A peach of a time

Just so you don't think I'm perfect... here's a peachy comedy of errors.

I scored a big time freegan score, and got permission to pick a tree clean of peaches the other day.  The whole time I was picking the peaches, this street person kept bothering me.  I gave him some peaches but he didn't go away until I loaded up my peaches and left.  He didn't want money, I don't think - just to talk to someone maybe.  Harmless but a bit distracting.  So I have this banker box full of smallish peaches.  I thought they were a bit firm still so when I got home I harvested my basil instead of deal with the peaches.

I have so much basil this year that I hung up about 12 bunches of it on an indoor clothesline, plus made a jar of fresh basil and olive oil for the fridge with the little leaves that were left on the seed stems I cut off.  The seed stems filled a very large mixing bowl to heaping.  Now they're in a paper shopping bag. This year's basil was all volunteer from seeds that fell on the ground last year.  It was everywhere.  I had a big patch of it the way I also have a mint patch.  I didn't uproot it, I just cut it, so who knows, maybe it will keep growing and I'll get a second crop.  I have coffee cans full of basil seeds going back to 2008 - maybe I should start a basil farm.  I still have frozen pesto left over from last year, too.

Back to the peaches: Having had a couple at lunch today, I thought they were ripe.  And I thought I was going to preserve them all in one night.  WRONNNNNG.  I started making peach jam but it was a real pain in the petunia.  I blanched about 20 peaches for 20 seconds. It didn't loosen their skins.  I put them back 3 or 4 times, each time boiling them for longer.  The skins didn't get loose even after 5 minutes of boiling.  I ran out of ice with the first dip because someone (me) didn't refill the ice tray, or it evaporated.  Should have bought ice.  So I got out one of those blue plastic ice things you put in a cooler out of the freezer and threw that in the bowl of water.  It only sort of helped.

I decided I should skin and de-stone the peaches with a knife instead of try to keep boiling the skin loose.  The slimy peaches kept escaping and having to be rinsed off.  The floor got sticky.  The pits didn't come out easy either.  I needed a lifeline! (I think that's what they call it in that game show)  So I called my friend the gardening and canning nut.  She said, there's two kinds of peaches, the hard kind and the easy kind.  I guess I got the hard kind!  Anyway, I did 40 peaches - 2 batches.  Ended up with about 6 cups of cut, peeled, destoned peaches.  The recipe called for 4 cups so I still have all these peaches that I think will end up in a pie. Plus about 3/4 of a banker box of whole, raw ones left to go.  I guess it's a good problem to have.

So then I made the jam.  It went fine except the peaches just wouldn't break down.  I boiled them a lot and they just stayed looking like cut up peaches.  I got a potato masher out, and then they just looked like little cubes.  Even when I cooked them a good long time.  So I have peach chunks in pectin-y goo.  Not sure if that qualifies as jam.  Maybe more like peach marmalade.

I put the goo in jars and got 2 1/2 pints.  Figured I'd use the half pint myself now, put up a pint, and give one pint to the guy who let me pick his tree, then make some kind of peach thing in the early morning for the office with the other 2 cups that didn't become jam.

So then, just when you thought it was safe to go back in the water, it was time for the water bath.  The half jar floated so I just stuck it in the fridge instead.  One of my jars of jam opened in the water bath.  Apparently not all jar rings are created equal.  I must have had one jar that was a mismatch to the threads in the rings I had, or maybe it got cross threaded.  It popped off in the water bath.  So I had to fish out the jar and find another ring and lid, and try again.  The popped off jar lid is still in the water bath.  I suspect the plasticky liner is done for because it boiled for so long, but hey it's only a jar lid.  Maybe I'll use that one on a jar of dried basil.

Pulling the jars out, the one with the odd ring kept slipping the tongs and falling back in.  Think I'll get a jar lifter tomorrow.

Gee, only like 150 more peaches to go. Hooray!  and there's another peach tree to pick, too.  Maybe I'll can them whole this time.  Dehydrate some, too.  Also, my roommate knows where there's an abandoned pear tree full of fruit.  We'll be real regular this winter, I suspect.

By contrast, the apple tree next door where I got 12 quarts of applesauce off it last year, only has two apples hanging on it this year.  The poor thing.  I guess it needed a rest.  (I better watch out for Lord Summerisle next May).  Same with my grapevine - no fruit this year.  Some years are good for some crops and bad for others.  If you are depending on a garden to eat, plant a wide variety of stuff.

How to Defeat a Backscatter Scanner

The vehicular version of the backscatter scanner looks like a panel truck or cargo van that sometimes has a big box bump-out on the back.  It has an X-ray machine that can scan houses and vehicles from a distance.  There's probably ones that are in buildings near border crossings etc. that don't look like trucks.  The TSA is rolling these scanners out and may be scanning a street near you soon.  I imagine they could use them to look for guns, electronics, gold, hidden people, or whatever the illegal thing du jour is. (guitars, lemonade, raw milk, Tea Party supporters...)

It seems the way to defeat one is with food.  Keep reading.

This is from an article on Liberty News Radio

"...the backscatter scanners coming soon to an airport or government building (or highway, in its mobile form) near you. Ironically, these purportedly protect you from dirty bombs by irradiating you today (and tomorrow, and the next day, and so on). But then again, these are defeated, or confused, by simply packing the sides, bottom and top of the cargo area with cases of innocuous "low-Z" substances. Like sugar. Or flour..."

