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“BOIL-WATER NOTICE, CITY-WIDE. NEXT 48 HOURS.”
“WATER SHUTOFF FOR UTILITY REPAIRS ON YOUR STREET.”

How many of us have seen announcements like these in the places where we live? Most of us, probably, at one time or another. Whether from the inevitable water-main breaks that happen in a city’s water system, or from natural disasters or maintenance needs or other causes, no town or city is immune to the potential for contamination or shut-off of its water system. Not even a city like mine, where I consider the utilities and public-works departments to be highly competent.

In my city right now, the boil-water notice was announced for 48 hours starting this past Monday afternoon. A water-main break had introduced air into the system, opening the way for potential pathogens to get in.

My city’s instructions call for bringing the water to a rolling boil for 2 full minutes, as a precaution to destroy potential pathogens.

Boiling sufficient water to meet a household’s drinking needs is a bit of an effort. As a rough rule of thumb, I allow a gallon a day per person for drinking and tooth-brushing:

1. “8 x 8” (eight, eight-ounce glasses of water per day for drinking — that is a half-gallon)(in summer, in hot climates, more may be needed especially by people working outdoors)

2. Use the remaining half-gallon per person per day for cooking, brushing teeth, making ice if you choose to make ice during a boil-water notice.

Electric kettles speed up the task of boiling. And, whether it’s in an electric kettle or a pot or kettle on the stovetop, those of us living in the rich industrialized world are fortunate to have access to quick means of boiling water and cooking food.

(In countries where people have to gather firewood for this task, and countries where access to safe drinking water is an ONGOING problem rather than just a temporary glitch, you can only imagine how difficult it must be for people. More about that has been mentioned in my book and on this blog.)

But although our fossil-powered appliances make it easy, boiling water in large enough amounts to meet a household’s needs still requires significant time and care. And waiting for the water to cool down enough to drink takes time also.

And buying bottled water is expensive, as well as supporting corporations that are pumping out our aquifers and generating mountains of plastic trash. I recommend never buying or drinking storebought bottled water unless you absolutely have to. The only bottled water I drink is bottles filled from my tap.

Water shut-offs and boil-water notices can happen anytime! My recommendation is for ALL citizens to be prepared, 24-7, for a water-supply disruption. Here are my suggestions:

• My NUMBER ONE easiest and cheapest suggestion, and my own number-one go-to!!! If you do NOTHING else, do this!!! Keep drinking water on hand at all times, stored in bottles such as large glass jugs, used wine-bottles, stainless-steel water bottles, etc. that you fill from your tap. Also for this purpose you can fill the large jugs that are used for water coolers; they hold 5 or 6 gallons. To prevent growth of algae (which according to my understanding is not toxic but it can be unappealing), keep this backup water stash stored in a dark location such as a closet, or cover the bottles with a towel, etc. As (I hope) you do with the canned goods in your pantry, use up the stored water periodically and refill the bottles with fresh water, to ensure you will always have fresh drinking water on hand. I always try to keep on hand a week’s supply for each fulltime resident of my household. At this moment we have 20 gallons on hand (not counting our stored rainwater which right now is at 400 gallons), which could be stretched to cover three people’s drinking and tooth-brushing needs for a week.

*Make sure all roommates/housemates and guests know where the backup drinking water is stored. Encourage your neighbors to adopt a simple drinking-water storage method as well.

*Extra Tip: If you cook vegetables in water during a boil-water notice, save the cooking water for use as a nourishing “vegetable tea” which can go toward meeting your drinking-water needs.

• More-expensive ($300ish?) suggestion but highly recommended and a great investment: Get your household a Big Berkey filter or equivalent. According to my understanding, they remove pathogens to the same degree as does boiling water. Do your own research by visiting the manufacturer website, calling them directly etc. But I personally know many people who use and trust the Berkey, and I myself trust it as well though I do not have one.

• Another more-expensive ($300ish) suggestion: Invest in a solar oven, which can be used not only for cooking food but also for pasteurizing water. My personal top choice which I have used since 2006 is the Global Sunoven, but many other brands exist and you can also build your own. Unlike a stovetop or electric kettle or wood/charcoal fire, a solar oven can be left unattended for hours or even days with no danger of fire, kettle/pot melting from being forgotten and boiled dry, etc. It’s nice to be able to walk away and attend to other chores and errands, knowing that Mr. Sun is beaming down all those fat, sunny, free photons for you pasteurizing your drinking water.

