Adaptive Curmudgeon

My mind has been blown and I blame Sarah Hoyt! First some background. Strap in because I’m going to talk science and history. Sarah may not have phrased it that way but I’m seeing that I fell prey to the Gell-Man Amnesia effect.

Gell-Man Amnesia effect:

“Briefly stated, the Gell-Mann Amnesia effect is as follows. You open the newspaper to an article on some subject you know well. In Murray’s case, physics. In mine, show business. You read the article and see the journalist has absolutely no understanding of either the facts or the issues. Often, the article is so wrong it actually presents the story backward—reversing cause and effect. I call these the “wet streets cause rain” stories. Paper’s full of them.

In any case, you read with exasperation or amusement the multiple errors in a story, and then turn the page to national or international affairs, and read as if the rest of the newspaper was somehow more accurate about Palestine than the baloney you just read. You turn the page, and forget what you know.”
–Michael Crichton (1942-2008)

That’s for other people. I’m a clever dude. I pay attention to my sources of information. I  wouldn’t fall prey to stupid shit like that. Right? Right!?!

The Standard Narrative of Population Explosion:

Mind you, I’m painting with a broad brush here. Even so, my bullet points are about what anyone would tell you is roughly “the truth” about human population growth:

1. Human population grew incrementally about from when we were cavemen through to about 10,000 years ago. The advent of agriculture led to the pleasant effect of more humans surviving despite the accompanying curse of cities and bureaucracy. Populations slowly grew.
2. From the advent of agriculture through ancient Greece and Rome and the Middle Ages things slowly inched along and populations grew slow and steady. There were ups and downs, as one would expect, but at best it was incremental growth or an occasional die off. Occasionally there would be a big die off from something ugly like the Black Death (1347) or Genghis Kahn (1200s). In due time humans recovered from these upsets. Occasionally there would be a boost in population due improvements in farming technology such as the heavy plow (9th century medieval Europe) or good luck such as the Medieval Warm Period (950-1250). Often this paved the way for resource competition or depletion that knocked things back in future decades. (Note that a period of unusually warm weather was good for humans! Warm = good, cold = bad. I’m just sayin’.)
3. Beginning around the Industrial Revolution, the global human population went apeshit. It began to grow exponentially. This was due to mechanized agriculture (more food) and then later due to the advent of decent medicine (less infant mortality).
4. In the 1960s, everyone read The Population Bomb took a bong hit and went full retard.  Paul R. Ehrlich  predicted massive death through starvation. The cause would be overpopulation. Everyone bought it hook line and sinker. They had a group hug, invented earth day, and started bitching at everyone about recycling beer cans. This continues to this day. Meanwhile human starvation went into decline. There was less starvation than ever before in human history. This continues to this day. By now (2022), mass starvation has been virtually eliminated. This is the first time in human existence it has been so! Starvation is now limited to self-inflicted situations; usually socialist paradises (Venezuela, Stalin’s Russia, Mao’s China) or similar totalitarian hellscapes (North Korea). (Note that Ehrlich was literally the most wrong a human being could possibly get. He was wrong about the direction, timing, and amount of human death through starvation. It is literally impossible to be more wrong on that subject that Ehrlich.)
5. About the same time, Normal Borlaug, a biologist & scientist, was going full bad ass and just rocking the world on rice and grain yields. He ushered in the “green revolution” which vastly increased crop yields. Borlaug probably saved more lives that any other human in history. (As an aside, the Nobel prize used to mean something and now it doesn’t. In 1970, Borlaug got a Nobel prize for saving an estimated one billion human lives. In 2007, Al Gore got a Nobel prize for a PowerPoint presentation. In 2009, Barak Obama got a Nobel prize for breathing.)
6. It is clear that mass starvation was narrowly averted due to higher crop yields  but people have never stopped freaking out about population growth. Hippies, in particular, have never seen a fully stocked grocery store with cheap food without protesting it. Here’s a hint, if a hippie wants to meddle with the food supply, punch them in the head before you wind up starving. (Ask yourself which is more dangerous to your wellbeing: GMOs in your box of cheap plentifully available cornflakes or the Potato Famine of 1847? Hint, even if cornflakes suck, they haven’t killed about a million Irish people.)
7. Because nothing succeeds in academia like being incredibly wrong in a loud and flamboyant way; Professor Ehrlich enjoyed a long and distinguished career. He’s a Professor Emeritus of Population Studies at Stanford University. I assume he’s the inspiration for Paul Krugman, who also is never right about anything.

The standard narrative produces charts like this:

If you back off a bit on the hysterics and fiddle with the axes you’ll get charts that aren’t so scary. They tend to have a peak and gradual decline from the peak. This one is about 10 years old from Britannia. (They exist, who knew?) It shows the same basic thing as the earlier chart but on different scales.

It never occurred to me to doubt any of this. Clearly the population had grown. I’ve personally seen crops from 1970 and 2022 and the difference is absolutely amazing. Borlaug really did pull our ass out of a bad situation (with help of human ingenuity and possibly capitalism).

I’m forever frustrated by hippies who’ve latched on to death by overpopulation. They flog that shit like a Catholic priest bitching about eternal damnation due to original sin.

But it never occurred to me to doubt the actual measure of global population growth in the last century. Say, 1950 through last Monday. I just sorta’ went with it.

Sara Hoyt asked the question that surprised me in it’s obviousness. She posted EVERY GENERATION A BLAST FROM THE PAST FROM MARCH 9, 2020 and now I’m thinking too much!

“The other thing they have believed with credulous certainty is that the population figures from the UN are accurate, instead of being — at BEST — guesstimations, and accurately at worst a steaming pile of bull of excreta completely imaginary.”

Dammit!

“I’m not a hundred percent sure wh[y] people in other countries, like, say, Portugal, think that the population “count” makes any sense.  No, I’m serious. I don’t get it. Unless it is a rock bottom assumption that EVERYONE must be more organized then them. (Bizarrely it doesn’t even begin to be true.)  I know that they tend to believe our federal government has machine-like control over every aspect of civic and cultural life in the US (no.  I’m okay. Really, I’m okay. Let me have some water so I can stop laughing and type again.)

Only this illusion allows people to believe that — what is it now? 8 billion? Yeah. It’s about as accurate as climate modeling into the far future.  Computers and GIGO rule! — population count the UN puts out.”

T-rex on a pogo stick! Why have I never considered this?!?

Furthermore, I live in America. As far as I can tell, my observations fit her theories.

