Becoming a Prepper

[Lsbcal]

Quote:

Originally Posted by donheff LOL. So serious with the responses. Didn't anyone else read Imoldernu as posting with his tongue firmly in his cheek?

I took it that maybe he was temporarily looking at things from a glass-half-empty perspective. But then I never heard the term "prepper" before. Here is one description of a prepper: What is a "Prepper"?

We've always had some stuff around in case of an earthquake (red zoned area). Generally try to have $500 in cash at the start of each month. Kept the landline, batteries, small portable radio. Common sense stuff ... etc., etc.

[youbet]

Quote:

Originally Posted by Lsbcal I took it that maybe he was temporarily looking at things from a glass-half-empty perspective. But then I never heard the term "prepper" before. Here is one description of a prepper: What is a "Prepper"?

Thanks for the link. That description makes much more sense than the sensationalistic BS propagated by reality media.

[ggbutcher]

The the "40 gallons of beer and a garden" plan aside (great plan, btw), I think it's worth considering the sorts of things that can happen in your neighborhood and what you'd want on hand if one of them did happen. We watched friends in northern Alabama deal with that bad tornado not long ago; if not wiped out, most said the most useful things to have until the power came back were 1) a generator to keep the fridge and freezer going, and 2) a bbq grill with a stove burner upon which to cook.

Generally, I'd say the one thing we all can do is to look at our house and its goezintas (electric, water...) and figure out how to support the things that depend on them. Generator seems pretty universal, but I'm also considering an inverter that I could hook to the running car...

DW and I are doing that thinking now, but it's harder in a relatively benign environment (CO front range). I'm from Louisiana, most folk there know what to have/do in hurricane season, but I'm not so sure how to plan for the eventual eruption of the Yellowstone super caldera. Maybe I'll watch that Pompeii movie...

[brewer12345]

Quote:

Originally Posted by ggbutcher DW and I are doing that thinking now, but it's harder in a relatively benign environment (CO front range).

You don't have to sweat earthquakes or hurricanes, but prolonged utility outages due to a winter storm or high winds, floods and perhaps evacuation due to a wildfire come to mind. The other thing that dances around in the back of my head is the possibility of quarantine and disruptions due to a bad flu pandemic. A flu pandemic is probably a lot more likely to happen in my lifetime than an EMP, Yellowstone blowing up, etc., just a question of how lethal it could be and when.

[ggbutcher]

Yes, I wrote my previous post before first coffee, and totally forgot about the wildfire thing. From the house, we watched the Waldo Canyon fire roll over the ridge into the Mountain Shadows neighborhood. The lessons from that fire and Black Forest were that prudent mitigation makes a big difference. To that end, I have some trees I need to manage. After that, wildfires are more about evacuation, and what you need to bring. Funny, most folk we've talked to ranked family pictures as one of the top-three things to take, the most irreplaceable thing most of us have. Most everything else has a finite (maybe large) price tag, and therefore replaceable.

For the Waldo Canyon fire, we'd packed the car and were waiting to see if we would be told to evacuate. I was outside with the garden hose on ember watch, I observed DW coming out of the house with two bottles of wine and a bottle of Amaretto, headed for the car. You go, girl...

That would have brought new meaning to "it's fun to stay at the YMCA"...

[razztazz]

For you people you keep a few hundred in greenbacks around: How do you keep the money? A wad of $20.00s? Or small bills like $5.00s and $10.00s?

I keep a few hundred myself but it seems that all $20's could run you out fast or just subject yourself to getting bilked ie paying for stuff and not being able to get or make change.

Smaller bills seems more functional but then you end up with wads and stacks of money to carry around in the event of an actual need to physically reloacte and that seems dangerous or at least cumbersome

[Hermit]

The obvious answer is to stock up on Strawberry Pop-Tarts!
http://www.nytimes.com/2004/11/14/bu...ney/14wal.html

[brewer12345]

Quote:

Originally Posted by razztazz For you people you keep a few hundred in greenbacks around: How do you keep the money? A wad of $20.00s? Or small bills like $5.00s and $10.00s? I keep a few hundred myself but it seems that all $20's could run you out fast or just subject yourself to getting bilked ie paying for stuff and not being able to get or make change. Smaller bills seems more functional but then you end up with wads and stacks of money to carry around in the event of an actual need to physically reloacte and that seems dangerous or at least cumbersome

20s mostly, some 50s. If it comes to that I figure I will not be that concerned with making change.

[razztazz]

Quote:

Originally Posted by brewer12345 20s mostly, some 50s. If it comes to that I figure I will not be that concerned with making change.

Ha, yes. I am not really concerned with having to pay 20 bucks for a 5 buck thing but I am concerned about running out of $20's

[samclem]

Quote:

Originally Posted by brewer12345 The other thing that dances around in the back of my head is the possibility of quarantine and disruptions due to a bad flu pandemic. A flu pandemic is probably a lot more likely to happen in my lifetime than an EMP, Yellowstone blowing up, etc., just a question of how lethal it could be and when.

