Salvaging the Situation


Keeping his ultimate goal in mind, the Servant of Gomi Sama navigates the waste stream with aplomb.

He surveys the flotsam and without prejudice, salvages that which he recognizes as valuable.

He imagines a thousand new uses for these discarded things.



Ganbatte!




Sunday, February 20, 2011

Who Will Profit From Reading This Blog?



First of all. This is NOT a debate forum; at least not about peak oil, financial collapse or any of that. 

Most of my contributions are anecdotal and represent my own opinion, if you are bothered by this, or need empirical data, endnotes or bibliographies supporting every assertion, you will not find my blog to your liking. Similarly, if you believe all is well with the world and that the economic, financial and ecological meltdown we are currently experiencing is just a hiccup on an otherwise smooth trajectory of endless expansion; if you are a person of means; have inherited a fully stocked nuclear survival bunker; are of the Amish-Mennonite-Hutterite faith or otherwise living in a mostly self-sufficient and tight-knit community; or believe that some sort of technological or theological solution to our fossil fuel impasse will save the day. Then this blog has nothing to offer you and it would be a complete waste of time for you to read it.

Having done you a service; I would ask should you belong to such a category, to refrain from disparaging others who might wish to participate in an open forum or thread.

The idea is to not waste time proselytizing or arguing but to focus on small, individual solutions to real problems dealing with collapsing infrastructure and self-sufficiency. With the added twist of achieving these solutions using recycled, scavenged and jury-rigged materials wherever possible. Here debate is crucial of course; as long as it is focused on addressing the subject at hand constructively and with civility. All the while remembering that, especially where scavenged materials are involved, there is never one solution that will apply to every possible scenario; but that the active exchange of ideas stimulates lateral thinking and "outside the box" solutions.

This is a creative effort, originating in complex, work-related humour devolving into performance art of sorts. Mostly it’s just a framework that allows departure from the status quo. Please bear with me. I promise it will be entertaining if naught else. The art, photos, and all text material are my own except where otherwise stated. I understand that the background image renders difficult the reading of some portions of text. However foolishly, I felt that achieving the correct mood justified a slight effort on the reader’s part. Some judicious scrolling may be necessary but I assure you the text can be read in its entirety.

The links on this page are those I consult on a regular basis.

Your Humble Servant
Frank Chapeau

P.S.: Watch Scrapheap Challenge/Junkyard Wars. I regularly see them addressing the kinds of issues we will soon be facing. Mindset is crucial to survival and contestants on these shows demonstrate the mindset required for the approach we will be discussing.