I’ve seen plenty of places with booming population but none where the boom is from birth. It’s is always a boom in population that arrived from somewhere else. If it wasn’t immigration (usually, but not always illegal) it was Californians (often fleeing their State with the inadvertent likelihood of replicating the same failed politics in their new home).

I’ve never personally witnessed a place in America growing in population due to Americans cranking out offspring. Sad but true. One exception: It seems like the Amish have grown a lot in Pennsylvania and Ohio and that’s probably not because of lots of Millennials chucking their cell phone to join the community. So maybe they’re the exception and more power to ’em. Even so, they’re rounding errors compared to Chicago or Miami.

Sara doesn’t give up. She has an answer to the immigration angle too. She twists the knife in my preconceived notions (Note: I added the emphasis.):

“Now, why did the west open their doors?

My guess is because our leaders have some inkling of how bad things are in terms of how many people are in the upcoming generations.  My guess is that they are becoming scared, because — get this — nonexistent people cannot have children.

As much as most people like to pretend I’m crazy when I say I think our world population is already falling (why this would be any more crazy than the UN’s baseless assertion that we’re drowning in babies, I don’t know) that’s what the actions of the government of EVERY developed country are doing.

They are in a desperate fight for resources: the biggest resource of all: PEOPLE.

The west is willing to take welfare cases and illiterate peasants, in the hopes — I would guess — that their children will be productive citizens.”

Holy shitsnacks! Forgetting the wisdom of unlimited illegal immigration, the amount and direction and trends I’ve seen in the several states I’ve lived don’t disagree with Sarah’s theories.

Don’t you just hate it when you had a notion and then realize there’s another completely reasonable theory that explains behavior just as well? I just believed the UN? Why the heck was I doing that?

I had to ask myself. Are the UN / Global population numbers for real? What do I think of my source:

• “How often has the UN been right about anything?”
• “How often are governments correct with statistics like this?”
• “If there was an error in population statistics, would the bias be to overestimate or underestimate? Which one brings more prestige, power, electoral votes, NGO funds?”

To which I answer:

• Almost never.
• Almost never.
• Always overestimate!

She’s got a point. After a lifetime of seeing government statistics and UN statistics and witnessing that they’re incredibly unreliable… just exactly why the hell would I think they’re correct this time and for this particular subject?

I’m pissed off that I hadn’t thought of this before!

I’m not the only one that thinks Sarah is onto something. Dio’s Workshop had a similar reaction to mine.

“What if, and I have no way to verify, no one does, but logic and historical precedents tell me its highly likely, that UN figures are complete bunk and Sarah’s estimate of Less than Half stated figures of world population are correct, then literally every talking point on Gorbalworming/Peak Oil/GreenEnergy will save the planet/we need to reduce the population (why if its already half of what they claim?) etc etc etc,,,  Every! Single! Point! they try to use to keep things in line is bullshit if just that number is off by half.”

Indeed.

I haven’t enough personal experience to form global opinions based exclusively on my own experience but I have traveled extensively in the USA. I know for damn sure our growth is mostly imported and not breeding. I also have been hammered relentlessly to report as much as possible to every census and head counter in creation. I live in a sparse poor farming community and at every census they’re flipping over rocks to find every last person. They sure as hell don’t check to make sure you’re telling the truth. I could claim I’ve got sixty people living in my chicken coop and they’d love it!

They’ve got a clear motivation. They want poor, they want many, they want minorities. They count every molecule that hints at it. If they find Bigfoot’s tracks they’ll count him as an underrepresented minority of large footed hominids in need of funding and next year there will be a project based on Bigfoot outreach.

Also I have a homestead and you’d be amazed how much shit the Dept. of Agriculture generates to try and fluff up farm numbers. (I’m just one guy… super small time. I’m a friggin’ rounding error. Ignoring me would make sense. Yet they’re always poking and prodding to count acres and such. (It feels like this: “Could you conceivably claim to have 100 head of cattle?” “Are you shitting me? I can barely keep up with a flock of chickens and a handful of pigs. I haven’t got time for fucking cows.” “OK, I’ll check the box for ‘under 100’, do you also have less than 100 zebras?” Get the fuck off my land.”)

I haven’t verified the same thing overseas. Maybe I’d think differently if I’d spent some time in Africa… or maybe not. (I did spend some time in Portugal; which is Sarah’s home. I thought Portugal was growing fast fast fast not unlike an American suburb. But I didn’t see lots of children and large families. I have no idea what the immigration of the time was or where the need to build fast food joints and malls was coming from. I’ll defer to Sarah about her home country.)

Here’s the deal. Sarah’s theories, that we’re already past a peak in population and sliding down the backside, wouldn’t differ from my personal observations. It’s also my experience that the UN has been wrong about anything it says since Woodrow Wilson created the damn idea. The US government data is about as reliable as you’d expect. (Does anyone buy US government estimates of inflation anymore?) Nor does the US have a great track record of intellectual competency. Did they predict the collapse of USSR? Did they manage the budget without massive debts? Heck, how often does the presidential election appear squeaky clean?

So, I’ve had a simple basic illusion shattered today. I’m pondering how weird that makes me compared to everyone else who still buys standard narrative and how dumb that made me in the past. How’s your day going.

Elon Musk just bought Twitter. Pending the inevitable legal wrangling the dude will own it, lock, stock, and barrel. Since everyone is apparently required to have an opinion, I’ll offer mine.

Bwa ha ha ha ha ha ha ha….

Now don’t get me wrong, for some people this is a big deal. The thought that Elon Musk will own Twitter is simply terrifying to them. Thus, I offer my sympath… Bwa ha ha ha… I just can’t say it with a straight face. I have absolutely no sympathy. Hate Musk? Build your own media outlet. Can’t do that? Learn to code bitches!

I don’t give a fuck about anything that ever happened on Twitter. It’s the land of woke bullshit and is (as far as I can tell) irredeemable. I don’t care if Elon reforms it, rebuilds it, improves it, or takes a dump on it.

Any forum that cancels a sitting president and not Isis has gone past the batshit event horizon. I’d no more expect reason from its fans than I’d expect a carrot to understand geometry.

Their misery is self-selected, self-inflicted, and pretty much imaginary. Which really means it’s hilarious. “Oh no, I won’t be able to have a social media outlet that carefully eliminates all people with whom I disagree!” Really? What kind of adult thinks like that?

