Does a homestead have to be in the country?

By Michael Smith (Veshengro)

Everywhere, almost, where we look when the word homestead and homesteading is mentioned it is done so in the same breath with country and countryside.

Now does this mean that you can only homestead in the boonies, on some property in the sticks? Can you only live the “good life” in the country?

To all intents and purposes a homestead can be anywhere, really. It depends on how one defines “homesteading” and “homestead” and the good life can be lived in suburbia as much as in the boonies, only it is on different scales.

Depending on where you live, which country and state, you may owner-build your home and thus can create a homestead even in the suburbs and even in town. As said, it is all a question of scale and perception.

It obviously depends on the local ordinances and rules as to what you can do and those you need to consider before acquiring a flock of hens for the backyard for instance or digging up the front garden to grown food.

Some local ordinances, we all know, are stupid in the extreme, such as where it is a felony to do rainwater harvesting for use in the garden and elsewhere. How come that someone, apparently, owns the rights to the water coming from your roof? The problem is, however, that if you break such laws you can be called to account for it. Therefore do check first as to what you can and cannot do.

In Britain, even though central government decreed, basically, that it is supposed to, now, be a right to be able to install PV panels or small wind turbines, the local authorities still insist that you go through the planning process and more often than not will refuse permission, despite of the fact they should grant it.

There are ways that you can “homestead” anywhere and much of it is a case of what you perceive as homesteading and homestead, as I have said already. A home with some garden space for growing food can be a urban or suburban homestead, no problem. And if your backyard (and front lawn) is not enough for your food growing requirements see whether you can get an allotment plot.

Anyone can can, and the double can is intended. Home canning, in jars; making preserves and jams; drying herbs and fungi; etc. is all homesteading, wherever this may happen.

Reducing your food miles, and otherwise your impact in the Planet too is homesteading.

When you put your mind to reusing and repurposing and even upcycling items of waste into usable and even saleable things then you are also homesteading, at least as far as I, and many others, are concerned.

When you go wild food foraging in countryside and urban parks then you are also homesteading, as far as I am concerned.

Homesteading is not just for the countryside and the boonies; homesteading is possible (almost) anywhere and everywhere.

© 2011

Post Title

→

Does a homestead have to be in the country?

Post URL

→

https://national-grid-news.blogspot.com/2011/04/does-homestead-have-to-be-in-country.html

Visit National-grid-news for Daily Updated Wedding Dresses Collection

Fertilizer from banana peels

by Michael Smith (Veshengro)

If you eat lots of bananas, like I do, at least at times, you end up with lots of banana peels. Instead of throwing them out or even composting all of them you can turn them into a potassium- and phosphorus-rich fertilizer.

While it is indeed true that, if you compost them, those minerals will find their way into the compost and subsequently to your plants by making this banana fertilizer you can apply the nutrients to the plants directly.

All they then need are matured chicken pellets for nitrogen. No, matured chicken pellets don't come from old chickens, but it is chicken pellets that have rested for at least a year.

Making banana peel fertilizer:

Place a tray in the oven and lay banana peels on it. Place the banana peels on the tray with the outer skin facing down so that they don't stick to the tray.

Leave the tray with the banana peels in the oven when you cook other food. That way you save energy by piggy-backing on your normal oven usage. Don't turn the oven on just to roast the banana peels. Just leave the tray in the oven until you're cooking something else.

Once the banana peels have cooled break them up and store them in an airtight container.

To use the baked banana peels as a fertilizer spread the mulch around houseplants and garden plants. The cooked peels will fertilize the plants as they break down, gently releasing the potassium and phosphorus.

You will need – and this is all rather more than obvious:

Banana peels (add them to the tray as the bananas are eaten)

Tray for the oven & before anyone wonders, yes, you also need an oven.

While, as I have said, it would be possible, and to a degree easier, just adding the banana peels to your compost heap, this way you can create a potassium and phosphorus fertilizer that you can use in addition to your compost.

© 2011

Post Title

→

Fertilizer from banana peels

Post URL

→

https://national-grid-news.blogspot.com/2011/04/fertilizer-from-banana-peels.html

Visit National-grid-news for Daily Updated Wedding Dresses Collection

How to use a gun in defense

by Michael Smith (Veshengro)

There are a few important points to remember as to using a gun – or anything else for that matter – for personal defense.

First of all you must be prepared to use it. And this is the most important point.

If you do not have the power to pull it off and are not prepared to pull the trigger to, if necessary, kill you opponent then you will be the victim and someone will use the gun against you. And this is also true for another weapon you may be using in defense, though we are talking here specifically about a gun.

