I could live off the "fat of the land" (my person!) for months and months. I wish, then I could lose weight!

I was just thinking about how I'm gonna have to eat on a stricter budget next year. No viable crops this year. Ugh. Prices are gonna skyrocket! What could I eat? I could live off of chickens fairly easily. Or eggs. They're both cheap. On the water. Hm. I'm not too far from it, but I don't think I'd fish in the Cumberland. Looks fairly icky.

Here is a link that might be useful: Cumberland River story (no date?)

silviatexas:

You raise an interesting topic: How would one survive after a disaster that wiped out most of the world's population. You'd have to go back to living off the land like our early ancestors did, but that might be more difficult to do than they had it, because our explorer ancestors struck out from an established support group. In this disaster, no such group would exist until re-established. As I envision it, you'd have to survive a few years until enough peole found each other to form a community. For example, one can not be all encompassing, e.g., a doctor, dentist, engineer, woodsman, hunter, carpenter, and blacksmith all rolled into one. One would soon realize that he needs the specialities of others to aid comfort and survival. Yet, at the same time after a wipeout by disease, peoplw would be very suspicious of each other - whom could you trust to be 'clean'?

All knds of senarios can be imagined. For example, human population would eventually build again, if only for the notion that nedical birth control would be missing. But one needs to look back only 150 years ago to see the burden placed on women who bore large families.

So who would survive such a disaster? The time of the year would play a role. Someone mentioned planting a garden and raising chickens. If this proposed disaster struck right now as the northern hemisphere is appraoching winter, it would have a grave effect on it. The southern hemisphere would have a greater chance at survuval because they'd have more time to prepare for their winter. In the northern hemisphere, we'd be forced to wait until next spring to plant crops. mManwhile, we would have to scrounge for food and heat, or at least enough shelter to make it through cold winter nights. A temperate climate would be good and many would gravitate to such. many would find the summers unbearable hot by a move south.

Interestingly, much of the environmental polution would abate. Vast tracts of land once tilled would lay fallow. Fields and bottom lands would begin to return to brush and grasses Wildlife would increase, but its makeup might be different to that of virgin America. Run off to streams would slow, soil erosion would slow, and stream waters would clear. No chemical fertilizers would exist to be spread around. City water plants and sewerage outlets would stop. Nature would havea hey day, but it takes time, many years for nature to revert the land back to non-farm. Meanwhile, what would humans do?

If there was too many of us left, there could be too many for existing game to support during tghe winter months. More would die or starvation until our numbers matched the supply.

Modern ammunition for hunting would soon be gone, and only a few of us might know how to make black gun powder and that would not matter anyway since one might not be able to gather the ingredients.

From my own experience as a boy on a farm, we derived 50 to 70 percent of our food from our land; It also consumed more than 30 percent of our time. Without refrigeration, the menu has to be adjusted as the seasons change. Its not an easy life and I would fear it. You should see what misery a toothache can cause with no dentist in sight.

jd, you need to see if you can get this program "After Armageddon" on DVD;
you'd love it!

It was sort of a documentary, with the narrator describing how the changes lead to more changes, but it was strung together with the story of an urban family, father, mother, son.

The dad, seems like, was a firefighter or paramedic (I missed some of this), so he had good skills.

After the plague shut down business (no more "going to work"), the family discussed "going to Idaho" (or Montana...), but they kept putting it off.

Then, services blinked off.

When the water stopped running, toilets didn't work, & they had to bury their waste in the backyard.
They thought that was pretty bad.

Then they thought about food supplies & went to the supermarkets, but the food had been looted already.

They hid out in their house & strewed debris in the front yard to make it look like it had already been looted so no one would break in.

They finally got in the car & took off, siphoning gas from abandoned vehicles.

Somewhere about this time, the plague burned itself out.
(It seems odd, but plagues actually do this;
if you survive 90 days, you've got a good chance of not getting plague.)

So the fear of contagion is lesser, & people can use the cars & homes of plague victims.

When the family got to a food warehouse, they were excited, only to find an armed gang in possession.

When they escaped, they drove as far as they could, then abandoned the car & went on foot.

They were starving;
the father killed a snake & grilled it, & the son refused to eat it, saying he'd rather starve.

(Narrator says that this is a stage of starvation. First you're hungry, then your metabolism slows, then your reflexes slow, then you don't want to eat.)

They're rescued by someone whem they'd helped, & they make it to a little community, where the head men rule absolutely, assigning chores & dispensing assets such as food, maintaining power through control of assets & weapons.