Anyone who’s desperately invested in a particular form of Twitter is a person who’s utterly irrelevant. The silver lining is this; maybe a few of the lost ones will come to their senses. This is their best chance to set down the keyboard, let go of the tactical Twinkie, lever their ass out of their basement, and go for a walk. Walk… outdoors. Rejoin reality. Maybe get a real job, or at least plant a garden. As my grandmother often said; “It’s good for what ails ya!”

The map isn’t the terrain. The finger isn’t the moon. Twitter isn’t even remotely relevant to a life well lived. It’s a place where dumb people say snarky things to manipulate dumber people.

We all knew that years ago. I don’t have a Twitter account. I never did. Most Americans don’t have a Twitter account. Because we’re not fuckin’ idiots.

Twitter started pointless and became destructive. Any concept constrained within Twitter’s specifications and censorship is shallow, oversimplified, without nuance, and… lets be honest here… retarded.

Twitter was built from the ground up to be the home planet of confirmation bias. A small herd of people telling each other the bullshit they wish was true in the hopes that a large thundering mass of dumbasses will follow them off the cliff. The fact that large thundering herds of dumbasses mainlined bullshit straight to their cerebral cortex, like a hive mind of clueless bots, is not news to anyone who’s paying attention. If you’ve read history, experienced college, or interacted with the purple haired harpy at the Karen convention, you already knew all about it.

The Twitterari claim superiority to us unwashed masses but it’s a claim without substance.  A bluff propagated by human marshmallows.

Great swaths of humanity are immune to their crap. They get information in a better form than a pre-digested woke-paste regurgitated by a big blue momma-bird and puked down our neck. We have depth. We have reason. We have experiences, skills, knowledge, and (this is important) humanity. We engage with the actual universe in which we live. Crucially, we observe results rather than getting in a lather about intentions. We know what “unexpected consequences” means because we care about consequences. We build stuff, fix things, manage our own affairs, and many of us even do silly things like read books.

The left is losing its shit as Elon strolls up just one hill in their mountain range of stupid. They’ve a plethora of options to stroke their needy egos. That should be sufficient. Yet they freak out at the challenge to a single one of their treasured pacifiers? The woke control damn near every form of social media in creation, along with just about every institution from the Church to the the Military to the Press to Netflix… all of which degrade under their childish mismanagement. They still flip their shit over a single source of external validation! How brittle can you get? Apparently that brittle.

On a more thoughtful level, the Z-Man weighs in:

“Gab has been up and running since 2016 and it offers what conservatives claim they want in a platform. Even better, it is free from the deranged lunatics that have ruined other platforms. Conservatives dismiss it because they say it is an echo chamber, by which they mean it lacks the people they claim to hate. They avoid alternatives to Twitter because they want to beg lefty for forgiveness and those platforms do not provide it.”

Remember when I said I didn’t have a Twitter account? I do have a Gab account (not in my blog’s name). There’s plenty of bullshit on Gab too but it’s not a relentless crap tornado.  With a little less censorship, I get a lighthearted mix of opinions (kooks and thoughtful alike). Plus a bit of humor. Some good, some bad, as with all human things. It’s better than Twitter which is singularly inhuman. Twitter demands groveling (as Z-Man wisely describes) as part of its experience of miserable joyless Kafkaesque woke bludgeoning.

The other good news is that I’m absolutely loving the spectacle of feces flinging monkeys going into apoplectic fits. They’re raging over the slightest risk to their little kindergarten-level sandbox. There are chihuahuas on meth who are less frantic than Twitter spastics. Who knows, a few might learn from this. They could pull out of the dipshit spiral and become more interesting people? Nah… if they had that level of self awareness, they wouldn’t care about Twitter in the first place.

Of course Babylon Bee is spot on. Plus the ‘net is awash in delightful memes. Enjoy them! Having survived Biden’s winter of death, we could use a good laugh.

Take it away NPC:

Robert Reich had something to say; which is to say Mr. Reich said something stupid. He’s the only man on planet earth with a worse track record of being correct than that galactic dipshit Paul Krugman. If Reich says it, it’s dumb. Lay your wisdom on me Rob:

Now that the bludgeon is in the other hand, the woke are suddenly less happy with bludgeons. Of course, nothing will come of it but Captain Circle Back has mentioned a baby step in the right direction. Tell me about misinformation sweetheart! You know I like it when you talk dirty:

You know… this is just one of dozens of bright signs of life out there. The last 15 months… the last 5 years… the last… whatever unit of time you prefer to call it, has had lots of disappointments. Sometimes it felt unbearably dark. The center cannot hold. The ratchet tightens. The flame smolders and starts to go out. Wisdom ebbs and witch hunters rise. Society re-enacts failures of other eras. Mobs run amok. They persecute the innocent and build pedestals for the demented. They destroy without building and hate without healing. They eat the seed corn and salt the fields.

But the story isn’t over yet. It’s never truly over. And it isn’t all dark. There is hope. Hope feels like it’s growing. Elon doesn’t mean shit, but the woke going into spasms over such a minor tribulation tells us they’re already hollow. Their monster is a construct. It is without substance and lacks persistence. It is a house of cards. The world can’t bow in submission. It’s not made that way. Even if it wished to, the world cannot remake itself in the service of… nullity.

That which cannot continue, won’t. The woke got every fucking thing they want. More or less complete control everywhere; not just nationally but across Western Civilization. And they’re miserable. They seated a meat puppet, the economy corrodes, they can’t even keep Disney from self immolation. We didn’t push them off the ledge, they jumped. We might as well enjoy the show.

Once in a while shit works out!

A couple weeks ago I wrote Camping Gear Discussion: Restoring Old Friends And Buying Their New Counterparts and followed up with Camping Gear Discussion: Photos & Testing. People get into camp stoves. I even induced Filthie to start a poll.

All this because I was overthinking choices about and subsequently pleased as a peach with my new camp stove:

Ain’t she a beauty? (Yes, I use “ain’t” as a legit word… I can do that because I know it makes me sound like an illiterate troglodyte dipshit and am doing so ironically. That’s how I roll! What bothers me is that my spell checker corrects my placement of the apostrophe in a word that’s, in my humble opinion, not a word. My software simply accepts shit like that! This is like correcting my use of irregardless or former President Bush Jr. asking “is our children learning”. What a dumb world in which we live! Don’t you feel it too? Is it any wonder one of the more popular Squirrels characters is deadly grammarian Edna Kampsett? Spoiler alert, Edna is also known as “The Inspector” and will have another role in due time. Alas, I digress.)

