Skills

We’re almost at the point in time when some of the seedlings you’ve planted should be going outside. Hardy greens like kale, cabbage, and chard will probably be able to weather the outside temperatures in the next week or two. This means there’s a lot of work to do!

The first thing you need to do is start hardening off your seedlings. This is a long but simple process that ensures your new plants will thrive once they’re in the great outdoors. Now that we’re getting a few days in the high 40s and low 50s (and sometimes warmer), you want to pick a day that’s slightly overcast and warm, with not too much wind. Take your flats or pots of seedlings and place them in a wind-free spot that isn’t in direct sunlight, and let them bask in the natural light for about an hour. Do this at the warmest point of the day, just after noon, if at all possible. Then bring them all back in. Repeat this every day, adding an hour or so a day to the time outside, until your plants have developed stronger stems and secondary leaves.

When the nights are all above freezing, you can leave your seedlings outside. Cover them up, though, because critters like raccoons and mice like to eat those yummy miniature plants. Once the plants are hardened off, you can wait for a nice, overcast day to plant your seedlings into the garden.

Before that, though, you have to prepare your garden. If you’re going to be using buckets and/or bins of any kind, they need to be readied for use. This means cleaning them out, bleaching them (to kill any bacteria that could harm your plants or transfer to them), and then rinsing them thoroughly. Drill, poke, or melt some holes into the bottom of each container. This allows excess water to drain. Some people do it in the bottom of the containers, but I find doing it about an inch above the bottom, along the sides, works best. That way, excess water can still escape, but there’s a “well” below the holes that continues to hold water for the plants on dry days.

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Love it or hate it, project management is a thing. It has to be there. If you don’t think it is there, you are just doing it badly.

Project Managers are a different kettle of fish. Some need to be boiled alive. Others can just dance on hot rocks. And a very few can sit at the big boys’ table.

I’m coming off the end of a rush project that was big. I had to take a customized system and add tariffs to it with about 14 days from concept to deployed. More than a little to get done.

When I started programming, I had a choice of an 8080 with a 24×80 character display, or a 6502 with a 24×40 character display.

When I was introduced to JOVE, Jonathan’s Own Version of EMACS, I fell in love with it. Multiple views into the same file, the ability to copy and paste from different files or different places in the same file. And auto indentation.

Powerful stuff for the time.

My fingers worked will with vi and later vim because I played Nethack and before that, Hack. The programs had a particular key set for moving the cursor based on the key caps of a terminal type used at MIT.

The author had never seen a terminal without arrows over the J, K, H, and L keys. To give you an idea of how ingrained those are, I had to fire up vim and tell my fingers “down”, “up”, “right”, and “left” to record the keys for this sentence. My fingers know, I don’t.

Besides jove, I learned emacs. Emacs is my programming editor. It is what I use when I need to write a lot of code or text. With modern computers, it starts just as fast as jove ever did on a 68020 class CPU.

The problem we had was keeping track of what needed to be done or fixed. This might start off as a document, written with jove in troff. This could be fed to different processors to create PostScript files to be sent to our printers.

Later, some of us used LaTeX for the same thing. Your “design document” was a separate file that was “fixed” before you started coding. These documents never contained more than brief pseudocode and discussions of algorithms.

As you were coding, if you discovered something, you created a comment and marked it. The two most common marks were, XXX which meant that the code was broken in some way, but it didn’t need to be fixed now. All XXX marks had to be addressed before the code could be released.

The other mark was TODO. This was working code but needed some features or extensions added. These did not need to be fixed before release.

In general, we used grep to find all these markers in a list of files. It wasn’t difficult.

The small program I’m working with has some 250k lines of code. After 3 or 4 years of supporting this site, I would say I’ve looked at every line of code in the system.

Finding every marker in 4100 files across 1200 directories is a pain.

Enter Kanban

Kanban is a project management tool. The concept is easy enough to do with sticky notes and a white board or notes with push pins on a larger bulletin board.

Today, the normal Kanban has 4 columns to hold cards. The cards are labeled, “backlog”, “To Do”, “Doing” or “Working”, and “Done”.

When you create a card it goes into the “backlog” column. These are issues or tasks that have no resources assigned to them.

