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Right now I am a little blah with how the blog is going, it is sort of in a rut. Nobody likes to say things like that but it is true. Part of that is my survivalist/ preparation efforts are sort of in a rut. Maybe a rut isn’t the best way to put it but I can’t think of a better one. To some degree this is a product of my hard work. I have knocked out all of the ‘low hanging fruit’ of stashing a decent amount of food, water purification, buying some guns n ammo, etc. I’ve even hit some of the middle branches with a NOD and the Honda EU2000. However the higher rungs, specifically a paid off piece of land (even a small one) with a little cabin, which are really what will take our preparedness to the next level are still elusive. I work hard and make decent money but with a 1 income household the basics, a few modest luxuries and saving about 10% for the future account for every dollar that comes in. It is honestly really frustrating for me at this point.

The situation right now is that while my efforts to better prepare in our scenario will make us more comfortable they are reaching the point of diminishing returns due to the inherent risk of A) living around people and B) the lack of redundancy which comes with a bug out location. In a true worst case scenario well before we ran out of food or fuel we would likely have serious problems in the form of hungry neighbors.

There are some possibilities floating around and maybe one will work out in the next year or so. Hopefully one of the various possible options works, we get shit on by life enough so it would be great to have the dice roll in our favor for once. I am trying hard to be optimistic without getting too excited like I did awhile back which really sucked hard when that potential option fell apart.  OK, That is enough “poor, poor pitiful me.” Onto the blog.

I have been thinking about doing a few things. These are ideas I am fairly certain would work in principle though I won’t get into the details unless folks are interested. 

Things I am thinking about doing in no particular order:
-Politely asking for some sort of voluntary donations. This is like the radio in that folks can listen for free but it is a lot more like NPR (aside from the blatantly hypsterish and arguably communist overtones) in that the due to my (work IE the job that takes care of my family) constraints I am limited in who the blog can associate with or advertise for. However I might or might not sympathize with them I simply can not openly associate with or advertise for people who like numbers between 2.9  and 3.1% or  names similar to “Matriots”, which greatly limits my readership and advertising opportunities and budget is pretty tight.

 I do not want to get into a bleging cycle at all; first because our household finances are, if not exciting, certainly stable and secondly because the idea of guilting a reader who may have a family and makes 25k a year to send me $20 every month for my internet bill, broken down car, mortgage or the excuse of the week is morally repugnant. We are not hurting for necessities in terms of money so really I could not complain very much.

-Will continue to think about it but I may ask readers who can afford it and enjoy the blog to donate some modest amount (Say between $12 and 24) of cash a year to offset costs and generally help my preparedness efforts.

-Setting up some sort of premium content type thing. This would be heavy on me sharing things that are within my personal and professional areas of expertise. It would be more A members only part of a/ the site or something. Maybe a newsletter that is published monthly for folks that subscribe. It might be a situation where folks can joint the site on a longer term deal for say 6 months or buy this months content stand alone in the form of a newsletter. I would have to figure out what sort of software/ programs are available to support either of these. It is important to note this would note take away from the content on the blog, it would just offer some high quality content to folks who want it. My rough idea of monthly price point would not exceed a fancy coffee drink or a tall draft beer at a neighborhood bar.

I would have to figure out the details but there would be some sort of a measurable (say 6 posts a month for 5 pages of content) deliverable to you but the bottom line is you would get a good bit of new quality content. I might post premium content on the blog down the road, especially if I am busy deployed or training, but it would be the exception to the rule and at least 60 days later. 

-Some sort of anthology or selected readings  from the blog. This might include old posts that are no longer available. Best of the blog type things along specific guide lines like ‘survival guns’, “self defense’, rants, etc at a nominal price of a couple bucks are what I have in mind here.

-Consulting. If you have a question(s) that goes beyond a quick email or such. Specif topics could be home defense, personal security, self defense and general contingency type planning. If you wanted me to say, do an area defense assessment/ training session, I could do that if it was within reasonable driving distance from (whatever is) my current location. If you are further away we would have to deal with maps/ google maps images and talk over the phone. Not sure how to price this but it would factor in my time and (if applicable) costs of travel. Would do my absolute best to make this very reasonable for the customer as I want you to have the advantage of my experiences. If you came to me with a general goal and budget I would do my absolute best to make it work.

- Offering the blog as a venue for sales/ barter. Say you want to sell an AK and we have a bunch of readers who might want an AK. For a nominal fee (I dunno $5 or 10) I post your ad on the main page and it gets to a couple thousand readers. Could work out good for everybody.

Those are the ideas I am mulling around right now. Please let me know what you think of them.