projections, and that if major changes to the consumption of resources are not undertaken, economic growth will peak and then rapidly decline by around 2040.[52]

 There is the famous graph.  I can't seem to copy and paste it.  You've probably seen it.  It shows human population peaking and declining well after food and industrial production peak and decline.  That seems pretty logical to me.  In other words, in their scenario collapse is well underway before the human population shrinks.  When adding climate disruption into the mix, I believe we are bringing collapse into play now - well ahead of 2040.

As I said, I believe collapse is uneven and unequal.  If you live in Ethiopia, or Honduras or Lebanon or Haiti it's kicking in the front door.  Here, It's waiting in the car outside. 

If you aren't aware of the rapidly deepening global ecological collapse then there is nothing I can say that will bring it home.  It's here.  Look around. 

For only one example, the world is on the brink of several water wars.

https://www.dw.com/en/tensions-rise-as-iranian-dams-cut-off-iraqi-water-supplies/a-58764729

https://www.bbc.com/future/article/20210816-how-water-shortages-are-brewing-wars

Your point about the innovations in fracking technology is well taken.  Of course those innovations were only possible as a result of immense government subsidy.  When the ponzi/tax charade no longer suffices I expect fossil fuel production to be mandated.

          Back to this morning. 

I am surrounded by ongoing ecological catastrophe.  And I live in a relatively healthy place. (Although for weeks this summer the thick grey air and blood red sun made it feel like Mordor.) Dramatic losses in insect and bird populations are the most obvious, but there is so much more.  Entire tree species are winking out.  They have nowhere to run.  The climate is now changing so rapidly that natural phyto-migration doesn't come close to keeping up.  So, I'm ordering tree seeds from much farther south.  A drop in the bucket and perhaps futile - but we do what we can do.  All this ongoing decline in the health of the natural world, if one is ensconced in a city or suburb, is likely to go unnoticed, or at least unacknowledged.  I get that.

Just because people can still go to McDs doesn't mean the Amazon is functioning as intended. 

Just because you can go to the lumberyard for a 2x4 doesn't mean the forests are healthy - or even surviving.

We haven't even touched on the increasing likelihood of major war between the big boys and serious geo-political disruption with the resulting drain on resources and  toll of human misery.

Collapse, as I see it, is a process that has been underway for a while and will go on for a while yet.  There will be stages of various duration.  For some, for a while, it might indeed seem like "downsizing".  The overall trend is accelerating and there is no serious attempt at scale to mitigate impact.  I don't see collapse as a single event or final state of being.  In my view, skewed by reality, we are past the point of no return.  As the natural systems are violently disrupted the human systems (constructs) don't stand a chance.  I don't need to see the elite and their minions boarding the the private jet for New Zealand before I recognize it.

For many years I wondered if we were living through the collapse and passing of an empire or something much larger - the passing of a civilization.  I don't wonder anymore.













 


RE

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Re: Shortages & JIT Problems
« Reply #17 on: August 23, 2021, 01:08:32 pm »
Collapse is a PROCESS, not an individual event.  Any given location can be at any given stage of the process at any given time.  What is important here is the trajectory, and the rate of change.  It's a calculus problem.  You also have past tense versus present tense to deal with.  Some places like Somalia for instance HAVE COLLAPSED.  Others ARE COLLAPSING.  Is there any place on Earth that is NOT collapsing, in one way or another?  In the future tense, is there anywhere on Earth you can identify that is NOT collapsing, or already collapsed?  Is there somewhere you could go today where things are getting better rather than worse?  On the calculus level, do you see the rate of change as slowing or accelerating?

To me, it is no more than a question of how LONG it will take for the process to complete itself.  Things are certainly a whole lot worse now than when I began observing the process in 2007.  I expect they will be a whole lot worse than this a decade from now.  The trajectory is all downhill, far as I can see.