Once per week, there is a meeting of the workers and the project manager. In this meeting, the project manager evaluates the cards that are in the “Done” column. If they are truly done, then they are removed from the board and added to the QA project.

Cards that are in the working column stay in the working column. Cards that are in the working column can be moved into the backlog column if some other card blocks them.

For example, if you have a card that says, “Put new tire on left front wheel” it cannot be worked on until the card that says, “Purchase a new tire for the front left wheel.” Until the purchase card is completed, you can’t work on the installation card.

If there are any resources (workers/developers) that think they are going to need more tasks to work on, the project manager will take cards from the backlog column and move them to the To-Do column.

When a worker requires more work, they move the card from the To-Do column to the working column. When they complete the card, they move it to the Done column.

I’ve used Kanban in the past. It never really appealed to me as it didn’t feel any different from the old ways of doing things.

For this latest project, I used my Kanban board.

Instead of putting markers in the code, I opened a new issue. That issue just went into the “backlog” column. I could tag the issue as a bug or a feature. I could indicate that cards were blocked. It was faster to create the issues/cards than to make entries into the files and then try to locate them later.

Today, I’ll be looking through anything in the QA column and writing unit or web tests for them. I’ll also be doing a QA across the site, to add to the project board.

The biggest thing for me was the ability to visual see what still needed to be done.

Conclusion

Good tools make the work go faster.

Everyone in my house loves stir fry. I do all kinds of stir fry dishes, too. I make a great coconut Thai curry, and my ginger soy poke bowls aren’t bad either. Recently, I was in a mood for noodles instead of rice, though, and I went looking and found a recipe for using ramen noodles in a stir fry. This is my take on that!

Ingredients:

• 3 tbsp regular soy sauce
• 3 tbsp dark soy sauce
• 3 tbsp hoisin sauce
• 1 tbsp oyster sauce
• 1 tbsp rice wine vinegar
• 2 tsp sriracha or sweet chili sauce
• 1/4 tsp white ground pepper
• 3 packages instant ramen noodles (discard flavor packets)
• 1 lb skinless, boneless chicken breasts, diced
• 3 tbsp vegetable oil, divided (see recipe)
• 1 cup diced red bell pepper
• 1 cup sliced white button mushrooms
• 1/2 cup diced sweet yellow onion
• 1 cup broccoli florets
• 1 tbsp fresh minced garlic
• 1 tbsp fresh grated ginger
• 2 thinly sliced green onion
• 1/2 tbsp toasted sesame seeds

Black powder is a low explosive. It deflagrates instead of explodes.

Does this mean it is less powerful than a high explosive? I’m not the one to answer that.

In doing research, I found that in some mining situations in the past, they would create a room to hold the explosives. The room would be filled with high explosives to shatter the rock and black powder to push the rock out. The cartoons of rooms filled with “gunpowder” and “dynamite” were based on real-world things.

I have not attempted to make any high explosives. I have the knowledge, I have some books on how to do it, I have not done it. Therefore, I do not have the skill(s) — yet.

One of the interesting aspects of high explosives it that many don’t like to go boom. They need an initiation charge to do so. So you need a small amount of a more sensitive yet still energetic enough explosive to make the high explosive go boom.

One of my manuals describes how you create a blasting cap from a 5.56 case. Simplified, remove the primer from a spent case. Feed a slow fuse through the primer hole. Place it in the “press” to be filled.

The press is a wooden dowel that fits in the case mouth. It is attached to a wooden lever, with one end of the lever attached to a firm upright. The dowel is positioned only a couple of inches from the pivot point.

The lever is a couple of feet long. At the far end is a hole for a rope. The rope leads down to a snatch block (pulley) on the ground.

To use the press, you put a small amount of the primary explosive in the case. You GENTLY put the wooden dowel in the case mouth. You go a good distance away to the end of your rope, and you gently pull the rope to pull the lever down to press the primary explosive into the case.

When you have an unexpected explosion of the primary explosive, you are hopefully far enough away and behind cover so you are not harmed.

Yeah, not for the faint of heart.

Primers, again something I have knowledge about, I haven’t attempted it. I have been collecting spent primers for a few thousand rounds, just in case.

