Timestepper

It's already happened. Several times.

Guilty as charged. :ugh:     This thread started out hijacked. :squint:       And suddenly here we are talking about sex again.    :leaving:

As a native Kansan transplanted to East Tennessee, I have managed to remain completely neutral on the North/South thing - both sides kicked the crap out of us during the late "unpleasantries."   That said, I feel it only rational to point out that since more cotton is produced in "the South" than in "the North" "Yankee Land" it would seem that, factually, more threads "go North" than "go South." Especially since, given the traditonally warmer climate of the South, less bulky clothing (and therefore, less threads) are needed here.   Now, as to pink gun toting, homosexual, black panthers who frequent East Tennessee water moccasin infested Waffle Houses & IHOPs operated by habitual gatherers of anecdotal evidence to discuss the relative merits of whether the cat & goat cheese is better cut by Bigfoot with a Glock or Sasquatch with a 1911, I can only say... "Ummm... More special brownies, please?"   :popcorn:

Excellent reads! Given the incredible true life hazards that Sir Ernest and his men experienced, It's sadly amazing that he has been largely forgotten.   Anyone who has ever read Jack London's fictional "To Build a Fire" and shivered along with the protagonist owes it to themselves to read of Sir Ernest Shackleton's remarkable Antarctic expeditions.    :up: :up:     ...TS...

  Wait long enough and most of the looters will have killed each other off. See, that's the thing about thieves and looters; they very rarely do it because they need to. They do it because they think it's finally the free ride they've deserved all their lives (and, while they won't work for it, they're not above killing for it). I remember going through a blackout several years ago where there was a fair amount of looting going on and laughing my @ss off because everyone was stealing electronics and other crap that they couldn't use, but almost no one stole food. :rofl:   And back roads are good if you're familiar with them. But don't be surprised to find homemde roadblocks, even early on. Heck, if I decided to bug in or wanted to delay the necessity of bugging out, one of the first things I'd do is drop a few trees in strategic places and/or block the road(s) with a couple of cars with the wheels & tires removed...     :2cents:     ...TS...

  My ankle is permanently fused to mid-foot and my left leg is now roughly 3/8 - 1/2 inch shorter than my right. I'm ambulating pretty good now (albeit with a permanent and horrible limp) and even tossed my cane behind the seat of the pickup more or less permanently a couple of weeks ago. There is a type of orthopeadic shoe called a rocker bottom which will help with mobility and gait provided I can ever afford to get one (or more) made.   I've come to grips with the fact that I'll never take another pain free step - although after the first 10 or so steps of the day (which feels like walking barefoot on thumbtacks) the pain decreases to a more tolerable level - but it really bugs me that I can no longer run or even stride out with the distance eating gait I used to have. (Again though, the rocker bottom shoe/boot should help with the gait and take the extra stress off my hips and spine that result from the horrible limp I now have.)   All in all, I'm staying pretty upbeat because I know it could have been much worse, but I did get a pretty huge lesson in humility on the evening of the 18th: My wife was in the hospital fighting a case of meningitis (she's home and doing much better now, btw) and I had limped out to the parking lot to smoke a cigarette and make a phone call. Having discarded both crutches and cane about 5 days earlier, I was feeling pretty proud (and even a little cocky!) for getting around "two-legged" for the first time in more than five months. When I started back in, there was a little old lady - if she was a day, she was 85 - using a walker about twenty feet ahead me when I reached the entrance. Proud and cocky as I was and no matter how hard I tried or how fast I limped... I couldn't catch her in the hallway to save my life! :censored: She had 33 years and four extra legs on me and if I'd been a Boy Scout, she'd have beat me across the street as soon as the light changed! :surrender: Needless to say, I'm considerably more humble now and have no plans to race any more octogenarians - at least until I get my new shoe!   :rofl:   Getting back to the OP, I'd actually thought about this method of travel a fair amount before my accident and even experimented with traveling fairly short (20 - 30 miles) distances this way in the past and it worked quite well. Better than I'd thought it would in fact.    Given that my BOL is such a long ways away and given my background as a truck driver and resulting familiarity with roads and terrain over most of the country, it just strikes me that this would make the most sense for me. I mean, as I alluded to earlier, I could literally do the entire route via water - from less than 1/2 mile from where I sit to my best friend's back yard - but it would take several months, possibly even a year or two. But if the pickup would get me even just over the Cumberland Plateau to Nashville and the Cumberland, then I've eliminated the entire loop down the Tennessee to Chattanooga and back up to LBL. And if the bicycle would get me across most of Illinois from the mouth of the Cumberland at Paducah (with occasional detours in the water), then I've eliminated the small craft hazards of navigating the currents at the mouth of the Ohio and a bunch more miles and so on. Having both bicycle and canoe also gives me the freedom to change routes without sacrificing either mode of travel.   Could be that I'd make some friends along the way, since a friendly cripple isn't much of a threat. Could be that I'd get killed early on because traveling mostly at night isn't as smart or cautious as I've convinced myself it is. But it could be too that I'd eventually make it to where I was headed and have some pretty boring tales to tell when I got there. Dunno... Kinda' hope I never have to find out. But if I do, well, I already know that it's possible...   :hat:     ...TS...