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RE

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Re: Shortages & JIT Problems
« Reply #18 on: August 23, 2021, 05:38:04 pm »
You need Webster to tell you what collapse is?  I doubt the editors there spend any more time revising the definition for that word than they do any of the other ones in the english language.

Collapse is like Pornography, you can't define it but you know it when you see it.

Anyhow, you didn't answer the questions I posed, so I see no reason to answer yours.  If you don't think we are immersed in collapse, nothing I say can change your mind. I already tried that tactic, explaining it to people who do not want to accept it is a waste of time and energy.  Clearly however, collapse has not yet arrived for you.

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RE

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Re: Shortages & JIT Problems
« Reply #19 on: August 23, 2021, 08:28:21 pm »
Somalia is a random example of a place you likely would not like to live.  I could run down a long list of other ones, from Afghanistan to Zambia in alphabetical order like Webster's dictionary.

You seem to think WV or the Smokies would be a good place, but most people never chose to live there.  Mainly only poor people with no way out got stuck living there.  Why go live there NOW, other than to avoid the collapse somewhere else?  It is also unlikely WV is becoming a better place to live than it was, otherwise more people would move there.  In fact the population there dwindles, as in most rural locations in the FSoA.

As to the rate of collapse, apparently it is not rapid enough for you to consider it so.  My opinion is it is plenty fast.  As big a shithole as the FSoA was in 2007 when I began writing about collapse, it is an order of magnitude worse today.  Do you wish to make the case it is getting better?  Staying even?  Those are your only 3 choices here.

RE

Digwe Must

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Re: Shortages & JIT Problems
« Reply #20 on: August 24, 2021, 01:34:59 pm »
Gentlemen

It's a beautiful day here.  It's sunny, cool and the air is better than it has been for 2 months.  We had some rain recently which has been a significant stress reducer.  It gets old fast waking up several times each night to smell the smoke and check the horizon.  The folks down south don't have the respite.  Thousands are on the fire line in CA.  Hundreds of homes have been lost.

Another day for me attempting to maintain a thin veneer of competence and productivity.  I'm inside for a break after spending quality time with my chainsaw in the woods taking down excess fuel.

 
Regarding the topic at hand:

https://www.reuters.com/world/middle-east/leaderless-lebanon-slippery-slope-mayhem-2021-08-23/

So is Lebanon in the midst of collapse?  or, is it not collapse until they're all dead?  Nurses, doctors, aircraft mechanics, hookers, anyone with a transferrable skill took the last stagecoach out of Dodge.  Lebanon used to be very wealthy and civilized.  It ain't Somalia.

Endless war and misery on the periphery of the empire are increasing, right on pace for general societal collapse.  We could debate the state of numerous countries and regions and their obvious future but Buddy J will not recognize collapse until it starts sleeping on his couch and using his toothbrush.

But the state of human geo-politics is not the basis for my view on collapse.  Human institutions will not survive the collapse of the major natural systems.  You are correct, billions do not see it my way.  Billions upon billions have not had my experience.  Had I spent my life commuting from one cubicle to another I might not see the collapse of the natural world or give it much thought if I did notice it.  After all, the Cheetos are still on the store shelves.  The chemicals to keep the lawn green are still available, the car is still shiny, water still comes out of the tap (for now), the average Kardashian ass is still bigger than a Buick and the government has my best interests at heart.

Here is an example of how denial of natural systems works in practice.  It is also a prefect metaphor for how the US deals with crisis. Capitalism at its finest.

https://gizmodo.com/trumps-border-wall-torn-apart-by-arizona-monsoon-rains-1847535174?utm_campaign=Gizmodo&utm_content=&utm_medium=SocialMarketing&utm_source=facebook&fbclid=IwAR3lI9wJyitfV-IBacp0nMS-7hTGRy_BsE3QNrtDybVS_bLxWEYF1I0gGC8