Backscatter image

 This sort of reminds me of my article about building a makeshift fallout shelter. To avoid the radiation emanating from fallout outside, you get in the center of the house (away from the outside walls) and build a fort around yourself with thick stuff, like boxes of books.  I'm guessing this is sort of the same idea.  You're essentially insulating yourself or your cargo from radiation with thickness.  I wish it had said how much sugar you might need.

The rest of the Liberty News Radio article that mentions how to shield from backscatter is a theoretical discussion of how a radiological attack could be done by scattering some stuff disguised as mud or road salt, made from some mysterious "Substance A" and "Substance B". Sort of interesting, but I hope nobody is stupid enough to try it.

Aw, Nuts! How to Process Foraged Nuts

courtesy of Wikimedia Commons

It's nut season! Black walnuts, hickory nuts, and acorns are falling.

I was stupid last night and cut the hulls off some black walnuts without wearing gloves.  My fingers are black!  I also have some hickory to do and some acorns.  I plan to go out many times this fall, get a lot of nuts, and then make some kind of nut bread.

Collecting and processing foraged nuts takes some work.  But it's worth it.  You get free food (except for the labor), fresh air, exercise, and you pretty much can guess it's free of pesticides and preservatives. 

If you have a bad back, there's a neat device you can buy that looks like a huge rolling egg whisk on a stick - just roll it over the nuts and collect them.  I'm not sure if it would work on big nuts like black walnuts, but it would probably work with hickory.  They make them with the whisks closer together for picking up spent bullet cases too, for those who shoot at a range.  Perhaps you can fashion a DIY one out of coat hangers, although that kind of wire is less springy than the kind in a whisk.

Here is a good article on how to process foraged nuts to maximize their yield and marketability.
http://hwwff.cce.cornell.edu/learningf531.html?unit=6&section=Marketing

As far as acorns go, they have to be soaked to make them edible.  How much depends on the variety of oak they come from.  It is best to shell them, grind the meats and then soak that a couple times because you will get more surface area to get the bitter tannins out.  Once they're out, you can either spread out and dry the acorn meal for storage or just use it in baking right then.

Back to walnuts, if you pick walnuts earlier in the year, when they're small and don't have a lot of tannin, you can pickle them, green hull and all.  But it's too late for that in the fall.

Don't throw away all the walnut hulls if you've got walnuts.  Walnut hulls can be used in a tea to get rid of worms.  You can also make a dye out of them (hence my black fingers!), and I would imagine also an ink.  Hickory hulls can also be used as a dye.  Whatever you don't save for dye or medicine can be mulch.

Several years ago I was messing around with henna designs at a festival - walnut juice could be like a poor girl's black henna.  I'd be careful dying hair, though - you might dye your forehead too! Maybe put Vaseline on your forehead first?

A Call to Sell Mortgages Locally

I stumbled on this article (I think I found it on Rense.com) where the author thinks mortgage notes could be sold locally like a municipal bond.  She doesn't think it will happen because she thinks the Feds are trying to cover up the enormous extent of mortgage fraud that happened during the go-go days.  Particularly by keeping hold of the control of these mortgage notes, they can keep shredding the damning evidence.

http://solari.com/blog/bring-your-mortgages-home/

Perhaps a little pressure by writing our representatives could change this.  Just a thought.  I hope, anyway, that writing our representatives still actually has an effect, because I've been doing an awful lot of it lately for food freedom etc. and getting form letters back in the mail.  Unfortunately some of these form letters seem to suggest I wrote supporting the opposite opinion, so that's pretty confusing to me.  I'll have to write back and clarify, I guess.

Baaaad Girls Steal Goat

These two girls age 6 and 7 in Minnesota went out at night in their pajamas, stole a goat from the petting zoo and were walking down the street with it when a cop came up and then the story gets pretty funny from there.

http://mankatofreepress.com/latestnews/x890682982/Girls-get-caught-for-late-night-goat-walk

LOL!!!

Google has Killed Google Archive

Oh, this makes me mad.  Google has taken Google Archive, merged it with their regular search, and gotten rid of most of its functionality.  This blog here complained of it - they're the ones who turned me onto it in the first place.  It was a really great tool in researching the past and what the media said back when quickly.  If an article had disappeared from its original place, often there were other articles that quoted it that you could still get.

What's left is the Wayback Machine at http://www.archive.org/web/web.php.  This is a nonprofit, so perhaps it will stick around longer.

This loss of functionality is a shame.  It seems the Powers That Be are tightening their noose again.  It's hard to research past government and corporate wrongs and prove they're lying now about the past, when the past becomes a muddy, murky, hard to confirm morass.

Feds Bust Gibson Guitar Factory, Fishing for Ebony Violations

The US Fish and Wildlife Service swooped down on the Gibson guitar factory Wednesday on a fishing expedition.  They think Gibson is importing illegal ebony from Madagascar.  Gibson maintains its ebony was legally imported from India.

If you have a wooden musical instrument made with even a little bit of ivory, ebony or rosewood and you cross an international border with it without proof of the age of your instrument, you can expect your instrument may be confiscated and to be fined $250.00 for the pleasure.  If you are an instrument maker, take warning, the Feds are on the warpath for more revenue.

This is so overreaching I can't even begin to express myself.  Keep on rockin' in the "free" world, folks!

DRACO - a cure for all viruses?

