Monthly Archives: May 2020

Trailblazers and Trail Maintainers

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I discovered the website “The Art of Manliness” several years ago and enjoy dropping by now and then to see what they have to say. While much of it, obviously, is aimed at men, there’s a lot of it that is applicable to anyone, like a recent post in their “Sunday Fireside” series, titled “Blessed Are the Trail Maintainers.” It’s short, but here’s the most relevant section:

It is easier and sexier to start things, because novelty generates a neurochemical bloom of involuntary motivation. It is harder to sustain things when this cognitive cocktail dissipates — when the thrill of pursuit dulls into the mundanity of upkeep.

But the difficulty, the rarity – the chosen intentionality – of perpetuation makes the task all the more worthy, and valuable.

Ever seeking the not-yet-possessed, without caring for the already-obtained, is like drilling a mine that never breaks the earth’s surface; building a skyscraper that never rises above the ground floor; writing a story that never progresses beyond the introduction.

Brett & Kate McKay

It definitely feels satisfying to accomplish something new. It’s much less so when it’s something you finished some time ago–and still have to keep looking after it. It’s satisfying having 72-hour kits prepared for our entire family. It’s…less fun going through them every year to make sure the food hasn’t expired, the spare clothing still fits, nothing has leaked, etc. It’s nice having a well-tended yard, but not so fun keeping it that way.

And yet maintaining what you have is the essence of self-reliance. It’s keeping the tools sharp. It’s re-balancing your 401K. It’s rotating your food storage. It’s cleaning the garage. It’s identifying the things you no longer use and getting them to someone who will use them or getting rid of them. It’s not just noticing that the stopper that shunts the water from your bathtub faucet to the shower head is getting old, but actually making a to-do item to replace it… (Speaking of which… one moment, please! Okay, done!) …and then following through (Oh.).

Self-reliance can be sexy. I’m still rather proud of my nice new water storage stack. But that will fade. And when it comes time to check it and replace it it probably won’t be so fun. Becoming self-reliant may be sexy, but remaining self-reliant will likely become work. But it’s the maintaining that matters. What good is having food storage if, when you really need it, the flour is full of weevil, or you find moisture has gotten to your cans and rusted some of them through? What good is learning how to change your own oil if you never do? Or building a new fence and letting it fall into disrepair?

Everyone loves a trailblazer. But it’s the trail maintainers who keep the trail worth taking.

COVID Confusion

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I found this in our local monthly/marketing newspaper in a humor piece of things the author learned from social media during the COVID-19 quarantine:

In effort not to get sick we should eat well, but we should not go out to get healthy fresh food when we run out and eat whatever pre-packaged food we have on hand instead. However, we should order out at our local restaurants to help keep them in business. Then it’s okay to go out to pick up the food. Your food might be prepared by someone sick that doesn’t know they are sick, but that’s okay if you pay by credit card and take the food out of the container. However, you should avoid going to the grocery store at all costs because you might get sick.

Joani Taylor, “The Social Media Scandal – What I Learned During Quarantine”, Sandy City Journal

If there is anyone left out there who still believes there’s a perfect response to a pandemic, especially one where the details about the virus aren’t really known…well, they’re probably on social media telling the rest of us what we should be doing. I’ve been fortunate enough to live in a state that took a somewhat moderate approach, while managing to keep the death rate fairly low, but the nags and scolds have been everywhere all the same.

Sure, I get it. People are scared, and fear makes people thrash about desperately in search of some way to feel in control. For many people that means lecturing everyone else. But the rest of us, when faced with conflicting information, reach a point where we just have to decide for ourselves which advice we can keep and what risks we are willing to take. Here are a few of the things I’ve learned (or re-learned) from all of this:

