Didn't dodge, Jim, just didn't see the activity. Lots going on at this forum to get waylaid to. No, I'm not kanecutter, must be a good dude though.

I'm personally not driven to immediately buddy up on the bug out thing, I've got a different plan I'm working on right now, but I can envision a time down the road when I created a community somewhere on a piece of land that's ideal for private self sufficiency. If you dictate the parameters, you control the situation. Better than the whole meeting of the minds, decide where to go scenario, in my mind. Just make it available, structure it, and then screen those who step forward wanting to be a part of it. But that's for a time a bit down the road. For now I'm staying put and riding out the wave of insanity and mayhem where I am. I have to.

Anyway, as for my suggestions here, I saw in this thread a band of the cool and mighty crassly discussing how to weed out the uncool, and a group of the noob (read uncool) getting left out in the cold. As I said, I'm not in the market right now for banding up, but I felt bad for the others here that were expressing interest in it. Time and post counts doesn't make one a better person, more skilled, more valuable. Those here with time under their belts and associations made don't necessarily represent the cream of the crop in said attributes. There are better ways to screen, less time consuming, more open door. Bar that system being in place, another option for those left out is what I suggested. Hell, it's a big site, does it have to be one group anyway? Simple answer, no. It could end up being several. Nothing to get all girly sensitive about.