A looter is shot in front of their eyes.

The community attracts people because it can feed them;
there is already a system in place, existing food is being managed, crops have been planted, etc.

The men have to work the fields as our grandfathers did, & the women have to feed them as our grandmothers did, providiing a high-calorie menu to fuel the hard work.

The risks of the past return;
infection, injury, or appendicitis can kill you.
If you're an insulin-dependent diabetic, you're a goner.

By this time, traders have the only medical supplies.
The dad gets an infected finger or something & asks the trader for penecillin;
the trader says he doesn't have any:
"they're having a war south of here, & they've used it all up."

& this is when the phone rang & I missed the end.

I tell you what...this past year has changed my life. Not that I would recommend it to anyone...because it has been very stressful. Jody used to kid me that I walked into Krogers like I owned the place....and I did. I bought anything I wanted and didn't have to give a thought as to what it cost.

The fish have quit biting....the freezer is empty. We do have food but not like before. I'm not whining about food...I am not missing any meals. I haven't lost any weight. Feeding the animals has been a priority...even before we buy groceries, we feed them. It is very expensive. The shelters who sent me all the cats, forget that I have to feed them. I am sure if I called them, they would say come get some cat food, but it is a 90 mile round trip, and gas money is hard to come by. It is just about as easy to buy cat food as it is to buy gas to go get cat food. Spent our savings...just paying bills.
Can't work on the house...living in it is like camping out.

Haven't bought any clothes in over a year, and the clothes we have are getting ruined. I am in the process of throwing most of them away. I have decided for $50 when I get money again, I can buy a new wardrobe. I had too many clothes anyway.

Another thing...this morning I was thinking, I have way too much stuff. I wish I could say to everyone....is there anything you need? Like kitchen equipment, dishes, plants, household stuff....tell me what it is and I will give it to you. You come to a point where you realize that you are owned by "stuff". I thought I'd put an ad on Craig's List or freecycle and give away most of the things I own....but then I got to thinking about having to put up with people coming here and getting on my nerves, which aren't too good anyway, and I'd just find another way to deal with the "stuff".

When Jody goes back to work, we have committed to living on as little as possible and saving at least half.

Today the water well isn't working. I sent Jody a text to come home before dark to see if he can fix it. Little things like this put another kink in our day to day living.

We've had two animals get very sick and needed a vet. My dog went to the vet...for $250 but couldn't afford to take my goat and had to put her down. Just didn't have the money to take her. This from someone who has routinely spent hundreds of dollars on animals...$500 on a stray cat.

I will be stocking up again, as soon as possible. You never know what might happen.

Jody has a settlement...was awarded on August 23rd and told it would take a month to get it. The month is now up. I am hoping that this coming week will be the end of it. I think I am fading fast. Just the stress. So, I do have a lot of sympathy for anyone going through trying times. I am fortunate that for the most part I have been able to kind of roll with it, but it hasn't been fun, and the worst thing is a whole year of just doing nothing. I feel like at our ages...we don't have a lot of years to waste.

Marilyn, hang in there!

Health problems & the inability to produce an income do change a person's priorities, dramatically & absolutely.

As you said, getting older & realizing how finite we are is a sobering experience, too.

I hope that settlement comes in quickly.

Thanks, Sylvia. He is able to go back to work....the lawyer told him to wait until everything is finalized. That's the aggravating part.

Sylvia, I saw that show also. After he asks the guy for penicillin, it shows them all sitting at long tables outside eating, along with the traveling traders he had asked for meds from. The dad looks like crap, suddenly he falls out of his chair to the ground.....

next scene, he is lying in bed, son and wife by his side, and he is dead. The infection in his hand killed him. While the narrator explains how this will be common. The life expectency will drop to 40's or 50's and people will die of the simplest illnesses due to lack of medicine, hospital care, etc.

it was very interesting.....really makes you think "could I survive that way"......

This year I planted tomatoes, potatoes, peppers (both hot and sweet), cucumbers and watermelon. Got lots of tomatoes, made and froze sauce, have picked a few peppers and cukes, the watermelons were a waste of space. Have to dig potatoes soon, maybe mid October? I don't can and freeze a lot. I'd never survive an Apocalypse.

aw, katlan, I hate that.
(I used to laugh at people who "felt" for fictional characters;
karma has caught up with me.)

jannie, I think everybody over maybe 40 or 45 would likely be goners;
if the plague or the war didn't get us, the younger, stronger people would, either by taking our resources so we starved or by killing us to get those resources.