  • Preparation buys time. We were not as prepared as we wish we’d been, but we still had at least several weeks worth of all essential items. Even though we weren’t sure how long our toilet paper supply would last, we had enough to hang in there until more started appearing. We didn’t need to panic, spend exorbitant amounts of money to secure the essentials, and could put off even shopping for groceries until things calmed down.
  • People don’t want or can’t handle fresh. When we did go shopping we had no trouble finding fresh fruits and vegetables. Do people just not buy the more perishable items in an emergency? It’s not like we were without power. Veggies keep for weeks in the fridge. Or do people just not know how to prepare fruits and vegetables anymore? Not that I’m complaining. We’ve been able to eat healthy while everyone else, from the look of the store shelves, are existing on flour, pasta and beans.
  • Savings are essential. I am one of the fortunate people who can work from home, even if it’s not my preferred way to work. But even I had been furloughed or laid off we would have had savings to get through this.
  • Flexibility and resilience help. When things like this happen we can sit back and complain over every inconvenience or difficulty, or we can relax, take a deep breath (or two or three), and deal with everything one step at a time. This is easier to do if you’re not worried about basic survival.
  • Cut everyone some slack, including yourself. I’ve had to continually remind myself that people are experiencing widely varying levels of stress right now. On the other hand, if there were people whose stress was causing me stress, I’m not obligated to keep absorbing their stress. There are some where I hit the “social media snooze button” so I wouldn’t have to deal with them until things calm down again. For the most part people have been keeping things on an even keel, and when they aren’t I would try to be kind and remember where they’re coming from.
  • Even introverts need people. While introverts across the world have been cheering about this being the moment they were born for, the truth is, introversion does not mean we don’t need anyone else. Introversion/Extroversion is more a matter of where we get our energy from. Extroverts get their energy from being with others. Introverts get theirs from being somewhat isolated and quiet. We can enjoy social interactions, and even get some energy from particularly enjoyable ones, but most drain energy from us, and sooner or later we need to get away and recharge. Being shut up at home hasn’t been particularly difficult for me, but after a couple weeks I found myself reaching out to people much more than I usually do. I miss the depth, breadth and variety of my normal interactions.
  • Focus on what you can do. This crisis quickly revealed where our family is not as prepared as we should be. The problem is that some of that just can’t–and perhaps shouldn’t–be fixed right now. We found we were least prepared in our supplies of paper products, baking supplies, and a few other food categories. And yet if we’ve learned anything about shortages, it’s that running out and stocking up just make things worse for everyone, so we’ve had to resist that urge. Instead, we identified some things we can procure right now, and we’ve focused on that. We have a much better water storage now, and we’re better prepared for the next power outage (and in our area, there will be one). I feel satisfaction and accomplishment at having done something useful, even if I can’t solve all of the problem just yet.
  • Have a plan for the rest. As I said above, there are some preparedness deficiencies we can’t fix yet. But I’ve learned from sad experience that if I don’t have a plan in place for when we get back to normal-enough I’ll likely forget to do anything at all. I can take this time now to at least come up with a plan so that I know the next steps to take once we can take them.
  • It’s difficult to be prepared for everything. I’ve been a homeowner for over twenty years. In this part of the world we have to be on guard against mice. Right before our state went into quarantine we discovered something entirely new: rats. Mice we could have dealt with. Nothing we had worked on rats. And even after some online research and a curbside pickup purchase it took a long time to figure out what would work.

I could probably go on, but I’m hearing too many heads hitting keyboards already, so I’l spare you. This quarantine experience has certainly given us a lot to think about, and a lot of time in which to think about it. Right now the biggest question we should all ask is, “What do I do about it?” What are we going to change as a result of our experiences? Set a goal, make a plan, and get it done.

Unexpected surprises – Follow-up to a product review

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Last week I wrote a review of the Saratoga Farms 5-gallon water containers we purchased recently. One of the things that bothered me about our purchase was that when I’d first started researching water containers there was an option to buy just the containers, and another to get a starter kit with them that included a wrench to tighten the caps. And oddly enough, they were the same price either way.

Unfortunately, when I went to order, the site claimed the “with kit” option was sold out. The price was so good on the containers I ordered them anyway, figuring I might pick up a smaller set with the kit another time–you can’t have too much water, right? But those were sold out, too. Then I checked back the following week after I received the initial order, and found that someone else was selling the containers with their own version of the kit. This one included a friction-band wrench, which looked like it could be pretty handy, so I ordered it.

That arrived this week, and when I filled these containers I got the chance to try out the friction-band wrench. Eh. It works, and it was certainly more effective than tightening the lids by hand, but the band slipped loose at high torque. But it appeared to do the job. The containers didn’t leak.

