Haironyourchest

The USA blew the pipeline. Biden promised to "Bring an end to it" if Russia invaded. Not hard to read between the lines. Payback/escalation for the referenda and annexation of the 4 regions. Keeps Germany on a short leash. USA want Germany to be their bitch in the EU. Trump told Merkel not to build NS2 back in 2018, remember? He warned Germany about being dependant on Russian gas. They fobbed him off. The EU will have to increase imports of US gas now.

Good question...

In recent news... Sweden went right wing. Italy went right wing. Also + to keep it arb related - Australians charged with murder and putting the body through a chipper.

That's a (partial) setup for the RADS (Rapid Ascent/Descent System) There should be a micro pulley in there as well. I started on this system, it's useable, not great. Basically it's the setup for industrial rope access and good for that application. Excellent for going straight down, not so good for going up and bad for moving around laterally in the canopy. Hard to advance the climb line. It works for rope access because it's main feature is easy and foolproof rapid descent. Rope access guys rappel off the top of a structure to reach their work position. Not too much ascending involved. Whereas we climb the rope/tree to our work position, and must have a retrievable anchor. I switched to trad double rope after a few years of frustration. But my RADS system still comes in handy from time to time. If I can get the single rope through a good high crotch, I can use it to haul up my double rope and pulley, then basal anchor the single rope with the Grigri/descender. This allows someone else to lower me if need be, and the descender devices are pretty rugged and foolproof. I wouldn't buy the setup again though.

Same here 👍 ... Sometimes, if I'm feeling energetic, I'll take the axe off her and do a few minutes of splitting myself...

My occasional neighbor dropped dead unexpectedly a few weeks ago. Early 60's, fit. Just got back to his main residence after spending a few weeks in my neck of the woods at his second home. Other neighbors said they were chatting with him before he headed for his main home. He told them not to get the booster. He got it, and had a really bad reaction. Don't know the time interval between boosting and death. Sad. Didn't know him very well but he was a good chap. We had a vague plan to harvest some fallen oaks in his woods and haul it out with my mini dumper and share the firewood. RIP.

It would work great for winching purposes though, with a Massadam rope puller. Or even just hand pulling. Multiple uses for one piece of gear.

Yeah, the off-roaders do this. The latest thing is using rings for snatch blocks with soft shackles. It turns the ring into to a pulley. However, they are working at really slow speeds. In a tree setup, there would be a couple of things to consider. The sling normally cinches around the ring, held in place by the flanges. It sits fairly tight, so the ring cannot pop out of the sling. The rigging slides through the hole. Most of the ware is on the hole. With your setup, the ring is going to be rotating (maybe). The sling is going to be holding a rotating ring, so the sling will experience ware. Normally with a pulley, the shieve is rotating on a bushing, and it's that bushing that takes the brunt of the ware. Your sling will be taking the place of a bushing. Also, metal snatch blocks have side plates to stop the line from jumping out of the groove and off the block. There is nothing to stop your line from leaving the groove, except gravity and tension. If it does somehow jump the groove, it will fall and be caught by the sling. Rope on rope friction, under a running load, your sling will be history within seconds. This is fine for winching a car out of a mud hole. Controlled, slow force, easy to monitor.

Depends on a lot of factors. Type of ground- soft, hard? Topography - hilly? Flat? Mostly mowing or mostly something else? What are you going to be doing there? What industry and projects do you expect to undertake? Small old tractor is the go-to machine for most people. 20 acres, maybe a decent quad?

The ground pressure of a sleeper (without a structure on it) is practically nil. Wouldn't be worried about it. if it's pure bog, maybe some piles (fenceposts) drivel down to harder stuff first, the cut off at ground level to support the sleepers. Use strapping to keep the sleepers together.

Very simple fix: pick up a log in each hand and whack em together. The bugs fall off. Then put the two logs in your basket or whatever you carry them to the house in. Be mindful of bats sleeping between to the logs. I nearly squashed a pippastrell bat last year but noticed it after it started hissing. Brought it to the local bat conversation lady and she sorted it out. No injury, bat's doing fine in a bat sanctuary now.

Very simple solution to this problem: water, and lots of it. Ware a synthetic top, Lycra - white if possible - and soak your top half at regular intervals. Evaporative cooling. Also add electrolyte to your drinking water and keep drinking. Maybe invest in cheap camelbacks so you don't forget to drink Forget the suntan lotion. Ware wide brimmed hats instead, or neck flaps taped onto helmets. Or even cardboard wide brims attached to the helmets. It's all about keeping the solar radiation off the body.

Never been happier with my 1.3 diesel. 10 cent per km. Even if it goes to €6 a liter I can still make a living. That's if there's any job left to go to, of course.

Got to save Ukraine and the climate.

Beauties!

Nailed it. This is the core of our maliase: not enough physicality. Men, especially, are made for physical work. We can be intellectual geniuses as well, but the majority are built for hard word. And this should start from an early age and be a aspirational. Healthy competition at work should be encouraged in the young. This involves a bit of diffuse societal shaming of boys who are lazy or weak. This is ok. By building a physically comfortable and "safe" society, men have been neutered. They've grown up in a feminized culture, so when they have the opportunity to experience one of the few manly spheres of work (arb) they don't know how to appreciate it and cannot enjoy it. The image of Conan pushing the "wheel of pain" springs to mind. What we missed in the movie is the WOP is not an instrument of torture, but a simple mill-wheel, an essential part of civilisation.

The Guardian's always good for a chuckle anyway.

In Utah USA, there's a local state currency called "goldbacks". A law was passed in 2011 making it legal tender in Utah, so shops etc have to accept it. Gold leaf notes in a polymer laminate - most gorgeous looking currency ever. Comes in denominations of thousands of an ounce, which roughly corrospond to $5, $20 etc...

All the young ones are at tree planting.

Personally I find "should" can be a trigger or underlying cause of depression. The burden of "duties not done" can really wear down one's satisfaction with oneself and life.... One strategy that works for me is to not give a ****************. Literally, just look at the falling apart shed or whatever, and stop caring (don't do this with motor vehicles in current use). Interested to hear if you ever try the mushroom therapy, what the results are. I heard if you get down on your hands and knees and graze the mushrooms direct from the ground, without "picking" them, then they're not illegal. Maybe try one mushroom for starters and see what happens.... I've experimented with them in my youth, a few times.. no interest anymore though. Nothing to be afraid of, if you go easy.

They should catch the male deer and squirrels and give them vasectomies.

We did that once. Mixture of peat moss and horse manure, in bags, with salt on top. Raked it into the lawn... Few months later the lawn was growing huge breakfast mushrooms. Grew them for a couple of years before they died out.

Just had a feed of shiitake mushrooms. Really nice. There's a story behind them.... A few years back some neighbors got into mushroom farming on a small commercial scale. I did some work for said neighbors, lopped some branches off an oak, and they kept the branch logs for growing mushrooms. Mycelium pegs etc. The were growing oysters mostly, indoors on loose substrate, but wanted to try log piles as well.... Anyway, the mushroom business eventually folded due to outside factors. I was there today, helping to move some furniture, and was given some shiitakes from the log stack. They were still fruiting several years later.... Just wondering if anyone here grows for themselves? As tree people we are in uniquely good position to aquire fresh oak logs, which is apparently what you need for shiitake. Fresher the better, they say you should inoculate the logs the same day they are cut from the tree.

What if you shake the container before use? Does that mix the additives back in suspension?

Missed that. Yeah, at one gallon a year Aspen is the way to go, no question. Even three gallons a year. Cheap insurance.