The stove works great and I’ve been randomly brewing coffee in the house with it. Note: using a camp stove in a house is officially a thing that no sane person would recommend. I certainly don’t encourage you to play with fire on your kitchen table. I’m just saying I do it. Just for the record, the ensuing coffee is delicious!

I also whipped up one of these: Jiffy Pop! What a blast from the past! I’ve got an air popper like a civilized human being, but sometimes it’s fun to relive old joys. (Warning, the link goes to a case!  Don’t buy a case unless you want a case. I bought mine locally, not via Amazon.)

I had been planning to build a carry case for the camp stove out of sewer pipe. (Calm down, I’d buy new pipe at the hardware store!) Unfortunately, the stove won’t fit into a perfectly cylindrical object like you’d expect. The pressure pump sticks out on one side. I curse the asymmetry of it!

So I went on E-bay looking for a padded bag to hold for the Coleman 533. (I still have the padded bag for my Coleman 400 and it’s in decent shape. Not bad for a device that’s older than the Millennials that are taking over from Boomers as Gen X like me get skipped over… not that I’m bitter. Oh, did that come out in my outside voice? Whoops.) What I’m saying is that I have camping gear that’s older than the median living human and some of it works fine. There’s also a squarish plastic case that Coleman made back in the day but I’ve got one for my old lantern and I’m unimpressed with the design.

I found a padded bag made by Coleman and fitted to the model stove I have. I clicked on it and the price was $33. Are. You. Fucking. Kidding. Me?

$33 for a sewn bag? E-bay can kiss my ass.

I decided to search elsewhere. Somewhere in the bowels of the internet I got a hint. I tested it out and holy shit it’s awesome! I went to a local store and bought one of these. (Warning, the Amazon link goes to a six pack. Unless you have a half dozen camp stoves or really like Folgers, just buy one. Also I get a tiny kickback every time someone buys from an Amazon link on my blog, now you’ve been warned. Up next, blipverts.)

For reasons known only to the intelligence which created the universe, the “grab handle” on a 30.5 ounce plastic Folgers coffee container are the exact right size to counteract the asymmetry of the pressure pump on an otherwise round device. The height is more or less perfect too. The stove fits so incredibly perfectly that I just can’t get over it.

Just look at it!

If I sat down with a micrometer and attempted to 3d print a better container, I doubt I could do it! It’s a snug fit. Not too tight, not too loose.

The lid is (sadly) just friction fit, bit it fits on just right. There’s very little wasted space. With the lid on, it’s more or less waterproof (certainly just fine for a non-sensitive camp stove). Because it fits snugly, the stove doesn’t rattle around loosely. It’s a match made in heaven. Speaking of which, there’ just enough room in there for a small pack of matches or a small ferro rod sparker. Nice!

It’s not backpacking gear. The stove is a smidge portly and heavy, but it’s pretty good. I’d feel comfortable letting the Folgers protected stove roll around in the truck or sit on a shelf in the garage.

I paid under $9. Also, it came with 39 ounces of free… um… coffee. I suppose, if I were the zombie apocalypse, I could get over my coffee snobbery and actually brew Folgers. (Right now the coffee is in a plastic bag in the freezer and looks exactly like I’m trying to hide a package of cocaine from drug sniffing dogs. Is that a thing or did I just see that in a movie once?)

Anyway, if you ever see a big plastic can of Folgers on the tailgate of a Dodge at a campsite (or in the vicinity of a little Yamaha dirt bike), that’s me.

Hat tip to Behind the Black.

I had succeeded! I had a smoky little fire that was just barely keeping the winter chill at bay. I had a barn cat happily purring on my lap and my dog’s grave nearby. I’d started a fire with flint and steel in darned near the worst of conditions. Good for me!

Even so, I felt alone. The sun set and I gathered another armload of firewood. It started getting chilly.

I am not a social person but humans are meant to be together. I began to miss my dog. My jacket began to freeze to the cold bench where I sat.

In general, I think cell phones are evil and addictive but I used mine to take a photo of the fire and text it to an old camping buddy. “Started fire with flint and steel. I’m as smart as and also smell like a Neanderthal!”

The signal went out the aether and the cat fell asleep. I didn’t expect to hear back. Like most men, we talk in intervals of months. I sat in the gloom not 100 yards from my house and relaxed. Slowly the fire did it’s magic and I warmed up. So did my soul. I did indeed feel better.

Then the phone rang. It was my old camping buddy. He was giddy with happiness. Certain things in his life which had been dire (and don’t belong in a blog written by me) had resolved! In fact, he was bubbly. I was aware he’d been slogging through the shit sandwich of hard times but I didn’t know it had worked out so well. I was delighted at the news.

We talked a few minutes and then he hung up. My mood had brightened considerably. His good fortune really made me happy! By now it was dark. The fire had died down and I kicked some snow over the ashes to put it out. Yes, I leave campfire ashes in my lawn. Don’t you? Why not?

The cat lounged near the heat of the fire and I said goodbye to my dead dog. I had a warm house to go to with happy people there too.

That was my Easter. How was yours?

To start a fire with nothing but flint and steel in these conditions might be impossible. Yeah yeah… I know. Y’all watched *Bear Grills or some fucknut on video start a fire inside a waterfall during pouring rain. Just because he did it doesn’t mean you can do it; nor I. (*Full disclosure, I’ve never seen a Bear Grylls show and I had to Google it just to find out I’d spelled his name wrong. Maybe his show is a fine and informative thing. How would I know?)

Conditions were bad. The weather has been not just miserable but almost maliciously so. The deep snowpack has partially melted (much to the relief of big game), but then a blizzard dumped a foot of wet snow on top of the half melted drifts. Then a day’s hard persistent rain turned everything into slurry. Then more snow fell on top. The ground isn’t frozen and it isn’t thawed. The forest is a basket case of mixed layers of wet dripping half-measures.

Perhaps you want to rattle off a thousand bits of tinder and material that could pave the way to success? I was having none of it. Like anyone else, I have a thousand methods of starting a fire. I left them all at the house. I intended to use as little knowledge and preparation as possible.

Having stepped out of the house, my brain instantly listed off some likely tinder locations. “This tree I remember at location X will surely have some…” Nope… I walked in the opposite direction.

As I walked, I chuckled that my “anatomically modern” brain was screaming out memorized locations of various resources. We really are meant to be predators.

It was bone chilling wet. Only about 20 degrees but windy and wet so it felt colder. Snow was lightly falling. I assumed I couldn’t do this. I’d unwisely set out not long before sunset.