Today I took the dog outside to play just as the UPS driver was pulling away. She’d left a small package, which was odd. I didn’t remember having ordered anything. When I opened it I found a plastic lid wrench for the water containers, from the same company I’d ordered the original set from. We had…a mystery on our hands! Did they read my review and decide to help me out?

I keep everything (not always a good habit), so when I got back indoors I checked the packing slip from the previous shipment to confirm the order date. To my surprised, I found that the wrench was listed on the original packing slip, quantity 0. Evidently they considered my purchase part of some package deal, and the wrench had been back-ordered.

In any case, I now have two wrenches! So I guess I’ll review those, now.

My two wrenches

Actually, there’s not much to discuss. I prefer the one on the right. It’s made for these particular lids, and now that I’ve seen one in person I can tell it’s made of fairly high-grade plastic and won’t be breaking soon. The belt wrench works okay, but you have to re-adjust the belt after every turn, and the design of the containers only realistically about a 90-degree arc where the wrench will fit around the cap and you can turn it freely. It also puts your fingers right in line with the edge of the container when the belt slips. The plastic wrench handle is off-set so it rides above the container edges and can turn 360 degrees. It fits the cap more snugly.

Mind you, I’ll keep them both. And the belt wrench can be used for other size lids–which I have. It may come in handy in other ways.

Controlling your money? or just monitoring it

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I’m a budgeting fanatic. Or at least I have been before, and I am once again. For the previous several years I’ve been more of a monetary monitor until I finally realized what I was doing and decided I had to stop it. I’ll get to that in more detail later. But let’s start from the beginning.

I love to organize things. Not everything, mind you. My desk is a mess, and I’m pretty sure my poor mother despaired of my room ever being clean. But some things were worth organizing and tracking. Like Halloween candy. I always found Halloween to be something of a letdown. It’s fun getting the candy, and it’s fun glutting yourself on all that candy, but then it’s gone, and you realize you never really appreciated what you had.

One year, probably around the time I was eight, I decided to change that. Rather than eat all my Halloween candy I instead ate some, and saved the rest. I actually inventoried my candy, and found places in my room where I could hide small stashes of it–partly because I didn’t want my older brother to find out and eat it, but also because I wasn’t sure if my mom would approve. The goal was to eat only one piece of candy a day, and I mostly stuck to that plan. I’m pretty sure there were some days when I allowed myself “just one more” a time or two, just as I’m also sure there were days I forgot. In any case, I stretched my Halloween haul out past Valentine’s Day.

I wasn’t as good with money. Around that same time period I got a newspaper route–with my mother as a partner, since I wasn’t actually old enough. We’d split the monthly take, and according to our deal, I’d set some aside for tithing and for savings, but the rest was mine to do whatever with. Sometimes I’d see something I wanted to save up for and do so, but most of the time I could have it all spent by the next payday.

Though I changed jobs and increased my income, I continued that pattern pretty much through college. I always made sure I set aside enough for tuition, but I wasn’t overly great at saving for a rainy day.

Then I graduated, got a real job, and moved in with my older brother for a few months. Consciously or not, my brother became my financial mentor. He and his wife were making good money, and were in firm control of it (much to my surprise; my brother could spend money even faster than me when we were younger). He’s the one who taught me to budget.

Then I got married, and to borrow a colloquialism, “excrement became concrete.” I married a gem of a wife who had lived in the former Soviet Union, which is the more recent equivalent of having lived through the Great Depression. Twenty years, three kids, and several pets later we are still amazed we were able to live on what we had then. I’m pretty sure we spend more on groceries in a week now than we spent in a month back then.

As time passed our income increased, but we managed to keep our expenses from increasing to meet it. Then I lost my job in the Great Recession of 2009-2011. We tightened our belts and cut back on the budget, and were able to make it for two years before I found another job that came close to matching our previous income. We had to relocate to another state, but everything looked fine once again.

But about that point something went wrong–or perhaps a number of things all went wrong. The area we moved to was more expensive than we thought. The house we bought needed some work. Part of my income (residuals from a business venture I had to leave behind) was unpredictable. The kids started getting expensively older. I had grown weary during my prolonged unemployment of worrying about money. I don’t know; one or all of these played a hand it it. The bottom line is I stopped paying close attention to money.

I was still tracking it. I still had my budgeting tools. But so long as we had money left over at the end of the month I was okay with it. I didn’t worry too much beyond that.

A few years ago that began to change. I think my kids were the main catalyst. My oldest, a daughter, was about to graduate from high school and wanted to go to an art school in Canada. I didn’t want to be the one to crush her dreams, so I told her if she would focus on getting good enough at art to get accepted, I would worry about paying for it. I had another son who took tennis lessons, and another who discovered competitive mountain biking. We were covering it all, but I could see the time was rapidly approaching when we wouldn’t be able to keep up.

It was about then I realized that tracking our expenses wasn’t cutting it. It was about the same as standing on the corner of a busy intersection counting how many car crashes occurred. I knew where our money was going, but I was doing nothing to determine whether that was the best use of it, let alone trying to slow the spending. Something had to change.

First step was to start paring down our budget. Little extravagances had been creeping in year after year, along with quiet increases in the cost of living. I got as brutal as I could be and found a couple hundred dollars a month that we didn’t need to spend. We made the kids start getting jobs to cover some of their fun on their own.

But I still wasn’t using my budget correctly. I was still only keeping track of where the money was going. Finally, around six months ago, I decided my tools weren’t cutting it any more. I started looking around for something better.

Enter my older brother, again.

He told me about an online tool he used, one that he paid a small monthly fee for. Double red flag! In spite of my career in IT (or perhaps because of it) I don’t really trust “the cloud”, and definitely didn’t like trusting my financial information to it. And I didn’t like the idea of paying a monthly fee, however small, for something I could do for myself for free. But my brother recommended it, the first month was free, and Quicken was going to force me to a subscription plan as well soon. I decided to try it.

The tool was called You Need a Budget, or YNAB. And I didn’t really “get” it. Yeah, it was similar in approach to an old spreadsheet I’d built once, but as the end of the free trial rolled around I didn’t really see the benefit, other than it was easy to use. And about that same time I learned my job of eight years was going away at the end of the year. Subscription software? No way.

But I gave it one more month, partly because my brother would get a free month if I did (and I was already sponging off him for several streaming services), and because something told me that, even if I wasn’t “getting” YNAB, there was still something there to be gotten. I kept going. The monthly fee wasn’t that big, and even cheaper if you signed up a year at a time. And I could still cancel it.

The year and my job ended, and then suddenly I had landed a new job–with a nice jump in salary. And over those two months I’d learned some more things about YNAB that made a huge difference. I changed my way of thinking about money, and found that YNAB along with some other strategies (also from my brother, come to think of it), was giving me what I had been missing before: control. I was no longer a passive observer, dutifully noting the flow of money toward bills. I was making conscious decisions about each and every dollar, and was finding that more and more of them were going into savings and into investing.

When we first moved and I got started in my new job I swore to myself that I would carefully control my budget so that the residual I was making from my former business would always be “extra money.” Everything I needed to be spend would be paid for from my regular income. In hindsight I’m not sure I ever achieved that goal, except perhaps a month here and there during the subsequent eight years.

I’m pleased and relieved to say I’ve finally accomplished that goal. And just in time, too, as my business is in budgetary freeze right now because of the Coronavirus. It’s getting by, staying afloat, but there are no residuals coming right now, and there probably won’t be for several more months yet. I realize I’ve been quite fortunate that my new job hasn’t been impacted, and I’m very grateful for that. But I’m also very glad to have my budget back under control again.

It really feels good.

I’ll be reviewing YNAB at some later date, but if you’re already interested and would like to check it out, use this link. If you like it and sign up, I get a free month (worth $7), but don’t do it for that reason. Also, check out their videos on their YouTube channel, so hopefully you’ll “get it” quicker than I did.

Diogenes and self-reliance

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The story is told of Alexander the Great visiting Diogenes and finding the philosopher laying in the sun. Alexander approached him and asked him if he could anything for him. Diogenes replied, “Yes, stand a little out of my sun.”

