Hey kids, welcome to the blog! First off let me say thank you and give you a big ‘ol hug for showing up. If you happen to find yourself here because “Stone House Road” is the name of your new favourite Icelandic death metal band or something like that, this would probably be a good time to high tail it out of here. No hard feelings. Just my condolences since “Stone House Road” is a really sucky name for a death metal band.
After a great deal of consideration I have decided to start this blog for a multitude of reasons, most of which are purely selfish. To the point – I bore people. Somehow everyday conversations about things like what to make for dinner or your cat’s furball problem end up with me giving a quasi-lecture on energy depletion, food shortages and how you had better learn to can if you know what’s good for you. I’ve learned to recognize when these conversations start circling the drain, but I am always left with the feeling I could have said so much more. I figure a blog is a good way of collecting all of my thoughts and information in one neat little place, and allow me to bore people much more efficiently.
In all seriousness I have found that more and more people I know are becoming interested in learning to be more self-sufficient, whether because of philosophy or more practical reasons like looming job loss, and since I am the resident doomer in these parts I have lots of information to share. This here blog is for those people. And while I am no expert, I will share what I know and what I am learning about. If you are an expert and happen to stumble across my humble little ramblings, you will probably find this place numbingly boring and want to give me a cookie, a pat on the head and send me on my way. But I hope you’ll stick around. We could use your advice. And because I would find that incredibly cool.
So, in anticipation of all the questions you are all just dying to ask, I’ve prepared a little primer on myself. This will explain why I do things the way I do, how I have the free time to do said things, and why other things can’t possibly get done. I have prepared it in interview format because I can.
What’s your name? Daisy Sandybanks. Not buying it? Ok, fine. I pulled it from a hobbit random name generator. You seriously can’t expect me to actually identify myself. There’s weirdos out there. Like hundreds of them.
Where do you live? Again, the weirdos. The most I will say is Ontario, Canada. I will say that I live on my family’s century farm and I am the seventh generation to do so. I live here with my husband and father.
Is it a working farm? Not anymore. Dad sold the cows when I was young. Mine is the first generation not to farm here. I would like to change that.
Do you work? Yes, I have a full-time job about an hour away. I find my two hour commute to be a time of quiet solitude and reflection. I tell myself this repeatedly throughout the day.
Why “Stone House Road”? The house is stone. So is the road. Like these things, I like how parts of life here are unchanging despite the passage of time.
Do you have kids? Not that I know of.
How old are you? I’m in my mid-thirties.
Shouldn’t you get on that? (points to kid question) For Pete’s sake, don’t ever ask a woman in her mid-thirties this question. Seriously. Don’t. Ever.
Do you have cats? Why, yes, I do. Two actually. They were both rescues and smell kinda funny.
Why do you talk about your cats so much? If people can talk about their kids, I can talk about my cats. Cats do amazing things. Like, when’s the last time someone’s kids kept the rodent population in check and possibly saved us all from a potential hanta virus outbreak? Hmmmm?
Why do you talk about zombies so much? I would just like to state for the record that I was into zombies before zombies were cool. I mean I practically invented them. Ok, maybe not so much, but I’ve been using the zombie invasion as a way to describe when the proverbial poop hits the propellers for a while now. For some reason people look at you a lot less strangely when you talk about zombies instead of the end of the world as we know it. Some people would rather hear about the undead than not being able to get strawberries in January or a mani-pedi every other weekend. ‘Tis true.
Why are you so into sustainability and self-sufficiency? There are lots of reasons. I think we are living in the age of peak everything. Take a look around you. We are living on a planet of finite resources, how can we possibly keep this up? I think it’s just logic. And I think the decline has begun. Take another look around you. Everything you see was created and brought to you using resources that will not last forever. As those resources fade their price will go up, and so will the cost of everything they made possible. I don’t think the end of the world as we know it will be some cataclysmic event where everything changes in a heartbeat, I think it will be a death of a thousand cuts, or more precisely, a death by a thousand increases. I think that ordinary people will begin to find it harder and harder to just keep their heads above water, and that slowly but surely their way of live will erode. I am interested in the things that everyday folks like you and me can do to help ease the hardship of such a transition and ultimately provide us with the skills we need to live our lives. I will have plenty to say about this is future blog posts, so for the time being I will leave it at that except to say that the way of life I think we are headed for is not necessarily worse. In fact, it could be a heck of a lot more fulfilling.
So there you have it kids, the first blog post. Welcome mat has been laid out, introductions done. A little wordy, I know, but I am new at this. Stick with me and I’ll do the best I can. And if you’re still reading this and want to read more, well, you’re probably my kind of person and I look forward to what the future may have in store. Either that or you’re still trying to figure out what this has to do with death metal, in which case all I can say is: Dude. Go back to Google. Refine your search. And try some Gordie Lightfoot every now and then. I think you’ll be pleasantly surprised.
Welcome to my big bad blog and Stone House Road.
Stone House Road 