Who, me? Accio Virus!

Could New Drug Cure Nearly Any Viral Infection? Technology Shows Promise Against Common Cold, Influenza and Other Ailments, Researchers Say

ScienceDaily (Aug. 26, 2011) — Most bacterial infections can be treated with antibiotics such as penicillin, discovered decades ago. However, such drugs are useless against viral infections, including influenza, the common cold, and deadly hemorrhagic fevers such as Ebola.

Read more here:

http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2011/08/110826134012.htm

Veterans of the Psychic Wars, the Borg Is In Your Soap

Imperio! Make them all do the psychic Macarena!

The Pentagon has publicly announced they want to create telepathic soldiers using computer technology.
http://www.wired.com/dangerroom/2009/05/pentagon-preps-soldier-telepathy-push/

OK, although I suspect they've already been doing this in the intelligence community for decades (See MKULTRA, ARTICHOKE, MONARCH, etc.), I can see a few things wrong with using this on soldiers in combat:

When a psychic soldier dies, will he broadcast his death experience to his comrades in arms?  Think it's emotionally traumatic to witness death now?  What kind of PTSD will these soldiers have then?  Will their comrade's life pass before all their eyes, literally?

Could this system be hacked?  Could someone jam the channel with, say, Annoying Orange videos (OMG NO!), or orders to march the opposite way?  What if someone gets hit in the head or is in great pain and can't stop broadcasting?  What about someone getting captured and tortured in order to make them broadcast?  Is it possible to amplify the broadcast so as to hurt or distract the receivers with its volume?  Could someone be psychically tortured?

Would someone's secret thoughts also be audible?  What about the mental babble we all have day in and day out?  Would this pretty much obliterate Don't Ask Don't Tell?

Would the soldiers, like Dumbo without his feather, develop the ability to do this without the central command computer link? (that would be cool actually, then they could psychically bitch about their mission without the Central Scrutinizer hearing).

Would their implants (if implants are involved) be removed when they leave the service, or will they be left in, leaving the soldiers vulnerable to a hacked after-market communications system, unintended RF from badly shielded appliances, or cancer like microchipped pets sometimes get at the implant site?  Or some kind of Bat Signal being used to call them back to duty? (but maybe it's a hacker!). 

Would the ability to communicate psychically become addictive?  Would the soldiers resist being unchipped, or fall despondent at the loss of their abilities after their tour of duty?

Would soldiers become only able to relate to others like them, feeling like non-psychics just don't understand them, the way vets sometimes feel about civilians now only even worse?

Would drinking or drugs dull the soldier's ability to use the psychic apparatus?  Would they be abused in order to dull the noise on the line?

Would it create another shorthand language like texting has created?

If you think getting veterans disability benefits for PTSD or blunt head trauma is difficult, try getting benefits for psychic injuries!!!

Would corporations start using this for uber-secret board meetings?  What about groups like the Bilderbergs?  They wouldn't need to leave their executive armchairs and jet to some other city.  Just start thinking and uplink to the Borg.

Mitsubishi has developed nano-RFID's that are the size of powder.  These could be inhaled, and also in other experiments, nanoparticles have breached the blood-brain barrier, so what's to stop someone from aerial spraying of nanomachines that go to people's brains?  Such machines could be used to disrupt the psychic soldiers, make it easier to read someone's brain waves the way barium is used in X-rays, or even as a receiver to amplify broadcasts of simulated brain waves - generalized emotions or ideas.  Or just make people into zombies.  (Hey, maybe that's what's wrong with those damn kids!)  Also if Mitsubishi has invented it, perhaps the military already had years ago and it's just now filtering out into the private sector.

Actually, speaking of nanomachines being sprayed, there is a skin disease called Mogellons that resembles psoriasis but also has unexplained wiry fibers in the sores that sometimes poke out.  Some people think it's an environmental disease caused by exposure to nanomachines being sprayed for agricultural or experimental purposes.  Perhaps rogue nanomachines are building these fibers and acting like an infection.  Or it could be a souped-up kind of fungus that has a fiber form. (or both! Who's to say a nanomachine can't be made of fungus?) 

I've been researching cures for it online, and one cure I found someone talking about was to bathe in water with detergent with color-safe bleach and alfalfa pills in it.  Who knows.  I guess one could try it on a patch to see if it works.  The worst that would happen is you'd irritate your skin some more, and perhaps be left with a bunch of detergent and some alfalfa pills you don't know what to do with.  Sounds like a cheap experiment to me.

Some detergent has RFID's in it, but I'm not sure if it's the detergent itself or the package it comes in.  The manufacturers are using it to geolocate the homes of whoever buys their detergent for marketing purposes.  (I bet they have a lot of hits at the dump now if it's just the package).  This is disturbing because one might wonder what other products are being used to geolocate homes.  Boxes of ammo, perhaps?  MRE's sold to civilians?  Eek!

Plumbing idea

I just had a brain wave.  There are a lot of jerks stealing copper plumbing out of houses.  For maybe $50 worth of copper, they are doing $10,000 worth of damage.  One thing you could do to make it not so hard on yourself if this were to happen to your property, would be to take photos of the plumbing now, and make a diagram of it, or assemble the pictures to make one big picture so you know where the pipes go.  Then if someone were to steal your plumbing, you'd know where to put the new pipes.  Maybe then you could DIY instead of hiring a plumber.