I took off my gloves and started touching things. This tree bark? That thin piece of exposed cambium? Was it dry? Was it soft and fibrous? I took out a knife and poked here and prodded there. I found a little chunk of pitch. Score! Pitch won’t light easily but once it’s lit it’ll burn like uranium. I tried to brush ice off my find but that didn’t work. I got my knife all messy cutting the ice off. Now I had a dirty knife and a pea sized glob of potential energy.

Finding pencil sized twigs (and smaller) that were dry wasn’t hard. It almost never is. You just have to know where to look. For a match lit fire, I was set. I wasn’t going to use a match.

When you start a fire with a flint and steel you need very fine tinder. Much finer than branches and twigs. It’s called a “bird’s nest”. Or at least that’s what I’ve read. I’ve never had an in-person discussion of how to start a fire with iron age methods. Have you? If so, where the heck do you guys hang out and can I come? I’ll bring beer!

Anyway, I expected a “bird’s nest” to be the insurmountable challenge. Everything was soaked and thin, fine, materials are usually soaked more than other things.

I stashed my kindling and precious pitch glob back on my lawn. Then I wandered about looking for fine dry tinder. To my surprise it wasn’t too hard to find. You just have to look. Take off your gloves and run this plant or that through your hand. Some plants retain water. Some shed it. If I were a botanist I’d know the species of plant, but I don’t. All I know is that one particular species of plant was pretty dry. Well actually 99% of it was mashed to the ground in a wet mess. But 1% of the stems stood tall. On those stems were leaves. The stems were ice encrusted but the leaves were long dead and surprisingly dry. They were broad-leaved and nothing special. It’s what I’d call “grass”. Who knows the details?

So it came to this, some shit that should have been bailed in a hay field wasn’t. Most material of that sort was mashed into the snowpack, except some that wasn’t. The thick stems were of no use but the leaves were fine. I’d planned on gathering moss but I found grass. Go figure.

By now my fingers were froze. I headed back to my pile of kindling. I’d gathered a much smaller “bird’s nest” than intended. I fluffed it up in my hands, set it down, and the wind blew it away. Shit!

So I repeated the process and glanced at the sky. I was running low on time. The sun was invisible behind snow clouds but it was obviously approaching the horizon. There’s a reason I do these things as “practice” instead of “mission critical”.

I set down my second bird’s nest on a dry spot and fumbled with the flint and steel. My barn cat showed up and pushed the bird’s nest onto the ground… because what else would a cat do? I shooed it away and rescued the tinder which, fortunately, had fallen on ice (which is dry-ish) instead of a mud puddle made by my boots. Then I dropped the steel into the mud puddle.

Getting steel wet is no big deal, I wiped it off and got to work. I got a couple sparks but juggling the flint and steel and the glob of pitch wasn’t working. I think the ignition temperature of pitch is too high. I wimped out and grabbed a speck of char cloth. Char cloth is a sort of flat delicate charcoal made of linen. I plan to experiment with making some out of old denim jeans when I get around to it. It’s delicate stuff and my piece had frayed to a chunk much smaller than a dime. It didn’t work and it wound up blown to the wind. Frustrated with my modern human weakness, I grabbed a bigger piece, about the size of a small postage stamp.

Within three or for attempts I’d… cracked off a piece of my flint. Whoops.

In case you’re wondering, flint is less a geologic term for a certain kind of mineral/rock than a word that means “really hard”. To me, “flint” is “anything hard enough to bang a spark off steel”. I’m sure a geologist would disagree, but there was no geologist to consult. Just me and my pain in the ass barn cat.

This particular hunk of flint was just quartz. I scanned my predator memory and realized there were no quartz rocks within the immediate vicinity. I was in a sedimentary area. But I still had some rock left. I banged it a bit to reshape it and started again.

This time I got a spark to hit the char cloth. Char cloth is impressive stuff, it catches easily… all you need is a single tiny independent spark. No more than a speck will get it to smolder. It won’t burn with flame but when it smolders it’s hot. I wrapped it and the glob of pitch in the bird’s nest and blew. Nothing happened and then the pitch dropped out into the snow. Whoops. But I held the bird’s nest steady. I know better than to give up on lit char cloth. I shuffled the materials a bit and smelled a wisp of smoke. Uncertain where it was coming from I shifted the bird’s nest more and briefly let the snowy breeze blow air into the whole ball. That helped!

Thirty seconds later I had it smoking quite a bit. Then it burst into flame. I’d been undisciplined and hadn’t assembled the fire yet. I scrambled to add twigs, caught it just in time, and built from there.

I have a stone bench near where my dog is buried. I shifted the whole burning mess near the bench and sat down. I had a cat in my lap within seconds. I built the little fire and it was very warm. In the snow and the breeze it had a much bigger influence than it’s true size. I added more fuel and began to relax.

Wrap-up in part 3 is coming soon…

Where do I start today’s story? The best I can guess is last year…

Easter weekend fell seven months after a president that *unquestionably won more votes than any other candidate in history declared his “patience had run out”. (*It is literally unquestionable in that it’s socially discouraged to articulate the question and in 2022 the distance from social pressure to legal force is only a matter of power, not law.)

My continued existence was an affront to his sensibilities. I would be corrected. To that purpose he would wield the full force of the State. It was the first time an American president implied that I, an American citizen, only exist within the bounds a president is willing to “tolerate”. I see myself as a citizen, he reduced me to “subject” or “civilian” or perhaps “ward”, I took that personally.

After some faffing about I got my shit together. God told me to stand firm. I mustered the minimal courage to do that simple task. No more fence sitting, it was time to nut up or shut up. Moreover, who was I to bitch? Men have been called to die in battle, I was called to jeopardize my salary and face paperwork hassles. Hardly, the worst of fates. If that’s all to be asked of me, I’m lucky.

I’m happy there was a moment in time when it all became clear. As far as I’m concerned, if a needle forced into my vein doesn’t cross the line, there is no line. There is always a point when one more submission is too many. How many poor sinners have seen that moment in the rear view mirror? Incidentally, if you wanted the vaccine, that’s completely fine with me. Your choices are yours, mine are mine. My decision has no bearing on yours. Such self-reflection is probably how I caught the eye of Modor and why “tolerance” for me had expired.

Now it’s half a year later and I’m still standing. I’ve neither been fired nor died. The president who lacked patience with me has failed to drive me to penury and his imagined terror didn’t lead to my death. He’s moved on to other concerns; among them fomenting war. Good luck with that.

What’s next on my part? Forgiveness? Wow, talk about a challenge! To take a punch to the face is so much easier than to forgive the bully that threw the punch. Lets not try to imagine it in some candy coated way, “bullying” is what it was.

