White Friday!

I was amazed at all the awesome deals I found on things we don't want or even need. Even if I wanted some things the internet was down because of some nice snow. I headed out of town after lunch on Friday because work was terribly slow and everything was iced up nice from the Thanksgiving storm. I did get our food storage stocked up a little more and need to visit Costco this week.
For the holiday we had a family dinner at father in-laws and I think I made my best apple pie ever and it was a nice afternoon.

It's always a surprise when it comes to the weather but it's never unpleasant because if you can't control it, just try and enjoy it.

Shoveling snow at 8500 feet is always a great workout. It took me about 90 minutes to shovel the drive and parking area. As usual I'm the only person who shoveled but we like it neat and clean.

They were nice enough to get the road cleared so it was easier for Rock to walk without ice forming on his paws. We had the fire going and the cabin was warm... ok, it was really hot for me so I didn't have the blower on and just let the stones suck up the heat.

Saturday it was almost 25 degrees (about 15 with windchill) out so I went for a run. If you've never run in snow or sand, it's a lot of work. You lose power with each step and because it's not very stable your quads get a great workout. I made hamburger stew and chocolate fudge brownies for our weekend eating pleasure and of course we had pancakes this morning.
The temp skyrocketed to 30 so I got ready for another run. The storm that was hanging out on the mountains roared in but I didn't care. When I was done with my run I was overheated and wet. The storm was really dropping snow but I was working hard and never noticed that it was cold out (13 degrees before windchill).
We refilled the kindling box, load up the wood rack, do some laundry, eat some stew.... A great night even if it's dropping another few inches later tonight. Right now the temp is dropping but I suspect the clouds will be back soon. Going to pop up the Christmas tree in the next week hopefully and get the lights strung up. Meanwhile we stare out of the picture window.

'One more'

Today I'm exhausted. I've got work locked down tight and will be heading across town for some kickboxing and grappling training. I'm looking forward to it but dreading it at the same time.
One more.

My run last night started well, my best friend and his dog ran with me. About 2 miles into the run my pace dropped and I was struggling mentally for the next mile. We dropped down onto a different trail and everything was golden again, we zoomed forward.
One more.

The worst paycheck in 3-4 years is heading my way tomorrow. I'm still thankful for it but it's frustrating that accounting keeps dropping expenses into the wrong months. This has happened for two months in a row and for some reason they don't understand to account for an expense in the correct month so the expenses even out.
One more.

Thanksgiving and Christmas at the cabin but I'm not sure I can spend 3 days alone with Father in-law when everyone else heads back to work. I think he will be bored out of his mind and I'll be busy doing projects, working out, dog hiking or reading. That's what I would like to be doing anyhow but instead I'll be worried about him and what he is doing.
One more.

Thrive (the rebranded Shelf Reliance) has all of their food storage on sale for 50% off retail for a week following black Friday. I'm going to float an order on my credit card for a month but we should be able to add a lot to our pantry as planned.
One more.
One more.
One more step, workout, stride, day, sprint, stair, sit-up, get-up, holiday, paycheck, work day, sarcastic comment, etc.

No matter what happens it only takes 'one more' to keep progressing. Not everyone has the capacity for one more, for never quit, for don't give up, for don't stop, etc. Some days it's the only thing that keeps us going.

Where have the days gone

Wake up.
Work.
Change.
Work out.
Sleep.

I'm on day 24 without a rest day and thats a total of 27 workouts not including any hiking. Kicking butt, every day is my best day.

The talking heads say to stay indoors and nobody should be out in this weather. Up to 20 inches of snow and people are flocking to the grocery stores. We are up to our necks in supplies and wouldn't want it any other way.

What do I know. I don't play the 'behaved citizen' and 'popular opinion' games. I've dropped some online friends over my stance on the activities in France and the Middle East but that's just fine. I prefer to pay attention to what's local and I can possibly influence and try hard not to be distracted.

