CreatingASimplerLife

Here is a huge positive to modern life that gets no press. I have an old 2009 Toyota, and the AUX port crapped out about a year ago. Went to YouTube. Young, enthusiastic guy explains how to fix it. It is not obvious - involves taking the dashboard apart in a counter-intuitive way, but once you see it, it's a 15 minute fix. There are actually dozens of videos showing how to do this, and they collectively have well over 200k views. Had this happened in 1995, I would have just lived with it. But the combo of the replacement AUX jack available from Amazon and the video of the simple (but not obvious) fix, I fixed it. I HAVE DONE THIS DOZENS OF TIMES. Replaced the control panel of my dishwasher. Replaced the ice maker in the fridge. Fixed a wonky sanding head on my drill press. Mastered a bandsaw technique that I use for my sculpture. On and on and on... I think it is likely no exaggeration to say billions of fixes and skill upgrades have been performed worldwide that would not have been performed if it were not for the instruction freely given peer-to-peer on YouTube. Take a moment to be happy about this. The busted item keeps performing, rather than going to the landfill. The person learning and doing the fix gains a sense of mastery and saves money. It's an unmixed blessing. Stop doomscrolling. Think of what is busted in your house, find the YouTube video on how to fix it, and fix it.

YouTubers be like “wake up at 4am and run, that’s alpha!” No, it’s not. Look at apex predators; they’re all lazy. Bears hibernate, lions sleep all day. You know who wakes up at 4am and runs? Squirrels.

Off Grid in the Adirondacks Build Update - The SINS of the PAST youtu.be/QcQCy-umNu8?si… via @YouTube

It’s actually insane that people used to casually receive a giant book with everyone’s home address and phone number in it. 😭

WARNING: do not make smoked shotgun shells unless you’re prepared to eat way too many of them. These things should honestly be illegal at a backyard cookout. Absolute 10/10.

Activist: "You can graze sheep underneath solar panels. It's called agrivoltaics." Farmer: "I've read the brochures." Activist: "Best of both worlds." Farmer: "The panels shade the sward. Productive species die back. What grows is what tolerates shade and compaction. Sheep won't finish on it." Activist: "But the trials show it works." Farmer: "The trials run three years and measure ewe presence. Not lamb growth rates. Not finishing weights. Not what the soil looks like in year fifteen." Activist: "It's still better than nothing." Farmer: "It's a 30% stocking rate, a steel frame I can't plough around, panel-cleaning chemicals running into the watercourse, and a 40-year lease I can't break." Activist: "But you're getting energy AND lamb." Farmer: "I'm getting a third of the lamb, a maintenance contract, and a field my grandson can't farm." Activist: "You're being negative." Farmer: "I'm watching a thousand-year-old way of feeding people get traded for twenty-five years of subsidised electricity. Negative would be the polite word."

every school should have a "fix-it lab" where students learn to repair their clothes, bikes and electronics. we should grow up knowing that not everything is disposable, that care and repair are part of living well on this planet.

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Probably

Literally getting it done one day at a time! youtu.be/o3lUHrzZfNE?si…

Hypothetically…….. We are being taxed on money we never made. Let that sink in. If I bought my property outright for $160,000 in 2009 Now the county says it’s worth $446,000. Did I sell it? No. Did I make a profit? No. Did I get a check for $446,000? No. But my taxes jumped like I did. That’s the problem. This isn’t income. This isn’t cash. This is a number someone decided on paper and now I’m being billed for it. If my stock portfolio doubles, I don’t pay taxes until I sell. If my income doesn’t increase, I don’t magically owe more income tax. So why does owning a home work differently? Why am I being taxed on unrealized gains? A house isn’t just an investment, it’s where people live. And this system means you can do everything right, pay off your home, and still get squeezed harder every year because of a number you never turned into money. You don’t truly own something if you can be taxed out of it. This isn’t about “services” or “inflation.” It’s about being charged for value you never received. It’s time people start to notice.

STRUCTURAL vs DESIGN: Making the Most of our STRUCTURAL STEAL BEAMS youtu.be/tiDHatKVeMY?si… via @YouTube

Off Grid Build Earth Sheltered House Build - Why did we keep this I-Beam... youtu.be/RWR8gahup2Q?si… via @YouTube

Boy carves the crucifixion into a giant leaf!🙏🏾

the older i get the more i realise happiness is quiet mornings, a clean space, early nights, a safe home and people who don’t drain my energy.

Keith the Apocalypse Bringer is a three-year-old Anglo-Nubian goat in a field in Devon. Keith should not be underestimated. Keith has been systematically dismantling the ecosystem since approximately 7am, when he ate a bramble. This is significant because bramble is an invasive scrub species that outcompetes wildflowers, reduces biodiversity, and creates dense monoculture thicket that nothing else can use. Keith ate it. Keith does this every day. Keith does not charge for this service. 8:15am - Keith ate a thistle. Thistles are also considered invasive scrub in managed pasture. Goldfinches eat thistle seeds, but Keith's grazing will ensure the pasture remains open enough for the ground-nesting birds that can't use dense scrub. Keith has not attended a conservation workshop. Keith arrived at this conclusion by being a goat. 9:00am - Keith dismantled a section of hedge. This was less helpful. Keith does not have a perfect record. 10:30am - Keith escaped the field. He was in the road for eleven minutes. He ate a neighbour's rose. This is not being counted in Keith's environmental impact assessment. 11:00am - Keith was returned to the field. Keith regarded the farmer with the specific expression of an animal that does not recognise the concept of property. 12:00pm - Keith ate more bramble. His digestive system: four stomachs, a rumen full of specialised microorganisms, the ability to extract nutrition from lignified plant matter that would defeat any other animal on this field, is converting scrub vegetation into milk with a fat content of approximately 4.5%. The milk will become cheese. The cheese will be sold at the farm shop. The farm shop is four miles away. The cheese food miles are: four. 3:00pm - Keith produced manure. The manure will grow the grass. The grass will grow the bramble. The bramble will be eaten by Keith. This system has no inputs. It has been running since goats were domesticated approximately ten thousand years ago. Keith is not aware he is saving the planet. Keith is thinking about whether the fence on the north side has a weak point. It does. Keith found it at 4:45pm. Keith got out again.

Honestly, this sign should be everywhere.

Sustainable Off-Grid Living - Giving OLD Wood NEW Purpose! Using other peoples garbage wood not only keeps it out of the dump, but saves us money too! youtu.be/q2LJrZcD9O4?si… via @YouTube

Truth