As for technology returning rapidly? Yeah, it will. Not because of any one person, but because of the wealth of skills that exist. As my mentor used to say, “If the Internet were to be destroyed tomorrow, it would be back up in a couple of weeks because geeks can’t live without their porn.”

It isn’t so much that we could rebuild everything, it is that we have so much “scrap” that could be brought back on line.

My plan for books is to take a few thousand with me. A Kindle device with a low-power draw and a few thousand books sitting in a cage to protect it from EMPs. Hell, multiple such devices. I have small memory devices of 64GB. You can put a hell of alot of data on one of those. And duplicate it.

Paper books would be a back-up, and we have bookshelves of such books.

Suppose you have to start over with basic hand tools and a stock of metal. Can you make things?

I have a foundry. I can make castings. I can make patterns. This is a good first step. Can I pour iron? I have the knowledge and tools to do so. I haven’t poured iron. I’ve only poured aluminum.

Aluminum isn’t as good as iron for most castings, but it is better than wood. There is plenty of aluminum to be had as scrap.

I do have a lathe. The lathe I have is belt-driven. That belt is powered by a 3 phase electric motor. I have the skills to make new leather belts for it. In a worse case situation, I can get slow speeds from it with a human-powered system, like a bicycle.

This is the reason I learned how to make safe steam boilers (knowledge) and steam expansion engines (skill). I have a generator set that I plan to make steam powered, if required, to make electricity for the mill.

Can I make a wood cutting lathe? Yes. I have the skills to use it.

Can I make a wooden screw? Yes. I have done so. The thing about making screws is that you only need to make one course and nearly correct screw to be able to create any screw of any quality.

The magic is in the reduction gears. Assume you want to make a screw that is a precise 8 threads per inch. You start with a hand cut screw of whatever pitch say 1.5x6tpi. This is a tap and die set you can pick up on Amazon. You can get different diameters and pitches.

Even if this thread is not that precise, you can use it to make a more precise thread. If you feed this at a 4 to 1 ratio, you can get a pitch of 24. If you run it a 4 to 3, you can get your 8 threads per inch. The gearing might be a bit complex, it will take some time to get it right, but it can be done.

Of more interest is making flat surfaces and right angles. With three right-angle samples, you can create three right angles and with 6 flat faces.

Start by making a flat surface. This is done by starting with three nearly flat surfaces. Call them A, B, and C. Ink B and use it to find “high spots” on A. Scrape down the high spots on A. Repeat with C on B.

A and C are now flatter as referenced to B. Ink C and use it to find high spots on A and B. Scrape the high spots. A and B are now flatter as referenced to C. Repeat for switching your inking surface each time. You can get a flat surface within the limits of your ink and the material you are using in short order.

It took me a couple of weeks to accomplish this with rough aluminum castings. Mostly because I was only working a couple of hours per week on it.

Once you have your flat surfaces, they become your reference. You can now make one face of each of your right angles flat. This doesn’t take much time because it is relatively easy because you are only scrapping one surface at a time.

Now that you have those three faces flat, you can use the same method of A, B, and C with the vertical surfaces. If A is your reference surface, and it is out 0.100 over 4 inches, and you use it against B and C. Both B and C will be scraped towards a 0.100 IN over 4 inches.

If you continued like this, you would end up with angle blocks that are not square.

But, when you rotate through a different master each time, the angles will move towards vertical.

A is out 0.100, this causes B and C to be IN by a little. Not the full 0.100. We now test A against B and A will be cut IN a little, making it more correct. B and C will hit lower than the top and will modify there.

Each round, the surfaces get better and better.

Can I make nitric acid? I have the instructions someplace. Again, knowledge, not skill.

I don’t know morse well enough. I have knowledge but not skill. I have references for semaphore. Knowledge, not skill. I have real-world cypher experience. I haven’t built a radio in 50 years, but again, I have the references.

So the brief answer is keep learning. Have fun learning. And make sure you translate that knowledge into skills.

There is a shed on my property that my children and I built. I built it as if I were building a house, but in small. I built it to translate knowledge into skills. And we learned. Boy did we learn.

I grew up a prepper. Most of the people I knew were preppers. The difference was that it was normal.

My parents were born at the tail of the great depression. They lived through WWII as children and suffered the rationing that took place in the US.

My grandparents planted and tended a garden every summer. It was just the norm.