Between us, my wife and I have over 75 years experience working in the natural world. ( I checked the fossil record) She, being the brains, beauty and ambition of this outfit, has all the managerial level experience.  I've spent my time at the grunt level in various follies. In her last gig for the government she managed 6.3 million acres - the Humboldt Toiyabe National Forest - with about 400 employees.  In the course of her career she has made the professional acquaintance of hundreds of "ologists", that is hydrologists, fisheries biologists, wildlife biologists, silvaculturalists, ecologists, botanists etc.  Of course they maintain various networks and keep track of each others' work in the various fields.   She has also worked internationally as a consultant on climate change strategies for several different governments as well as state governments in the US.  In the course of this work she has also associated with numerous academics and experts in the fields I mentioned above as well as climate scientists, sociologists agriculturalists and a few goatherds.

They're all brighter than me and not one of these folks will tell you we aren't in dire straights. Not one.  This matches what I see with my own eyes. You can worry about what Webster says ( I used to have a rooster named Webster.  He was quite the talker.)  I worry about dead and missing birds, disappeared pollinators, Massive levels of species extinction, dying forests, collapsing ecosystems, dead fish floating in oxygen starved rivers, disappearing ocean fisheries, shellfish baking on the rocks, whole towns burning in wildfires, little kids drinking lead and I'm just getting started. 

There is no coming back from this. The fact that most folks are oblivious to the situation doesn't make me wrong. Just lonely.  RE is right.  There is no place on the planet that is not experiencing collapse at some level.  Oblivious humans are no proof against it.

Can you think of one civilization that has withstood environmental collapse or a precipitous decline in available resources?

An increase of the human population well past sustainable levels is not, in my view, an indication that collapse isn't ongoing.  In fact, I view it as the opposite - another symptom/cause of collapse.

I also view the techno-fantasies of life on Mars as another symptom.  If this were even possible how many humans would it benefit?

A lesson for me from recent history involves the US entry into WW2.  With the fullness of time it is obvious that the US was going to war.  However, on Dec 6th 1941 a majority of Americans believed the US should, could and would stay out of the war.  The truth was inconvenient.  The end of empire and ecological collapse is just as inconvenient now.

I'm not here for a battle of wits or definitions and stats with you, Buddy J.  It's obvious I would come to the contest poorly armed and barely able to defend myself.  I wish you well.  It would be better if you were right.  But your not.

A tune for RE



And now back to it.  I'll need to harvest plums today before the hornets get 'em.  The dogs were busy last night - It's been a poor year for wild berries and the bear are hungry. They smell the fruit.  The deer look good but the rabbits have disappeared.  I keep a backyard above ground 16'x4' pool filled in the summer for fire protection.  It holds about 6,000 gallons.  Well, a few frogs have moved in.  They will be sorely disappointed in a few weeks when the pool goes away.


 

Nearings fault

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Re: Shortages & JIT Problems
« Reply #21 on: August 24, 2021, 03:33:44 pm »
This is a fascinating conversation. I believe there are hundreds of mini collapses going on all the time. There does seems to be a building growing collapse of the natural systems that underpin life on earth. I've given up trying to predict when. I don't think it hits all at once so hopefully we pull our butts out of the fire in time. I'm sure we are heading for a much diminished natural world with less predictable weather and less ability to support people but not mad max. As to the rural living question if you have resources or a means of making money living rural is the best life going. I think the smokies, or WV would be great places to check out. Rural Ontario is a wonderful place to live.

RE

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Re: Shortages & JIT Problems
« Reply #22 on: August 24, 2021, 04:21:00 pm »

You seemingly indicate that folks fleeing the backwoods, as many have, is a disadvantage to those wanting to return? "Unlikely WV is becoming a better place to live than it was" is probably highly negatively correlated with the amount of liquidity one arrives with.


This explains your attitude completely.  You're living off a nice fat retirement package.  Good for you.  The vast majority of the population however does not have so much mailbox money incoming.  In my years on the internet, virtually no one in such financial circumstances would recognize collapse.  You won't until either the checks stop coming or the money you have won't buy your food.

I am done with you.  Have a nice day.

