[Arktwo] This Week at Ark Two

[Bruce Beach]

First off -
someone sent us some squash seeds -
from Baker Creek -
and we have been unable to identify
who sent them -
so that we can thank you.
Please hold up your hand !

Another follower of Ron Weinland

 http://www.the-end.com/2008GodsFinalWitness/

contacted  us early this week
and told me that Weinland is saying
the US gets nuked on June 15th.
I do declare -
these people do press the line -
before they start worrying about
building a shelter.

Anyway -
June 15th is okay with me.
That really fits into my paradigm
just as well as July 28th.
Weinland says that if it doesn't happen
on the 15th -
then he will declare himself a false prophet.

I don't have that problem -
because I am not a prophet -
false or otherwise.
I don't get revelations, visions, or whatever -
and I don't KNOW that it is going to happen
on July 28th.
I have picked that date
through an altogether different process.
Still -
that is my date -
and I am sticking with it.

If I have to revise later -
I will do so -
without declaring myself a false prophet :)

One very insightful reader
was asking me if I picked July 28th
because it was three and a half years
before 2012.
Interesting.
But - nope.

Also -
similar but different input -
from another reader
in a still different religion.

I just never know how prophecies work out -
until afterwards.
Great training as an economist.
I can never tell you what is going to happen -
but I can always explain afterwards.

---------

Because I consider it so important
I am going to once again tell you
about what I consider to be
the book of the year:

Reinventing Collapse:
The Soviet Example and American Prospects
by Dmitry Orlov

and there is an in-depth presentation
about the book -
with slides at:
  http://www.energybulletin.net/23259.html

One of my readers writes:

If you have not gotten your copy of the Orlov book.  I just went online to
Alibris.com and they have 10 copies available for around $12.  They ship
very quickly.

Here is someone else writing about
how you can tell
when your empire is collapsing.

	http://tinyurl.com/6z8wv5

-----------

I guess the thing for me to do
is to also keep telling everyone
about the Food Storage Calculator
and Jean's Secret of Life
until the requests stop coming in.

We have now sent out dozens of both of them.

Just before sending out this issue
of the Ark Two Newsletter
I have sent out all requests in hand -
so if you have not received your's -
then your request has fallen through the cracks -
and you should request again.

You can see about Jean's offered info at:

	www.webpal.org/SOL/

if you want it send an email to -

	Jean@www.webpal.org

with the subject line as:

	SOL

For the for food storage calculator
you have to have the EXCEL program
to use it.

If you want the calculator send an email to:

	DawnSayer@webpal.org

with the subject line as:

	Food Calculator

I now have the send out system for these
pretty well automated -
and only have to find a couple of hours each time -
to sit down and send out the whole batch.

-----------
Working on our worm farm.

Turns out that -
worms don't fly.
The levels must NOT be set down
on their bumpers.
On the model we use -
we run a finger around the outside edge-
to make sure it passes under the bumpers.
The higher level must sit DIRECTLY
into the material of the lower level.

We gathered up some dirt from the field -
where we had put in the truckloads of leaves last year -
and then had planted fall rye.
A mistake.
Planting the rye was not a mistake.
Rye is great -
puts nitrogen back into the soil -
and has a special property
of killing some bad stuff in the soil.
Unfortunately -
it also appears to kill worms.

We got it back out -
and rescued our worms -
but they sure don't like rye roots.
The may not even like the soil
that Rye has grown in -
we don't know.

We live and learn by experience -
and sometimes our worms die
by our experience :(

---------

June 23rd,
is Printer's birthday.
We can remember that easily -
because it is also Jean's birthday.

Printer was Jean's first puppy
for autistic children.
Here is a story that appeared
in the Globe and Mail last week
about the puppy.

http://tinyurl.com/3wyyeh

A couple of weeks ago -
we took Jema down to Oakville
to the kennel for dogs for the blind -
and she was bred.
We will now be keeping her until the end of June
when she goes back to Cambridge.
That is only about three more weeks.

Jema had ten puppies last time -
and a couple of days ago
I was told they are all still doing well -
in the advanced training program.

---------
We don't actually have to have Jema back
to the kennel -
until the first of July -
but we learned this week
that we won't have a car
past the end of the month.

The car licence plate comes up for renewal
on Jean's birthday -
but we know that it won't pass
the e-test.

Wasn't a problem
because it used to be a rule
that 20 year old vehicles
were considered antiques
and didn't have to pass the test.