Cheap Housing Caveat Emptor Stuff

I have been looking at cheapo abandoned real estate just to see what's there.  In my city if you are handy you can get a house near the city for $5,000 right now, and then fix it up.  This was also true before the crash, but you get more house for the money now.  Such a house would have been $10,000 or $15,000 in 2005.  I once bought a house for $2,000 back then, but it had a lot of building orders on it, and the building inspector was a right bastard.  It also had a title problem.  Be careful buying one of these junkers, the problem may not be so much the house itself as the city officials, or the title, or something like that. That house was a mess, though.

Buying a house cheap for cash, especially if it's a FSBO and not through a realtor, is a temptation not to cross all the T's and dot the I's.  Don't be penny wise and pound foolish.  Always research down at the building department for orders, look also for utility liens (like at the water dept.) and also get the title done by a title agency to see if they will sell you owner's title insurance on it.  Having owner's title insurance is a lot of peace of mind for a couple hundred bucks.  Having a property with a cloud on the title can be extremely expensive and frustrating.  And the insurance covers stuff that they wouldn't find in the title search, like fraud or unknown lost heirs.  At best a title cloud would cost you $1500 for a quiet title suit, or you'd have to track someone down and ask them to sign a quit claim deed.  At worst, you wouldn't really own the house after all.  Have the title agency do the closing for you.  They're good at it.

There are title agencies and then there are title agencies.  If you use creative financing, you will need a title agency that is used to it.  You can probably figure out who they are by going to your courthouse and looking up the recent closings, look for cheaper houses that sold, and look to see who conducted the closing.  A title agency will often put a preparation statement or some other mark on the deed.  Or just ask other real estate investors, if you know any. (call the I Buy Houses signs you see).  For a cash deal, you can use anyone, but it's better to use someone more established, and not a title agency that is captive to a mortgage company but rather one that belongs to a law office.

Another thing to do, especially on houses where there are no fixtures, is to make sure the sewer is not collapsed, or nonexistent. (I speak from experience).  If you are unsure, get a plumber to put a snake in the sewer and look around.  It might cost $250 for the pleasure but you might save yourself from buying a place that needs $5,000 in sewer work.  

I was once defrauded by a seller who sold me a house with no sewer.  The house was gutted inside. Someone had placed a toilet in one of the smaller rooms, I assumed it was the bathroom, but the toilet was just there for show.  There was no plumbing whatsoever and the house had NEVER had a sewer. (old house)

I am convinced the listing realtor must have known.  She acted really funny when I brought it up - actually tried to throw me out of a community council meeting.  I didn't even accuse her of knowing, just mentioned that the house had no sewer!  This woman was a real dragon lady.  I've got some really juicy other dirt on her but I think I'll refrain.  This is not a gossip column and I don't see as it would do any good anyway.

A whole house inspection is worth the money.  (also a termite inspection). Even if the house is a wreck and you know it, get it done.  A whole house inspector may find foundation problems, weird "home improvements" that are dangerous, coverup jobs, etc. and even if you plan to fix up a wreck of a house, you might not realize the extent to which the house is screwed up.  Here are some things I, other investors, or various inspectors have found in houses: Make sure you go through a house with a fine tooth comb if you are going to rent it to someone! Some of these were life threatening.

• A roof built over another roof, where they laid new rafters on top of an old roof
• Cracked foundation hidden behind/under the front porch. Was invisible/inaccessible unless you crawl under the porch
• Do it yourself septic line (it was stinky)
• The Termite Society World Headquarters
• Wiring made by running an extension cord through the wall and plugging it into an outlet in the next room, then wiring the other side to the back of an outlet
• 220 volt wiring run on the outside of a wall instead of inside the wall, down near the floor at the top of the basement stairs where little kids might play
• 3/4 of the outlets in the house had only 6 inches of wire on them, and that's it, the wire didn't go to the panel.  In other words, someone took old outlets they ripped out from somewhere else, and cut holes in the wall and put them in to make it look like the house had more outlets.  Or they pulled wire without attaching new wire to it first.
• Outlets not grounded for some reason, even though the wire had a ground wire.
• Wire splices in basement that are not in a box and wire not going through the joists but just sort of hanging there in mid air
• Clogged downspouts, water pours over edge of gutter (can't see until it rains hard)
• Broken glass and razors in sink P-trap
• Tenant has dislodged P-trap and instead of screwing it back on, has stuffed shower curtain in sink cabinet to "absorb" graywater (different house, and this wrecked the ceiling below).
• A house with no heat will not show a roach problem until you turn the heat on.  You can spray all you want, but they're not going to get poisoned until they come out.  Put the heat on 80, see if they come out, then spray.
• Burst pipe from the cold
• Cleanout trap on drain pipe removed in basement, graywater going onto basement floor
• Basement floor drain collapsed, full of sand
• Basement floor drain clogged, full of hair and grease
• Kitchen cabinets screwed into drywall but not into the stud (fell on tenant)
• Ceiling fixture screwed into drywall but not the joist, ceiling has 2 layers of drywall on it so a 2-inch screw is necessary, idiot who installed light used 3/4" screws, same house (fixture fell on a different tenant)
• Ceiling fan wired with dimmer switch (dangerous, can cause fire, but typical DIY mistake)
• Metal stand up seam roof painted with latex house paint
• Guy I flipped a house to tore up the floor and found old bones and a rusty gun.  The homicide squad was there for 3 days, and he couldn't get in to renovate.
• 14-2 wiring on 15 amp breaker, in outlet under a window where a tenant will probably want to put a large window air conditioner.  (Also make sure they tilt it out so it doesn't drip into the wall.)
• Non-GFCI outlets above kitchen or bathroom counter near sink
• Soil stack made from old shop vac tubes!
• Vents for furnace system not attached all the way to registers, heating the inside of the walls or crawl space
• Hole in exterior wall of closet with furnace in it gets fixed, tenant starts getting headaches, turns out there is a gas line problem, if worse they could have died.  Get the gas lines checked.  Hole in wall was ventilating closet enough to prevent CO poisoning.  Fix one problem, find another.
• Clogged chimney causing CO problems.  Keep your chimney traps cleaned out every year.  Sometimes a bird will fall in and die in there and if you can't find the source of the smell, look there.
• Someone cut a big hole in the outside sheathing of the house to get at the soil stack instead of cutting the drywall on the inside, then put the siding back over the hole without fixing the sheathing, making a 1 foot wide by 8 foot tall hole in the side of the house.   But you couldn't see it, it was covered up with siding.
• Drop ceiling concealing the top of the above-mentioned hole in the wall going to the exterior
• Drop ceiling concealing toilet fill line leak, someone installed 2 drop ceilings one lower than the other, to hide the leak from this $10 plumbing part that just screws in.  Or maybe to hide the hole in the side of the house.
• Someone built an addition over a crawl space that at the end is only 3 inches deep, exposing the bottom side of the floor to too much moisture, etc.  End propped up on a row of loose bricks.  Not much can be done about this except slap cement on the bricks to stabilize them, but floor may need to be replaced every 15-20 years or so at which point, dig deeper and put pylons.  Hopefully this work can be done from indoors, but probably getting no rent while doing it, and at great expense.