RE

FreeWillHijack

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Re: Shortages & JIT Problems
« Reply #23 on: August 24, 2021, 04:28:08 pm »
Its another day during the COVID Lockdown Calamity here in Sydney NSW. Since I visited a shopping mall fruit and Vege Store, for about 15 minutes on 13th August, and dutifully QR coded my presence using the NSW Covid checkin services App, one week later, the health NSW team notified by phone message, that I was deemed a "close contact" and had to self isolate for 14 days , of which 7 had already passed. This tells me that the virus infection rate is beyond control. People are being infected, becoming contagious, spreading the virus in the community, and only some of them later become sick enough to seek testing or treatment, and documentation as a a registered case for contact and trace. Fortunate for me I am 2x vaccinated, tested -ve and will be eligible to leave my house in a few more days. My suburb documents in the statistics as the highest growth rate and number of cases in this city.   We can have our mobile phones, wear masks, don't travel far ( < 5km), and can register our movements and visit places by scan QR code and upload, but its not containing a contagious upper respiratory virus. JIT is a week too late. Biology trumps civilization.

While waiting in the car queue line for my free 2nd COVID test, that I was told directly by NSW health to have, I listened to reports of evacuation chaos at the airport in Kabul Afghanistan. A man was saying that families with Visa documents on their phone , essential to be accepted for a trip out of the hot zone, are being told to go away by Australian employed staff. This after they have run the dangerous gauntlet of Taliban checkpoints on the roads.  Hard copy print documents are difficult to obtain, and the entire system of producing them in time is broken, if it ever was working fairly. DFAT , the Department of Foreign Affairs is said to be working divided against itself.

One section of DFAT takes the money transfers, processes the documents, does the checking, and maybe gives the approvals.  Another section gets to man the barricades, and reject all the evidence of them, and doesn't what to see them, or have to verify them. They are different sets of people, different lives, working under entirely different conditions. And perhaps given different and conflicting instructions by political divisions. So remote, in a foreign country, different language, and novel situation under stresses. The people holding the fort at Kabul Airport feel they are under threat, and they are running their own show all by themselves. Instructions from Canberra bureaucrats that do get through must be getting laughed at. This what an end can be like, where nothing is working as expected, only prejudices can recognise titles, passports, visas, or rules, or compassionate need, or citizenship of a powerful nation. Deals get to be negotiated with local power and resources, personal persuasion with the local banditry, dealing with all the irrational passions and prejudices in between. Our values, beliefs and documents become meaningless when confronted with people for whom it means little.

We have the global social machine breakdown, with cracks and fractures between our separate realities. Depending on ones position of power and receiving of privileges, we work at conflicting goals. The only sure thing is we all need to keep consuming our resources to live and spread our wastes, as entropy producing machines.
At Sydney Australia, the global goods, food supplies, water, news internet, are all still being delivered. Our currency and money savings still work for exchange the global megamachine. Australia still ships out its coal, gas, and traded products.  The evidence is that our systems time left and domains of power are shrinking.

The Australian government has been putting up new barriers against migration and acceptance of refugees now for a long time. It is not hard to think that the governments find the current stuff ups in Kabul altogether convenient, suits the system designed for common national rejection of foreigners, and they and the national media will ignore the temporary embarrassment.


Eddie

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Re: Shortages & JIT Problems
« Reply #24 on: August 25, 2021, 08:02:10 pm »
My ears are burning.

I think a lot about what retirement would be like now. At 35 when somebody I met said that thing I’ve so heard many times....”Oh, you’re a dentist!”....I always replied, “Hey, that’s just what I do, not who I am.”

At 65 I’m here to tell you it’s become a LARGE part of who I am, whether I ever wanted that to happen or not. I worry about how I’d really feel if that part of life was over. Would I still be me? Would I feel like some old emasculated has-been with no purpose anymore? I really have no idea.