If it were to really come down to it, and staying put was not a viable alternative, my BOV is a combination of a litlle Dodge Dakota 4X4, a mountain bicycle and a 16 foot canoe with a cart. Since my BOL is quite some distance away (I could get there strictly via canoe, but it would take several months),   I figure to go as far as the pickup would get me, then hook the canoe cart to the back of the bicycle (the cart was designed specifically for that purpose) and travel on. If traveling via bike becomes problematic or unviable, then the nearest waterway will suffice until such time as I can once again safely travel by land. Having puncture proof tires on both bike and cart insures less maintenance and fewer tools to be carried while increasing odds of success while traveling overland and/or portaging. And I can carry everything I need and then some in the canoe whether on water or towed behind the bike on land.   Folks were traveling the continent via canoe & horse for hundreds of years before the first automobiles came along, I'd just be adding a modern and slightly more effective and efficient twist to my travels...   ...TS...

  Strikes me that boobs, butts and legs are kinda' like the sun - Wear sufficiently dark wrap-around glasses and you can stare all you want... B)       :hat:

Wow, what a thread!  :popcorn:   Okay, I'll play. (And mostly by the rules, too!)   Handgun: Long-barreled (eight plus inches) .22LR single action revolver.  Reasoning: Having owned one and hunted with it in nearly every weather condition imaginable for several years in a couple of different states/regions, I've found it to be reliable, steady and accurate. Not to mention the fact that take down and cleaning is a breeze with the even the simplest of materials.   Long gun: Savage 24V .357mag/20ga. Reasoning: Having owned one for nearly thirty years, I've found it to be extremely realiable, highly accurate and with sufficient knockdown power and range to kill anything I'm likely to come up against. And again, takedown, cleanup and maintenance is a breeze. Granted, it does have that extra barrel (chambered in 20ga) hanging underneath and adding weight, but I won't talk about it here since the OP has specifically requested that shotguns not be mentioned. (On the other hand, if I were in a survival situation and happened to stumble across someone's worthlessly hoarded batch of 20 guage shells, I'd happily relieve them of their burden just because I'm a great guy.)   Having said that...   If I had to start from scratch and choose guns that I don't already own, I'd still go with the long-barreled .22 revolver, but - assuming that I had a readily available/previously hoarded supply of ammo - for the long gun, I'd go with a Winchester '73 chambered in .44/40. There's a reason they call it the gun that won the west and that's the reason(s) I'd choose it.   Now, as to the other can of worms (which I would hunt with a sharpened digging stick rather than any of the aforementioned firearms) opened here, the western mountain men had a saying about newcomers or "greenhorns" in the west: "He don't know poor bull from fat cow..." ...Strikes me that knowing the difference might just make a bigger dent in your survival than what caliber(s) of rifle/hangun you carry...      :usa:     ...TS...    