We once lived a good 2 hours from any supermarket. There was a local grocery, but everything there was pricey. It was the sort of place you went if you ran out of eggs.

Once a month, my mother would drive onto base in DC and shop at the commissary. She would have three or four carts of food. She purchased a month’s worth of milk. When we got home, everything was put away in freezers. We had “fresh” milk for about 3 days per month, thereafter, it was from frozen.

When we could, mom had a garden. She was never happier than when she had an entire acre of garden.

People think about “getting started” with prepping.

I believe this is the wrong mindset. The correct mindset is to start thinking about what knowledge and skills do you need?

Skills and knowledge are entirely different things. You might know how to wire an electrical outlet, but do you have you done it? Do you know how to use the tools? Do you have the right tools? Can you do it without harming yourself or others?

Because of my parents, I started with a “being prepared” mindset. There was always enough food in the pantry, freezer, and refrigerator. It was just the way I grew up.

I remember the first major snowstorm in Maryland after my daughter was born. Wife number one wasn’t satisfied with what we had in the refrigerator. Our child would starve if I didn’t get some milk, right now.

I put on my calf high moccasins, my wide brimmed hat, my winter coat and walked to the 7/11 to get milk.

On the way there, I pushed a female cop’s car out of the snow bank three times.

My wife was in a panic. I was not. I had powdered milk, a supply of gravity feed fresh water, and a camp stove. There was nothing to worry about.

I was wrong. I had knowledge, but not enough skills.

I’ve spent the last forty years learning more skills. What skills I didn’t learn for myself, I found people I love and trust to have those skills.

When I lived in Maryland, it felt like there was a strong chance of a war engulfing the East Coast. Not American vs. American, but of actual foreign soldiers on our soil. I had the money, I spent that money on firearms for battle. I wasn’t thinking of hunting. I wasn’t thinking of food and shelter.

I was ignorant. But it was a step in the correct direction.

Today I have more skills, I have a better idea of what I don’t know. I still don’t know what I don’t know, but I can see that I have gaps.

One of the people making comments suggested that I have a flintlock style firearm. Amazingly enough, that is coming to my home shortly.

The Fort At #4 represents the time around of the French and Indian war. I am working with some reenactors to find a smoothbore that is period correct and a rifle. I want a Kentucky long rifle. I’ve loved the look of that rifle since watching Daniel Boone on TV.

I not only know how to make black powder, I’ve done it. I have extensive notes on how I did it. I have the tools to manufacture it, about 2 pounds at a time.

We are practicing making salt-peter but haven’t succeeded yet. I’ve made proper charcoal. And I have some sulfur. KNO3 is also around here.

I want to make my own primers, but it is not worth the risk.

I’ve made my own slow fuse and my own fast fuse. I’ve made fireworks. All cools stuff.

If I’m talking to somebody knew to prepping, I always start with the rule of threes.

1. You can live 3 minutes without air
2. You can live 3 hours without shelter
3. You can live 3 days without water
4. You can live 3 weeks without food
5. You can live 3 months without hope

Without air is first-aid, hygiene, medical. If you are bleeding out, you aren’t going to make it the 3 hours to die without shelter. If you aren’t breathing, nothing else will matter in a few minutes.

Without shelter includes fire making, proper clothing, proper shelter from the elements, and the skills to build a home.

While 3 hours sounds extreme, consider falling into a freezing river in winter. How long will you survive? How long will you survive in the desert without proper protection from the sun?

For whatever reason, most people put food before water. Water is life.

Back in the ’80s, the army was looking at the best way to hydrate their soldiers. One method was to only allow the men to drink at rest stops, and only as much as they wanted. Another was to make them drink a certain amount at rest stops. Another was drinking on the move and making sure they drank “enough”.

The test was simple, take a group of soldiers, make them hike a distance, then test them in a combat situation.

Method one had the men combat ineffective at the end of the march. They were combat ineffective for a couple of days after.

Method two had the men combat effective after a few hours of rest at the end of the march. They were combat ineffective for the next few days.

The third method? The troops arrived and immediately went into combat, they were effective. They were able to repeat the test the next day without issue.

There is a reason that the military has hydration rules that push water into the men. There is a reason that hydration packs are worn by sailors.

