Obama: Don't go out and buy guns

Since people have been purchasing guns in droves since Obama's been pres-elect, he has told people it's ridiculous to keep buying them. I personally don't trust him and will use credit cards if I have to before inauguration to buy a couple more.

See article http://www.suntimes.com/news/politics/obama/1318968,obama-gun-sales-up-120808.article

My take:

People are stocking up on guns because they don't trust the federal government any longer. They are buying the guns for protection against the government, such as martial law or civil unrest. Obama has already spoke at length about 'flaws' the constitution has. I have no doubt he will attempt to disarm citizens. It was Jefferson who knew that citizens themselves were the only last resort in overthrowing a tyrranous government; and as our government becomes larger and more communistic, we will someday need these guns to defend ourselves.

The inauguration of presidents to 'uphold and protect the constitution' is an absolute joke. They all want to subvert it, modify it and ignore it. Just look at the patriot act.

I no longer trust my government as I once had some faith that our government was setup to protect us. I no longer believe this with the banksters running the show.

I hope you will educate yourself and make your own decisions regarding this. You will find our liberties are on the brink of being done away with.

We need to restore our republic with leaders who will actually support and defend the constitution. Otherwise our liberties are doomed.

Jefferson Republican Party

Those of you who feel like the GOP does not support your ideals in government, there is a new party who may make a difference: The Jefferson Republican Party. I am joining this party. If you are a conservative without a political home and are a conservative, maybe you should give them some support too! http://www.jeffersonrepublicanparty.com

It's getting tough

Well, this week has been tough for the country, heck even the world. Credit is drying up, markets are in a panic, small businesses are laying off employees in droves. I saw this personally with bank loans this week on a travel trailer I own.

I am not at all happy about the federal government getting involved in this crisis, but the country and small businesses are in a complete panic. A local company auto dealer laid off nearly 40 employees this week. Sales are at an all time low - from about 150 cars per week being moved to 20 per month.

I am fortunate enough to not have car payments, but everything I have is at least 12 years old.
88 honda civic
91 honda civic
96 chevy suburban

All paid for. I can't image a car payment on top of my mortgage and property payments.

I do think that this regulation is leading us towards socialism. Whats amazing is that many Americans know how to solve this problem without more tax payer money. It's simple conservative economics.

- The USA needs to go into complete isolationism
- Get out of NATO and foreign entaglements
- Stop supporting foreign dictators who hate us
- Become completely energy independent through wind, nuclear and oil drilling.
- destroy the welfare state and limit welfare to 12-18 months one time
- start using land to farm additional crops. The world is coming to a food shortage.
- Export goods instead of import
- Diversify the workforce and have Americans learn to farm again
- Drill, Drill, Drill and export what oil we don't use.
- Nuclear power and wind power to charge autos of the future - plug in hybrids
- Upgrade the energy grid to support this new infrastructure
- Broadband internet and technology connectivity everywhere to stimulate this diversified workforce, telecommuting
- Build a huge wall at the border, tazer anyone coming across the border illegally
- Get rid of regulation and zoning which deprives land owners from significant value and possible small business start-ups
- Reduce the capital gains tax from 0-5% to get businesses to bring their money back to the USA
- Reduce building regulations so land owners can build low cost houses on their own. It costs more to permit a mobile home than it costs to put a used one on a piece of property. It's extorsion and artificial inflation of the market to increase government's taxable property value.

Do this and watch this economy boom....

If only the politicians were not so entagled with their own special interest groups.. this could be implemented and America would once again lead the world in productivity, exports and wealth.

Update: 8/17

I am still waiting on the septic application to become a permit. I should have final information this week.

My Yuchai dozer is down. Transmission problems. The hoses china ships with these things are junk, fortunately there are only a couple 5/8" hoses that need replacing. Going to have to find the screen where the hose deteriortated clogged the shuttle clutch. Going to be a job. Might need to get the dozer home for repairs.