You get the idea!  Get the house, the title, and the utility liens inspected.  The total cost may be around $500 to $1,000 but you may save yourself $10,000 or even more.

Mid-week Miscellany

After my posting a copy of the FBI prepper flyer last week, the DHS visited my blog. It appears they googled "FBI Prepper Flyer" and that was the exact filename of my picture.  They didn’t stop to look around the blog as far as I can tell (I have stats).

Indeed the noose is tightening all around, even if I seemingly got off easy this time. I can't let it intimidate me from disseminating the truth, though.

I fear that the snotty municipal regulations against residential food gardening are a test.  Soon we may see the backyard garden become illegal all over.  Although if there is a famine I can't see how they're going to stop people.  The only good excuse would be widespread radioactive fallout.  Oh wait, that's already happening, but they're not telling anyone.  Use a Geiger counter on your food.  Even if you grew it.

Even if they don't outlaw private food growing, if there is a famine then you will have to worry about neighbors stealing your crops.  Guerilla gardening is an answer.  Also, learn about crops people are not used to seeing.

I tested some garbanzo beans I got at Restaurant Depot and tried to sprout them.  They plumped up but didn't sprout.  I suspect they have an anti-germination chemical sprayed on them. Grr.  So one could take the lentils, garbanzo beans, any beans that are edible raw from there and soak them, and eat them raw, but not get any greens off them and not be able to plant them.  I wonder if adding rooting hormone would help, not for eating but for making it grow in spite of the germination retardant? That's my next experiment!

In the name of finding crops people won't know, and being able to grow sprouts, I went to Whole Paycheck yesterday and bought some organic beans for sprouting/planting and some organic amaranth seeds.  This plant looks like a raggy kind of grass, but you can eat the leaves and the seeds, and chickens like it.  I suspect most people would not recognize it as a food plant.  It does get kind of tall, so I'd probably have to keep harvesting the tops to keep it shorter.  My friend and I have been talking about guerilla gardening for next year to increase the amount of land we have to garden on.

Both amaranth and quinoa get to 6 feet high if you let them.  Or taller.  If you guerilla garden those, you want to make sure it's where nobody ever mows and the building/weed inspector doesn't see it from the street, even if you are trimming them to keep them shorter. I suppose this is also true of any food plant, since a lot of them get to a few feet high.

By the way, they've found radioactive feminine napkins that were produced in Fukushima.  It's not just food from there that's radioactive.  So use the Geiger counter on personal care products too, just in case.  Wouldn't want to fry your petunias.

How to Avoid Surveillance

 Here's some random tips.

• Rather than trying to avoid surveillance entirely, you might be able to avoid it some and fool it some.  Also, you don't want to appear as if you are trying too hard to avoid it. 
• Most people don't get caught doing sneaky stuff unless they blab or are acting funny, or someone else blabs.
• Don't discuss any plans for any illegal activity on the phone unless you have code words that make it sound like a normal conversation.  Likewise email, texts etc.
• The country is less likely to have things like light pole cameras than the city.  Back roads are less likely too, than highways.
• It is possible to disguise what you are doing by covering it with another activity.  For example, when burying things to hide them, or digging a hidey hole, have another fake reason to dig in case someone nosy comes by.  Wearing work coveralls and carrying a clipboard helps in situations where you are in public scoping something out - nobody suspects the meter man. You might consider posting a lookout who can make excuses for you and distract people away.
  