Some of the things I keep around include a box of N-95 masks and a box of those handy blue nitrile gloves from Harbor Freight. This PDF publication written by a doctor discusses home care for those with the flu during a pandemic. Hydration, OTC anti-diarrheal meds, OTC anti-nausea meds, even little things like bendable straws. The stuff lasts a long time and doesn't cost much at all. Anyway, there's probably a very small chance of a flu pandemic, but it's one of those things that has happened before and for which a little cheap advanced preparation might go a long way.

[brewer12345]

Quote:

Originally Posted by samclem Some of the things I keep around include a box of N-95 masks and a box of those handy blue nitrile gloves from Harbor Freight. This PDF publication written by a doctor discusses home care for those with the flu during a pandemic. Hydration, OTC anti-diarrheal meds, OTC anti-nausea meds, even little things like bendable straws. The stuff lasts a long time and doesn't cost much at all. Anyway, there's probably a very small chance of a flu pandemic, but it's one of those things that has happened before and for which a little cheap advanced preparation might go a long way.

I keep all that stuff around. The bigger problems would come with a prolonged quarantine, IMO.

[samclem]

Quote:

Originally Posted by brewer12345 The bigger problems would come with a prolonged quarantine, IMO.

Yes, and people just refusing risk infection by going to work. I know I depend on a lot of people for a lot of things.

[Jack_Pine]

Quote:

Originally Posted by samclem Some of the things I keep around include a box of N-95 masks and a box of those handy blue nitrile gloves from Harbor Freight. This PDF publication written by a doctor discusses home care for those with the flu during a pandemic. Hydration, OTC anti-diarrheal meds, OTC anti-nausea meds, even little things like bendable straws. The stuff lasts a long time and doesn't cost much at all. Anyway, there's probably a very small chance of a flu pandemic, but it's one of those things that has happened before and for which a little cheap advanced preparation might go a long way.

Good post. We do that as well. We also have 30 days of food and water. Ammo is not an issue as we shoot a lot. So we have 100's of rounds per caliber...good to go.

Forgot to say, 3k cash in gun safe.

[Dreamer]

I had never heard of a prepper either and have never seen or heard of the TV series. I try to buy more of things that we use when they are on sale. Also, try to keep ahead on things that we eat frequently and things that we can't do without, such as toiletries and toilet paper. However, if we don't quit getting snow, I will be running out. Temps are supposed to be higher this week and rain, so I will probably go to the store.

[veremchuka]

It's all fun and games until someone gets their eye poked out huh? Lot's of glib replies here, got it all figured out huh?

Well I'm not a prepper but as I see it there there are two kinds of prepping.

The 1st is when nature takes away electricity. You see how crazed people are when they predict a 6-8" snow storm, you'd think no one had any food in their house. You'd think that bread and milk were never going to be available again for months. You need some supplies to make it 2 or 4 maybe 7 days. Then your world returns to normal.

And then there's the other kind, the we're not in Kansas anymore Toto and that kind is no joke. You can have that nice farm and big garden, you can stock pile firewood and water you can have gold and silver. But when TSHTF, to be honest when the hordes come from the populated suburbs and especially the urban cities, you need people in addition to all that. You need people you can trust your life with and they can trust theirs with you and you'll need guns and lots of ammo.

People riot when their "team" wins whatever championship game they played. What do you think they'll do when they haven't eaten in 5 days, when their children are hungry and sick? People have zero clue how to feed themselves if the stores are out of food. Few if any have any real survival skills and they are coming to take what you have, by any and all means they possess - mark my words.

I laugh at the prepper shows because I can find holes in just about every one of their compounds and TEOTWAWKI plans. But just let a 1 or 2 kilometer wide meteor create a Tunguska event or the one that hit the Yucatan 65 M years ago or the side of an unstable mountain range on the coast of west African (sorry I forget the country) drop 25 cubic miles of dirt and rock into the ocean sending a 600 or 900' tidal wave screaming at the east coast traveling at the speed of a jet or a solar flare/EMP destroy the electrical grid or the super volcano under Yellowstone blow and you'll see things you only saw in your nightmares. And guess what - all these things will happen it's just a matter of when. It might be next year or it might be 200 years (in which case we are off the hook) but eventually these catastrophic events will happen, it is just a matter of time, a matter of when.

Other than Katrina, nothing I remember was on that scale or intensity of that, all the catastrophic events in this country have resolved themselves within days, a week or maybe two. Other than those whose homes were destroyed and loved ones died for the most part things were getting back to some semblance of normal but what if it takes months or years. It was readily apparent on the evening news each night just how society collapsed after Katrina, the law of the jungle was on display, he with the largest club or the firearms was going to get what they wanted. It won't be pretty and it won't matter what you have as much as how you'll protect it from those that have nothing and nothing to lose. If you think you can share, if you think you can reason, if you think because you're well educated and a civil and just person means anything in those scenarios, well pardner you have a huge wake up call coming.