Guess it all boils down to "To each his own." Just like the best fire starter thread - the best fire starter is the one that you've personally tested enough to become comfortable and confident with in any given situation/scenario, not the "really neat firestarter" that some guy told you he heard his buddy talking seeing some place on the internet that was really cool but he can't remember the name of, but it's guaranteed to work - even in an upside down rainstorm thirty feet under a waterfall in a rainforest in the Tyrolean Alps.   I've owned my Savage 24V for nearly thirty years and it has never let me down. The shots I've missed have been my fault, not the gun's (maybe I just got lucky with the one I bought, but even shooting rifled slugs through the 20ga, I've never wanted for accuracy, although aim point does indeed vary depending upon what caliber/load you feed it.) And even after shooting myself with the damn thing on March 15th of this year, there's no amount of money that will tempt me to part with it. But that doesn't mean it's what's best for every one. It means that it works for me.   I've read/heard about the inserts mentioned in the OP for several years now and I can see where they'd have their applications and I wouldn't mind being in a survival situation with someone who has one that has proven itself. But since I already own a proven (to me) rifle/shotgun combo, it wouldn't make much sense for me to purchase one. The potential versatility could prove an advantage, but Caster makes a great point regarding his own observations of the versatility of his .308. Does it make me want to run out and buy a .308? Nope. Because what works for him isn't guaranteed to work for me any more than my personal experience with the 24V trumps his past experiences with a similar gun.   Bottom line, if the newly opened sporting goods store I checked out when I was 24 years old had carried these inserts, I'd have tried one (or more) in half a heartbeat. As it happened, they didn't and instead I stumbled onto a deal on a unique gun that would end up giving me a lifetime of unfailing service...     ...TS...

This morning: Six over easy home fresh banty eggs topped with buttermilk white cheddar cheese and sprinkled liberally with Cholula brand Lime & Chili hot sauce, pumpernickel toast w/butter and homemade brandied peaches for dessert. Washed it all down with "Hazlenut Dream" coffee spiked with a little Irish whisky.   Tomorrow: A cup of hazlenut coffee at home followed by five or six more cups of whatever commercially available nasty, coal oil tasting (free!) coffee we use at the office...   Tuesday: Pretty much the same as today except that I'll toss some marinated mushrooms on top, switch out the buttermilk white cheddar cheese with Amish Vidalia onion cheese and go with Tabasco Smoky Chipotle sauce instead of the Cholula.   Wednesday: See "Tomorrow..."   ^_^   ...TS...