I have dealt with rookie military cops that did not have the power even to pull the trigger “in anger” (without ammo in the gun) and I was able to disarm them without hearing the clicks of the safety and the hammer. Anyone like that will be, as said, a victim in any confrontation, regardless whether he or she has all the firepower in the world at his or her disposal.

Without the will to use such deadly force even the possession of a battle tank would not swing the situation in that person's favor.

Aside from the skills to shoot straight and to know how to properly handle the gun you have to have the determination to use it against your opponent. If you don't have that mental strength then do not, under any circumstances, pull the gun.

While it is true that in many cases the pure presence of the gun having been drawn may stop what is happening, in most cases the opponent will have to see your iron resolve that you are prepared to use, as it is termed, “deadly force” in that you are prepared to pull that trigger.

If you are not prepared to pull the trigger it is a little like bringing a knife to a gun fight... it will be rather dangerous. If you are not prepared to use the weapon that you carry – and draw – for personal defense but hope that just flaunting it will change things, the very same weapon could and, probably, will be used against you. So, use it!

© 2011

Post Title

→

How to use a gun in defense

Post URL

→

https://national-grid-news.blogspot.com/2011/02/how-to-use-gun-in-defense.html

Visit National-grid-news for Daily Updated Wedding Dresses Collection

Utah legislators propose M1911 as official state gun

by Michael Smith (Veshengro)

Salt Lake City, UT, USA: Lawmakers of the State of Utah are debating whether to designate a semiautomatic pistol as the official gun of Utah, despite protests from people who believe it's inappropriate because of recent mass shootings.

The bill to make the Browning M1911 the official gun breezed through a committee hearing recently and is scheduled to be debated by the full House soon after.

Republican Rep. Carl Wimmer said the state should have the gun as one of its state symbols to honor John Browning, a Utah native who invented it in 1911. He defended the idea by saying that Browing invented a firearm that has defended American values and the traditions of this country for 100 years. Who could argue with that?

Utah has 24 state symbols recognizing the history, geography and culture of the state. They include a state cooking pot, a state tree, a state hymn and a state folk dance and the committee approved the bill to add a state gun on a 9-2 vote.

Wimmer said the Browning M1911 is widely used by the military, police officers and private citizens, which is why he chose the pistol instead of another Browning gun. And it was the standard sidearm of the United States Army in both World Wars and still in the Vietnam era.

I personally carried a 1911 in preference even when the Beretta had become the official issue sidearm and I would give the 1911 preference always. While it may not have the ammunition capacity of the Beretta and others, as in magazine capacity, the .45 ACP is superior in all things to the 9mm Parabellum.

Gun Violence Prevention Center board member Steve Gunn told the media that honoring the M1911 is wrong because the people who opened fire in most recent U.S. mass shootings used semiautomatic pistols. That includes the shooting of January 8, 2011, in Arizona where six people were killed and 13 – including Rep. Gabrielle Giffords – were wounded, though with a Glock pistol.

The likes of Steve Gunn have no idea, it would appear, as to what they are talking about. It is not guns that kill but the person pulling the trigger. If it is not a gun then those people will use a knife, a hammer, or a brick or iron bar. Though I can see the likes of him trying to ban all those things too.

“There is nothing about the actions of a madman,” said Rep. Wimmer, “to change the fact that firearms have been used throughout our history to defend American values and traditions.”

One might also add that had others in the crowd in Tuscon that day been armed with a pistol and been prepared to use it then maybe, just maybe, the perpetrator would not have killed other innocent people but would have been one of the only casualties himself.

While some legislators oppose the idea of honoring Browning via his firearm by designating the 1911 as Utah's state gun others see things rather differently.

Republican Rep. Stephen Sandstrom told the committee that recognizing the M1911 is an appropriate honor for Browning. Instead of the gun being blamed for killing people, it should be credited for saving lives on the battlefield, Sandstrom said.

“Tragic events happen because of bad people in this world. But handguns, and firearms in general, do not kill people,” Sandstrom said. “We need to stop demonizing firearms.”

In the same line as what Rep. Sandstrom says I say again that guns do not kill people, it is people that kill people and if they don't have access to guns they will use something else. Stone age man used rocks and in many cases today a rock still is the murder weapon. Therefore I propose that we ban all rocks.

The bill to designate a state firearm is H.B. 219.

© 2011

Post Title

→

Utah legislators propose M1911 as official state gun

Post URL

→

https://national-grid-news.blogspot.com/2011/02/utah-legislators-propose-m1911-as.html

Visit National-grid-news for Daily Updated Wedding Dresses Collection