• Tires have RFID's that can be read as you drive. Consider keeping several sets of working used tires around, and swapping them out often.  And/or use a number of different, ever-changing cars if you have those kind of resources.  You could have a car repair hobby or something, and get them at auctions.
• New cars will have black boxes and Obama wants to make them "cyber safe", i.e. snoop on you. Buy older cars. Audis don't have black boxes yet.
• To shake a tail while driving, make a habit out of making a lot of left turns in a row so you make a box around the block.  Keep in mind that if you are tailed, it may be by a team that switches up positions periodically so no-one stays behind your car for too long.  The same is true of walking.
• Consider taking the battery out of your cell phone whenever you don't need it.  Also don't wear it, or get a shielded case for it.  Both because they'll know where you go and because the cell phones emit microwaves.  Not a lot, but it might still be bad for you in the long run.  The WHO has recently said they cause cancer.
• Don't get a cell phone data plan.  Keep the simplest cell phone you can find.  Data cell phones like Androids and Iphones are easy to hack and emit more radiation.
• Detergent has RFID's. Make your own laundry soap, or find a brand that doesn't have RFID's.  If it's in the package, re-package your detergent.
• Department store clothes have RFID's in them (like the soles of shoes).  Buy only used clothes, except perhaps underwear.  You could make clothes.  You could try to make your own shoes.  I guess making them from tires won't avoid the RFIDs anymore!
• Is your pet microchipped?  Are you trying to disappear?  Might need to lose the pet. 
• They make RFID's that are the size of powder now.  So who knows where there may be some.  A degaussing coil may be able to mess them up, if they have writable memory.
• Big box stores and malls are crawling with spies.  Buy only from mom and pop stores whenever you can help it.  The big box stores also can read RFID's embedded in your clothes etc.
• Put your vehicle in a trust or corporation.  This would put one more step between you and a civilian trying to find you by your vehicle registration.  Wouldn't do much against Uncle Sam.
• Stay out of college, for now.  It's not worth it as the economy tanks, and there are now spies all over the colleges.  Learn online for free from Open University files.  Download whole free programs of study for use later if the internet disappears.  
• Home school your kids if you can, or at least supplement the schooling they do get with your own instruction so you can provide some balance to the brainwashing they get.  Or if you can afford it, send them to private school.  It is possible someone could try to spy on you through your children or their stuff, like the school that secretly activated all its students' laptop cameras every night.

10 Suspicious Activities You Should Report to DHS.

 I cribbed this from Prison Planet in toto.  They reprinted from Activist Post.  I dunno if I'd actually call DHS with any of these complaints.  What is the use of talking to a corrupt regime about its corruption?  However the list of complaints is something everyone needs to know about.

http://www.activistpost.com/2011/08/10-things-citizen-spies-should-report.html
http://www.prisonplanet.com/10-things-citizen-spies-should-report-to-dhs.html

The Department of Homeland Security wants the public to be on the prowl for suspicious and criminal behavior. They’ve gone to great lengths to recruit business owners in this effort to report unusual activity.  They’ve struck deals with Google, Facebook, and Twitter to monitor Internet activities.  DHS has also set up fusion centers nationwide to coordinate with local authorities and private sector partners to hunt down potential threats.
Lately, they’ve cranked up their effort to recruit citizen spiesthrough the “If You See Something, Say Something” campaign; supported by taxpayer-funded Hollywood-produced commercials encouraging citizens to be vigilant and report their suspicions to authorities.  Given their Rated “G” audience, they display almost comical scenarios of being politically correct while spying over someone’s shoulder to read their text messages.  Is texting suspicious behavior?
n the recent past, DHS has instructed local authorities to be suspicious of those with Ron Paul bumper stickers, homeschoolers, breastfeeders, and returning veterans.  They have instructed business owners, like hotels, to report people who pay in cash, as well as extremist “preppers.” Is paying in cash now suspicious act?
Well, certainly most Americans are capable of catching bigger fish than those pesky nonconformists.  Why sell our citizens short?  As activists, let’s report the hardcore criminals to DHS when we see something suspicious.  Below is a damning list of some of the criminal behavior to report to our protectors.  Be warned, from this point forward this article becomes Rated “R” and very politically incorrect by naming high-powered enemy combatants.  Someone’s gotta do the DHS’s dirty work.
1. Suspicious activity about 9-11: Something is very suspicious about the official version of the attacks of September 11th, 2001.  First, corporate media restricts discussion of the events of 9-11, especially technical aspects like how a 47-story steel skyscraper (WTC Building 7) collapsed into its own footprint without being hit by a plane, steel turning to powder or molten liquid, or destroyed insider trading records of airline put options, among many other anomalies.  The idea that investigating these mysteries is in any way harming the 9-11 family members is nonsense. Report the WTC lease holder, Larry Silverstein, to the DHS for pre-wiring WTC 7 for demolition.  Report “Tricky” Dick Cheney for standing down when being told a plane was approaching the Pentagon.

WTC steel beams suspiciously turning to dust – Dr. Judy Wood

2. Bank looting: Somehow, the original bank bailout — TARP in 2008 — of $700 billion (which a large majority of the public opposed) turned into a mass looting of $16 trillion to prop-up failed banking institutions around the world.  Somewhere in between was a massive stimulus, QE1, and QE2 that by all indicators only benefited the banksters as well.  There has been no official authority given by the people’s representatives for these transactions, yet the bank bailouts were clearly a jailhouse-raping of the American public.  The people will suffer higher inflation, higher taxes, lost jobs, and less public benefits as a result.  The ring-leading rapists are Ben Bernanke, Tim Geithner,Hank Paulson, Jamie Dimon, Lloyd Blankfein and others, presidents from both sides of the isle and nearly all of Congress. If you feel financially raped by the direct actions of these powerful banksters or their minions, immediately report these crimes to anyone who will listen.