Even if I can’t forgive right now, with some recovery I can work towards that plateau. It will soon be spring and that will help. I can’t wait to see flowers and tree buds. It will come. I know it. I will see the earth renew and I will go out there and feel young and light like a yearling fawn. If a sick society fades in its deathbed, it’ll have to stay inside with the shades drawn and imaginary fears locking the door. It’ll suffer or thrive without me. I did not cause decline and I will not shoulder the burden of its self inflicted misery.

Before spring rejuvenates me I’ve got to ride out the last of winter. Winters come in all flavors. This wasn’t a mild one. The president cursed me to a “winter of severe illness and death for the unvaccinated — for themselves, their families and the hospitals they’ll soon overwhelm”. It was the mad cackling of a bully and of course virtually nothing he said happened, but I did have frozen pipes and a broken tractor.

So it came to Easter. I was and remain alive and fine… and just as Curmudgeonly as ever. “Winter of death”? Fuck ‘em!

What a conundrum! It was a Holy day and I cannot forgive. I am in error. I will someday forgive, but not yet. I want those fuckers to burn!

As is common in times of tribulation, I sought connection to nature. This is never a bad idea.

The best guess of science is that anatomically modern humans, a clunky phrase of great import, came on the scene 200,000 years ago. Theoretically, a smelly ape-like being some 200 millennia gone and I have the same brain. If we could cross the vast gulf of culture and language, we could sit by the campfire and talk about the things we have in common. The more we have in common, the better life I’d be living right now. We could talk about fishing. We could talk about hunting. We could talk about fire. If I met a caveman and we could get along enough to find a rapport, we’d both laugh if one of us ripped a fart. I don’t care who you are, farts are funny.

I would love to have a discussion with primitive man. It would be cathartic. My troubles would seem stupid and self inflicted to him. If I tried to piss and moan about taxes and politics it would seem retarded and unaware; the conversation would always veer back to our interactions with the lovely planet we both inhabit. Also, can you imagine the ecological knowledge he’d have at hand? He’d know more about a late spring or rabbit hunting than I’ll ever know. And what deeper knowledge of the universe would he have to share? I can barely taste the hint of the infinite, but he’d have lived it. A man who has slept under the stars knows something one who’s slept in a house doesn’t.

I grabbed a steel and some flint, stuffed it in my pocket, and went for a walk. Flint and steel puts me in the Iron Age; around 1,200 BC or so. Sorry, paleolithic man, I’m a bit tired today. I can’t go back that far. Maybe we’ll have a conversation in August, after a dry spell. Right now my brain is too weak and modern, also the forest is wet.

Stay tuned for part 2…

(This is a continuation of my earlier post. Note: I’ve included links to Amazon. If you use the links and subsequently buy shit from Amazon… no matter what it is… I get a tiny kickback. I will use it to buy whiskey and fishing lures! The kickback costs you nothing. Amazon requires me to inform you of this. I suppose they want to protect the last living being on earth who has no idea how affiliate links work. Also, if you think I’ve got a nefarious plan to manipulate my millions and millions of deeply devoted and incredibly rich readers so that I can amass funds to buy a yacht a nickel at a time, this is the proof.)

I’ve got cabin fever. I couldn’t wait for proper weather so I did a test in shitty weather, which I suppose is a much better test. In mid-test the shitty weather got immeasurably worse; because of course it did. At least I got a good cup of coffee out of it.

The first photo is the first firing of my Coleman 533 Dual Fuel stove. I don’t know how many of these are still out there but if you’re interested in getting your own, don’t dawdle!

You know it’s brand new because there’s no soot on the top. It’s scandalously clean. In this photo it isn’t even heated up yet, that’s why the flame is yellow.

A word about fuel:

For fuel I was burning “Crown brand” white gas from Walmart. I didn’t treat this fuel particular well. I got it last year for a failed test of my two old white gas devices. That means I broke the seal and used some of the can. Then left the rest of the can in a freezing garage over the winter. It seems OK.

Don’t get screwed when buying fuel. Coleman sells its brand of white gas for $11.99 a quart. That doesn’t sound too bad until you do the math and come up with a heart attack inducing $48 a gallon! Holy crap!

Walmart sells Crown brand white gas for $7.64 a gallon (or at least that’s what their web page says, I can’t remember what I paid last year). I can’t imagine there’s any difference between the two brands.

Camp stoves don’t need a lot of fuel but it adds up. Compare $48 for a gallon of Coleman brand, $7.64 for a gallon of Crown brand, versus $5 a gallon for unleaded (which the dual fuel stove can digest). Those are big differences!

(Let pause now to reflect on fuel prices and our super smart and very active president who undeniably, unquestionably, without the slightest doubt, won the highest number of votes ever recorded in America. Gasoline prices doubling during his first 15 months in office is unquestionably someone else’s fault and that’s why he’s just so darned popular.)

The stove’s packaging says that 1 gallon of white gas is the equivalent of 4.5 pounds of propane. That seems to agree with what I’ve read on-line. I’m a little sketchy on the current cost of a one pound disposable propane tanks or most anything else that I can’t personally verify. A while ago I stocked up on disposable 1 pound tanks for $4 a pop but that was before the unassailable, squeaky clean, election that had the highest vote count ever tallied. For reasons utterly unrelated to that event, I don’t think anyone will be buying propane canisters for $4 in the foreseeable future. Right now Amazon is selling camping propane at $10 each. I can’t believe $10 is the normal cost?!? That’s nuts right? For the sake of discussion, I’m going to assume $6 per one-pound tank is the reasonable price nowadays? That means $27 worth of disposable propane tanks (adjusting for one that will be only half consumed and paying $6 each) to equal $5 in unleaded or $8 of white gas bought at Walmart.

I haven’t tested with unleaded yet. It is said that white gas burns cleaner than the EPA mandated witches brew they sell at an unleaded pump. I don’t doubt it. Some folks get all whiny that using unleaded will clog up the stove and do all sorts of mayhem. This seems more “perceived wisdom” than people who’ve tried it. Others say they’ve personally used unleaded for many years and report it’s fine. Once I get the ball rolling, I intend to use unleaded exclusively. If it’s a bad idea I’ll let you know. (I’ll be prepared for more frequent cleanings.) By my math, even if unleaded nukes a generator after a few years, the replacement generator will cost vastly less than the consumption of more expensive fuel.