Regardless of the situation, I have saved thousands of dollars in land development by doing this stuff myself. Just the building pad, road grading, entrances, land clearing has taken so many hours. A contractor here would charge a minimum of $55-$65 per hour for this work.

Most people say that on unimproved land, you are looking at $75-$100k in costs for infrastructure. Here are some example costs:

$10k-20k for a well
$5k for septic
$25k for power; plus $100-$150 monthly expense
$15k-20k in grading, paving depending on site
$3-$5k fencing

My costs when not including construction equipment or repairs:

$8400 well
$3000 septic
$10000 5180 watt solar replaces PG&E and runs well
$5000 for misc on power (inverters, batteries)
$1000 solar mounts
$300 gravel for driveway
$100 in gates
$190 barn permit
$2300 barn
$100 in fencing material ( I had some old pre-existing fencing )
Landscaping costs will be incremental and will cost $50 a month or so as I add trees, etc.

So as you can see this is still expensive but nowhere near $75k. Plus, I have no monthly overhead bills associated with power. I will however hookup to PG&E when we build our main house in the future unless the $5k air conditioners (DC powered) that cool 720 sq feet each and are 30 SEER become $3k. Then these can run right of the batteries and bypass the inverter.

Well, I have a load into this property now. I will have more money before I am done, lots more. However, even in this depressed real estate market, once a home is build (2800 sq feet) with the setting (views of three mountain ranges) the house and property combined will be well worth over $580k.

Update on the property

It's been about 3 weeks since I posted. Here's the update:

The county is still waiting on my septic system due to the water table being right within the 5' range. We did not have enough rainfall this year to consider it a 'normal year', so I still wait making interest payments on the land. It's starting to get quite expensive. I am hopefully going to have a permit approved in the next few weeks.

Things done:
- Solar panels purchased (5180 watts) for off-grid
- PG&E is 900' away, probably will hook up someday when I want A/C in the house and we build our real house
- 12x36 barn on property - not assembled.
- Almost finalized my agricultural barn permit, just need some gravel on the driveway to get the public works portion finalized.

- We picked our final house plans when we build in a few years (Wife will have to work to get that done) - 2818 sq foot house

Lights out: GOP stays in the house

There is a story buzzing around the internet, but hardly any news media outlets are covering it. Pelosi turns the lights out on the GOP after the GOP stayed in the house and refused to go on the 5 week vacation without proposing an energy vote. I can't find a video of this anywhere, however I turned on CSPAN last night and there was some footage before the democrats left the house. John Boehner was quite adamant about a vote on energy regulation, but democrats kept putting it off saying it would stop votes on other important bills, not energy regulation.

You can see the article here about what happened:
http://www.politico.com/blogs/thecrypt/0808/House_Dems_turn_out_out_the_light_but_GOP_keep_talking.html?showall

I was impressed with the veracity in which the GOP finally went after the dems in the final hours of the day on Friday. It's historic. First, when a vote came to adjourn, the 50+ members of the GOP stayed. Then, Pelosi turned off the microphone; then the lights, then one of the GOP members somehow got the microphone back on, Pelosi turned it back off again.

The GOP stayed for 5 hours talking about energy crisis and they are fed up. It's about time as the American public has been outraged about this issue for six months.

The dems better listen, otherwise they are going to get wiped out. This issue crosses all party line barriers, and even many environmentalists are saying lets get energy independent with our own oil, wind and start using some natural gas too. You should see pickensplan.com if you are interested in that particular plan. It's quite good and will take time to implement, but a step in the right direction.

Well, enough about this for now. Hopefully we get some real energy changes over the next few years, my gas bill is killing me now. . . any extra income I had goes in the fuel tank. Forget about saving any money or putting money into the property right now.