We learned on Thursday  -
this year they are changing the rule
and vehicles younger than 1988
will always have to be tested,
and our Toyota is a 1989.
So - no more car.

But-
fortunately -
our pick-up truck is a 1984
so we will be able to use that.

I have a big water tank
on the back of the pick-up truck -
that we put five spigots on
to take water down to the people in the village
if they can't get water
because of not having power to run their pumps.

We are hoping to take the tank off the truck
next week
and set it up in the field
to drip irrigate the Three Sisters.
Drip irrigation is considered the biggest advance
in irrigation -
in decades.

The Three Sisters are
corn, climbing beans and squash.
We will rototill circles
four or five feet across
and put a stalk or two of corn in the middle.
Once the corn is up -
we will plant the beans to climb the stalk.
Then the squash is planted -
to surround the stalks and keep away varmints.

------

Jean's sister got a new rototiller
and gave us her old one this week.
Dennis was able to put a new diaphraghm
into the carburetor and get it going.

Bonnar, my son,
got our old rototiller going -
that I had loaned to my son-in-law.
I was able to pick up at the dump
some parts that he needed.

Dennis may be bringing still another old roto-tiller
back from the city.
Someone had stolen the motor off it -
but he was able to find another motor -
so we may end up with three rototillers.

The 'A' field really needs working by a tractor -
but we will be glad
that we can do it with the rototillers.

Day before yesterday,
we took a trailer load
of sawdust and ashes
out to the compost pile is the Bee field.
The heap is ten truck loads of leaves
(that a nearby town gave us)
plus a trailer of chicken droppings
and hay -
from someone else -
plus a load of horse manure and hay.

Nephew Mark came and turned
one part of the pile
with a front-end loader
and yesterday and today -
I brought down sixteen bucketfuls
for Jean's garden at the house.

The town also gave us 32 truckloads of leaves
that they spread over our 'A' field
and where we planted winter rye last fall.
This is what we are rototilling in
for the Three Sisters planting.

----------

Friend going to AILA in Germany -
has offered to pay for the social events
for Jean and myself -
so that we will be his guest.

Dr. B from Texas is now scheduled for having
a pacemaker put in this summer -
so he won't be able to go afterall -
but he is arranging for a professor friend in Germany
to present his paper.

It may be that another friend of his
from Australia
will also join us -
and with my friend from the Isle of Man
and Prof. B from Japan -
we will still have good representation
on our Symposium.

It is thanks to DY -
who is providing the air fare
and to AA who paid for the registration - and accomodation
that Jean and I get there at all.

Not that I expect any of it to happen
at the time presently scheduled -
because the way events have been this last few days
I think that my July 28th day is looking more and more.

BUT -
also in my paradigm -
it is important to have made these arrangements
with China -
for Germany -
and so forth at this time -
so that the successors can be easily implemented.

Same with seeds.
Saving them for planting next year,
so we continue to welcome any gifts of seeds.

What would be really great -
is if someone had an older family teenager or young adult
who would be willing to come and help
for the next few weeks.

Jean complains constantly
about how tired she is -
and being over eighty -
that is understandable.

Still -
there is always so much to do -
for Ark Two
in preparation for recovery afterwards -
and we greatly feel the urgency -
where most everyone else does not -
that we get up very early -
and work until very late.

We are very blessed in the help
that we get.
I look back during just this week
and think of the things that
Dennis,
Brian,
Bahi'a,
Bonnar,
Mark,
John,
Velda,
Jim,
Terry,
Barbara,
Diane,
Antony,
have all done to help.

Others help in other weeks -
so that we are indeed very fortunate.
Last month KS and BT paid the balance
of the month's mortgage -
and while we are still two months behind -
we are still here.
PJ and JS have bailed us out before.

Every month -
every day -
every minute
is a miracle.

And we live in a miraculous location
with our beautiful streams and gardens.
The weather is beautiful -
gentle rain at this moment -
watering all the planting that Jean did today.

Dennis and Brian due back tomorrow –
and grandson to come help with mowing
on the weekend.
Mark to try to get big loader
to turn the rest of the compost piles -
in the near future.

We are so grateful for the many friends that we have.
We just wish that more of them could be here
during what we expect to be the coming events.

Our greatest blessing of course -
is feeling the presence of the Lord.
Last night when the electric power failed
for a couple of hours
we were lying there in the peace and quiet
listening to the stream outside the window.
It is heaven on earth.

Peace and love,
Bruce and Jean
DawnSayer@webpal.org