I’m sure having some money will make things easier. If  the money will buy anything when I’m retired a few years, which is less and less of a given. I’m glad I hedged the way I did. It seems to be working for the moment.

But we do live in an unstable world. One that has less opportunity, I think, than it did when there were a lot fewer people and a lot less tech and a lot less need to harness the entire energy of the sun just to keep our lifestyle going.

There are too many people, not enough open country that isn’t surveilled by somebody, and too many laws....and too many regulations and too many taxes.

And there is an elite political class that owns almost everything and pays next to nothing to support the boondoggles they come up with to waste my money and yours and siphon off a bit of it for themselves.

But to quote Jerry Seinfeld, it is what it is, and you do what you gotta do.

Our world has some major problems....of that there is no doubt in my mind. Man-made problems....and I never had much faith that mankind would solve its own problems.

I like very little about where the national zeitgeist is taking us these days. I think social media is a sewer...and a dangerous experiment that won’t end well. I think the average American is dumb and delusional. I think more changes are coming that I won’t like at all...but I can’t get behind taking up arms against the hordes. **** that.

Climate change sucks. But other things suck too. You just have to try to make the best of it. Some of us are luckier than others. I count myself very lucky.

I think about the possibility of relocating, but I will probably stick around here. I just drove to Chicago and moved my son and his wife’s studio equipment and power tools and the contents of their shop to Austin.


Twenty-one hours straight, on the first leg.....and about 24 hours, loaded to the max, coming back. He flew down and we made the trip together. It’s probably the only time we’ll ever do a trip like that. I enjoyed every grueling minute of it.

I learned that my top speed for pulling my 18 ft flat bed fully loaded behind my Silverado is 62 miles per hour. Anything faster makes me nervous in the service.

Three of my four kids are here. One is probably starting medical school next year, and she will be moving away again after 11 years here.....after more than 10 years of college. I still hope she can.

The kids all come and go but Austin is always home to them. Maybe me and the missus being here is part of that.

Life, for me, is often just about making some kind of plan and then doing my best to carry it out. A road trip to Chicago. A trip to Alaska. Building my boathouse. A trip to the dump to haul off the detritus that just keeps piling up behind me and threatening to catch up with me before I take the dirt nap.

I am studying retirement these days.....lots to learn about how to keep the tax man out of my pocket. Doesn’t matter if you retire..if you have some income, they want it. I am dedicated to not paying a lot of tax after I quit work. I am learning the ropes while I still have time to make some course corrections...I hope.

I lost two good friends this last year. One to COVID, and I only found out months later. I only ever saw him at the lodge at Christmas, but I’ve seen him there for 18 or so of the last 20 years. He was one of my few Jewish friends of this lifetime..... and he was funny as hell. He was in his 80’s and the poster child for co-morbitity.

The other friend was lost  to a brain tumor that only became symptomatic a few weeks before it was fatal. Also found out later, when I looked for obits because I hadn’t heard from him...and there was a very nice one....it still sucked. One of my go-to guys for work. He installed the equipment in my first office, and he fixed my broken **** for more than 30 years. There will be no real replacement for him. He was also a sailor and had me out on all his many boats over the years. He will be missed.

No closure in the Time of COVID. Funerals have fallen out of fashion.

Just rambling......and it’s getting late and I have early patients.

I hope you’re all coping with whatever bullshit life is currently putting center stage. One lesson my dogs taught me....live in the moment, and always love unconditionally. If humans could do those two things as well as the average Blue Heeler, we’d be shittin’ and flyin’.



« Last Edit: August 25, 2021, 08:05:57 pm by Eddie »

RE

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Re: Shortages & JIT Problems
« Reply #25 on: August 26, 2021, 09:57:39 am »
My ears are burning.

I think a lot about what retirement would be like now. At 35 when somebody I met said that thing I’ve so heard many times....”Oh, you’re a dentist!”....I always replied, “Hey, that’s just what I do, not who I am.”