I almost hate to add this to the mix, but I know of some who will appreciate it and a few others who will be glad it wasn't them. (This was also published in "Muzzle Blasts" magazine a few years back.)   About #$%@* years ago (back when the earth was still cooling), I had the opportunity to get in on a week long survival outing. It was intended to be real live mountain man stuff with nothing to eat but what you shoot or catch or gather. This was in September of 19*#. Starting to cool, but warm enough during the day.   My regular outfit back then was moccasins, breechcloth and leggings. I almost never wore a shirt. I carried my rifle and shooting bag everywhere I went. My camp name or buckskinning handle back then was "White Man who falls on Ass" although most called me "Wumwufoa", which is the phonetic pronunciation of the acronym. (W.M.W.F.O.A.) Or just "Wumwuf" for short.   All in all, there were about 12 or 13 of us on this particular outing and things were really looking positive. We were camped in a primitive area, several miles from the nearest road with a couple of lean tos for shelter. We had a high of 75 degrees on the Thursday we started. And we had our guns and plenty of powder and lead... That's about as far as the positive part went...   On Thursday night, it started raining. When we crawled out from under our blankets Friday morning there was 8 inches of fresh snow on the ground. But, hey! We were roughin' it like Bridger and Carson and we were in good shape! Especially, after I borrowed a buckskin shirt so my "stipples wouldn't nick out."   Anyway, we were having a great time except that no one could find anything to kill! I guess the snow storm had run all the critters back into their holes. And being as how it was a wet snow, it didn't take much time to get soaked to the skin. So we spent a lot of time hunkered around the fire talking about how nice it would be not to have to spend all our time hunkering around the fire. And boy, wouldn't it be nice if a big ol' 12 course meal would wander into camp just looking for someone to eat it!   It snowed another 4 inches on Saturday and we decided that maybe we oughtta' start gettin' serious about finding something to kill, before "Fat Jenkins" started getting REAL hungry. Besides being an eating machine, Fat was also one of the best stalkers I've ever known. He was 5'6" tall, nearly that wide, and could move like a ghost. He was phenomenal!   Anyway, Sunday morning we split into 3 groups of 4 with one man left in camp to tend the fire and hog tie any stray 12 course meals that happened to wander by. We hunted pretty much all day long and finally managed to take 8 or 9 rabbits. The man we left in camp said he didn't see so much as an after dinner mint, let alone a 12 course banquet - We accused him of sleeping on the job.   After an unfortunately light meal, supplemented with judicious applications of Taos Lightning and Grumpy's "Moon Juice", we turned in under the light of a nearly full moon. Since my leggings and borrowed shirt had become soaked, I took them off and hung them over a bush at the edge of camp, then crawled between my blankets with my rifle and shooting bag close to hand. (Like a real Mountain Man.)   About 4 O'clock the next morning, I awoke to the sound of laughter. When I roused up and asked what the hell was going on, a guy we called "Stinky" pointed at a coyote running up the side of the steep hill to the west. I looked and sure as heck, it WAS funny to watch! Every few steps the poor critter would stumble like he was getting tangled up in something, and slide back down the hill a few feet.   All of us were up by then, laughing like fools at the misfortune of that poor, dumb beast. Then I happened to glance at the bush where I'd left my legging's... Then I looked back at the coyote... Then back at the bush - GIMME BACK MY LEGGINS, YOU SON OF A BITCH!!!!   Well, I grabbed my rifle and took off on a dead run. Behind me I could hear someone hollering "Get 'im, Wumwuf, sic 'im boy!" And raucous peels of laughter.   The temperature had dropped during the night and what had been WET snow was now slightly dryer and considerably hardened ice. After falling twice I discarded my rifle, considering it to be an impediment to my progress. (Not to mention the fact that it hurt like a b*tch when I landed on it!) Having lost sight of the coyote, I had no idea that he had dropped my leggins and headed for parts unknown.   The guys in camp were still hollering things like "Sic 'em, Wumwuf!" And "Yer a gainin' on 'im now, hoss!" in between snorts of laughter.   I was roughly half way up the hill (a good 250 feet) when I slipped for the third (and last!) time. All I really remember is my feet going up in the air and blurry scenery. Needless to say, I came back to camp considerably faster than I left it... Luckily, my breechcloth caught on a snag on the way back down and slowed my progress enough that I didn't slide completely through camp.   ...I don't remember who finally fetched my leggings for me, but I do seem to recall that it was a couple of days before I could stand to wear 'em again, what with the major league rug burns I'd picked up from sliding on the ice. The bright spot was that I killed a nice doe while laying on my blankets in camp later that morning while everyone else was out hunting. (Which served to bouy my spirits considerably, knowing that I was no longer the dumbest creature in the vacinity.)   All in all, our survival outing was a success, although for some reason we never tried it again. The snow had melted almost completely by the time we hiked out, and except for the psychological ones, I have no permanent scars.   Now, after a little more than thirty years, I still (as you might imagine) have yet to live this episode down. Although the fact that I don't hang around with any of those guys any longer makes the memory easier to live with.   And, oh yes, someone did have the presence of mind to snap a few pictures of my wild "ride". ...But fortunately they all came out blurry...     ...TS...

