Lately a lot of American politicians have been coming to Canada to talk about our tar sands. There have been campaigns for and against oil from this source. Sometimes I find it to be comical, sometimes it makes my blood boil.

An example of humour in this is companies that will not use 'the dirty oil' from the Canadian tar sands. Yeah, good luck with that. Americans are willing to send their kids half way around the world to die for oil. ( Oil, freedom, freedom, oil, it's all the same right?) And just how do these dipshits plan on determining where the oil they use comes from anyway, let alone separate it from the supply stream that feeds almost every product in the market today? It's just another example of blow-hards getting on the media to play the masses who refuse to think for themselves. Oooh, Greedcorp says they won't use that filthy Canadian oil, they must really care about the environment and me. What a warm load of exit stuff.

But here's the part that gets my dander up. Pelosi is having supper with the Premier of Alberta and they are talking about America's dependence on foreign oil. She actually says to him, 'Don't worry, we don't consider Canadian oil foreign.' Premier Ed Stelmach responds with such childlike glee, he almost wets his knickers. Excuse me? WTF? Do I need to send both these retards a map?

First of all, if the US doesn't want to buy our oil, then so be it. We'll keep it for later. But no, we're so anxious to sell it at any price they see fit and comply with whatever terms they wish.  The US, China, whoever. It doesn't matter. We will sell anyone all our raw materials, then try to scrape together a few bucks to buy back some finished products. We can't make anything here anymore. We've been de-industrialized.
I used to think I lived in the greatest country in the world. The more I look around though, I realize this country is just a resource whore for the world's johns.

A Year of Composting

We had to leave the acreage yesterday for a trip to the city. I really hate going there anymore. Everyone seems to be on edge, not even realizing it. I don't blame them though. The traffic, noise, pollution, crowds, advertisements, and many other things just getting in your face non stop can really strip you of your serenity.

We went to a little restaurant for lunch before heading home. I went to the washroom and was struck by the thought : "Here I am pissing in one days worth of treated drinking water for a person, and I'll use two more days worth to make it magically disappear!"  Talk about crazy.

About a year ago, my wife and I started looking into alternative ways to deal with our septic tank/field concerns. Building a new home, we were faced with many thousands of dollars to deal with toilet waste. What we discovered was a system that is incredibly cheap, easy to operate and will actually add value to our property. Maybe not dollar value as some suit-wad from the real estate company might calculate, but REAL value. Value as in we are able to improve the quality of our own soil. Value as in we don't have to produce potable water just so we can shit in it. And the whole system was super cheap to put together and operate.

Plywood box, 5 gal pail, standard toilet seat

Bin system from free pallets

If you haven't read Joseph Jenkins' Humanure handbook, then you should. It gives plenty of details on setting up, operating, and most importantly, the science and data behind showing the safety of such a system. At first I was mighty skeptical, so was my wife. So we tried it on a week long trial. It's been a year and now I hate having to use anything else. The book recommends using sawdust for cover in the pail. Well that isn't so easy to get around here, but wood shavings in bale size bags are, so we use that.

The book can be purchased through Amazon or viewed for free (some versions downloadable) at the authors website : http://www.josephjenkins.com/books_humanure.html

People may think I am crazy for using this system (mostly city folk, not rural or old timers) but I'm not, and I don't care what anybody thinks (except for the wife). When you turn on the tap and nothing comes out, will you be sorry you took a dump in the last gallon?

Domestead Pictures

Some photos showing the recent progress on our little domestead....

We still have a long way to go but I'm pleased with what we have been able to do so far. After all, there is only my wife and I working on this with out the aid of machinery. Well not entirely true. My old lady is a machine. Since I scurry off to my wage slave thing every day, humping a desk for the man, she has built more than half of this place by her incredible little ol' self.