You can see the difference between the above photo which is not too far from operating temp and brand new below. BTW: The soot on the burner is not a problem It’s supposed to get discolored.

A propane burner’s flame is nice and blue within seconds. A liquid fuel burner takes a minute or two to warm up. The snow started blowing and that didn’t make me feel very patient. (You can see snow melting on the tank.)

Now for the test. COFFEE!

A word about percolators:

This test involved a new Stanley Percolator. Mrs. Curmudgeon heard me whining about my other camp percolator and got me this one for Christmas. She’s a keeper!

There’s a reason why I’m particular about percolators… actually there’s two. The first is that I take coffee seriously. The second is that my previous percolator was more optimized for an open fire than a stove. It is big and clunky and sooty. Also too much of a hassle for inside my hot tent. (I’ve already tested the new percolator on a wood stove inside a tent.)

On a stove there’s no smoke to mess up the shiny percolator. I’ve also tested it on a propane burner and there was no soot from that either. (Much like a house with a kitchen LP stove doesn’t soot up a frying pan.)

I have had other percolators. A pretty blue one Mrs. Curmudgeon got me sprung a leak after a few year’s use. That’s weird, but it happened. Shame because it was cool. Here’s the old blue on a generic propane burner. Pretty, but on the propane stove it was tall and wobbly!

Later I bought a stainless steel percolator. I’ve used the hell out of it. Here it is when brand new (also perched on a propane burner):

Here’s a photo of that same percolator on a campout last year. I wash the shit out of that percolator after every trip but as you can see, it gets pretty sooted up when I’m burning wood (in this case pallet wood). The big wide bottom is ideal for a fire or my folding outdoor woodstove. (Also, the lid is a little warped but it has been used hard so I can’t complain.)

The new percolator is totally unblemished but it is camping gear. It must be tested as it will be used. It was born soot free but it will not stay that way!

Here’s an important note. The Stanley percolator fits on a propane campstove but not well… it’s a little too narrow and it feels sketchy. I checked the Stanley’s fit on an MSR burner and it was the same; adequate but not great. (In case you’re wondering, I walked into a sporting goods store carrying a percolator and put it on the display model MSR to see the fit.)

To my delight the Stanley percolator fits more or less perfectly on the Coleman stove!

Here’s the virgin percolator and the brand new stove:

When camp cooking, I rub bar soap on the bottom of anything that’s going to get sooty. I do this before I cook. That way cleanup is much easier. I didn’t know if that was necessary over white gas so I didn’t do it. That was probably the correct call. There’s more soot than from propane but vastly less compared to wood. BTW: I’ve sent the percolator through the dishwasher a half dozen times already. It works great. It’s a tool not a display piece.

There’s a silicone handle cover that’s removable. The instructions say to remove the silicone piece if handle is exposed to flame. On the propane burner I think I’ve left it on but I can’t remember. On the tent’s wood stove I left it on because there was heat but no flame. On the Coleman 533 I removed it because the flames occasionally went up and around the percolator’s base.

I’m not sure how tough that handle is but I don’t want to damage it. Also, I’m extra careful that I don’t lose the handle. I’m sure Stanley would rake me over the coals for a replacement if it was even possible to source one. Here’s a picture with the silicone piece removed. I can almost smell the coffee!

It came together perfectly. The percolator is now “broken in”.

I tried to block the wind but it was a pretty lame attempt that wasn’t very successful. I guess I’ve proven that I can percolate coffee in 20 degree weather with wind blowing the flame all over the place and snow landing on everything. I don’t know how much that affects cook time but it can’t help. It wasn’t as fast as I’ve gotten used to from summertime use.

Incidentally, the coffee was excellent. I mean just plain incredible!

Successful test, but immediately after the coffee was ready it was over. I was driven back indoors by the elements. We now have an additional 3″ of snow on the ground.

I haven’t been camping much lately (because the weather is a total mess!) but I’m still optimistic about the summer. Here goes with my newest plans…

Changing Lanterns:

Last October I pondered changing some camping gear. I mentioned it as an aside in Skunked By Grouse: Motorcycle Trip: Part 2: Campsite Mechanic. Here’s what I said:

“I use a little LED area light for camping and it does the job well, but I started thinking about my antique Coleman lantern. If I’m going to get into a groove (rut?) of State Park camping, maybe a brighter light emanating from a delicate device is appropriate? Electronics are super handy and lantern mantles break. But an antique would fit my attitude, not a small concession.”

Pictured is my old Coleman single mantle lantern. It’s over 50 years old. I’m not sure where I acquired it. I think I bought it at a garage sale in Maine three decades ago but who knows?

Sadly, but not unexpectedly, it doesn’t work. This is through no fault of the lantern. I’d neglected it during several decades of prowling deeper and more inaccessible realms of nature. When you’re a zillion miles from nowhere and carried everything there on your back, heavy delicate lanterns aren’t reasonable; you reduce weight or die trying.

Now I’m reverting to earlier and more mellow ways. I’m shifting into car camping (or Dodge camping). I can now afford the weight and hassle of a lantern. If I use it I’ll be getting back in touch with an old friend.

I watched a zillion YouTube tutorials and tore the lantern to pieces (carefully). Then I ordered most of the necessary parts. While waiting for parts delivery, winter hit hard and my shop froze. I postponed the effort. Some things scream for a well ventilated, non-flammable environment that’s not the house. I don’t need the drama of fixing it at the kitchen table.

The lantern has been sitting in pieces in a cardboard box. I will get it done (glances out the window and sees it’s still snowing) but not yet.

Changing Stoves:

I also dug out my old single burner Coleman stove. It’s a Coleman Peak 1 and this bad boy is a trusted friend and companion. (Note: The photo is a random pic from the internet but they all look the same.)

I don’t know how old mine is, I’d guess it’s maybe 38 years old. (Mine is a little dirtier than this one.)

I carried the plucky critter many places and used it very hard. Alas, I neglected it too. A few decades of ultralight camping and the siren song of a JetBoil powered by butane set the plucky device back a bit. I probably last used in around 2005 or so. Unsurprisingly, it’s not working. I didn’t tear it apart because I didn’t want to mix lantern parts with stove parts.

I am 100% confident I can buy parts and fix this stove too. I will. But not yet.

Thinking About The End Of The World:

So that was the plan. I’d fix up a 50 year old lantern and a 38(?) year old stove. That would make a nice two piece ensemble for “car camping”. However, I got to thinking. If the world insists on crawling up it’s own ass, shouldn’t I do more to “prepare”?