Not specifically a hunting story (although some of the "lessons" contained were learned while hunting), but rather a "letter of introduction" to aquaint a former supervisor of mine with the Rocky Mountains: (FWIW, it was also the first piece I had published.)   Dear Boss: Congratulations on having chosen the Colorado Rocky Mountains as your vacation spot this year! As you may know, even though I'm originally from Kansas, I have spent a great deal of time in the Rockies. In fact, due in large part to inaccurate maps, faulty compasses and the mysterious geologic forces which strive to constantly re-arrange otherwise familiar landmarks - I have probably spent more time in the Colorado back country than most members of the search and rescue team. At any rate, I am convinced that you, yourself could not have picked a better destination. I must admit that I am honored that you have come to me for advice and I commend you on your excellent judgment. Naturally, over the years, I have acquired an almost encyclopedic knowledge on this subject and you may believe me when I say that I have forgotten more than you know. From the time of Zebulon Pike to present there have been literally thousands of books and articles authored on the subject of camping and living in the Rocky mountains So many so that my wife jokingly inquired as to why anyone over the age of eight who owns a library card would willingly come to me for advice. I politely informed her that I, for one, could understand your wanting to learn things that only a real expert like myself would know! With that in mind, Boss, I have decided not to fill your brain with information easily obtained from other sources. Instead, I have enclosed the following list of things you should NOT do while you are in the mountains. I know you should not do these things, because unfortunately, I have done them all at some point in the past. Needless to say, the results have ranged from just thoroughly embarrassing to damn near disastrous! Good Luck Boss! May you learn at least as much from my "adventures" as I have... Things you should NOT do in the Mountains (Or anywhere else for that matter!) 1. Do not wrap an egg in clay and place it the campfire to cook. 2. Do not try to start a campfire using only a mouthful of brandy and a Zippo lighter. 3. No matter how cute and cuddly it may look - Do not try to pet a baby porcupine. 4. Never try to kill a skunk with a banjo! 5. Never try to bluff a moose... 6. Never try to cross a stream on any log which is more than ten feet above the water - Especially if the water is less than three feet deep! 7. Never leave your clothes more than a mile from where you are actually "skinny-dipping." 8. NEVER allow yourself to be convinced that riding a plastic toboggan down a two thousand foot snow mass and into a mountain lake would be "a really neat thing to do!" 9. Do not sneak up on your camp partner and "woof" like a grizzly - Especially if they are holding a cast iron skillet or a fly rod. 10. Do not throw rocks or pinecones at your camp partner when they in the bushes answering the call of nature - Especially if they are bigger and meaner than you are. 11. Do not throw rocks or pinecones at any stump that looks like a sleeping bear. 12. If you must climb a tree to escape from a recently awakened bear, do NOT disturb anything which looks like a yellow jacket nest (at least until AFTER you are past it). And finally - Even if the hornets choose to go after the bear and leave you with only a few stings - Do not jump up and down, clap your hands and laugh uproariously while you are still standing in the uppermost branches of a pine tree!     ...TS...

I'll second that emotion! :up:   :pleased:   I've owned mine for nearly 30 years and, although I tend more toward traditiional muzzleloaders, it is my very favorite modern gun of all time. Over the years I've used it to hunt just about everything from rabbit & squirrel to pheasant, waterfowl, hogs, turkey and deer (both whitetail and mule deer). I seldom use a scope, but have mounted one on it in the past and taken both coyote & whitetails out to 150 yards (not bad for a "pistol bullet!").  I gave (I think) 120 dollars or so for it brand new back in '84 and wouldn't take 20 times that much for it now.   :usa:

Thought about this some more and realized that, due to my rather catastrophic ankle injury earlier this year, it kinda' already has happened to my wife and I. I mean insofar as my becoming suddenly disabled with pretty much ZERO income for several months, it really gave a us a chance to test our preparations. Indeed if it weren't for the prepping we've done, we'd have been more or less completely helpless from the start. As it is we've gotten by reasonably well with just a little outside help from friends.   It hasn't been fun, but we've learned a lot from it and now know what changes we need to make in future preparations to avoid the pitfalls we've encountered thus far.   Question: "What if all of this is for nothing?"   Answer: Then you count your freakin' blessing that you never actually had to put it to the test... And then you really give thanks that you've never stumbled and put a .357mag 158gr JHP through your ankle or suffered some other equally idiotic & crippling accident and had to suddenly find out the hard way whether your prepping ideas actually work.   What if all of this is for nothing? Well, it's not for nothing --- Because it doesn't take a government or societal meltdown or an electro-magnetic pulse or even an earthquake to put it to the test. Just one stupid little accident... I found out the hard way that only Superman is truly invincible. The rest of us are frail and human and only one stupid little stumble away from finding out just how freakin' important prepping actually is.   ...TS...

