Camping was wonderfully...wet!

We're back from a camping trip to our favorite island in the middle of an Adirondack lake. Eight days out of which we had rein on 6 of them. I vowed to write when the weather was bad...that was a good goal. I got somewhere near 100 pages of a recycled marble covered notebook filled with my notes and writings on building a homestead water system. This book is intended for someone that is interested in where their water comes from and how to take control of it, especially if they are building or rebuilding a place to live. I cover wells and how to build/hire one built, how to get the water from the well, water pumps (electric, solar, hand, wind, deep well hand pumps, pitcher pumps, centrifical pumps, human/bike powered pumps, well buckets, filtering, general primer on plumbing, wind powered water pumps, water storage, rain catchement and more).

I've already passed on my scrawlings to an "eager for spending money while she travels in Germany with my wife" high school senior. I will endeavor to have the bulk of the book ready for printing by the end of August. I hope to sell them at the Natural Builder's Colloquium at Thunder Mountain Sanctuary in Bath, NY and at the Pennsylvania Sustainable Living and Renewable Energy Fair. More on these events in a future blog.

I don't usually answer comments, but...

Hi to the two recent people that made some comments on my website and activities.

First off,
I didn't completely 'jump ship' on my teaching career. My wife, Krista, is also an employee of the same district I used to work for. I'm 'vested' in the NY State Teachers' Retirement System and will get around 50% of my final average salary when I'm 55. My wife has continued to maintain our family's health insurance and since she's taught there for 20+ years we're vested in that after her retirement. I also continue to contribute to the NYS Ret. Sys. by teaching adult ed. classes at our local community college. I've also been offered a position as "Director of Energy Resources" for that college; basically writing my own job description- developing a 2-year program for renewable energy system design and installation, coordinating the various campus programs to support that, developing the specific classes for hands on installation of the materials, working with the various certification agencies, improving the campus' use of renewables and energy conservation program, recruiting students for the degree program, coordinating efforts between 2 & 4 year colleges so we can 'feed' 4- year programs with students interested in persuing a 4-year degree, and more. However, the position is tentative based upon the receipt of a 3-year federal grant. I'm not worried.

To the gentleman from Florida. If I ever come to Florida I will look you up and come and give a talk, if you are still interested. Contact me for further information at jsjuczak@gisco.net. My parents live in Sun City Center, FL, and I do actually get to visit them there every few years.