Three weeks without food is pushing it. People become less capable after only a few days without food.

Our family added, “Three months without hope.” Hope is having some form of joy with you. Pictures of loved ones. A deck of cards. Anything to help take your mind off what you are going through.

One of the biggest takeaways I can give you, if you are starting to prep, “Don’t plan on survival, plan on living. Life was strong before our modern society, and life was good.”

I close with a definition of a zombie. A zombie is that city dweller, from a deep blue city, that hasn’t eaten in a week, is drinking unfiltered water wherever they find it, and they are stripping the countryside clean of all food and goods.

We saw zombies burning down cities because a criminal died of heart disease while in police custody. When you think of zombies, think of those drones, living in a city with less than 24 hours of food.

There are five rifles on the wall. Four lever action and “Mrs. Pink”, an AR-15 platform with pink furniture. Don’t ask.

They are known as “Bear”, “Deer”, “Raccoon”, “Squirrel”, and “Mrs. Pink.”

Bear is a Henry Big Boy in 45-70. Deer is a Winchester model 94 in 30-30. Squirrel is a Henry Golden Boy in .22LR.

We do have bear around here, and I know that Bear has enough stopping power, with rapid follow-ups.

Deer has taken a couple of deer. She does a fine job with iron sights for me out to around 150 yards.

Squirrel isn’t used for squirrel hunting, but damn he’s fun to shoot.

That leave’s Raccoon. Raccoon is a Rossi R-95 in .357 Magnum. She eats .38 special just fine. She is a little loose where the stock attaches to the receiver, but she will put rounds on target out to 100 yards with no problem.

The lever action in .357 is a nice, mid-weight, rifle. I’ve used it for taken fat raccoon and opossums. One shot and they are down.

She is easy to reload for, and it is easy to police up all the brass. I cast hollow point bullets for her and have some commercial bullets for her as well.

All in all, she is a great rifle.

There is a matching wheel gun in .357 magnum. I don’t have enough time with that revolver. It is more than capable of putting rounds on target, I’m not. It doesn’t shoot like my Sig nor my 1911s.

Would I recommend an R-95 for a first-time gun buyer? No.

They don’t have a great reputation. The loading gate is nasty sharp, it needs a little care to get it to function easily. I found that finding ammo for it was a bit of a pain. With reloading, it is a joy.

Mrs. Pink as a red dot on her. She belongs to my wife. We run the manual of arms every so often, but I figure she has 30 rounds before she needs an assist to load the next magazine. But I know that those 30 rounds are going exactly where she wants them to go.

The iron sights on the four lever guns work fine for me today. I have another 30-30 that has a scope mounted on it. I need to spend a few dollars to replace the scope with something modern and then sight everything in.

All in all, those rifles make up the “go to” when needed now.

The other part of this are the LBV that are available for use. Each vest has 6 30 round mags of 5.56, at least 2 spare mags for the pistol that goes with the LBV, and a first aid kit.

Past Plans

When I was considering buying my first firearms, I was looking at “what happens if…” My thought process was based on the concept of availability of ammo after the fall.

That lead me to an AR-15 in 5.56, an AK type rifle in 7.62×39, a 9mm Glock, a bolt action in 7.62×51, a black powder revolver, and a black powder rifle.

The firearm I have the most fun with, to this day, are the AR’s. They are gentle on the shoulder, the ammo isn’t too expensive, they are easy to carry and are just plain fun.

Though I will note that they eat ammo rapidly. It isn’t an unusual range day when I won’t send 300+ rounds down range.

I still have .308 from the original ammo buy. I’ve augmented it with reloads, but I don’t feed much through that rifle.

Of course, once I started buying firearms, it hasn’t really stopped.

Regardless, as more than one person has said, when the SHTF, the best firearm is the one you have.

See those seedlings hardening off in the header image? Those are from a garden I was growing about a decade ago. They’re strong, healthy seedlings. They’re ready to be set into the ground to thrive and grow and make veggies for us.

And then there’s this specimen:

See how it’s falling over, and it only has a single set of leaves? Those aren’t even leaves, by the by. Those are called cotyledons, or “seed leaves.” They’re just there to get the plant going. By the time a seedling is as tall as this one is, it should have several sets of leaves. So why is this poor thing falling over and not growing better and stronger?