• Another higher-end measure is to collect rainwater in barrels. I use my collected rainwater for irrigation and showers, but would not hesitate to use it as backup drinking water in times of emergency (actually have done that for periods of weeks at a time as an experiment).

• Global Sunoven also sells a Water Pasteurization Indicator, WAPI ($12). This is a small, sealed, reusable tube filled with a waxy substance designed to melt when water has been heated to a sufficient combination of temperature plus duration for pasteurization (killing of pathogens) to occur.

• If you don’t have a WAPI, you can still use the duration + temperature method by using a thermometer such as a candy thermometer. The WAPI or candy thermometer method works whether you are heating water using a solar oven, stovetop, regular oven, wood cookfire, pot on your charcoal grilll, or whatever.

Temperature Plus Duration example times:
*Rolling boil 2 min
*150 degrees F (65 degrees C) 6 min

(A rolling-boil advisory is used because it gives people an easy way to see if the water is boiling, and stand there and time the two minutes. BUT, pasteurization can also be done at lower temps — you just have to allow more time!)

• SODIS: Solar Disinfection method. Put water into bottles and put it outside; UV exposure will pasteurize the water in a few hours. I once did this with raw river-water in Austin TX on a cloudy day just to test it out; I drank the water and was fine though I am not recommending that other people go to this extreme except in event of actual emergency with no alternative. But the info is good to have!! (I am looking up the time duration + sun combo info for you and will post it here)

For detailed info – visit a water pasteurization info page (see links below) or contact me directly; I have been doing household drills and teaching community classes with these methods and tools for years as part of everyday household & neighborhood preparedness.

Water is life! Keep your household and community safe with redundant water supplies and a low-tech, low-fuel pasteurization method.

Photos from my corresponding Facebook post: 1) stovetop kettle; 2) electric kettle (left); and emergency household water supply that is always on hand: tapwater stored in large glass bottles and stainless-steel bottle (right); (3 & 4) Global Sunoven being used to pasteurize drinking water at my home, which is also the headquarters of my grassroots community-servant organization Permaculture Daytona.

And, on my art page: This pretty trio of bottles decorates one corner of my office/studio-bedroom, while also serving as measuring devices that, together, contain about a one-day supply of drinking water plus a little extra for tooth-brushing.

Safety and sustainability is a community thing, and low-tech simple preparedness methods are our friend! Reliable, central city water supply is a great blessing, but supply disruptions happen even in the most well-managed systems run by the most caring and competent staff as we have in my city. Let’s all reduce our vulnerability to disruption of centralized supply systems, look out for each other and keep each other safe and healthy!! I offer talks and workshops on this and other essential topics for your congregation, neighborhood group, or other community. Any questions, please contact me anytime. I am here for you!

Added 12/19/21: Bonus fun water storage tips: Have different pretty bottles in each room. (In my bedroom I have a set of differently shaped wine & liquor bottles in shades of pale blue, to go with an oceanic theme.) Each household member could choose their own bottles to suit them. For young kids, use stainless steel or other non-shattering bottles rather than glass. Also for kids, you could turn the water storage operation into a fun practical math activity, including liter-to-ounce conversions, figuring how many 8-ounce glasses in a bottle, etc.

LINKS

• The WAPI: https://www.sunoven.com/product/water-pasteurization-indicator-wapi/

• A Summary of Water Pasteurization Techniques, paper by Dale Andreatta, Ph. D., P. E. A treasure trove of DIY info: https://sswm.info/sites/default/files/reference_attachments/ANDREATTA%202007%20A%20Summary%20of%20Water%20Pasteurization%20Techniques.pdf

• The SODIS method – info from CDC: https://www.cdc.gov/safewater/solardisinfection.html

As a child long ago, I loved fall leaves; loved how they looked on the sidewalk and how they carpeted the yards; loved how they whirled in the wind; loved their crunch underfoot. Loved their smell!

I loved them, but I also took them as an annual given.

Little did I know that I would one day come to live in a world where fallen leaves left on the sidewalks and yards would become a thing of the past — casualties of the “manicured landscaping” aesthetic. Or as I call it, BLAND-scaping, or land-SCRAPING.

An “aesthetic” that is turning the world sterile and ugly. An “aesthetic” that has people constantly expending labor and fossil fuels in a compulsive effort to “tidy up” the entire great outdoors as if it were their own living-room carpet! A “cleanup” compulsion that is dirtying our air and our waterways; destroying our peace and quiet; depriving us of curves and softness that would buffer the relentless hard straight-edges of asphalt and concrete; killing our leisure time; destroying the magic of the seasons.

