An Illustrated Guide to Rain Harvesting

Revisions and announcements

I’ve spent the second half of this week revising the rain harvesting guide. I’m getting valuable feedback. These drafts won’t be perfect the first time, or even the second. Some ideas might look a little dumb, but I’ve got to put myself out there and risk embarrassing myself in order to make progress that others can benefit from.

That’s the entire point of the project.

A few announcements...

People have expressed dislike for my character, and despite steady support for the project, I’ve lost a lot of subscribers this week. Honestly, some of us can offend the world by breathing. It doesn’t matter how much I offer to some readers or how much they claim to value my work, the slightest thing triggers them. They go out of their way to complain about everything, and they wonder why AI is taking over the internet. Oh well, no pleasing them…

When I dig down into these topics, I also tend to get bashed for “privilege.” Look, the way things are headed, someone is going to have to know how to do these things, and that someone will be taking care of their community. I’m going to make the book as inclusive as possible, but a lot of times it takes 120 percent of what I’ve got just to figure out (and illustrate) something like plumbing.

Next, I’m going to be moving on to bugout bags. I’m going to test pack different-sized bags so we can develop a clear sense of what you can bug out with, by weight and volume. I’m even going to make some diagrams for packing cars of different sizes. We’ll also talk about bug-in bags, a similar idea, but worth some special attention.

The basics of rain harvesting and plumbing felt important to tackle early on. It was a project I’ve felt some anxiety about pulling off. Now, I’m feeling like we’ve got a good grasp of the essentials. I’ve also tried to clarify: You don’t have to build a special structure to collect rain. If you want to use a shed or adapt something else, that’s fine. I’m just trying to offer ideas and be as detailed as possible.

Here’s where we are now: