Shooter at parallax adjustment has posted an exercise described as, "tell why someone should let you into their survival retreat. Be sure to list any and all applicable skill sets, equipment carried (100 pounds or less), and any injury, allergy, illness, etc. that would make you a liability to the camp."

I have never considered myself as being especially skilled in such matters.  But this is something I've been thinking about since I read his post a few days ago, so I thought I'd give it a shot.

Like Shooter, I am an amateur radio operator so I have some skills in that area.  My license is of the old (now deleted) Advanced Class.  So I have knowledge of Morse Code as well, and though it is somewhat rusty right now I'm confident that it would come back very quickly if I started using it again.  I think that Code skill would be important.  When conditions are poor, code communications can get through when voice can't.  There are some other more sophisticated digital communications that can also get through during poor conditions, but they are mostly computer-based and computers require additional electricity and maintenance.  I can also build serviceable wire antennas from scratch, and I know how to scrounge up a makeshift code key if required.  I have equipment that would allow me to get on the air in several different modes, and of course I already have a code key.

Hunting/fishing.  Yep.  I also have bow hunting equipment although I have never used it for anything other than targets.  I used to be a very good tracker, although that's another thing I haven't had to do in a long time so I might be a little rusty.  I also know a thing or two about trapping.

Shooter says, "Give me a blade and I can sharpen it."  I guess it betrays some of my naiveté in that I thought this was something everyone can do, but maybe not.  I do vaguely remember my dad teaching me how to sharpen a knife, but I was so young that I don't remember exactly when.

I have some basic knowledge of electronics and am quite handy with a soldering tool.

I've also been wondering if people who could teach something, or people who just know a lot about something, would be worthwhile.  Will people eventually want anything beyond basic survival, or is this going too far?  I know that I could teach basic music theory including composition in four-part harmony.  Like I said, I know this isn't necessary for survival, and am just wondering if it's something that might still be considered valuable anyway.  You know, "for the children."

Would there be anyone who might want to hold worship services?  I have many old gospel hymns memorized, or nearly so, and I know that I could reconstruct the harmony on paper for numerous old songs if I needed to.

Besides, I think I could find room in my stash for at least one hymnal.

By the way, I've been wanting to write up some posts of the subject of hymns and hymnals, but so far all I've been doing is try to figure out how to start on it.  I'm sure that most readers of this blog wouldn't really be all that interested in it, anyway.

Man.  The things some people have to deal with.  Man in Underwear Pins Leopard for 20 Minutes:

The 49-year-old nature guide was fast asleep Monday, his family and pet cat dozing beside him, when a larger feline hopped in his bed for a latenight visit - a wild leopard, to be exact.

Du Mosch, 49, a nature guide, didn't flinch. Clad only in underwear and a T-shirt, he lunged at the leopard, grabbed it around the neck, then pinned it down for 20 minutes - until park rangers arrived on the scene.

"This kind of thing doesn't happen every day," he said, plainly. "I don't know why I did it. I wasn't thinking, I just acted."

He admits that he was successful only because the leopard was weak and not in the best of health, but still.

Something really odd about the report is this line:  "His young daughter had been in the room at the time because a mosquito in her own bedroom had frightened her, he said."  Maybe next time she'll just swat the mosquito.

I know lager isn't ale.  But it's only humor.  Used GIMP to add the extra caption on this one.

From the land of coming-of-age TV sitcoms comes this:  Bill Requiring Background Check For Private Gun Sales To Be Introduced Tuesday:

"The person that bought the guns that killed our sons, he bought the gun in a tavern, the same tavern that he killed our sons at," said Beverly Anderson, the mother of one of the shooting victims.

When their son's killer brought [sic] that gun, the tavern didn't do a background check. It didn't have to. Private gun sales in Wisconsin do not have to go through the background check process.

For three years, these woman [sic] have worked with state Sen. Spencer Coggs (D-Milwaukee) to close, what they call, a loophole in the law.

1.  As far as I know, "taverns" aren't in the business of selling guns.  I don't see how the tavern owner could be responsible for something that happens in a shadowy corner of his place where it looks like two people are just having something to drink.  The next step, of course, will be to prosecute the property owner on which such a thing took place without his knowledge or consent.

2.  Criminals--gang members, conspiring murderers--will of course not be affected by this law (the criminal loophole).  If they are planning on committing murder with the gun, why would they worry about how they buy it?  I realize this is a fact that is pointed out time and time again with little effect to the gun grabbers, but that doesn't make it any less of a cold, hard, ugly truth.

3.  One of the major backers for this new exercise in tyranny is Mick Beatovic, "a lifelong member of the NRA" and owner of Badger Ammo.  When this law is passed, as it undoubtedly will be in such a freedom-loving place as Milwaukee, those gun owners who do wish to follow the law will then be required to execute the transaction through the medium of a government-sanctioned "licensed dealer" such as Mick.  Mick will then, of course, charge a fee for this encroachment on their liberty.  No conflict of interest there, is there, Mick?

P.S.  What "authorized journalist" wrote this?  It's full of spelling errors, misused words and extraneous commas.  My high school English teacher would have ridiculed me in front the entire class if I had turned in an assignment that looked like this.

Dreamers

Soldiers are citizens of death’s grey land,
Drawing no dividend from time’s to-morrows.
In the great hour of destiny they stand,
Each with his feuds, and jealousies, and sorrows.
Soldiers are sworn to action; they must win
Some flaming, fatal climax with their lives.
Soldiers are dreamers; when the guns begin
They think of firelit homes, clean beds and wives.

I see them in foul dug-outs, gnawed by rats,
And in the ruined trenches, lashed with rain,
Dreaming of things they did with balls and bats,
And mocked by hopeless longing to regain
Bank-holidays, and picture shows, and spats,
And going to the office in the train.

--Siegfried Sassoon

Oscar Poppa has another excellent poem that I hadn't seen before.