At 65 I’m here to tell you it’s become a LARGE part of who I am, whether I ever wanted that to happen or not. I worry about how I’d really feel if that part of life was over. Would I still be me? Would I feel like some old emasculated has-been with no purpose anymore? I really have no idea.

I’m sure having some money will make things easier. If  the money will buy anything when I’m retired a few years, which is less and less of a given. I’m glad I hedged the way I did. It seems to be working for the moment.

But we do live in an unstable world. One that has less opportunity, I think, than it did when there were a lot fewer people and a lot less tech and a lot less need to harness the entire energy of the sun just to keep our lifestyle going.

There are too many people, not enough open country that isn’t surveilled by somebody, and too many laws....and too many regulations and too many taxes.

And there is an elite political class that owns almost everything and pays next to nothing to support the boondoggles they come up with to waste my money and yours and siphon off a bit of it for themselves.

But to quote Jerry Seinfeld, it is what it is, and you do what you gotta do.

Our world has some major problems....of that there is no doubt in my mind. Man-made problems....and I never had much faith that mankind would solve its own problems.

I like very little about where the national zeitgeist is taking us these days. I think social media is a sewer...and a dangerous experiment that won’t end well. I think the average American is dumb and delusional. I think more changes are coming that I won’t like at all...but I can’t get behind taking up arms against the hordes. **** that.

Climate change sucks. But other things suck too. You just have to try to make the best of it. Some of us are luckier than others. I count myself very lucky.

I think about the possibility of relocating, but I will probably stick around here. I just drove to Chicago and moved my son and his wife’s studio equipment and power tools and the contents of their shop to Austin.


Twenty-one hours straight, on the first leg.....and about 24 hours, loaded to the max, coming back. He flew down and we made the trip together. It’s probably the only time we’ll ever do a trip like that. I enjoyed every grueling minute of it.

I learned that my top speed for pulling my 18 ft flat bed fully loaded behind my Silverado is 62 miles per hour. Anything faster makes me nervous in the service.

Three of my four kids are here. One is probably starting medical school next year, and she will be moving away again after 11 years here.....after more than 10 years of college. I still hope she can.

The kids all come and go but Austin is always home to them. Maybe me and the missus being here is part of that.

Life, for me, is often just about making some kind of plan and then doing my best to carry it out. A road trip to Chicago. A trip to Alaska. Building my boathouse. A trip to the dump to haul off the detritus that just keeps piling up behind me and threatening to catch up with me before I take the dirt nap.

I am studying retirement these days.....lots to learn about how to keep the tax man out of my pocket. Doesn’t matter if you retire..if you have some income, they want it. I am dedicated to not paying a lot of tax after I quit work. I am learning the ropes while I still have time to make some course corrections...I hope.

I lost two good friends this last year. One to COVID, and I only found out months later. I only ever saw him at the lodge at Christmas, but I’ve seen him there for 18 or so of the last 20 years. He was one of my few Jewish friends of this lifetime..... and he was funny as hell. He was in his 80’s and the poster child for co-morbitity.

The other friend was lost  to a brain tumor that only became symptomatic a few weeks before it was fatal. Also found out later, when I looked for obits because I hadn’t heard from him...and there was a very nice one....it still sucked. One of my go-to guys for work. He installed the equipment in my first office, and he fixed my broken **** for more than 30 years. There will be no real replacement for him. He was also a sailor and had me out on all his many boats over the years. He will be missed.

No closure in the Time of COVID. Funerals have fallen out of fashion.

Just rambling......and it’s getting late and I have early patients.

I hope you’re all coping with whatever bullshit life is currently putting center stage. One lesson my dogs taught me....live in the moment, and always love unconditionally. If humans could do those two things as well as the average Blue Heeler, we’d be shittin’ and flyin’.

