My goal in life is to walk away from Civilization and become a full-time hunter-gatherer-horticulturalist. To walk away from civilization means a lot of things to a lot of people. To me, dropping out of high school was one step towards dropping out of civilization. Refusing to go to college was another. Refusing to work for someone else for a living is another. Yet, for every step I take I feel as though there is something else that gets in my way, another pair of chains I must figure out how to get out of. This week it is two pair; desire for celebrity and running wilderness schools.
As some of you know I bought a Tipi a few months back to serve as one of my shelters on this urban hunter- gatherer adventure. I have learned a great deal about tipis in the last few months. Mostly gleaning information from the book, The Indian Tipi: It’s History, Construction and Use, which covers much more than just tipis and has tips on Indian lifestyle that I have heard no where else.
I can personally remember feeling ill at the thought of libraries, full of books containing knowledge gained through science, burning down during the collapse of civilization. All that knowledge… lost forever… I used to believe that despite all the terrible things civilization has created, science still felt worth saving. For some reason I saw science as “pure,” something even civilizations mythology could not ruin. I don’t feel that way anymore. In fact, these days a wry smile forms on my face and my eyes begin to sparkle when I envision of a world without science.
(The Complete Edition, with commentary by Urban Scout)
For those who don’t know, I was involved in a publicized feud for several weeks in the late summer of 2006. The feud began with the Portland Mercury article about my summer camp for post-apocalyptic survival. The Portland Mercury is known as the pretentious, sarcastic and cynical paper of this town. Luckily, I myself am a pretentious, sarcastic cynic. Towards the end of my interview the reporter, Marjorie Skinner, asked me if people often thought of me as a hippie. The following was my printed response:
Apocalypse Soon – Portland Mercury 8/17/06
Just don’t try calling them hippies.
“Ha, ha. Fuck you,” replied Scout when I broached the topic. “I fucking hate hippies. Hippies are pot smoking, peace- and love- and sustainability-begging pacifists with no understanding of the power structure of civilization, or even a shred of understanding of the laws that govern the natural world. Hippies claim to love the earth, but most I’ve spoken with do not even know five native plants to their own bioregion. Preemptive Post-Apocalypticism is not about peace™, and love™, and sustainability™. It’s about survival. It’s about adaptation. It’s about deep knowledge of place.”
Rarely do I think about money, let alone write about it. Money seems like one of the most trite subjects anyone could write about. Never the less, what began as a lament about money turned into a rant, which then turned into my first (and hopefully last) philosophical examination of my feelings about money, which bared some uneaten fruit… at least by me.
From October until April the Northwest is a cold wet place. I’ve always felt January and February mark the coldest, wettest months. During these months I have to fight this strange sensation that I am “not being productive.” Rather, I’m inside staying warm and dry and simply doing… not much. This has always made me feel guilty.
1. Get rid of stuff (broken car, old clothes, etc).
2. Make a quality digging/throwing stick.
3. Set up library/study at Willems.
4. Sew Tipi lining.
5. Build composting toilet.
6. Set up solar kit.
Hey peeps. I need your help. I’ll tell you the plan, then ask what I need.
The Plan:
I will eat roadkill, but as it is an oportunistic source of food, it is not reliable. I need to hunt for protein. I’m planning on mostly sticking to the old throwing stick. I can get squirrels, ducks, geese and rabbits and such. Maybe that will be enough. But I’d like to catch me a raccoon. A few of them at least, to make muklucks for next winter. I don’t think rabbit or squirrel hides are thick enough to for boots. They also don’t have a lot of fat like those raccoons do. Anyone know if I can get enough fat from geese? I think I’m going to stay away from the fish, seeing as how fresh water fish have the highest level of dioxin of any animal. I’m guessing those are farmed fish, which means wild fish probably have more. I will probably shy away from trapping at first, don’t want to kill a defenseless house cat.
Any tips on hunting? Any bright ideas? Please give me feedback. Thanks.
—
Show your support and appreciation for Urban Scout
Today Sasha and I are fully on the Body Ecology diet, so I thought I would throw out some info/theory on bacteria.
The following are the specs of my solar kit, what I have to get power and what I need to power.
What I have to get power:
Solar Panel: Battery Trickle Charger
Up to 5 Watts solar power
Current: I=350mAmps
Voltage (open current): Voc=24 Volts
7 Amp Battery Charge Controller
Load: 7A Max
Cut-out: 14.2V
Cut-in: 13V
Battery BP 12-12
12V, 12Ah/C20/1.75VPC/25ºC
Valve Regulated Lead-Acid Rechargabe Battery
Cigarette Lighter Adapter
Power Inverter
Input: 12 VDC, 15 A Max
AC output: 120 VAC/60 Hz
80 W/0.65 A (Continuous)
100 W/0.80 A (5 minutes)
DC Output: 5 VDC/0.5 A
What I have that needs power:
Cell Phone
Input: 120V-AC/60Hz/4.8VA
Output: 3.7V-DC/340mA
AA Recharger for Digital Camera batteries
Input: AC 100-240v 50/60 Hz 7W
Output: DC 1.4V 1050mA (AA)x2 525mA(AA)x4 640mA(AA)x2
Laptop Computer
60W portable adapter
Input: AC 100-240V~, 50-60 Hz, 1.5A
Output: 16.5V=3.65A ADP-60AD B
My Digital Camera Batteries
…don’t have it here right now, I’ll update later.
Current Questions:
1. How long will it take to charge the battery in the winter/summer?
2. How much juice can I get from the battery? Will I be able to charge all the other batteries frequently?
3. How do I connect all this shit?
4. Where should I put the panel to maximize it’s charge?
5. How durable/weather/humidity/water proof is this gear?
—
Show your support and appreciation for Urban Scout
When I first read the book Ishmael (almost 9 years now!) I realized that Civilization was going to collapse in my lifetime. My initial response was, “I must learn to live like a hunter-gatherer!” I saved up a lot of money and went to a weeklong class at one of the nations most notorious schools for wilderness survival. During this class our instructors told us that by the end of the week we would be able to walk out into the woods with only a knife… and survive. That was very exciting. I could regain 10,000 years of ancestral forgetting in 7 days! Can you even put a price on that? The money was worth it. Of course this was a lie. The purpose of this I guess was to either get you inspired enough to actually try it when you got home, or fill the class with students. Well I was inspired, so I did it. The experience lasted 2 days. It made me so uncomfortable and ill that I to this day, six years later have never tried it again.
Late last summer I ran a post-apocalyptic skills summer camp. We traveled to Laurelhurst Park for Calens grappling hook climbing lesson. Calen began his lesson at the west end of the park. Having a shoulder injury I could not partake in the climbing so I began to wander the park in search of food. When I reached the pond I saw that it was almost glowing neon green in color. It looked radioactive. Around the pond was a strip of yellow caution tape and posted every so often were signs that read, “TOXIC ALGAE BLOOM: Microcystis. Please keep away from water.” I thought, isn’t it odd for a pond in a city park to have a toxic algae bloom? Apparently it isn’t as rare as I thought.