I hope you all contact your congressman or senator and tell them how you feel. They are actually listening right now and know a revolt is in the works. The government can only ignore it's people for so long. I am surprized some nut-job hasn't gone out and whacked some of the liberal leadership in congress/senate who want to keep us dependent, want to raise our taxes, want us to just become Europe. Hey, at least it'd be a start. LOL BTW, congressional approval rating is less than 10%. Even Bush's approval rating is near 30%.

Brock

Quite the week

This has been a really challenging week for me personally. This past weekend with the dog bite, and my son going to the ER kind of threw me over the edge.

Wall street also had a horrid week. Very concerning about the housing crisis, and it appears to be getting worse. Today, Indymac bank that holds over 32B in assets was taken over by the Fed. They had a liquidity crisis from the housing market crash. Chuck Schumer mentioned this bank being in trouble about a month ago, and people pulled out over 1.3B in the past 30 days. This further created the crisis. I hate to say it but these things are probably going to get much worse, and as oil climbed again to a new high today of $147, oil is increasing daily as the dollar slowly collapses. It would be nice to know when we are at the bottom of this market, but the bottom is probably still far away unfortunately. I had told my family to get their stock out about a year ago, but they did not listen.

This whole thing with Iran isn't helping either. With Americans now concerned about the economy and their assets (housing), I think Ron Paul would have a much better shot if the nomination process started today instead of six months ago. It just goes to show you how timing is so critical. Iran isn't helping things either, instability is everywhere and is completely volitale now that our economy is more global than it was in 2001 when 9/11 hit.

I have some fear about this, but I think I would be better off praying for our country and it's citizens. I have concern that things are going to get worse, especially if Barry Obama becomes president. Not that Mccain will do much good either. I think unfortunately that we are going to have to get another Jimmy Carter elected to get a Reagan. I think that the current person who could become a great leader is Bobby Jindal. He is unique, humble and is a leader.

Going to try and take it easy this weekend, sleep and rest.

Dog bit by rattlesnake

Well, we had quite the weekend. Never a dull moment. Needless to say it was challenging.

Our dog twinkie, a 6 year old 1/2 boxer/pit mix was bit by a rattlesnake. I saw it happen. What scares me about the situation is it was unprovoked from what I could tell. The western rattler was hiding under the tractor bucket when the dog running by the bucket was struck. The ugly thing later showed it's head. We had to rush the dog to the vet. We didn't do the anti-venom shots, as she was in pretty good shape. She is doing well at home. I had our neighbor who is also a vet come look at her, he says she should be fine. Unless she was bit several times, he would not normally administer anti-venom. She had benadryl, some steroid shots and an iv for about an hour. The charge from the vet clinic (at 7am sunday morning for all this was $271.) If I went with the anti-venom shots and an overnight stay - $1548.

She seems to be okay and we are keeping an eye on her.

Happy 4th of July

This 4th of July is another time to celebrate our Independence. It was somewhat of a sombering year here in Chico, as the abundant wildfires had most fireworks cancelled. It was the first year in my life where Fireworks were not going to be displayed. At about 11pm my son ran downstairs as he saw some fireworks from his bedroom window. We all got in the car and drove towards the fireworks. It was the local Chico baseball team having fireworks at Nettleton stadium. We saw the last 2-3 minutes, the kids were happy and we went back home. This 4th of July was a trying day for myself and my family on a personal level as we had to take my 3 year old son to the emergency room when he drank something he shoulden't have. He is okay.

We spent the day at home after this incident and laid low.

Our national Independence is becoming an interdependence upon other nations in terms of borrowing money, and oil. It is becoming so apparent that oil is the lifeblood of this economy. The senate and congress better get their act in gear. Americans are actually becoming more united than I have ever seen when I talk to people. It isn't about the war any longer, it is about the slumping economy at home and the oil economy. I hope that you all speak to your friends and family about the oil crisis, and how we need to drill here, drill now. See newt.org for that information. We should make this our Oil independence day and declare to meet our own needs at home by whatever means necessary, ANWR, oil shale, etc. Thomas Jefferson never wanted us to be 'hocked' to a local banker who is in turn 'hocked' to a foreign banker. That's essentially what we have with Oil. Jefferson knew this situation would be disastrous for the republic.