3. Fraudulent foreclosures: The mortgage fraud scandal is indeed the biggest in human history.  The involvement of mortgage brokers, ratings agencies, appraisers, robo signers, and every other type of criminality went right up the ladder to banks like Goldman Sachs, JP Morgan, and Bank of America.  Some even employed real mafia tactics bybreaking into people’s homes.  Now banks are scrambling to provide documentation, as it appears that people have been thrown onto the street without proof.  92% of NY foreclosures lacked proper documents, and that is just the tip of the iceberg for the rest of the nation.  There should be a real full-scale investigation of the criminals running this operation at the highest levels.  Instead, we see a few courageous people taking matters into their own hands, like the Florida couple who foreclosed on Bank of America.

• A d v e r t i s e m e n t
• 
  

4. Radiation cover-up: Ever since the Fukushima nuclear meltdown occurred, there seems to have been a concerted effort to minimize the severity of this ongoing catastrophe.  While radiation levels are getting dangerously high, there are accusations of criminal negligence on the part of the EPA: “The EPA re-calibrated (rigged) Japan nuclear radiation monitoring equipment causing them to report lower levels of radioactive fallout after the Fukushima nuclear meltdown than what was detected before the disaster.”  Instead of acting as the public’s watchdog on environmental health, the EPA increased the level of acceptable radiation despite all scientific evidence to the contrary.  No level of additional background radiation is safe for human health.  Those responsible for covering up what will become known as the most devastating holocaust of the Northern Hemisphere are complicit in crimes against humanity and must be reported.
5. Environmental devastation: The environment is being exposed to a full frontal assault by the corporate government.  In addition to the exorbitant radiation already touched upon, everything from industrial to genetic pollution, water contamination, DNA alteration and human-animal hybrids, oil spills, atmospheric chemical spraying, pesticides, and much more are devastating our human habitat.  No one in power is called to account for these outrages. Just the opposite: in all of these environmental crimes we’ll find the government’s seal of approval as they cover-up for their corporate friends.  Which agency do we report this to, since the feds are the perpetrators?
6. Illegal wars: Report Barack Obama for war crimes. Normally war crimes involve more than a single individual.  However, in the case of Libya, Obama acted alone without even consulting the people’s representatives. Therefore, he and only he is responsible for war crimes against the innocent Libyan people. Obama is guilty of mass murder of innocent civilians and using taxpayer money without the consent of Congress.  Additionally, Obama is wagingexpensive drone wars in other sovereign nations without Congressional approval.  Report Obama to all agencies that swear an oath to the Constitution for directing illegal wars that have resulted in mass death.
7. War on children: There are many proven government agency culprits here that can be reported, rather than sending anonymous tips to snitch on your neighbor.  CPS stands out as an especially diseased agency that has been documented abusing, raping, drugging and selling children.  Vaccines have resulted in the injury and death of children, and those like Rick Perry who haveauthorized it knowingly should be held accountable.  Instead, government seems intent on spending taxpayer money to criminalize homeschooling, sending kids to prison for pranks, cracking down onlemonade stands, and arresting mothers for not drugging their children with mind-altering chemicals.  This has to stop; the real criminals should be reported immediately.
8. Complicity in The War on Drugs: The war on drugs has effectively turned the CIA, DEA and ATF into the meanest gang of armed drug dealers in the world. Report to the DHS that the CIA was caught trafficking cocaine into America in the ’90s; that the CIA cultivates, protects and transports the opium in Afghanistan, that the ATF was complicit, if not active, in the “Fast and Furious” false flag of gun smuggling to Mexican drug gangs; that the large banks have been openly laundering ALL the drug money.  All this while federal DEA thugs raid lawful medical marijuana dispensaries for cancer patients.  It’s all very suspicious and it’s time to report it as loudly as we can.
9. Abuse of power: When a president says to torture detainees who haven’t been charged with anything or had any presentation of evidence or a trial, you’d think we would be talking about some ghastly country like Iran.  Oh wait, they actually have trials over there.  The American president has also declared it okay to assassinate American citizens without due process if they are labeled an “enemy combatant.”  It seems suspicious that this would be a lawful act in America.  Anywhere in the world and in anytime in history these are the most horrific characteristics of a tyrannical regime and we should continue to report these crimes. These have ramifications that trickle down to a consolidated “Super Congress,” the destruction of free speech with Internet controls and shutting down cell phone service to stop protests, unwarranted domestic surveillance, literal molestation by the TSA, and over-zealous local police — all of whom seemed to have forgotten their oath to the Constitution.  Call the “If You See Something, Say Something” hotline to report the oath-breakers.
10. Food, water, air, and land theft: The very essence of life and freedom is being corrupted.  While the DHS wants a snitch culture to report the subtle cues of al Qaeda-linked terrorism; real terrorism is already being carried out through the poisons in our food, water, and air by corporations who have received their stamp of approval from regulatory agencies.  These are the criminals who should be brought to justice; not the Amish, food clubs, raw milk producers, organic farmers, and people growing tomatoes in home gardens.  Public water is still being fluoridated after thescience has proved its harmful effects.  Meanwhile, criminals are openly stealing private property in the U.S. with the help of globalist re-zoning environmental initiatives like the Wildlands Project and Smart Growth under the umbrella of Agenda 21.
It’s high time that we stop taking orders to report on each other from the very criminals whom we should be reporting.  Stay vigilant and place your calls today!