Kyle Eschenroeder examines this exchange in more detail and analyzes what Diogenes tells us about self-reliance in his article, “A Man’s Guide to Self-Reliance” from The Art of Manliness website.

Diogenes’ simple, ascetic lifestyle may seem to exemplify self-reliance, but these externals are not its essence.

Rather, self-reliance is a mindset, an approach to life that can be adopted whether you live in a wilderness cabin or a “little box” in the suburbs. Self-reliance is about living a life in which you make decisions and opinions with primary respect to your own experience of the world. You trust yourself. You’re true to yourself.

This doesn’t mean living in a void, it just means that we’re conscious about our relationship to the world and other people. It’s not rejecting external advice outright, but trusting ourselves enough to sift through which advice is worthy. We’re aware of the agendas of others, and don’t let them sway us from our self-determined path. Self-reliance doesn’t necessarily mean rejecting all established customs and values, it just means experimenting with them so we know if they work for us. It’s putting stock in our inner wisdom.

There’s a lot to unpack in this, but the last paragraph is especially of interest to me, especially these two lines: “It’s not rejecting external advice outright, but trusting ourselves enough to sift through which advice is worthy. We’re aware of the agendas of others, and don’t let them sway us from our self-determined path.” Put simply, we need to think for ourselves.

Far too often these days we are expected to buy into an ideology and follow it to the exclusion of all else. If we relate with an identity group we must think a certain way to remain in step with our fellows. Our news media, where once they would simply report the facts and let us decide what those facts mean, increasingly tells us what to think of those facts as well. Anyone who disagrees needs to be beaten down. We get our information from headlines and proceed as if we know and understand not just the details, but the nuance.

But how can we? Why should we? Why should we blindly accept another person’s “truth?”

The short answer is, “We shouldn’t.” We need to question, to seek to see as broad a perspective as we can, to measure what we’re being told against what we have learned through our own experience. We need to seek to verify, not just accept. We have far too many examples of history where terrible wrongs were committed under the cover of “I was just following orders,” or “It didn’t want to go against the crowd.” If we are to be judged and sentenced we should at least be so for our own beliefs, not for someone else’s.

Intellectual self-reliance is not an easy path. The world is a complex place, and it takes time and effort to sort through that complexity. But while we need to question, we can’t afford to continually question everything. We need some solid ground to stand on before we can move forward. We should be willing to adjust as we discover new information and encounter new perspectives, but be prepared to stand firm on our own foundation when a choice must be made.

Perhaps most importantly, even when we come to reject a particular philosophy or ideology, we need to resist the easy temptation of “that which we cannot believe we must despise, must hate.” We can oppose, but even when our own thinking in solid we can still learn much about ourselves and our beliefs through associations with those with whom we disagree. Someone with whom we can disagree, yet still respect and listen to, is invaluable in this world. It’s far too easy these days to dismiss anyone who thinks differently, but such intellectual reactionism is as wrong and dangerous as those who follow the herd. From Eschenroeder again:

In fact, there may never have been a time when developing this type of self-reliance has been more important. We’re over-politicized and polarized. Advertisements are creeping further and further into our content, making them less obvious. The Internet has given us two or two-thousand sides to every story. Social media feeds allow our peers to weigh in on our every decision. The comment section of a blog post allows us to see what other people thought of an article before we’ve formed our own opinion. It’s increasingly difficult to live a life that is inner-directed rather than other-directed.

In order to operate effectively in this kind of autonomy-sapping environment, developing a strong sense of self-reliance is crucial.

To be truly self-reliant may mean we not only stand firm, but that we stand apart. To follow the crowd too closely, however well-intentioned, is to invite disaster. As anyone in a mob or riot or Black-Friday frenzy understands, if you stand in the middle of any crowd it can be extremely difficult to escape before they run headlong off the cliff. Keep an intellectual distance, and trust in yourself to decide what is best for you.

Leadership skills for self-reliance

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I recently found an article titled “Leadership Skills Anyone Can Develop.” It outlines five traits of leaders:

  1. Take ownership of your life
  2. Be optimistic
  3. Be honest
  4. Measure results
  5. Believe God wants you to succeed

Simple ideas, though not necessarily easy to implement. Read more at the link.

To carry or not to carry (mobile phones)?

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The other morning I had a dream. My wife and I were out walking our dog when we saw a family playing together in their front yard. I’m not sure if we knew these people or not, but we decided to sit down on the side of the sidewalk (which was at the top of their lot, dropping quickly down toward their house).

Suddenly one of their children came running up to us and told us their parents wanted us to come hide with them quickly, because something bad was going to happen. This being a dream we quickly complied, and we ended up hiding in one of their storage rooms–and suddenly it was dark outside. We could see police lights flashing outside, and there was some sort of commotion, including gunshots.

I decided to see what was happening and crept over to the window to peek out. I could see a man just out side the window, and I think he was armed. I ducked back down again, afraid he might have seen me. At that point I woke up, and I lay in bed contemplating the dream in one of those half-asleep states where thought is conscious, but not entirely rational. My biggest concern about the dream was that we hadn’t taken a cellphone with us, and we had no way of calling our boys to tell them not to come looking for us and put themselves in danger.

My wife and I have a love-hate affair with technology. I work in IT, but I’m not a gadget guy like so many of my peers. My wife is Finnish, but in spite of her people practically inventing the cellphone, she doesn’t like using them, especially since they became portable time-wasters. So unlike most people, we look for opportunities to leave our gadgets behind. We don’t want to be connected 24/7/365. People have become too dependent on instant communication, and assume everyone should respond immediately to everything and anyone. They can do without us for half an hour.

And yet as the dream pointed out, there are times when communication is critical. We have had several dogs during our marriage, all of them rescues, and all of them older. My wife usually walks them in the morning while I’m getting ready for work, and there have been several times through the years when something has happened and, for various reasons, it becomes questionable if the dog will make it back home.

As a result we’ve many times discussed the necessity of taking a cell phone with her so she can call me for help. We agree it would be a good idea, but she never does.

Similarly, one several occasions we’ve been out walking and encountered a stray. Many times they have collars with a phone number. It would be handy if we had our phones to just call the owners then and there and spare them and us some worry. But we never do.

And there are Saturdays when I spend most of the day outside working on this or that. Sometimes I keep my phone with me, which comes in handy when my wife wants to call me to lunch. Other times I leave it in the house all day and find hours later that someone needed to contact me.

As much as I hate to say it, we would probably be much more self-reliant if we carried those darn phones with us. But the argument could also be made that not having to have them with us is also showing our self-reliance. Are we just being digital hermits, or is it sometimes a good thing to not have the world always a text away? Life is full of such dilemmas.

Spherical gardening?

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I’ve heard of Square-foot Gardening, but IKEA now has something new in mind: spherical gardening.

Read more at the link, but the idea is that the design ensures that all levels get air and light, and you can access it from both inside and out. Heck, it might even make a nice little reading nook or a meditation chamber. It certainly looks like the Yoda version of Darth Vader’s meditation chamber:

See the source image

I like the idea but, seeing as it’s made out of wood, how long before weather and water make it unstable? We’ll have to check back in a few years and see how well it works.

The plans are available online. If anyone out there has built and used one of these, please drop me a line and let me know how it works!

Product Review: Saratoga Farms water containers

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As discussed here and alluded to here, we finally decided to do something about our inadequate water storage. Fifteen gallons just won’t cut it for four people and three pets in any serious situation. I’d been looking into various options for some time, but finally decided to pull the trigger and get something.

I looked at large-capacity storage tanks (ie. 50 gallons + in a single big container). I looked at small-capacity storage. I discussed the merits of Water Bricks with my brother, who has been using them for a while for their storage. And over time I came to some conclusions. When we got water storage containers, they had to be:

  • 5 gallons or less so they can be carried easily to wherever they are to be used
  • made to take spigots to make dispensing easier
  • made of high density polyetholene (HDPE), and opaque for best storage and durability
  • airtight
  • inexpensive

I finally settled on Saratoga Farms’ 5 gallon stackable containers. I did consider Water Bricks, as their design allows for taller and more secure stacking, but I’d been warned by my brother that they can leak, and they’re designed to be stored sideways, which only encourages leakage. Perhaps I’ll invite him to do a guest review on his and how they’re performing. Ultimately the biggest deciding factor was price. For the amount of storage we purchased, we would have spent about a third more for the same volume in Water Bricks.