The doom and gloom surrounding the media's daily negative agenda provides a constant reason to be bitter and worried. That we should let our government fix this problem is their answer.

I submit to you who read this blog and who are independent minded to not despair, but rejoice in the fact that you are making preparations and live your life in a manner that you can take care of yourself, and are not reliant upon the government. The agrarian lifestyle is going to re-emerge in the years to come. The US of A once was an agrarian country through the mid 20th century, where we all met our own needs. Look at the situation we now deal with when we move away from this mindset.

I hope all of you had a great 4th of July. We should pray for this country and thank God for what blessings we have. Regardless of what CNN and the local newspapers will tell you, the USA is still the greatest country the world has ever seen, and we are blessed by it's people through their generosity, hard-working nature and conservative roots- not political leaders in the government who seek to have us become part of Europe.

Brock

power system solved for the homestead

I am purchasing a 5,000 watt solar system for my property. This will produce over 30KWH per day in the summer, and about 15KWH per day in the worst winter months. It will be entirely off-grid and will meet all of my family's needs. For those of you who know solar, it consists of 120 solar panels, 72v each, fed to an 80 amp outback charge controller, charging T-105 batteries with a capacity of 13.5kwh per day. The batteries will be replaced in about 4-5 years. The well pump will be a S40-6 made by Grundfos, DC powered producing 70GPM at 90' while only using 300 watts - and this does not tape into the inverter. This is the ideal solution I have always wanted, and the cost is about 60% of what the PG&E hookup cost would have been. The best part- no red tape with the local county and I have full power. A Xantrex SW5548 Inverter producing 5500 watts will run the cabin. It really pays to buy used solar panels and used gear(except the batteries). The monthly payment on this system is about $170 over 84 months. I am going to add wind power- most likely an 800 watt unit. This will run another $800 installed. Since I am a techie installing this will be hard work, but do-able without a solar professional.

Now the next step is to finish the septic with the county, then get the 120' well drilled.
Brock

50% more food needed by 2030

See http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/24942035/

Buy some land, grow some food.... you're going to need it.

Jumping through Hoops

Russell over at logcabinhomestead.net sent this over to me. It represents the hoops I will need to jump through to make a home. I just hope I get through it without too many problems.

Single quote that summarizes state of USA

A blogger called MichiganFarmer has quoted "Our totalitarian government has, by stealthy encroachment, taken our basic rights away and is forcing us to buy them back as privileges, permits, and licenses. This is not freedom.". Lets break this down.

Source - Dictionary.com

totalitarianism, a modern autocratic government in which the state involves itself in all facets of society, including the daily life of its citizens. A totalitarian government seeks to control not only all economic and political matters but the attitudes, values, and beliefs of its population, erasing the distinction between state and society. The citizen's duty to the state becomes the primary concern of the community, and the goal of the state is the replacement of existing society with a perfect society.

Encroachment is a term which implies "advance beyond proper limits"

Human rights refers to "the basic rights and freedoms to which all humans are entitled. Examples of rights and freedoms which are often thought of as human rights include civil and political rights, such as the right to life and liberty, freedom of expression, and equality before the law; and social, cultural and economic rights, including the right to participate in culture, the right to work, and the right to education.


Permit may refer to:

• Permit (fish)
• Various legal licenses:

*License

*Work permit

*Learner's permit

*Permit to travel

*Construction permit

*Home Return Permit

*One-way Permit

Does any of this sound like a free society? - What happened to Life, Liberty and the Pursuit of Happiness? We all need shelter, water and food and even these basic rights have been violated.

Shelter - Need building permit + Ton of fees

Food - development permit for over an acre of land in California + requires water, hunting licenses and fishing licenses.

