{"id":5387,"date":"2019-03-26T09:45:02","date_gmt":"2019-03-26T13:45:02","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/kneedeepinit.com\/?p=5387"},"modified":"2019-09-01T11:14:26","modified_gmt":"2019-09-01T15:14:26","slug":"whats-that-stash-for-anyway","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/kneedeepinit.com\/whats-that-stash-for-anyway\/","title":{"rendered":"What’s That Stash For Anyway?"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

If you’ve followed this blog for a while, you know we put together a hurricane stash<\/a> last summer, with the plan to use up the old and replenish it each season. It’s island hoarding, and there’s a really solid reason for doing it. Even though we aren’t big on having a lot of stuff<\/a>, we’re completely fine with this. Like our solar backup power system<\/a>, it gives us one less thing to worry about.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Since the 2018 hurricane season passed, we’ve been whittling away at our hurricane stash, using up the more perishable things like UHT milk<\/a>, cookies (nice combo there), pancake mix, fruit bars, the sort of things that are only good for months, not years. We also had cans and jars of things that were going to expire in the next year, like fruit, jelly, tomato sauce, so we ate those. BTW, we had canned mangoes in the stash, which we thought would be a nice treat after a storm. We were wrong, so wrong!, those things were like some strange candy-like goo marinated in toxic chemicals. So they are gone now, so gone! – this season we’ll replace them with something actually edible.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

We also lost a bunch of oats from what we think was a leaky soda bottle. All we know is that three large cartons of dried oats were moldy and although they were dry when we found them, they were in close proximity to a soda bottle that had gone flat (but since it was still “full” it was hard to prove). Anyway, the horses down at the baseball field got some slightly old oats for a treat that day. We also drank down our hurricane beer stash, but I always keep restocking it, you know, in case of emergency like hot weather or if we have to go to the beach.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

I went and checked the big stash the other day and told Deb it sure looked like we’ve done a good job of using it up, there wasn’t much left! She told me I ought to really keep her around, reminding me that most of it is under the bed. If for some strange reason she goes first, I’m obviously going to starve to death shortly thereafter! We also discovered, much to our surprise, that this isn’t really a hurricane stash. I should say that it isn’t only a hurricane stash.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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And there’s a lot more where that came from!<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

In way of explanation, let’s just start by saying that in Puerto Rico, sometimes things don’t work. Those things could be power, or water (the nectar of life), or maybe cell service or the Internet. This is a place with 3 million people who expect to live in the modern world yet are also used to the basic necessities disappearing on a moment’s notice. From that point of reference, now go over to a remote island, still part of Puerto Rico, but accessible only by ferry boat or small plane. At this point I’ll note that the small islanders feel like they get only lip service from the mainland PR government machine. The reason is that they often only get lip service from the mainland PR government machine! <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Exhibit A is the ferry boat system, which is run by a public entity called ATM (Autoridad de Transporte Mar\u00edtimo). As great as it is living in Vieques or Culebra, the ferry system wins the prize for the worst part of island living (which is why we avoid it). In this system, residents of the islands rightfully get priority because they use the ferry to go to jobs, doctor appointments, and other important functions of life. This ferry system is the “road” to and from the small islands and is a critical function of small island life.<\/p>\n\n\n\n