The first thing it’s lacking is probably light. Most of the time, when we’re starting seedlings indoors, we’re short on light. There are plenty of ways to fix that, of course. You can put them on a rack with a light right above them, and put a timer on it to give them 12 hours a day. That will fix the light problem, even if they’re cheap light strips. What if you don’t have a rack with light strips, though? Well, you can make do by giving your plants as much light as you can. I have a “daylight lamp” that I use in the winter to help with depression. This time of year, I no longer need it, so I give it to my plants. I move it around, so they all share in the glory of it. Any lamp put close enough to the seedlings will help.

Your seedlings also may be too cold, or alternatively, too warm. Most seeds like to germinate between 65 and 80° F, so if your home goes below that at night (or, like mine, never gets that high even in the daytime), you  may need to pick up a seed mat. The mats aren’t that expensive, and you just place your seed trays right on top of them. They keep the temperature warm but not hot, and convince your seedlings that it’s time to grow.

A third option is that you are not watering your plants enough, or that you’re over-watering them. You can tell if your plants have enough water by feeling the soil they’re in. If it’s dry and flaky, you need to water them, stat! If it’s saturated and dripping, it’s probably too wet. You need moist soil that clumps when you take a handful of it, but that isn’t dripping and sopping wet. It’s my strong opinion that the best way to water seedlings is from below. The containers your seedlings are in should have several small holes in the bottom (and if there aren’t, add some), or be made out of porous material like paper egg cartons. The containers should be sitting in a waterproof container, either one designed for the purpose or whatever you have on hand. Pour the water into the bottom of the tray, and let the soil suck it up from below. This encourages strong roots, which is important for your plant. If there’s a tiny bit of water in the tray, you’re fine. If it’s an inch deep, you need to drain it out. I also keep a mist sprayer on hand full of water, and each day I will spritz my seedlings. This helps prepare them for the rigors of a rainfall when they get outside.

The last option for helping seedlings develop strong stems and avoid them being leggy, is to blow a fan over them. This should be a VERY gentle fan, aimed above but not directly onto the seedlings. This simulates the breeze outside, which is part of what causes a plant to create thick stems and rigorous root systems. The fan, sweeping back and forth, will make your plants signal themselves to create more roots and stronger stems. Another method is to (GENTLY) brush over your seedlings with your hands each morning and evening. This need take only a couple of seconds, and should be done very carefully.  You don’t want to break or damage the plants.

If you get to the point where you need to thin out seedlings (an unfortunate thing but necessary), don’t pull them up. Pulling plants disturbs the soil and surrounding plants, possibly causing more than intended to die. Instead, cut them off at the soil line. The plant will die off and feed the soil, and you can feed the thinned plants to your chickens or bunnies (so long as they aren’t poisonous).

In computer languages, there are very few that are structurally different.

FORTRAN is like COBOL, which is like Pascal, which is like BASIC, which is like ADA, which is like …

Forth is not like those above. Nor is APL or Lisp.

Assembly languages can be used in structured ways, just like FORTRAN, COBOL, Pascal, and many others. It requires the discipline to use if not condition jump skip_label; do stuff in condition; skip_label:. The actual programming logic stays the same.

The two computer languages I dislike the most are PHP and Python. Both because they are weakly typed.

In a strongly typed language, you declare a variable’s type before you use it. The type of the variable is immutable for its lifetime.

In other words, if you declare a variable of being of type integer and then attempt to assign a string to it, it will barf on you during compilation.

In PHP, all variables look the same, any variable can hold any type at any moment. The type can change from line to line. And the language will do implicit type casting. It is hateful.

Python has all the same characteristics I hate in PHP, with the added hateful feature of using indentation instead of begin-and markers for blocks.

I’m lucky that Python has an optional typing capability, which I use consistently. The optional part is a pain when I want to use a module that has no typing information. When that happens, I need to create my own typing stub.

But the worse part of all of this is that they get jumbled together in my head. How many entries in an array? In PHP, that is determined by the count() function, in Python it is the len() function.

In Python, the dot (.) is used to access methods and attributes of objects. In PHP, it is the concatenation symbol.

I am tired of writing Python in my PHP files and I dread switching back to Python because I know my fingers will mess things up.