Water - illegal to drill a well in California for your own needs without using a C-57 licensed driller specializing costing you about $6000-20,000.

-----

I thought that this is the one exact sentence that shows us the state of our country and it's distance from the founders. Jefferson believed that the people would have to occasionally rise up and wash out the government and start over.

"The tree of liberty must be refreshed from time to time with the blood of patriots and tyrants." - Thomas Jefferson

Each day that goes by with the government is becoming more cradle to grave, anti free-market and anti-capitalist. The people want the government to allow us to have our own energy independence. The people are sending a clear message to the politicians and they are not listening. It's time to continue the Revolution Ron Paul started. Government is too big, too costly and is strangling it's working class by the neck to support a welfare state. Something will change in time. I have personally lost faith in our system, it's politicians and activist judges. It is no longer functioning to it's original purpose. I can only trust that God is putting us through this turmoil to bring us a reformer.

To the liberals - YOU cannot put enough solar panels on your car to make it function- plus the power to charge batteries has to come from somewhere- either more solar or wind power.

WE NEED DOMESTIC OIL RIGHT NOW. There is a gap between technologies that may be viable and the available infrastructure such as the state with hydrogen. Live in reality - most liberals would rather see our internal destruction with our economy before we drill more oil on our lands and make more refineries.

Little house on the prarie cabin

Here is a picture of the Little House on the Prarie cabin as a model. I found this at www.pioneerontheprarie.com site in the multimedia section as a link. My wife loved this series as a girl, however I mainly watched the Waltons. I too enjoy LHOTP series- a little dramatic, but still good.

I want to build something like this that looks like an old barn, and would meet my basic needs. A timber frame inside and could be re-used as a barn without much work at all when I go to build another house someday on the parcel (when and if I can afford it).

Here is a picture.

Homesteading movement is growing.. especially out of fear

http://apnews.myway.com/article/20080524/D90S5MLG0.html

Frontier Talk and the Industrial Revolution vs. Agrarian movement

So what was the original american frontier? It was considered the area between urbanized areas and wilderness. Many regard the original American frontier as a place where true freedom existed as westernization occured across this county, and those living in it had to be resourceful and promoted a spirit of self-reliance.

This blog "New American Frontier" is named for this because these freedoms and openness are now somewhat limited- but we must strive to still keep a spirit of independence and self-reliance alive. We are told that we cannot take care of ourselves outside of consumerism and our governments ( both federal and state ).

There is no reason we still cannot be self-reliant and live with less crap in our lives. I read an article recently about consumerism right before the stock market crash in the late 20's. Basically, most people lived an agrarian lifestyle where they met nearly all of their own needs by their land. During the 1830's and up to the 1920's people still produced most of what they needed themselves. The 1920's was a huge time for advertising success in business, and people starting buying. They never stopped. Today, consumerism is at an all time high, and so is our national debt. Most people don't have any sort of savings. Retirement for most in my generation (30 years old) looks bleak. Social Security isn't going to be there either. That's one reason I wanted to purchase my own land and attempt to live on it, good or bad.

In 2003, people now spend 75% more on their mortgages than they did 30 years ago in the 70's based on the same income and what it would buy. The state and local governments want to strap us with more fees to build something than what it costs to build with our own hands and labor, or they want to fine us. This is really a tax. The greed of government knows no bounds.

America's real problems today are core problems that will never be fixed overnight. We need people to spend less, and tell their kids that they can't have everything at wal-mart. I think that people need to re-evaluate themselves, their spending, and where it will lead. The agrarian lifestyle starts to look pretty good as gas prices, food and cost of living is increasing by the day- especially oil.

We have pretty much parked our 1996 diesel suburban at this point except for towing (3/4 ton). We're now driving my 1/2 ton pickup extra cab and squeezing the kids to it instead for $4.00 per gallon gas and 19 mpg vs. 15 mpg at 5.10 per gallon here in California.

I found a spring!

