[ExI] Farming

[Kelly Anderson]

On Sat, Mar 3, 2012 at 10:59 AM, Eugen Leitl <eugen at leitl.org> wrote:
> On Fri, Mar 02, 2012 at 12:19:45PM -0500, Mike Dougherty wrote:
>
>> I pretty sure it wouldn't take very long without supplies for polite
>> society to turn very ugly.
>
> There are plenty of desert communities in the middle of nowhere which
> require a steady flow of water, energy and supplies to keep them going.
>
> Particularly in the US where the supply chain is tied to diesel, one
> shudders to think what a long-term increase in diesel prices with
> intermittent spikes and shortages/rationing will do to these communities
> which are already teetering on the brink.
>
> Here's hoping the new ghost towns will not be populated with too many
> actual ghosts. You can consider that LA riots where just a dry run.

I have a bit of a survivalist bent... not TOO far off the deep end...
I tried living off the [electric] grid for about 5 years, and what I
discovered is that it is very difficult to get completely off the
[entire] grid. I still needed gasoline, eventually food from
elsewhere... no man is an island... and it is very expensive to live
in such a way as to avoid the problems of society melting down. If and
when it all goes to hell, it's going to be a very bad day in LA. I'm
better off where I am here in Utah, but now that I've moved into the
city, it's still going to be very difficult. The only thing I have
going for me is that I grew up with gardens and agriculture (I once
worked as a migrant farm laborer), as did many of my neighbors... so
we might be able to just make it, except that the hungry crowds from
LA would just have to be eaten as they migrated up here, or they would
ruin the scenery completely. The waves of immigrants from California
are hard enough to deal with now and society is only melting around
the edges at this point.

-Kelly