I quite enjoyed retirement until I got sick and lost the leg.  Even though my mobility was poor, I was relatively independent and I had my interest in collapse and my writing to keep me occupied.  I liked being by myself, I've been a loner since I got divorced three decades ago.  My income was low, but still plenty for me because I don't spend much.  Taxes also not a problem for me at all.  Many laws bother me intellectually, but practically they have little effect on my life since I don't break them.  There are a few I broke in the past, but fortunately never got caught. :)  Now however I don't leave my digs enough to break a law, even if I wanted to.

I only have 2 friends from the past I know who are dead, and both died quite some time back.  Today I have only 3 people I can consider friends, Eddie, Keith & Brian.  Even if visiting with Eddie or Keith wasn't so difficult, neither of their wives like me much so I wouldn't visit them because of that, and even with Brian anywhere I go I am just a burden who can't get around by himself to do anything.  Unless you spend time together also, long distance friendship has the same problems as long distance romance.  Spending time together is what really makes a friendship, IMHO.

Finding a way to occupy my mind these days is the hardest part of living.  I am no longer inspired to write about and pontificate on collapse. I find both reading and watching video to be boring.  Even fantasizing in my head is boring.  In all cases, I know all the plot lines, I know how things will come out in the end. When I sit in my recliner now, I try to not think at all, which is also difficult to do.  On the occasios I do fall asleep, sometimes I have a good dream but I always seem to wake up too soon because I have to ****.  lol.

Animals don't seem to need to keep their minds occupied.  Cows stand around all day just eating grass.  It's much harder for a Homo Sap to just sit around all day and eat Mealz-on-Wheelz.

RE

Digwe Must

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Re: Shortages & JIT Problems
« Reply #26 on: August 26, 2021, 10:20:30 am »
RE  If I were in your neighborhood I'd take you out to break a law or two just for fun.  I really do think a few hours out of doors in a nice spot before the weather turns would be good for you - but you say that's not possible.

FreeWillHijack  Thanks for the Sydney update.  I agree about the global societal machine breakdown.  Is the government in Australia (I'm asking for your opinion of course) being proactive, reactive, manipulative?  Are they acting in good faith re Covid?  Or, have they seized upon the situation to advance a previously existing agenda?  Or some combination?

Eddie  At 65 you are a retirement whippersnapper. Enjoy it.  Enjoy the family.  Adventures await.  If you decide to do some service work in your community or elsewhere I'm sure your skills would be greatly appreciated.  OR you could take up a new hobby This gal is 79: 
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=l4s2WAMZIVM&feature=youtu.be


Buddy J  I'm not going to debate.  I would just point out that no previous civilization I'm aware of has so scoured the entire planet of resources and polluted the damn place.  The next civilization will begin on salvage.


Meanwhile, this cracks me up.  Talk about JIT delivery!

Do you know how the Burj Khalifa takes out its poop?
NEWS  THURSDAY,

At over 828 meters and more than 160 stories, the Burj Khalifa in Dubai holds the record of being the tallest building in the world. With so many floors and tremendous height one would assume the technology used for its sewage system to be highly sophisticated.

Unfortunately this is not the case; according to a report on inhabitat the tallest building in the world uses an archaic system for the disposal of its sewage. This archaic system involves the sewage from the building being literally trucked out to a treatment plant. The report also mentions the reason behind using such an archaic system is because the building is not hooked up to the municipal wastewater system

According to the report, the sewage is collected in trucks and is transported to a wastewater treatment facility outside the town.

Many tall buildings in Dubai are not connected to the municipal sewage system. Once the sewage is collected in trucks they wait in a queue for the collected sewage to be put into a waste water treatment plant. According to a calculation made by Gizmodo the Burj Khalifa has 163 habitable floors, and can hold 35,000 people at any given time. Humans on an average produce 100 to 250 grams of poop per day which when taken to be an average of 200 grams it comes up to 7 tonnes of poop every day. This does not include human produced liquids like pee, water used for bathing, cleaning their teeth etc. which will bring the total up to 15 tonnes of sewage daily.

RE

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Re: Shortages & JIT Problems
« Reply #27 on: August 26, 2021, 12:34:47 pm »
What law would you break just for fun?