I finally realized something after doing some more research on my property- I have a spring.

It appears that I have a natural high groundwater spring on the western portion of my property, about 1200' away from where I want to build. This spring occurs naturally and still has groundwater at about 5-6' from where I found an old monitoring well. During the winter months it creates a second small swale that runs for 3-6 months.

Supposedly there was an original hand-dug well on my parcel as shown from an old septic report where the windmill was located. I found a pile of rocks, but not a well. Too much land to just easily find it when you have 48 acres. I thought maybe looking at an old satellite photo might clear it up, but I can't see the windmill.

In California, you cannot legally drill your own well without a C-57 license. I am going to have a professional well drilled, but I am thinking about developing this natural spring some 1200' away from where I want to build for cattle grazing since it should just require a pump down the hole and maybe a bit of backhoe work to clean it out. It is about 40-50' lower in elevation and it eminates from my property as shown from the contours. Might be a valuable resource.

I originally wanted to drill my own well under an 'owner-builder' method but there were court cases that I found online where these wells could never be permitted and even the state was going after those doing this. I only need to drill about 20-30' max to get plenty of water. Even still, the cheapest driller including casing for a 100' well was about $6,000 not including the pump or permit ($235). If you are in California, you are pretty much screwed with this work. The well drillers have cornered the market and you are out of luck for a legal well. I don't see a problem however you drilling other wells on your property once you have one permitted... It would be difficult for both the assessors and environmental health to figure it out.

Solar looks more attractive in terms of property taxes

Solar starts to look really good. I found a place online that sells solar panels that don't qualify for PG&E rebates (BP solar brand new 70 watt panels) for $2.84 per watt. You can build a 5800 watt system for less than $16,000 not including the batteries or inverters. With 5 hours of average sunlight you would get about 25-30kwh of electricity produced per day. Currently I use about 14 KW per day in my house. When I run the swamp cooler this increases by 2-3KWH per day.

One thing most of you may not know is that in California solar panels cannot be taxed on your property, so this saves you versus a PG&E hookup. The assessor came out and re-assessed my neighbors property once power was hooked up at $25,000. 1% of that pear year is going to cost him about $250 in taxes or $20 per month. Over the long run, a 10 year investment alone in solar with the $20-$22 per month in tax savings equals $2500. Over 30 years the system in terms of taxes pays for itself at about 50% ($7500). For many like me the cost of not having to drag telephone poles down my property line, permits, trenching make solar worth it. PG&E will not assist you in financing. When I started this proess, power was supposed to cost me about $12,500 to hook up including the transformer. After a site visit and formal quote, that price doubled.

Basically I can build about a 9kw system for the price of PG&E hookup; -plus no tax disadvantages, or issues about where I build my home, less trenching, etc. Additionally, there are companies who will now finance solar panels in a lease at 12-14% with a $1 buyout at the end of the term.

I am also fortunate enough to have great wind around 8-10mph year round; so wind power will supplement my power in the roughest of times during the winter. Those of you looking at spending lots of money with PG&E should seriously look at solar and wind. In terms of a monthly cash-flow position, you are looking to save $100-$200 per month in utility bills alone which pays for your $20-$25k solar power system versus paying for hookup + monthly service.

Russell's Cabin

I have been talking over E-mail to a very nice gentlemen named Russell out in the North East. He has built a beautiful cabin as shown from the picture here, and has been helpful in me making a decision about what to build. Here is a picture of his gorgeous 16x20 cabin. His blog as is at http://logcabinhomestead.blogspot.com . He built the cabin some 10+ years ago and has lived in it for several months at a time with his 3 kids. They also rent it out. on the weekends. http://www.logcabinhomestead.net

Russell told me that the total cost to construct the cabin for everything except power, road work, etc was around $20,000. He said he could have saved thousands if he would have had someone mill the lumber on-site or work with a logger. Notice the comp roof on the house alone will run several thousands, versus a DIY metal roof. The comp is more attractive and will have a better insulation value than metal. Currently, metal roofing is about $2.33 per linear foot for a 26" wide piece.