Sometimes known as American Chop Suey (no idea why), this dish has been served in American homes since the mid 1800s. It’s usually a macaroni based ground beef dish. This week, I made Orecchiette pasta with Chris last night, and we enjoyed it in my American Goulash. This is my own recipe, and I recommend it highly!

Ingredients:

• 16 oz elbow macaroni or fresh pasta
• olive oil as needed for cooking
• 1 large onion, diced
• 2 cloves garlic, minced
• 1 lb ground beef
• 1 medium carrot, finely diced
• 1 stalk celery, finely diced
• dash of red wine
• 2 tbsp all purpose flour
• 28 oz (2 cans) diced tomatoes, any flavor
• 1/4 to 1/2 cup tomato juice or V8
• 1 tsp brown sugar
• 1 tsp dried oregano
• 1 tsp dried basil
• 1 tbsp salt
• ½ tsp black pepper
• 1 tsp Worcestershire Sauce (optional)

Fill a large pot with water, add a dash of salt, and bring it to a boil. Cook the pasta according to package directions. If you’re using fresh, cook your pasta until it’s al dente, which can take anywhere from 3 to 7 minutes, depending on the thickness and overall size of your pasta. Drain the pasta, and set it aside.

In a heavy pot, add a bit of oil to the bottom and brown the ground beef. When the meat is thoroughly cooked and no pink remains, add the onions, carrots, and celery, and continue to cook until the onions soften and become translucent. Stir often, to make certain the mixture doesn’t stick to the bottom of the pot. If necessary, add a bit of olive oil or butter to the pot. Add in the garlic and cook for one more minute.

Drizzle in some of the red wine and deglaze the bottom of the pot. Make sure nothing is sticking to the bottom, and add more wine as necessary, but not enough to make it very wet. Sprinkle a tablespoon or two of flour over the ground beef mixture, and stir gently to incorporate it. The result should be a slightly sticky, somewhat gummy mass in the bottom of your pot.

Add in the tomatoes, sugar, Worcestershire sauce, and spices, and cook until it begins to thicken. Add in as much tomato juice or V8 as necessary to make the consistency similar to a thin gravy. Simmer for 2 minutes or so, until all the food is evenly heated. Pour in the cooked pasta, mix it in well, and add salt and pepper to taste. Let this simmer on a very low heat (or in your oven at 250°F) for about 15 to 20 minutes, checking often to be sure it isn’t sticking. If it’s too thick or dry, you can add a bit more tomato juice.

Serve this up with a bit of crusty bread or a side salad for a delicious and hearty meal.

You can take that title however you like. When I first wrote it, I was thinking of the four legged kind of beastie that sneaks in and eats your broccoli while you’re sleeping. However, if we’re talking prepping, there’s a legitimate chance that the critter in your garden is two legged and armed. So let’s unpack that!

Regular Critters

The most common form of problem in your garden is likely to be pests. These include, but are not limited to, ants, roaches, moths, hornworms, tent caterpillars, aphids, and bunches of other multi-legged beasties, as well as mice, voles, moles, possums, raccoons, deer, porcupines, and other wild and domestic animals. A cat that digs up your kitchen garden in order to use it as an outdoor toilet is just as destructive as the raccoon that takes out whole plants.

Poison is one method of getting rid of pests. It’s not a method I recommend, only because I know that poison can be transferred from its intended victim (the mouse or raccoon) to unintended victims such as owls (who keep the pests down naturally and should be cared for and preserved) and local cats and dogs (who sometimes do eat pests outdoors). There’s also a possibility that vegetables covered in poison might be transferred to deer that we harvest later for our own eating pleasure, and that would be a Very Bad Thing, indeed. When it comes to mice in winter, I occasionally lift this personal ban, only because I dislike mouse poop in my kitchen more than I dislike the thought of accidentally killing an owl.

Traps are another method, and while they do work, they’re a LOT of work. You can dead-trap or live-trap, but regardless, you have to deal with what’s in the trap on a daily basis. Depending on what you’ve caught, it can be problematic. Consider the person who accidentally captures a skunk in a “have a heart” trap, and then has to figure out what to do with the stinky critter. When it comes to live traps, again, I really don’t recommend it. When you unload your traps, your victims have the ability to just wander home and do more destruction.

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