So we ordered them online, only to find they would be shipping from a local company not more than a few miles from our house. We prefer to shop local, but had already discarded that business, as their prices were too high by comparison. I wasn’t sure why they’re so willing to undercut themselves on Amazon, but that’s their business model, I suppose. Since then I’ve found another company selling the same containers on Amazon, also at a lower price, so I guess they needed to be competitive. But why they couldn’t lower their local price accordingly, I don’t know. They offer free shipping on Amazon, so had they sold at a similar price locally I would have saved us some time and them some money.

An empty container, pre-rinsing

The order arrived earlier than expected–always a plus. We had another order scheduled to arrive that day, so we thought it was the other order until a few hours later when the expected order arrived. That evening we unpacked the containers and put them in their expected destination until we had time to fill them.

That time was this weekend. My wife and one of my sons helped. I had heard that the containers seal better if washed first, and since they ship with no lids on it was probably safer to at least rinse them. Someone in the comments recommended filling a separate container with warm water and dish soap that you could then pour into the containers to swish around to clean them, as putting dish soap directly into the container itself would cause lots of foam and take a lot longer to rinse out. I may have put too much dish soap in the bucket I filled, but every container created a lot of foam when I started shaking it around. It did rinse out without much trouble, though.

The wash bucket

It might not have been the best idea, but for rinsing out the soap before filling I added some water, swished it around again, and then dumped it out on the lawn. My front lawn isn’t the greatest to begin with, though, so it it probably won’t make a difference.

To fill the buckets, I bought a fresh, clean hose just long enough to reach from the faucet to the containers. I intend to use this hose for nothing but filling water containers in order to keep it as clean as possible. Our house is on city water, which is chlorinated. Though the company that makes the containers suggests buying their water purifier solution, all the sites I checked (FEMA, ReadyUtah.org, etc.) all say that chlorinated city water is sufficient and should last at least six months to a year.

Containers during rinse and fill

Filling the containers didn’t take as long as I expected. We were able to fill one in a couple of minutes. From there we put on the cap. The caps that came with them have extra bands around the outside that ratchet against the opening on the container to keep the lid on tight. To open the containers you’ll have to tear the band off, similar to the caps on milk jugs.This implies the lids are not intended for reuse, though I can’t imagine there being any problem with it. The containers we already have been using are reusable and have given us no trouble.

Once each jug was capped I tested them to check for leaks. Here we ran into trouble. The very first container I tested dripped from the cap at a pretty steady rate. The second sealed just fine.

Signs of a leaking cap

As it turned out, close to half of them leaked. I had read in some of the reviews that the caps had to be really tight before they would seal, but other reviews insisted that you wouldn’t need the wrench they sold as part of a starter kit (which they were out of when I ordered them) and most people could hand-tighten the caps without any trouble. I’m only 135 lbs, and don’t lift, so I guess I don’t qualify for “most people.”

Stre-e-e-e-e-e-tch those pliers!

After several attempt to hand-tighten the caps (often I could go back after I’d already tightened the first time and tighten them a little more) I decided to see if by any chance my channel lock pliers would open wide enough to fit the caps. The fit–just barely–and I found I was able to tighten each lid at least another five or six clicks beyond what I could do by hand. That seemed to be tight enough, finally, and I didn’t have any more containers that leaked.

Finally I was able to place the containers in the location I had prepared. I’ve heard from several sources that plastic containers react with concrete floors, leeching chemicals into the water. I’ve also found sources contesting that assertion. In my case I chose not to take chances, plus it’ll keep the containers cleaner if they’re not right on the floor. I laid down some two-by-fours and a section of old wall board on top of that to provide a slight base just wide enough to stack two containers next to one another. The containers are 10″ x 11″, and 14″ tall, and designed to bear the weight of additional containers on top.

Yup, they stack! My old ones (seen on the left)…don’t.