In case you haven’t noticed, the whole world has gone to shit since 2019. Regardless of your politics, you see it. Rule of law, supply chains, society itself… it’s all seriously less stable than it was in 2019. It’s dumb to pretend it’s not happening. Waiting for a return to “normal” is a form of denial.

Both the lantern and the stove can be infinitely repaired and parts are available, but they run on white gas. Right now, white gas is readily available. It has been so all my life. It will remain readily available; right until it’s gone or rare.

Back when I used the Peak 1 more or less constantly, there was similar alternative stove that ran on white gas OR unleaded. (That was so long ago they called the stuff you put in some cars “unleaded” and it was to differentiate from “leaded” fuel you put in other cars.)

I did some research and the “dual fuel” devices are still common, liked, and readily available. NOT!

I can find endless videos and reviews of Coleman dual fuel devices but they’re mostly several years old. Coleman itself doesn’t specifically say they’ve stopped making them. Stores don’t specifically say they don’t exist. There’s no announcement by anyone that dual fuel / liquid fueled devices of this sort are “discontinued”… but good luck finding one in real life. Like sanity, they’re not officially “gone” but you can’t find them.

You’re probably laughing at me. You probably think you saw one last week at WalMart. Fine! Whatever. All I’m saying is that I looked and it was a wild goose chase.

My theory is that some lawyer somewhere decided unwashed dipshit deplorables in fly over country shouldn’t be pouring unleaded into camping gear. Not banned in writing but de facto banned in practice. (Admittedly, it’s easier to set your ass on fire with liquid fueled stoves and lanterns than gas powered ones.) My alternate theory is that the profit margin on disposable 1 pound propane bottles is too dang tasty to undercut it with liquid fuel devices?

Don’t believe me? Look around for yourself. You’ll find white gas at any WalMart but everything made by Coleman that’s stocked on the shelf runs on propane. I have nothing against propane. It is convenient and (mostly) idiot proof. In fact, I’ve got several propane burners. But that’s not what I wanted. (Nor am I interested in a two burner “suitcase style” stove which seems strangely more commonly found.) Aside from casual use and my Mr. Heater Buddy I have a desire for non-propane devices.

It became a quest. I wanted to power lighting and cooking off gasoline. I got pretty pissed off about it.

Why? Because I like gasoline!

New Toys:

It’s bullshit that a simple mature technology that had been sitting on shelves my whole life was suddenly gone. Taken away for no reason at all. The McRib of the camping world!

I looked long and hard. I searched in five states and finally found two dual fuel lanterns on a dusty forgotten shelf at the back of a Bass Pro Shop. I bought one. I considered buying both to “flip” one on e-bay but I left it in case there’s a kindred soul out there. I hope it’s found by someone like me who’ll enjoy it.

As far as I know, that’s the last time I’ll see one in a store.

It was even harder to find the stove. (I wanted one burner, not two burners.) It feels like they just aren’t made anymore. If they are, I couldn’t find one in person.

Ominously, there’s a very active market in “refurbished” and “useable” and “antique” variants of this device. A five year old used but good working one burner dual fuel Coleman stove can be sold right now for more than you paid to buy it. (In case you’re wondering, that’s a sign that both society and the economy are in decline.)

I gave up looking in person. I ordered a brand new stove from a third party supplier that was not Coleman. I assume it’s the last of some dwindling supply on a pallet in a warehouse somewhere. The seller I bought from said they had 4(!) left. I don’t know if that’s true. Maybe they’ve got a container ship full of them. YMMV.

It wasn’t cheap, but since they only recently became (“temporarily unavailable”) the premium wasn’t too bad. It was worth it to me.

So Now What:

Eventually I’ll repair both my white gas devices. They’ll be scratched up but function like new. Both will have a personal history. They served me well when I was young, I used them happily when they were new. We were parted but reunite on the other side of life’s bell curve. Given basic maintenance and the continued accessibility of parts and white gas, they should last longer than I live.

I also have two brand new white gas / unleaded devices. If it’s only a temporary thing that they were hard to find they’ll re-appear on shelves. However, it is not a good era to wait for “normal” to return and I feel like I got them just as the sun set on their era. So many things that “always will be” have ended since 2019. The world is giving you the clue! I’m happy to have picked up the two devices just before their unofficial and little noted extinction. Maybe I’m wrong and they’re fully stocked at your local K-Mart.

Not a minor thought is that they’ll run off the same fuel that runs my motorcycle. There is almost nowhere on earth where you can’t get gasoline within a day’s travel. The new devices will probably outlast me too.

I’m pleased with how it’s coming together. I like owning two of everything. I like owning equipment that should outlast me. I like stuff that can be repaired. None of the four devices are plastic wonders that will fail when Microsoft ships its next update.

I’ll enjoy them this summer. Presumably, they’ll still be working when I’m dead. Future owners will either totally ignore them because they’re plugged into the Matrix, or use them heavily as they hunker in a far less advanced future. You’ve heard the joke: “What did socialists use for light before candles? Electricity!”

These are weird times. Don’t deny what your own eyes are telling you. If you want a physical object and it seems fleeting, heed the warning of the last few years. Get it now or be prepared to live without it forever.

A Nod To The Pedantics:

You’re dying to tell me Coleman isn’t the only liquid fuel / unleaded capable game in town. I found many variants of the MSR product line. They were in stock!

Nothing wrong with those. I just wanted the old Coleman style that’s tougher and cruder. The Coleman stove feels solid; like you can wallop a bear with it.

The MSR is functional but I irrationally I prefer the look of the Coleman. My new model 533 and my beloved old 400A are shaped like a lunar lander. They’re literally from the time when humanity could build and operate lunar landers and they feel like a reminder. Even if the MSR is awesome, it looks like a water bottle with a brake line.

You can’t stop the signal: you can buy an off brand knock-off of the Coleman 533 from the internet. I’ve never seen one in person but salute them for trying. Since Coleman abandoned the market, I hope they occupy the void and eat Coleman’s lunch. The only advantage of the Coleman is parts availability. It was only a little bit more to get the real deal and 40+ years of parts floating around can’t hurt.

One last pedantic note. I know that 1 pound propane tanks can be refilled. This changes their economics from ridiculously expensive to quasi-reasonable. Refiling LP tanks is either dangerous and banned or safe and legal depending on who you ask. I will not offer an opinion on this. (So many things in modern times are regulatory “grey areas”. That’s another hint about the evolving nature of what was once called rule of law.) Regardless, refilling an LP gas canister will never be as handy as pouring liquid into a tank and hand pumping.