If I had a Ford it would look like a Dodge so my friends wouldn't know that I'd changed sides.

I'll echo Moped to a point; I've read both good and bad about the inserts.   Knowing myself the way I do, I'd stand a better than average chance of losing the darn thing just about the time I needed it most. My trusty ol' Savage 24V, however, (.357mag over 20ga.) is the most versatile long gun I've ever owned - between being able to use slugs in the 20 and birdshot (rare, but rather easily made) in the .357, I've effectively got four guns (five if you're into .38sp) in one package that still takes down small enough to fit into a backpack.   ...TS...

  Monteagle has an interstate and state highway or two running through it and you'd be swamped. Better off to buy Brushy Mountain Prison (unless of course you're planning on being lonely and want all the company that you'd get in Monteagle).  :shrug:

Schrodinger's cat...   :hat:

My favorite was Billy Bob Thornton playing Davy Crockett and flinching every time he fires his trusty old flintlock. :down:

If I won $100 million bucks, I'd be so far off the grid so fast that even God would have to ask directions.   As to livestock, supplies, armament, vehicles, etc... Well, let's just say that the place I have in mind already has most of what I'd need. :pleased:

With 2 1/2 million miles behind me (and hopefully more to come once I heal up!), my personal opinion is that it will affect different types of drivers (local, regional, long-haul, live-load, drop & hook, flatbed, reefer, dry van, tanker, over-dimension, etc...) in different ways. None of which will contribute to the overall safety of the industry.   In fact I'd venture to say that virtually NONE of the changes I've seen in the past 25 or so years regarding the laws which govern the transportation industry has contributed much at all to public safety. What HAS helped the overall safety of our industry is better equipment, better education & training of drivers and law enforcement and better <trained> dispatchers. I still get as tired now as I did 25 years ago and the changes in the hours of service regulations don't make me any more rested now than they used to. Granted, I'm a safer driver now than I used to be, but that has come through experience, education and training rather than being told when I can or can't drive, have to take a break and for how long.   And to answer the OP's initial question as it pertains to me, personally, I'm neither for or against: I'll generally be able work around it and not have much of an inconvenience, but it ticks me off when someone who doesn't know me (or any other driver for that matter), from Adam tries to make me believe they know more about my personal physiology than I do. :(

    I'm originally from the High Plains of Western Kansas myself, so I know about rough winters. An insulated hen house with a heat lamp and heated watering bowls kept egg production at about 1/2 or 2/3 most years...

Oddly enough, I like banty eggs for the very reasons you don't (although I agree wholeheartedly that they make make fantastic pickle eggs). But with only my wife and I, if I decide to cut a recipe - which calls for 1 egg - in half, I just use one banty egg. And true, you do have to use a bunch of them for breakfast type meals (my usual breakfast is six banty eggs sunny side up), but our little hens are great layers - if we don't get 10 or 11 eggs a day, it's because we couldn't find a couple. And our banty eggs taste so much richer than our Rhode Island Reds ever did, despite the fact that they were both free range. Plus, as I've already mentioned, we grind the shells and mix them right back in with the chicken scratch to lessen the need for calcium supplements. And with a light in the hen house, they've always produced through the winter as well.   :hat:

  Actually, my claustrophobia seems to be pretty selective. I'm just not always sure what it'll select; having been born and raised on the High Plains of Western Kansas, I sometimes get claustrophobic just being in East Tn. with all the trees and hills. Other times I can curl up and sleep under a canoe. I suppose it has something to do with whether or not I know there's an easy escape route.  :shrug: