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Geraldo,,,When you say it takes more fuel and chemicals to produce corn than what the corn is worth, obvously you are following the same investigative reporting procedures as your infamous TV counterpart. I grew up on a 160 acre dairy farm in Greenford,Ohio that was totally self sustaining. Currently I am hobby farming on a small 60 acres farm in Youngstown, Ohio. Lacking the initial startup capital to buy modern farm equipment, we opted to get some basics on the used machinery market, a 1960 Mineapolis Moline 36 drawbar horsepower tractor ($2000), a 1966 ford 20 drawbar horsepower tractor (2.7gal/hr), 3 bottom 16" moldboard plow ($300 new), a tandem 9 ft disc ($50) and a two row John Deere corn planter ($300). The large tractor burns 5gal/hr and plows 6 acres per hour( $.83/acre), discs 12 acres per hour ( $.41/acre). The small tractor plants the corn at 5 acres/hr ($.55/acre) We practice crop rotation by planting corn one year, then timothy and clover hay for two years. The legumes provide a very lucrative cash crop of hay, which we bale in small bales targeted to the individual horse owner market. Five acres of hay will provide enough cash income to provide all the fuel used by our equipment for the entire season. In addition, the legumes replace the nitrogen that is taken out of the soil by the corn thus we have no need of buying fertilizer. (Though the concept of crop rotation is almost abandoned in commercial large scale farming in exchange for no till planting, chemical fertilizers and herbicides, in truth George Washington Carver originated the idea of crop rotation for self sustaining farming before the civil war. While tinkering with my antiquated equipment and outdated farming techniques will in no wise rival the fuel efficiencies of our commermercial counterparts on the mega farms with 200 horsepower diesel tractors, I can still produce an average of 100 bushels to the acre. (100 bu x 56lbs/bu = 5600 pounds of corn.) I currently have contracts to supply corn for home heating fuel through a small co-op of 20 homeowner neighbors. Based upon this little experiment I am discussing with 4 or 5 local farmers who are interested in joining our co-op to have a market for what they do best, produce corn. As a sideline, we are now applying for a Federal Gasohol" permit, which will allow us to own and operate a "Still" to manufacture corn whiskey, which will be used as the primary fuel for all our current gas burning engines. Federal law requires that all the distilled alcohol must be labeled as automotive fuel only, but no doubt someone may get a bit fueled up on a saturday nite tooo.

Another site which lists free and low-cost Kindle books each day is http://www.pixelofink.com/. Like Debby's site, the links will take you to the USA Amazon. Here is a link that might be useful: Pixel of Ink

Our basement room is not huge, it's actually tiny. It's not fancy, it's not elaborate like some of these pictures, but it does contain lots of kids. My husband, FIL and I finished off the space a few years back so our 3 kids could have their own space to hang out with friends. Our room is about 13 x 22 with 3 foot deep closets that run 13 feet along the far wall for storage. We have an air hockey, rod hockey, darts and pinball machine on one side of the room. The main part of the room has a cubby extension that holds my treadmill and small flat screen tv, then there is a set of slouch chairs, a bean bag chair, 2 high legged chairs with a small table to play board games on. That part of the room has stereo surround sound so x-box games can be blasted! We have another larger flat screen tv with a small cabinet that holds stereo equipment, and video game units. We put wood panelling along the bottom which I painted in Cabinet Coat, thicker paint that holds up well to kids. We did a slight drop ceiling in order to put panels in that contain sound proofing. For the floor, we used carpet tiles. The upper portion of the walls are sponged in shades of darker blues since my husband is a Toronto Maple Leaf fan, but the walls look like fresh Levi Jeans. We did run heat into the room, but only keep the vent slightly open down there. We painted the floors with a waterproofing before laying the carpet tiles which have their own pad built in. The great thing about the carpet tiles is someone spills, you pull up the offensive tiles, wash them, dry them and reinstall them. We have tons of lighting down there, the main switch controls one light off in the table section and the 4 cans in the main area. The second switch controls the 4 cans for the gaming table area. A third switch inside the closet doors contains lighting for the shelving units. All run CFL floods except the storage area. I installed sliding closet doors along the back wall that are also painted with cabinet coat (as is all the trim) and then put heavy duty shelving units back there. We store all our ski equipment, school supply 'store' that I have, board games, videos, etc. on the shelves there. Tons of storage I am so glad I insisted on. Could have had a few more square feet, but I am happy with having the 'stuff' behind closed doors. We had planned on a fridge, but didn't, don't miss it. There is a large food pantry where I store all excess food things just outside the door. I keep it well stocked with juice, water, gatorade and snacks and everyone is happy. A well placed, easily accesible trash can is far more important than a fridge, in my experience. We didn't skimp on insulating the area, so it's comfortable year round. I designed most of the space, my husband came up with the cool cubby that has my treamill, we did the whole thing ourselves and spent way on the lower side of 5ooo - 7500 including all permits. 50K basements room = nicer homes than mine, but the kids love our room.