Fun local issues:
In the city the police no longer have to perform P.T. tests because they got sued by 12 women who couldn't pass it and were put on administrative duties. It's not like they prevent crime but it would be nice if they could run without adrenaline doing all the work.
At the cabin the community has a matching program for non profits. You select one of the eligible non profits and donate and it's matched by a non governmental organization. Perfect!
Oh... the Sheriffs Office is one of the organizations you can donate to.... doesn't that mean I should be able to write off whatever % of the property tax collected is given to them. Sigh.

We are stocking up the cabin with a lot of supplies so that's actually a bit of work that we didn't expect to take so long. I have a truckload to take down this weekend and a carload to deliver sometime this week. It's been windy down south and down in the teens (feels much colder with the creeks so close) and up into the low 50's during the day. The fireplace has been used but since it brings the temp indoors up to 80 really fast I'm not allowing it to be up and running all day/night.

Plans until the end of the year:
Level a spot (concrete maybe) and get a shipping container (20')
Add switch at electrical panel so generator can run the well pump
Buy emergency hand well pump
Build woodshed extension
Buy and cut plywood so windows can be secured
Relocate 90% of long term food storage
Black Friday long term food storage sale purchases (would love to pick up another year)


Get out and get something done even if it's in short-shorts in 20 degree weather with sleet/snow hitting your crazy hair!

and Happy Birthday Jam!

and to think people dream about this life

It's so romantic, driving around like mad-max popping zombies in the head, stuffing pillowcases with canned goods from the wally world distribution center, swooping in with your fellow militia members and saving dozens from a sex slave operation...

I would add some nice fun photo's but our bandwidth cap has been reached and I can't upload anything.

I don't think I'm far off about what a lot of people think this sort of life would be like post SHTF. Most of you who read this understand already, it's a lot of work and that's in the right now. Recently I've tried to extend our network a little, perhaps find a few more people who think the same way and might be good companions now and for whatever the future holds. At this point I'm taking a reserved approach and doing a lot of listening but that's easy when people like to talk (a lot).

We had a nice, full of hard work, 3 day weekend although I was the only one here for all of it. The woodshed is as full as possible with enough space to get to the seasoned wood if we need it. We added 2 rows outside and have about 2.5 cords under a tarp. It's some nasty piñon wood but it shall burn just as good as anything else. Soft wood doesn't make any more/less creosote in the chimney but it's just not as dry as we would like.
We pulled out the fireplace insert and fired up the new shop-vac. Around the insert there was about 4 inches of soot and ash, not sure when it was cleaned last because we didn't do it on move in. We checked the insert over and found it to be in good working order. The fan made a lot of racket last year so we took off the mesh guard and now it seems to be better. We wanted to add some more insulation around the insert (between the rocks and the insert edges) but the local Ace didn't have any. I'll kick around amazon and see what I can find.

Friday evening there was frost and snow all over the place so the run was a little chilly once I got out of the tree's (5 degrees). I ran every day and today was a balmy 63 degrees. We ran together yesterday, a rare occurrence and were enjoying our jog when we heard a kids voice.... I looked and the kid was probably around 8 or 9 and he seemed to have a problem with us running by his house, especially the fact that I didn't have a shirt on. There was a lot of F bombs and even a couple 'I'll f-n kill you lines' and my favorite of the encounter 'ill shoot you with my bb gun'.
Not sure what to make of it really, I could blame the parents (or lack thereof), the prison (I mean school) system, video games.... maybe it's our fault, maybe I shouldn't be running with my shirt off, maybe.... maybe someone should stick a bar of irish spring in his pie hole. We had some laughs about it once we were down the road a bit. Everyone wants to offend people and most people want to be offended but we use critical thinking.

Not ones to be victims we don't let our guard down, even if it's a punk ass kid on an old country road. I don't want to be the person begging for my life when the next asshole decides it's time to kill people. I HATE running with my pistol because every ounce adds up with every single step. The shooting close to the city house reinforced what we do, and why we do it. We just hope we are on the winning side or at least made an effort.

This life isn't easy, and it's rarely romantic (ever try to caress someones face when you have gloves on filled with splinters and pine sap?). It's what we love and to us that's what counts. As the world continues to go to shit we just push forward and deal with whatever is thrown our way.