When stacked like this they really to store efficiently. I’m not sure I’d trust the caps enough to store them on their sides, at least not in an area that doesn’t take water leakage well, but upright like this they should be just fine. It’s recommended you store them in a cool, dark place. I’m not sure that’s as critical with the right containers. Sunlight encourages algae growth, and cooler temperatures tend to preserve most things better, but we’ve stored water in the containers on the left in our garage before, and the water was fine for several years at least.

The key is when you go to use the water, check for two things. First, is there anything floating on top the water when you open the cap. That’s bad; the water grew bacteria. Second, smell the water. If it stinks, don’t use it. If it just smells stale it’s fine. The air in water tends to separate out over time, so when you go to use it you might want to add air back in by pouring it into a sealable container and shaking it up, stirring it well, or some other means of aerating it.

The long-term viability of these containers is yet to be seen, of course, but so far I’m satisfied with the investment. The difficulty in getting them to seal was frustrating, but otherwise they function pretty much as advertised. They are a little heavy to lug around, but the handles are comfortable, so getting them from their storage location to our kitchen to use shouldn’t be an issue. Even I’M not that wimpy!

I will test the water quality in about six months, and then a year, and see how it goes. If there’s a problem I’ll write a follow-up review and/or update this post. But I will admit that I feel better knowing we have a good amount of water on hand should we have any more quality issues with the city system or should we get hit with a worse earthquake (though that in itself might reveal some other issues, such as whether the containers are durable enough to handle falling over without rupturing or compromising the seal).

All in all, these containers seem to be a good storage solution at a decent price. Most containers seem to sell for at least $20 – 25 for a 5-gallon unit. With some bulk pricing these came to close to $17.75 or so. It’s a little pricey for something so simple, and there may be cheaper solutions (like the larger barrels or tanks), but over-all I don’t think it’s too much to spend for peace of mind.

UPDATE – May 8, 2020 – I got some more containers from another source that included a wrench. I also got a back-ordered wrench from the first source that I didn’t realize was coming. It’s time for the Battle of the Wrenches!

Emotional self-reliance

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When most people think of self-reliance, when they think of it at all, they tend to think of emergency preparedness, homesteading, or living off the grid. True self-reliance, however, encompasses much more than just the external factors in our lives. It’s as much an internal state of being as an accumulation of physical resources.

This was reinforced for me by an article co-authored by Trudi Griffin, LPC, MS on “4 Ways to Be Self Reliant.” I’ll probably revisit this article more than a few times; there’s a lot there, and it covers a lot of ground. The article begins, however, with emotional self-reliance, or avoiding relational dependency:

Although being in a committed, bonded relationship can enrich your life, feeling unable to function without another person could lead to a problem like Relational Dependency.[1] Relational Dependency is a progressive disorder, meaning that the relationship may start off healthy but one person becomes gradually more controlling of or dependent upon the other, which can lead to an unhealthy relationship. Furthermore, self-actualization is needed for personal growth and is thought to be an essential need that motivates our behavior.[2] In general, those who are independent and self-reliant typically survive and function better in society than those who are dependent on others for happiness and sustainability. Taking control of basic tasks and life skills will not only help you stay in control of your own life but will ultimately contribute to making you a happier person.

Some of the steps Griffin recommends:

  • Assume responsibility for your life: This I took as meaning taking control of the little things in daily life, such as cleaning up after yourself, paying your bills on time, getting to appointments on time, etc. It begins with the realization that no one else is responsible for your success or failure. It’s up to you to take care of yourself and your environment.
  • Be informed: “Information is power, so having information will give you the power to make your own decisions and assert your independence,” Griffin tells us. To do that she recommends a rounded approach to keeping up on what is going on in your neighborhood, your job, your town and so on, up to the level of world events. The more your know the more influence you can exert on the world around you.
  • Know where you are going: Decide what you want. Develop a plan. Break that plan down into goals. Seek guidance where needed. But if you don’t know where you’re going with your life the world will always step in to offer alternative options–most of which will not ultimately benefit you.
  • Make your own decisions: All of the above work together to help you make your own decisions–and make better decisions when you make them. It’s okay to consider the needs of others, or to seek their advice, but take the final responsibility for your decision and do what is best for you. Letting others make decisions for you is to give up your independence.

There is more–much more–to this article. I suggest you read the entire thing…or hang around. I’ll more than likely come back to it again.