TAKING BACK OUR COUNTRY, ONE CITY AT A TIME

Last night the ground shook in shock: a City Council in Huntington Beach, Orange county, California, did what no other government body has done in recent decades--it took action reflected by the will of the people and repealed the plastic bag ban.

Over a year ago, four members of the HB City Council: Jill Hardy, Connie Boardman, Joe Shaw and Jim Katapodis, imposed their (Shaw's words) "progressive, personal agenda" to install an intrusive, micromanaging, unnecessary law banning plastic bags in grocery stores in HB. I blogged about the facts in some depth previously, (you can read it here) but suffice it to say that all the rhetoric about "pros" of plastic bag bans are false. The economic rationale: false. The environmental rationale: false. Forcing the people to be "good environmental activists?" False.

This past election, there were many good, solid candidates running for HB City Council on the platform of getting Big Government out of the citizens' lives, and back to doing what Government is supposed to do: infrastructure and security. Four of these people (Mike Posey, Erik Petersen, Barbara Delgleize, Billy O'Connell), joined existing councilmember Dave Sullivan and committed to putting power where it belongs--in the hands of the people

Too many have been brainwashed into thinking government is supposed to govern every aspect of our lives--evidenced by the many students from The Pegasus School who spouted false facts, opinion not backed up by full research etc. They weren't the only ones, and I'm not picking on them particularly, other than to lament that students from this particular school, which prides itself on a rigorous curriculum, evidently does not teach the skills of logic, research and debate.

In a day and age where campaign promises don't mean anything, it was refreshing to see that the four candidates-turned-city-council members actually lived up to their promise and started taking back our country and our city, one regulation at a time, straight off the bat. This was the first "real" City Council meeting, as the first one of the month in January is chiefly ceremonial--outgoing/incoming thanks and platitudes, recognitions etc.

And it is truly horrific that a government entity acting to reflect the will of the people (you know, that little part of the Declaration of Independence) is considered a bad thing (according to the many carpetbaggers who spoke in favor of keeping the ban). Many of those wanting to keep the ban didn't even want to allow the citizenry to vote on repeal. Quote "did we vote for helmets? Did we vote for cigarette bans? No, we just let our government tell us what was good for us, so why should a vote be allowed for something like a bag ban?" Endquote.

BE ALLOWED? BE ALLOWED?? BE ALLOWED???

ARE YOU KIDDING ME??? This person is my age. The decades of brainwashing it takes, and is being done in our schools, to get someone to believe that the right to vote is something that is allowed not something that is a right under our form of government. Because not allowing THE PEOPLE the right to vote is called a DICTATORSHIP and TYRANNY. Did you flunk basic civics class? Or did you just never bother to take it, because the government told you not to bother?

Thank God 10,000 patriots sounded the war cry and in November installed intelligent, freedom loving people, intent on governing with the consent of the governed, to the Huntington Beach City Council. 

Someone famous when asked why he was backing off national politics said, "because it is more effective to work at taking back our country one city at a time, one county at a time, one state at a time."

He is right. And last night--we did. One if by land, two if by sea. Patriots: the battle is on. 

Onion Preps for Free

Have I mentioned I do not do things in moderation? Why volunteer a few hours a week in Little League when you can be President and spend 80? Why speak one foreign language when you can learn and speak five? Why dry pack a sole canner's worth of vegetables and be done in two hours, when you can buy/harvest five bushels and can for 48 hours straight? Why do genealogy for an hour here or there when you can be on the hunt for 14 hours without moving?

Stuff like that. I think it comes from spending summers with my grandparents. Their place was only an half acre, but I think they probably grew food on my great grandparents' place also, which was 5 acres. I only know that my grandfather managed to can enough variety to last a year and three months, so when I think of canning or preserving, I think in terms of putting up multiple bushels worth at once, not solitary canning sessions. That tends to get me in trouble (48 hours straight.)

I provide that background so you will understand my compulsion to "put up a ton" is inherited honestly <grin.> When I stumbled across a huge deal on dehydrated onion flakes, I jumped. I've home dehydrated 50# of onions before (in a 4 tray Excalibur and a 7 tray round dehydrator....we won't talk about how long that takes. Hint: think weeks not hours.) In case you want to know: 50 pounds of onions, dehydrated, yields a #10 (gallon size) can filled, and 1 quart filled.

Yeah, that's not the same as 70 pounds of already dehydrated onion flakes. 70 pounds of already dehydrated is more like 400 pounds of fresh onions I'm guessing? It might even be more, because commercially dehydrated are all small, flat and virtually symmetrical flakes, whereas home dehydrated are more like onion dices, so home dried takes up more space.

End result: it takes a minimum of 61 quarts to dry pack 35 pounds of commercially dried onion flakes. I would have done the whole 70 pounds, but I ran out of clean canning jars.

Watch the awesomely cool video for this amazing adventure here: http://youtu.be/RJl6fU5ZqGE?list=UUcBqcPCg2yBUou3KRvOhloA

Segue:  because I'm a math nerd, I did some rough onion math. 1 small onion is the equivalent of 1 tablespoon of onion flakes. It takes five medium onions to make a cup of onion flakes. A medium to largish onion weighs one-half pound (yes I weighed it.) Based on the 61 quarts I put up, 4 cups to a quart, 35 pounds of commercially dehydrated onions should be equal to 610 pounds.

Onion math looks like this: 

20 onions per quart. (5 onions per cup x 4 cups)

20 onions x 1/2 pound each = 10 pounds of onions, dehydrated = 1 quart)

61 quarts x 10 pounds of onions = 610 pounds of onions, "wet"

That's just in one box. I bought two.

All of a sudden 610 pounds of "wet" onions for $36 (versus when I buy 50# of 'wet' onions for $11.99 and home dehydrate them) starts looking like such a bargain, it's nearly free (it comes out to about 1/2 cent per pound ICYMI.)

Ooookkkaayyy. So I should end up with over 120 quarts of dehydrated onion, or about 1200+ pounds (of wet onion.) That's a lot of onion. I'm thinking I'm probably good for a while and can cross it off my 96 ingredient list !!

Love prepping. Love seeing the jars fill up. I worried about using my beloved wide mouth canning jars for dry pack canning (I prefer re-using Classico or La Romanella brand spaghetti sauce jars: regular mouth canning lids and rings fit on these jars) so I fretted about whether I should buy more jars. My friend Wendi told me to just use up my wide mouth jars and then as I get more spaghetti sauce jars, sub them out. Duh. That's why she's the ultimate prepper, not me. Then in an ironic moment, I went to the grocery store last night intending to buy two jars of sauce for dinner. Classico was on sale for $1.79 a jar. I ended up buying 20, lol. 

Sidenote: if you know someone on food stamps who wants to be self reliant, get them buying Classico spaghetti sauce. Those jars can be used for (dry pack) canning and they can start building up food stores. But that's another blogpost.

One can always find reasons to put off prepping. At the end of the day, we need to just do it.