Overall Russell has about 40K into the project when including hooking up power and road work. I can empathize with these costs as my power hookup alone with PG&E is looking at around $22-$25k even with PG&E discounts.

Russell's blog features daily updates on critters, substructures and gas price talk. A great place to visit if you are a conservative Christian.

30' Pacific Yurt

I owned a 30' Pacific Yurt a short time ago. I thought it would be a great idea, and the price was right- $10,000 including the deck. I ended up selling the Yurt due to some financial pressures, and the fact that the high winds in our area would make Yurt living fairly uncomfortable. However, I can't say enough good things about the Yurt. My wife and I took one down in a day with the person selling the yurt, and stacked it on a car trailer. Building any other structure besides a mobile home would be difficult or even tearing it down. The yurt had 7' sidewalls. I made a template of the 2x4's and center ring to build one down the road. Ideally, if the panelized yurt option was less expensive, I would have gone this route. It really seems to be the only route that would feel like a real house with real windows.

If you are thinking about getting one, make sure you like camping. That's what it feels like inside a Yurt, kind of a camping/jungle safari feeling inside one. The pricing new is about $15,000 plus the deck, which will set you back another $4-$5k. Definitely craigslist one if you can. I sold my Yurt pretty quick, but probably had over 30 phone calls that past month from others wanting to buy it w/o even looking at it. The person who purchased it was off-grid with a 120 acre parcel and a seasonal stream for water in calaveras county.

Below: the yurt completely dissasembled in my garage.



You will need to use a transit to get your deck level. In terms of yurt manufacturers, pacific yurt is great for a camping yurt. I personally love the designs over at www.greenlivingsystems.com out of Grass Valley. The 36' version they sell is panelized and can meet certain building codes - even here in the environmental nut state of California. They start at about $25k for an 18', and $50k for a 36' Yurt with about 1000 square feet. You can build one yourself for about $10k. www.smilingwoodsyurts.com also has a panelized yurt that's affordable in a kit.

Pictures of the Tractor

This is an older 1960 John Deere 440 Industrial Backhoe. It has been a good tool thus far for getting my septic system started. I can't complain, the tractor has been running good so far this year. I found this on craigslist, like about everything else I now own. I plan on finishing the leach field, power lines and water lines using this. Since I have a cobbly-loam with great drainage, a ditch-witch isn't an option because of the rocks.

First post

This is the first post of the New American Frontier blog. I want to talk about homesteading and share ideas, pictures for living a self-sustainable lifestyle. I will also talk about how the state of California won't let you drill your own well, and want to nickel and dime you for everything imaginable and how I want the government out of my life. If you are planning on moving to California, stay where you are.

I have been studying Cabin plans, wooden panelized yurts, etc and hope to put some plans online including BOM (Bill of Materials) to be completely self-sustainable off the grid.

Attached is a picture of my 48 acre parcel in North Chico. Power is about 900' from my property line, but PG&E wants $25,000 to hook it up! Solar hookup for a complete 6000 watt system is less than the PG&E hookup cost. This land is part of the last original untouched frontier in Northern California between the Sierra Nevada Mountains and the coastal mountain range. My land is about 1 mile from the base of the Sierra Mountains.

The New American Frontier is about the current homesteading movement. Obviously, land is no longer free, nor are we under our current government. The 1863 homestead act gave a person the right to own free and clear any 160 acre parcel of land as long as they lived on the parcel and built at least a minimum of a 10x12 cabin with one window. Today's governement wants to take you to court for building without permits. With the current housing crisis, most people are having a difficult time getting a construction loan to start building a house. This is why I am most likely going to build a cabin or yurt to live in with my three kids. The New American Frontier is about utilizing current technologies - not just solar to make economic living also comfortable living. Enough for now, I hope you enjoy the blog over time.