A Few Updates

Here are a few updates:

We slept on the foam mattress in the travel trailer. It's pretty comfy. Good thing because it's getting hot and the only real a/c we have is in said trailer, a.k.a. the escape pod. It's just 3 pieces of foam (4"firm,4" med, 2" memory foam). We ordered it on e-bay from Sleepy Mountain Mattress.

The solar system was ordered and arrived yesterday. It has not been put to work yet. That will be reviewed in another post. It looks like a pretty easy set up, and we're excited about it.

On a more personal note: Randy's niece has found both his mom's and dad's wills. Better late than never. Had we not made nice with his brother in law, this would not have happened, as Randy's sister passed away unexpectedly. Now, maybe we can sell this place with everyone benefiting. Even if it's not that simple, this is good news because the lawyer didn't give us much. He said if the AG's office is working with you, keep it up. Of course, we saw the lawyer before we found out the wills had been found. Things might be made clearer Monday. Who knows?

No matter what, there's still lots to do. I better get to it.

Well, I had this really long winded rant about the state of Washington coming to take our property, but things changed a little after Randy talked to them. We got an e-mail stating that they were going to start foreclosure proceedings by the end of the month. Randy talked to the woman handling the case and got a little more info from her. She had not been very forthcoming previously. For those who don't know, Randy's mom was in a nursing home paid for by medicaid. There is a state recovery law here and now they want this property to pay back some of the cost. After Randy talked to this woman, she really sounded like she didn't know how the whole process works if you're not willing to just let it go. Up until this point she was just trying to scare us out. She kept telling us we could sell it, with any and all going to them. The problem with that is how could we sell it if it wasn't in our name? Yeah, she didn't have an answer for that either. Anyway, we're going to a lawyer Thursday. Maybe we can figure it out from there. I don't know.

Things to come...

Summer is coming into eastern Washington. It's starting to warm up finally. It's been an odd spring here this year. It's usually hot before now. I'm not complaining by any means. It's been really nice. We're probably going to end up sleeping in the escape pod when it gets really hot. It will be much cheaper cooling it than trying to cool the house. That being said, I ordered a new foam mattress for the pod. Unfortunately, we had to do something. Not too long ago, we accidentally left one of the cats (Romeo) in there overnight. He decided to express his displeasure with us on the bed. (Damn cat! Stupid humans!) I'm hoping the foam will be more comfortable anyway. It was a cheaper replacement too. I'll report on our comfort level at a later date.



Randy is going to order our solar set up this week. That should help, if not take care of, the cost of running the a/c in the pod. It's a big chunk of change, but it will pay for itself in no time. We will use it here, and be able to get mobile quick when our personal SHTF event comes to pass. We're already using the fridge in the pod. Ours crapped out. You can follow my logic here, given our situation.

On my other blog I mentioned that we're trying to live "it" before we have to leave here. I keep reading all these great blogs and think to myself, "we're kind of in survival mode right here right now." Prepping is not just for the well to do.

We live "it" because we really don't have much of a choice. The state is eventually going to kick us out of this place, because Randy's dad didn't write a proper will. It's not so bad here, really. I'll miss the meth-heads that practically live in our backyard. And the regular visits from various law inforcement agencies. It's pretty impressive watching them line up down the narrow easement to visit the neighbors. Randy goes to work at a dead end job that doesn't pay what he's worth, and I stay home with the 38 and the dog to make sure the meth-heads don't rob us blind. But I digress...
I grew up in Houston with floods, tornadoes, hurricanes, etc. So, we tried to keep a minimal collection of supplies. Now that I live in a more rural area in Washington state, it's much more important to be prepared for power outages, and anything else. It's a treck to go to the grocery store. When canned goods we like go on sale, we buy extra. We get the big box of rice, dried milk, potato buds, and anything else that will keep. I was buying bulk frozen stuff, but since we're going to be moving, we've gone through most of that stuff. We plan on selling the little freezer. (And pretty much everything else.) I don't know if this qualifies as being a prepper. It works for me though.
We have our junk land, a travel trailer and tow vehicle. We're working on getting a solar package. I'm still considering the Berkey for a water filter(a little pricey). Our land doesn't have water or electric.
I love reading Wretha's blog on how they are going off grid and being self sufficient. They sound a lot like us. There's much to be done before hand. I should get to work on that.