5 Common (wrong) assumptions about living in the country

[CountryGent]

This guy is an idiot............./

I'll take my chances in the Country.

That said, his assertions ignore the facts that if SHTF, things change.

^. This sums it up nicely. (Alas, I'm working way too many hours to muster a lengthier response at the present.)

 

[Certaindeaf]

Thinking about that, Portland's premiere medical facility OHSU, is probably going to be a heap of Rubble blocking I-5 if/when the Cascadia Subduction takes place.
It is literally perched on that steep hillside, and strung out over 150 yards or so.

If liquifaction takes place on that hillside it's all over but the shout.

It won't. It's solid basalt up there. Liquifaction will happen on a large scale all around the lower areas in SE, NE and N Portland though.
OHSU will get messed up regardless but not as bad as down yonders

 

[The Heretic]

It won't. It's solid basalt up there. Liquifaction will happen on a large scale all around the lower areas in SE, NE and N Portland though.
OHSU will get messed up regardless but not as bad as down yonders

Good luck getting to it though

 

[No_Regerts]

One thing he is right about, at least where I live, is crime incidents in the unincorporated areas are greater in number (in number, not percentage) than in city limits. The people who built in the country during the 60s and 70s are dead. Their kids have moved on and the properties are now inhabited by less desireables or recluses who don't get to know their neighbors. Makes for the perfect scenario for all sorts of bad things.

 

[Mistman]

The way I see it is in urban areas you have masses of people all in the same boat, no infrastructure, no food or water. So all those hungry/thirsty people are going to start turning on each other for food and other resources. How many will be prepared to last more than a couple days before desperation hits? Most people in urban areas don't have the tools to 'make do'..... there's so much that guy didn't think through before making his assumptions. While some of his facts ring true rural people are more prepared for those scenarios as we already live with them. We've already learned how to 'make do'.

To much speculation, we'll just have to wait and see I guess.........

 

[The Heretic]

One thing he is right about, at least where I live, is crime incidents in the unincorporated areas are greater in number (in number, not percentage) than in city limits. The people who built in the country during the 60s and 70s are dead. Their kids have moved on and the properties are now inhabited by less desireables or recluses who don't get to know their neighbors. Makes for the perfect scenario for all sorts of bad things.

I vacillate back and forth on this because the numbers do not lie - and yet, in the years I spent on the farm and now up here on the mountain, I have personally witnessed very little crime beyond the periodic dumping of trash. I live on a private road, on a mountain, off a backroad that goes nowhere, off another backroad, off a less traveled two lane paved road that goes thru a rural area. My neighborhood with 8 families has a reputation on the mountain for responding to one prowler with rifles and other guns (this was a local peeping Tom before I moved here) and there just are not many people passing thru.

I often go about working on my 20 acres out of sight of my house, with the doors of the house and shop unlocked. In the almost 6 years I have been here only a few people have stepped foot on my property uninvited (that I know of) and those were JH Witnesses.

OTOH - when I lived in the city - there were always people trespassing almost every day - sometimes messing with my stuff, sometimes stealing my stuff. Mostly kids, but sometimes adults. My neighbor was broken into several times. I had my car broken into twice. There were also drive by shootings. Up here, any shooting is the neighbors target practicing - which is not uncommon.

I feel safer and I think my personal property is safer here. There have been times when I have forgotten to lock up my shop at night, sometimes even with the lights on and there are valuable things in there - nothing was ever touched. If I had done that in the city, I would have been cleaned out.

FerFAL can keep the city - it is not a place I want to go to today, except that I still need to make a living for another couple of years. Once I retire, I will go into a city maybe once a month, if that.

 

[joken]

I'll be 71 in a couple of months. It seems like when I was a kid here in Oregon, it was poorer folks that lived in the country. Today it seems just the opposite.

 

[P7M13]

Goat buggery for the win!
lol, didn't click
:hide

Yup, my goats will be named, Soddom, Gomorrah, Zeboim, and Admah -- because, when the time comes, those suckers are going to roast.

At my ranch.......we make our own food, power and water what can city dwellers make?

Lately, a lot of noise, trash, signs about snowflakery....

 

[The Heretic]

I'll be 71 in a couple of months. It seems like when I was a kid here in Oregon, it was poorer folks that lived in the country. Today it seems just the opposite.

The jobs are in the city. The percentage of people who live in urban areas has gone up from about 50% when I was a kid to about 80% now. Rural land has increased in value because it has decreased in quantity. Orygun has done a decent job of controlling urban sprawl, but yes, there are more areas out here now where people are putting up houses and less vacant land on which people are allowed to build. In WA county you can only build a house on farm land if the plot makes $80K per year for a number of years - and that is not easy to do. When we sold the 4 plots of land that made up our farm, only the two that already had houses on them could have houses on them. The other two could not - one went to Ponzi and they build a winery on it, the other is still a filbert orchard.