It's not that I can't go out to look at nature. There certainly are plenty of parks around here and lakes and mountains etc. It's just I don't see the point in going to one of these places to sit in my wheelchair and look at it. It just wouldn't be much fun. More depressing than anything else.

RE

Eddie

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Re: Shortages & JIT Problems
« Reply #28 on: August 26, 2021, 04:41:18 pm »
Hiking up to the Whittier Glacier in the rain, which the missus and I did on our selfish alone day without RE, was without a doubt a high point in my life. And thank God for the rented RV to dry off and warm up in....it was parked by the trailhead. FYI, it’s a much longer trail than they say it is in the freakin’ brochure. Not exactly primitive camping, ....... know, I know.

I  didn’t come equipped for hiking. We were both wearing Uggs....which did okay until they finally just got soaked after an hour of steady rain. I think I wore them for the other long hike we took up at Denali too. Can’t remember for sure. That one was easier......but we didn’t get to see the peak. It was pretty socked in when we were there. There were some really nice mountain lakes up there.

The Seward water is surreal. We ate on the dock and looked out at the sailboats in the marina. I can fantasize about sailing up there with no problem, but I’d need to up my game from what it takes in the Gulf, or even on The Atlantic

I would probably fish a lot now if I were in AK.....the fishing looked to be pretty spectacular, although we didn’t have time to sample it. I seem to be taking a sabbatical from fishing here. I have some gear again....always meaning to do more fishing, but life tends to get in the way. Like golf, fishing takes time.

Digwe Must

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Re: Shortages & JIT Problems
« Reply #29 on: August 26, 2021, 05:27:48 pm »
What law would you break just for fun?

It's not that I can't go out to look at nature. There certainly are plenty of parks around here and lakes and mountains etc. It's just I don't see the point in going to one of these places to sit in my wheelchair and look at it. It just wouldn't be much fun. More depressing than anything else.

RE

Well, I wouldn't want to steal, do damage or hurt anyone, but that leaves us many statutes related to personal conduct that we could have a good time with.

The last time I mentioned getting out in nature you wrote that the only way to do that was in a van full of old folks and they wouldn't let you get out.  Not what I had in mind.  If, in fact, you could actually get out and feel something other than parking lot exhaust on your hide then I strongly recommend it. 

As I said to you before, I'm not pulling either suggestion I made to you out of my ass.  Getting severely disabled vets and those suffering from PTSD into and immersed in nature is proven in studies and anecdotally to really help.  I believe it because I have seen it work.  It's not just about getting outside.  It's about getting outside of yourself.  It might help - but it sure as hell has no chance of helping if you don't do it.

You asked for suggestions and where I come from if someone asks for help you do what you can. 

I'm with Eddie.  I'd go fishing.  Possibilities abound. I first went to Alaska 50 years ago this month.   A friend and I drove a 62 Chevy Biscayne to Alaska via the Maritime provinces and across Canada from Boston.  The Alcan was not paved yet.  We went through a lot of tires.  We smuggled two Canadian girls across the border who had been denied entry, and then wound up around the docks in Anchorage.  I got outstandingly drunk at the Salty Dog Saloon in Homer where I spent most of the night draped over a large driftwood log outside the side entrance.  (I didn't get mugged, rolled, beat up or harassed - it was a different world) After several adventures I eventually hitchhiked back to Boston. I spent 2 days in Delta Junction with my thumb out before two young women on vacation heading back to college in NY picked me up.  Life was good.  But, I digress.   Alaska was the first place I saw salmon run - and huge bear tracks in the mud.  In Whitehorse (Yukon) I walked around an old paddle wheel steamer, hauled onto the bank, that had run up and down the Yukon River in the early days. It's long gone I imagine.

In my second Alaska stint I worked as a cook in a gold mine about 100 miles north of Anchorage- fly in and out.

Anyway, I have to get the sheep in.  Have a good evening.