Green Bell Peppers Experiment; 3-Months Later

Back in October, I felt my Bell Peppers were at their end of production life and was going to pull them out and wait for spring to plant new ones. However, since I had nothing to lose, I left them alone to see what they would do with the winter days becoming shorter. To my surprise, the plants kept blossoming and producing except that the Peppers are about 1/4^th the size and smaller of the longer sunlit days production. The lessening of sunlight has a profound effect on plant production. However, even being smaller fruits, they are very good to eat!

Now with the days getting longer the Bell Peppers are getting bigger. Funny how just a few more minutes of sunlight bring the plants back to life and producing bigger peppers.

Also my bucket gardening of Green Beans, Onions, Carrots and Russet Potatoes are doing fine, but just like the peppers they’ve been growing slower due to the lack of sunlight.

I haven’t had my first frost yet (normally that’s anytime in February), but when we do that will be the end of my gardening until my last frost which is generally, March 15^th.

Link to the original article:

https://livingprepared.blogspot.com/2019/10/green-bell-and-jalapeno-peppers.html

The larger Bell Pepper

More Bell Peppers

  

Jalapeño Peppers

The Pepper plants look weak but still producing

Car Break-Ins,,, Again

No matter how careful you are when looking for the ideal and safe home or homestead, the bad guys will eventually find you. It’s best to live as far as possible from people, but even that will not stop the population of cities migrating to and eventually surrounding you!

About once a year my neighborhood has car break-ins. A couple days ago, seven cars were hit. Their method of operation (caught on video every time) is between 2:00am to 4:00am, 2-3 people on foot looking into the vehicle windows in the driveway’s for mostly guns or high value, easy to sell items are followed by a getaway car and driver. If the vehicle looks promising they break the window and crawl through it, look in the glove box, under the seat or center consoles again mostly for guns. They don’t open the doors as that sets of the vehicles alarm off!

My neighborhood of 85 homes, with only one-way in and out, is a secluded area on the extreme edge of town, as far as possible from the cities' bad neighborhoods. We are surrounded by water on two sides and the other two by a large hospital and insurance campus’s of several hundred acres in size.

Separated from those are limited access, six-lane roads. There is no foot traffic as we are miles from other homes, apartments and shopping stores. My location is not the best for area for robberies, car break-ins or home break-ins because getting away in a hurry is very limited, plus many homes have video surveillance.

The only bad thing about my location is a 24/7 convenience store nearby. It’s a sub-human magnet. I suspect that the sub-humans stop there for their beer or lunch or dinner, then drive around my area casing the homes or vehicles that look promising. Never allow one of these businesses to be built anywhere near where you live.

Here’s a surveillance photo of the getaway driver: (we finally got a good photo)

Wishing all of you a Merry Christmas

and Peace throughout the New Year

Kindle, PaperWhite Reader 10th Generation

Electronic gizmo’s don’t interest me much, like my smartphone, I hate it. It does too much, it’s too complicated, and has features I’ll never use, however as a phone and texting is one of the greatest inventions.

I felt the same way about the Kindle Reader. I always wanted one but the early versions had many faults such as, can’t see the page in bright sunlight and no back-lighting so you can’t read in low light conditions.

Well the latest version, ‘The 10^th Generation PaperWhite’ has solved all those issues and more. So, I finally bought one and love it! Reading it is just like reading a printed paper book. As for battery life? It runs constantly for weeks between charges. It weighs just 6½ ounces and it’s thin, only ¼ inch thick. The outside dimensions are 4½ x 6½ with a 6-inch diagonal display. The font is selectable to suit your preference including the font size. The best thing I like about the kindle is the feature that lets you choose “Text to Speech” which means you can listen to the book!!! (requires BlueTooth headphones or buds) Now that is a cool feature!

If you purchase one be aware that if you buy one, buy one “Without Special Offers Included”. If you don’t, then you will see in the bottom ½ inch or so, product ad’s displayed. You can, like I did, buy the Kindle “Without Special Offers” for $20.00 extra and never be harassed by endless ads!

My thoughts about saving ‘how-to’ books on the Kindle:

Remember this is an electronic device that needs WiFi to operate and therefore can be corrupted and rendered useless by events/people out of your control. All books stored in the Kindle Library could be lost. A safe way around this is to download the Kindle reference book you like and read it. If it is of interest to you then buy the hard copy book and save it in your ‘home’ hard copy reference library so you can access the important information.

Shown here is the actual Kindle with a book page opened. This is what the ‘PaperWhite’ screen is like. It is the same in total darkness because the screen is always back-lit.

Here is the front of the box.

Here is a picture of the back of the box showing the product description.

Link to more information:

https://www.amazon.com/All-new-Kindle-Paperwhite-Waterproof-Storage/dp/B075MWNNJG/ref=sr_1_3?crid=36HRNCJAVGN5P&keywords=kindle%2B10th%2Bgeneration&qid=1576330558&smid=ATVPDKIKX0DER&sprefix=kindle%2B10%2Caps%2C182&sr=8-3&th=1

Scripto Lighters are Junk

Lighters are an important piece of survival gear. You need a flame to start camp stoves, lanterns, candles, or fires. If you are a non-smoker, chances are you’ll never find a lighter or matches around the house when you need them most. This is where multiple butane lighters are worth their weight in gold especially when the unprepared neighbor comes over looking for a lighter or matches.

I keep lighters everywhere such as vehicles, with camping gear, in the kitchen etc. I normally buy and stock ‘BIC Lighters’ as I’ve found them to be the longest lasting and most reliable year after year. (I do have a Fire-Steel as the ultimate back-up.) The only down-side to the BIC is it has no adjustable flame height which is beneficial when lighting a stove or lantern.

The other week I saw the above Scripto lighters in a 7-pack with an adjustable flame on sale, so I bought them. It didn’t take long to find out they were junk. Using the maximum flame height the flame only lasted for a dozen or so lights before it dwindled to a very low flame then the next dozen or so lights ran out of fuel.

Sad the amount of junk that's out there for sale in our country. Save your money and buy the ‘BIC’ brand.