Desperate people do desperate things.

[aja8888]

Quote:

Originally Posted by veremchuka Other than Katrina, nothing I remember was on that scale or intensity of that, all the catastrophic events in this country have resolved themselves within days, a week or maybe two. Desperate people do desperate things.

Katrina was the first of three pretty devastating hurricanes, and was highly publicized but not much worse than the other two (Rita and Ike).

Ike was especially bad as it took a community (Crystal Beach) and removed it from the face of the earth. And I mean gone!

Ike caused a lot of damage and took power out of a town of 4+ million people for two weeks. We survived and somehow didn't starve to death, dry up from no water, have to use our homes for firewood, deliver babies on street corners, etc.

Heck, I didn't even get any good shots off with my Walther P99!

But, when that asteroid hits............

[HFWR]

Quote:

Originally Posted by veremchuka It's all fun and games until someone gets their eye poked out huh? Lot's of glib replies here, got it all figured out huh? Well I'm not a prepper but as I see it there there are two kinds of prepping. The 1st is when nature takes away electricity. You see how crazed people are when they predict a 6-8" snow storm, you'd think no one had any food in their house. You'd think that bread and milk were never going to be available again for months. You need some supplies to make it 2 or 4 maybe 7 days. Then your world returns to normal. And then there's the other kind, the we're not in Kansas anymore Toto and that kind is no joke. You can have that nice farm and big garden, you can stock pile firewood and water you can have gold and silver. But when TSHTF, to be honest when the hordes come from the populated suburbs and especially the urban cities, you need people in addition to all that. You need people you can trust your life with and they can trust theirs with you and you'll need guns and lots of ammo. People riot when their "team" wins whatever championship game they played. What do you think they'll do when they haven't eaten in 5 days, when their children are hungry and sick? People have zero clue how to feed themselves if the stores are out of food. Few if any have any real survival skills and they are coming to take what you have, by any and all means they possess - mark my words. I laugh at the prepper shows because I can find holes in just about every one of their compounds and TEOTWAWKI plans. But just let a 1 or 2 kilometer wide meteor create a Tunguska event or the one that hit the Yucatan 65 M years ago or the side of an unstable mountain range on the coast of west African (sorry I forget the country) drop 25 cubic miles of dirt and rock into the ocean sending a 600 or 900' tidal wave screaming at the east coast traveling at the speed of a jet or a solar flare/EMP destroy the electrical grid or the super volcano under Yellowstone blow and you'll see things you only saw in your nightmares. And guess what - all these things will happen it's just a matter of when. It might be next year or it might be 200 years (in which case we are off the hook) but eventually these catastrophic events will happen, it is just a matter of time, a matter of when. Other than Katrina, nothing I remember was on that scale or intensity of that, all the catastrophic events in this country have resolved themselves within days, a week or maybe two. Other than those whose homes were destroyed and loved ones died for the most part things were getting back to some semblance of normal but what if it takes months or years. It was readily apparent on the evening news each night just how society collapsed after Katrina, the law of the jungle was on display, he with the largest club or the firearms was going to get what they wanted. It won't be pretty and it won't matter what you have as much as how you'll protect it from those that have nothing and nothing to lose. If you think you can share, if you think you can reason, if you think because you're well educated and a civil and just person means anything in those scenarios, well pardner you have a huge wake up call coming. Desperate people do desperate things.

Aren't we a ray of sunshine!

[InParadise]

Anything is possible, but is it probable? You can only plan for so much before losing your mind, and frankly I do not include asteroid strike as something probable worth planning for. On the other hand, in picking our vacation/retirement home we avoided places known to be a target for devastating natural events. We'll keep those areas for our travels. We bought on a river, but a home that is out of the flood plain and geographically set so that the flood water will run to the other side of the river in substantial amounts before it encroaches on our home, (ie: across from a field, not a wall of rock, as pleasant as those are to look at.) We avoided places known to have the potential for running out of water. Does this guarantee our safety? No, particularly not with the uncertainty of climate change, but it makes it probable.

Life has to be lived, and when I can no longer be true to myself, I don't want to live anymore.

[daylatedollarshort]

Quote:

Originally Posted by InParadise Anything is possible, but is it probable?

I am reading Against the Gods currently, and it has a an interesting story on just that topic. A Soviet professor refused to go to the air raid shelters during German bombing in WWII, because he said with seven million people in Moscow, what were the odds he would get hit? Then one night he showed up at the bomb shelter because he said there were seven million people in Moscow and one elephant, and last night they got the elephant.

[Nemo2]

This seems to be an appropriate thread theme song:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cbzIVR1OaAY