S&P Board Fires CEO, Replaces him with COO of Citibank

Read all about it here
http://www.zerohedge.com/news/sp-board-fires-ceo-telling-truth-be-replaced-coo-citibank

You didn't expect them to leave that guy who downgraded the US credit rating in there, did you?  How dare he defy the great Bernanke and topple the apple cart!! etc. barf

Makes me wonder how long his life expectancy will be, if he stays put where he is now.
Western Rifle Shooters had a great picture for their repost of this, think I'll steal it.

Spenditol!

Tons of Books the Establishment Doesn't Want You To Read

Books are the single most persuasive form of communication, interestingly enough. And so we should read more books that will wake us up.

See here for the original list of 21 books from Activist Post with great descriptions. (these are the first 21 of my list.  I left out the descriptions for brevity's sake).  There are also many additional suggestions below their post by readers, which I also listed here. And a few of my faves thrown in at the end.
Propaganda by Edward Bernays
Big Brother, the Orwellian Nightmare Come True by Mark Dice
What I Saw That Day Israel's June 8 1967 Holocaust of US Servicemen Aboard the USS LIBERTY and its Aftermath by Phillip Tourney
The County Sheriff: America's Last Hope by Sheriff Richard Mack
Corporatism: The Secret Government of the New World Order by Jeffrey Grupp
Confessions of an Economic Hit Man by John Perkins
JFK: The CIA, Vietnam, and the Plot to Assassinate John F. Kennedy (Second Edition)  by L. Fletcher Prouty
Where Did the Towers Go? Evidence of Directed Free-energy Technology on 9/11 by Judy Wood and Eric Larsen
Tragedy and Hope by Carroll Quigley
None Dare Call it Conspiracy  by Gary Allen
American Assassination:  The Strange Death of Senator Paul Wellstone by James H. Fetzer
New Complete Book of Self-Sufficiency by John Seymour
Human Race Get Off Your Knees by David Icke
The 9/11 Commission Report: Omissions And Distortions by David Ray Griffin
63 Documents the Government Doesn't Want You to Read by Jesse Ventura
Stranger Than Fiction by Albert D. Pastore
9/11 Synthetic Terror: Made in USA, First Edition by Webster Griffin Tarpley
Snitch Culture: How Citizens are Turned into the Eyes and Ears of the State by Jim Redden
The Creature from Jekyll Island : A Second Look at the Federal Reserve by G. Edward Griffin
War at Home: Covert action against U.S. activists and what we can do about it by Brian Glick 
Winter Soldier: Iraq and Afghanistan: Eyewitness Accounts of the Occupations
by Iraq Veterans Against the War
Income Tax the Root of All Evil by F. Chodorov
They Own It All (Including You)! by Ronald MacDonald and Robert Rowen M.D.
How an Economy Grows and Why It Crashes by Peter D. Schiff
The Plot to Seize the White House by Jules Archer
The Roosevelt Myth by John T. Flynn
The Secret History of the American Empire by John Perkins
Bad Trip: How the War Against Drugs Is Destroying America by Joel Miller
The Rise of the Fourth Reich: The Secret Societies That Threaten to Take over America by Jim Marrs
Crossfire: The Plot That Killed Kennedy by Jim Marrs
The Shadows of Power: The Council on Foreign Relations and the American Decline by James Perloff
Infamy: Pearl Harbor and Its Aftermath by John Toland
End the Fed by Ron Paul
The Real Lincoln: A New Look at Abraham Lincoln, His Agenda, and an Unnecessary War by Thomas J. Dilorenzo
America's Great Depression by Murray N. Rothbard
The Grand Chessboard by Zbigniew Brzezinski (he's one of Them! big time!)
The True Story of the Bilderberg Group by Daniel Estulin
Crossing The Rubicon: The Decline Of The American Empire At The End Of The Age Of Oil, by Michael Ruppert.
JFK & the Unspeakable by J. Douglass
books by William Engdahl:
A Century of War: Anglo-American Oil Politics and the New World Order
Seeds of Destruction: The Hidden Agenda of GMO
Gods of Money: Wall Street and the Death of the American Century
Full Spectrum Dominance: Totalitarian Democracy in the New World Order
Behold a Pale Horse by Milton William Cooper 
Trance Formation of America By Cathy O'Brien with Mark Phillips
Access Denied: For Reason of National Security by Cathy O'Brien with Mark Phillips
Alan Watt  http://www.cuttingthroughthematrix.com/  (culture hijacked)
Alan Watts  http://www.alanwatts.org/  a Buddhist type
Grand Theft Pentagon by Jeffrey St. Clair
Age Of Reason by Thomas Paine.
Phoenix Rising by Mary-Summer Rain

High Alert by Anthony Wile - for free here: http://www.thedailybell.com/Public/Files/High%20Alert%20-%203rd%20Edition(1).pdf
Secrets of the Temple by William Greider (about the Federal Reserve)
A Terrible Mistake by H. P. Albarelli, Jr.
Acid Dreams by Martin A. Lee, Bruce Shlain
The Illuminoids by Neal Wilgus

              Happy Reading!