Oh, and by the way, killing biodiversity and destroying the entire frickin’ biosphere. But, for purposes of this post, I’ll keep it simple and just stick with the beauty aspect.

Oh sure, we raked leaves back then. But we also always seemed to leave enough of them that sights like this were a defining visual of the fall season.

Today, in my seaside neighborhood in Daytona Beach, Florida, I came upon this magnificent sight. A SIDEWALK WITH FALL LEAVES LEFT IN PLACE!!!

WOW! I could not have been more surprised and delighted if I had encountered a carpet of rose-petals! I will never take the beauty of fallen leaves for granted again.

You can see photos by visiting the corresponding post on my DEEP GREEN Facebook page.

Photos 1 & 2: sidewalk in my neighborhood today when I was walking to the mini mart.

Photos 3 & 4: Micanopy Cemetery (Micanopy, FL), carpeted with fallen live-oak leaves. Feel the soft quiet beauty. (These photos I screenshot off of Google search results; these photos are by Ben Prepelka. I googled Ben Prepelka just now and found that he has a website where you can see more of his work and order prints. https://scenicusa.pixels.com )

Got a favorite fallen leaf story or image? Please share in the comments on the Facebook post if you like!

Any of you folks with a blog ever receive these emails from random people/websites? I used to find them annoying but have devised a happy new way of responding! This is about the fifth or sixth time now that I have responded in similar manner to such an email.

Who knows, maybe someday someone will take me up on it and pony up some cash! In the meantime, I feel I am finally standing up and defending my honor <wink>. Random Blog-groupie spammers, make an honest woman of me or begone! <gleeful laughter> #CrossMyPalmWithSilver

The letter

2021/12/14 12:14、Helen —- <last name left out as a courtesy; email addy and URL left out to avoid giving free publicity to random stranger asking me to link her content for free>

Dear Jenny,

Just following up one last time to make sure we don’t get missed in your inbox.

Is there anything preventing you from citing our guide to streaming services here on your page your page your page at Jenny Nazak?

I’m always interested in actionable feedback so please feel free to be candid.

Best wishes,

Helen
Helen —–
Outreach Manager

Don’t want emails from us anymore? Reply to this email with the word “UNSUBSCRIBE” in the subject line.
Incognito Mode LLC, 1013 Centre Road, Suite 403S, Wilmington, New Castle, Delaware, 19805, United States

My reply:

Dear Helen,

My current rate for advertising on my blog (I categorize link-sharing as a form of advertising) is $100 per week.

If my asking you to pay for a presence on my site sounds audacious to you, consider this: You were drawn to my blog for some reason! You found me, and you somehow find value in the idea of being mentioned on my site.

If this interests you, I can accept payment by PayPal at this email address, or I can take your credit-card number over the phone. (I can accept Zelle and CashApp too, but for security reasons I don’t make those available to strangers over the internet unless we have a realtime phone conversation first.)

Thank you for your persistent interest in my blog. I must say I have worked hard to build it thus far, and I plan to keep up my hard work, as I keep hearing from readers that it is making a difference in their lives.

Happy Holidays and all the best to you!

Jenny Nazak
DEEP GREEN book & blog
www.jennynazak.com

Itty bitty ZW project success!! I needed additional space to hang posters, cards, etc. in my adorable tiny bedroom/studio/office. My cabinets are not magnetic.

And my walls are made of impenetrable stuff that you can’t drive a nail or screw into (without masonry bit, power drill and other stuff I did not want to buy).

So … Awhile back I hit upon the idea of taking the tops of steel cans (from used-up cans of veggies — also the bottoms from Pringles potato chip tubes), mounting them onto the cabinet doors (by punching 2 holes in them and screwing them onto the cabinet w short screws), and then using a magnet to hold the desired paper or fabric object in place. Today I finally got around to it! Am loving my functional extra “wall space”!

Sometimes an itty bitty improvement like this can bring such a huge smile to my face!

Here’s a photo of what I did.

You could also do this by screwing the steel can parts or other magnetic metal directly into the wall, if you have walls that you’re able to drive nails or screws into.

Do you love tips like this? To get other practical creative ZW tips from people all over the world, check out the Facebook group Zero Waste, Zero Judgement.

Q: HELP: My kid is majoring in digital marketing and visual media! (Or art, or English etc. — insert “major that seems unstable from a parent’s perspective” here.)