Where I live on the mountain the only reason the county allowed houses here is because it could not be farmed as it was too steep - only trees could be 'farmed' on this land, and with the zoning I have to maintain a certain percentage of forested land or get the zoning changed (not easy to do).

Most of the houses up here are either upper end houses, or they were already here before the land prices went up. Most of the people are upper middle class professionals who commute into the city to work, or are retired - not farmers. Most of the farms have been leased out or sold to larger farms as current generations no longer wish to farm - too much work for too little reward.

 

[No_Regerts]

I vacillate back and forth on this because the numbers do not lie - and yet, in the years I spent on the farm and now up here on the mountain, I have personally witnessed very little crime beyond the periodic dumping of trash. I live on a private road, on a mountain, off a backroad that goes nowhere, off another backroad, off a less traveled two lane paved road that goes thru a rural area. My neighborhood with 8 families has a reputation on the mountain for responding to one prowler with rifles and other guns (this was a local peeping Tom before I moved here) and there just are not many people passing thru.

I often go about working on my 20 acres out of sight of my house, with the doors of the house and shop unlocked. In the almost 6 years I have been here only a few people have stepped foot on my property uninvited (that I know of) and those were JH Witnesses.

OTOH - when I lived in the city - there were always people trespassing almost every day - sometimes messing with my stuff, sometimes stealing my stuff. Mostly kids, but sometimes adults. My neighbor was broken into several times. I had my car broken into twice. There were also drive by shootings. Up here, any shooting is the neighbors target practicing - which is not uncommon.

I feel safer and I think my personal property is safer here. There have been times when I have forgotten to lock up my shop at night, sometimes even with the lights on and there are valuable things in there - nothing was ever touched. If I had done that in the city, I would have been cleaned out.

FerFAL can keep the city - it is not a place I want to go to today, except that I still need to make a living for another couple of years. Once I retire, I will go into a city maybe once a month, if that.

It sounds like you have good neighbors and you don't live with your head up your azz. Around here, if you don't live in a subdivision, you're not likely to ever meet your neighbors unless you force the issue.

 

[The Heretic]

Almost all of my neighbors are good, some are excellent and have helped me more than I deserve.

One of my neighbors, about 600 feet away, is an eye surgeon (who can also operate an excavator - I've seen him do it). In a pinch, we have a doctor here. Two are electronics engineers. Another is a machinist, ex-army, who is good with a dozer and an excavator and seems to be a decent mechanic. There are number of college age to young adult children around, only one toddler.

There is a TVFR station 5 miles and 10 minutes away.

 

[2Wheels4Ever]

What can I say, it's all true. You are better off living in the city. Less drugs, crime, fatties, and the like. I heard Portland is an amazing place to live, please move there and stay in the city, especially you folks from California. The country just an awful place to live. We have rattlers, scorpions, and black widows in every bush as well.

 

[The Heretic]

What can I say, it's all true. You are better off living in the city. Less drugs, crime, fatties, and the like. I heard Portland is an amazing place to live, please move there and stay in the city, especially you folks from California. The country just an awful place to live. We have rattlers, scorpions, and black widows in every bush as well.

 

[CLT65]

What can I say, it's all true. You are better off living in the city. Less drugs, crime, fatties, and the like. I heard Portland is an amazing place to live, please move there and stay in the city, especially you folks from California. The country just an awful place to live. We have rattlers, scorpions, and black widows in every bush as well.

That's all well and good, to contain them to Portland, except for one thing: they vote.

 

[Colts4me]

just opinion and worth what you pay for it but the guy that wrote that article won't survive long if things turn ugly.

 

[The Heretic]

just opinion and worth what you pay for it but the guy that wrote that article won't survive long if things turn ugly.

You do understand that he already has?

FerFAL went thru a collapse in Argentina and things got ugly there

 

[Colts4me]

You do understand that he already has?

FerFAL went thru a collapse in Argentina and things got ugly there

He didn't do it on a farm.

 

[P7M13]

You do understand that he already has?

FerFAL went thru a collapse in Argentina and things got ugly there

Is he still there, or living here now?

 

[The Heretic]

Is he still there, or living here now?

I believe he is in the USA now.

He has held this opinion about the city v. the rural for years. IIRC some of it had to do with the vulnerability of those in the rural areas and what he saw happen there, but I don't recall completely, and either way I do not agree with his assertions or conclusions

 

[The Heretic]

He didn't do it on a farm.

No, he didn't. He was in the city. But he lived it and witnessed what happened.