Fall 2018 update

Just got back from a three-day, marathon visit to the future site of Anarres Two.

The gravel road up the mountain was in better shape than last time. Maybe the county worked on it a little. It’s still not great, but better than it was.

The cows broke in by forcing their way through the gate, and tore the place up again. So I poured a concrete post hole with a metal pipe as an anchor for the gate post and added a bike lock, so hopefully that will keep the rascals out. The barbed-wire fence I put up last time was still in good shape. The cows leaned on my makeshift carport beams though, and the wind blew most of the cloth off the top, so it’s in a sorry state – that will be a project for my next visit.

The existing trees were still alive and I planted six more, all hardy black locust trees. I planted seedlings this time so that they wouldn’t need bracing. I hear they adapt to the wind as they grow. I watered them with the sparkling waters of the roaring Humboldt River (smiley face). The weather is much nicer in late September and is probably even nicer in early October. Clear skies and a gentle breeze, warm days, cool nights. No grasshoppers, spiders, scorpions, mormon crickets or mosquitoes. I was so busy cleaning up, planting trees and weeding the firebreak that I didn’t even have time to take pictures. I had to rent a car this time, so I was on a tight schedule.

Back in August I made an offer on the 20 acres just to the east, but I did not receive a reply. I guess that is the new social norm – no reply means ‘no’.

I thought about a possible, future, dorm-like structure. with maybe five or six small, private rooms and shared kitchen and restroom/bathing areas. A pre-fab building? One made of interlocking, rammed earth blocks? There are cool, portable machines that do that, so that you don’t have to truck in tons of concrete blocks.  A mobile home designed as worker housing? Powered by a wind and solar system. We’d probably need a barn as a work area too, for whatever it is we are going to do to generate income. Have to come up with the money for a well and then a septic system before any housing will be permitted though.

The hard part is finding other communitarian democratic socialists who are interesting in seeing this happen. I should probably advertise more, but I think letting people seek the project out filters for people who are the really interested, ideologically motivated pioneer types, which is what you need when first getting started.