A: Oh wow!! Visual arts and digital marketing can actually be a wonderful major right now!! — among the top skillsets for communicating the urgency of world problems and helping to effect change, help people and the planet.

Spoken as someone whose supposedly “useless” English Lit major and Sociology minor, and psych & marketing courses, and associate’s degree in commercial art back in the 80s, have all turned out to be PERFECT and exactly what I need for my work as an activist and permaculture teacher/speaker!!

And also, ask yourself: Is there a particular subject you would rather your child study? If so, what is it and why?

Question I saw today in one of the food-forest groups: If you were given a plot of flat land (2 acres in zone 9B) to build a food forest, what would you do first?? Step 1, uno, very first plan of action.

My answer: What I would do, and what I have always advised my clients with this much land or more to do: Leave 90% (in this case 1.8 acres of it) wild and tree-covered. “Zone 5” as we say in permaculture design terminology.

Fit the house and mini orchard / food forest on 10 percent of the land — in this case 0.2 acres. Trellises, espaliered fruit trees, and other multi-functional use of vertical space, leaving most of the space for wildlife and native trees/plants.

(If the land was cleared and flattened and mowed by the previous owner already (ugh!), my condolences but all is not lost: Simply allow that 90% to revert to meadow. Assuming the land has not been doused with chemicals for years: Shrubs and trees, mainly native, will grow in succession more rapidly than you might think possible.)

Also: If the site is really dry & barren, or even just super flat and cleared/mowed, my “numero uno” step would be Bill Mollison’s advice on the first three things to do with a degraded piece of land: “Mulch it, Mulch it, Mulch it!”

The mulch can be any combo of wood chips, leaves, twigs. And even logs! All of which will break down and nourish the site and build back the soil biota. (In some permaculture design circles we refer to logs used in this manner as “nurse logs,” also known as the “poor man’s mulch”!)

I am deeply grateful to Ruth Friddle, a fellow permaculturist and fellow member of Transformative Adventures, for allowing me to run this gem as a “copy-paste guest post.” Thanks and much love to you Ruth! And, dear readers, I hope you enjoy this post as much as I do!

“Recently I listened to someone share their utter despair of the life they were experiencing: life-threatening illness, break-up of 20+years relationship. Another person shared their debilitating addiction to prescription meds and alcohol and the trickle-down effects those were having on their life. Someone else talked about the depth of loneliness and despair they were feeling from all the isolation and distancing they’ve been enduring for the past year and a half. They all said they were at rock bottom.

“The dreaded rock bottom, where all seems lost, all options gone, where everything seems to teeter on the edge of life and death. Physical pain. Mental and emotional anguish. Spiritual hell. I suspect we’ve all been to those places in varying degrees of intensity at different times in our lives. I certainly have.

“Hitting rock bottom sucks. There is no pleasure or joy in that fall, no moon-beams or unicorns as a booby prize once we’ve arrived. There is just this endless unknown that, more often than not, we fill with every worst-case scenario our thoughts can dredge up. Sometimes those scenarios playout. Sometimes they don’t. No guarantees.

“I’m not sure there are any answers, but lately, I’ve been wondering if maybe befriending the rock bottom we keep hitting might hold the relief we seek. Rocks have a lot to teach us: to listen, to be still, to wait in silence, to trust the solidity and strength the rock offers when we’re lying there, on our back, with no where to look but up.

“While hitting rock bottom is a terrifying and miserable fall, maybe rock bottom itself, is the safest place to be. Maybe being on that rock solid foundation makes everything else just clouds in the sky, coming and going. Clouds that may demand our attention but can only be wisely dealt with from the position of rock bottom. Everything is much clearer when you’re at rock bottom. You’re not lost in the clouds of thoughts, trying to figure it all out. You’re resting on that unchangeable place that allows for complete surrender because there’s no where else to go.

“However horrifying it might be to sometimes suddenly find ourselves there, I wonder….could it be that the dreaded rock bottom, once we’re there, is actually the best seat in the house?”

And my comment: Yes Ruth. My experience concurs with your observations. I hit an extreme rock bottom some years back that further turned out to be a trap-door to a cascading series of rock-bottoms. At one point when I really thought I was well and truly done for, I took a deep breath and decided to try to befriend it, and the relief came almost immediately — and always thereafter when I was willing to befriend it and learn from the rocks. It has ended up bringing me so many riches. I now know how to surf or navigate the rocks, so when it hits again as I am sure it will, I will be ready. This is one example of anti-fragility. Thank you Ruth for this deeply insightful and beautifully written post.