MS-13

Quite some time ago, I suggested scouting your area if you live in an suburban or urban environment to look for gang activity. My scouting has involved nothing formal, just taking different ways to the grocery store, driving behind buildings to scout if they have been tagged, etc. Nothing too crazy. I have a large police force in my town, and the community is pretty good at not putting up with groups of youths running around causing mayhem.

On an abandoned building I saw this:

Using the gang identification link I learned this is none other than MS-13 in my area. That's just great. I have not seen any other gang activity, which makes them more dangerous. Somewhere in town there are a few houses loaded with guns, drugs, and nitwits who are just waiting for law and order to break down.

If you live in a suburban or urban environment, knowledge of what area is claimed by who will have a direct impact on your survival in a lawless situation. I will be assembling a map in my survival book with notations on where and when I have seen gang graffiti and other activity.

Survival Mindset

Check out this article on CNN's website.

Seems like it's the ones who can think who survive. Go figure. I'll sum it up by listing what qualities make for a good survivalist.

Humility
Independent Thinkers
Strong Family Ties

Thankfully I have these bases covered, although here in the "Nuclear Family" Northeast, I consider my family to extend to my close friends. I would add that one skill needed is to be able to make the hard choices. If your brother has gangrene, well without antibiotics he's going to die. You need to be mentally prepared to face the hard decisions around him. If there is no way of getting him the medication you're going to have to chop off the leg, which might kill him anyway. Or if it's too far along, then you might have to euthanize him. It's a horrible thought, and I wouldn't dwell on such thoughts, but acknowledge you might have to make that call, then get on with living in the here and now.

It's a tough balance to think about the horrible things that could happen in the future, but keep living in the here and now. It's hard for me to read 5-10 articles about economic doom and gloom, then pony up the $10 to see a movie for entertainment. We need that, though. If we focus on the doom and gloom then we lose the gift of life we have now.

How to deal with Old Man Winter

This post will be in two parts, and it might get a bit long. The first part will be on what you should do to prepare your home (or apartment) for winter. The second part will be how to survive winter if you cannot afford to heat your home. Some of the lessons in the second section were learned the hard way. Even if you're in a southern state, there will be some necessary things to do in here.

So winter is on the way, and by all indication it's going to come a month early this year. I start on the roof, then the rest of the outside, then move inside.

Start with your chimney, if it doesn't have a cap, then go buy one. Preventing birds from nesting, stopping stray tennis balls from rolling into your furnace (don't ask), or water mixing with the ash to rot out the liner of your chimney. It's short money for the headaches it stops. Next is to check the flashing and the mortar itself to be sure everything is in good shape.

Next clean your gutters and downspouts. Ice dams will permanently damage your roof. No excuse not to do this, even if you shell out some $ to a local kid to do it for you. Check the roof to make sure no summer storm puled off a shingle, better to find it now, then when it's below freezing!

Now follow your powerlines to the street, and verify that there are no trees or tree limbs that look sketchy hanging over your power lines. Although we all should have a generator, or solar, etc. blah blah blah. No need to make it hard on ourselves when we can prevent it with a simple tree haircut. You also might want to follow the lines on the streets and see if there are any power lines in danger of diseased trees and such and complain to the power company. Needless to say do not win a Darwin Award by doing something dumb near a power line. Be careful!

Now go around the outside of the house, and make sure your soffit vents are clear, and the siding of the house is in good shape. If it's moldy then get a power washer to clean it up. Now pull all your window AC units and close and lock the windows.

Check each window and door to be sure 1) It locks tight 2) The weather seal is nice and tight and 3) the storm window/door works properly and seals well. Don't have storm windows or doors and you live north of the mason-dixon line? Well I will advise you to find the nearest flat surface and smack your head onto it as hard as possible. Then repeat until you have storm doors and windows installed.

Now into the shed or garage. Find your ice scraper for the car and toss it into the trunk now, don't wait until the first snowstorm when your already late for work! Then find the snowshovels and put them by the door. If you own a snowblower, then fire it up and make sure it works now. If you have a plow for your lawn tractor then get all the parts together now and install it just after the last time you mow your lawn.

Now head for the basement. Check out the furnace, and crank up the heat so it turns on for 10 min or so. Easier to schedule the repair guy now rather than on the first cold snap. If you have forced hot air replace your air filters, and also visually check all the ducting for tears, or unhooked ducting. If you have forced hot water, then make sure the automatic water thingy is working. In either case if you have the $ then have the chimney and furnace inspected. Wraping your hot water heater is a good idea most of the time to save on the energy costs.

Now go replace all the batteries in the smoke alarms and test them. Also check your fire extinguishers. Close the damper in the chimney, but don't forget to open it before you use it.

There you go! a weekends worth of work and your ready for the next few months. Now on for some energy saving tips.

* If you have a fireplace, then use something to cover the giant gaping hole! It will blow the heat your paying for outside, so slow it down.
* Add socket insulation things to every electrical outlet and switch in an exterior wall. These are little foam pads that stop the cold air in the wall from drafting through the outlets into the home. Do not discount the savings from this simple activity. Pop off the plastic cover, pop out the pre-cut holes for the outlets, then place the foam, and replace the plastic cover.
* Check your attic's insulation, you should have R-30. Adding a second layer is not that much money, but be sure your soffit vents have unobstructed airflow to the attic.
* If you have replaced the sashes in old windows, the ones that used to have the weights inside, then open them up and stuff the cavity with insulation.


Well now it's mid-winter, and you can't afford to heat your house anymore. Now it's time to tighten up the house further to save energy. The level you take this, is up to you, and as your circumstanced require.

The first thing I'd do is lower the thermostat. If you have a newborn in the house it might be a problem, but we didn't have central heating until recently, so... have the kid suck it up. I keep my house at 50-55 degrees, but I live alone and don't have a woman bitching that it's too cold. Then again with one income I don't have a choice. Those programmable thermostats are awesome. I installed one last year and had the luxury of having a warm house when I got home, and having it automatically cool down when I hit the rack. Cost me $80, and was well worth it.

Next is the plastic sheeting you put over your windows. The kind that uses a hair dryer to pull it tight. Regardless of what the packages say, it will damage the finish on the windows. We used to have a ritual on that first day of spring where we run around the house and ripped off the plastic on all the windows. That was fun. If you use wood or coal to help heat the house, I'd leave one of the newer southern facing windows without the plastic, just so there is some air transfer. Don't want to die of CO (Carbon Monoxide) poisoning!

I'd seal all but the most frequently used doors as well. For those doors left unsealed, supplemental weatherstripping can be added, but at a minimum get one of those draft snakes to hold as many drafts at bay. A draft snakes is just a tube of cloth filled with sand or kitty litter that you push against the bottom of the door to keep cold air from coming in. Instructions to make one here.

Now after doing all that if your still in trouble, then I'd consider sealing up part of the house. It's no small undertaking, and believe me it sucks. We had to do it one year when I was a kid, and sleeping in the family room when Mum was in the living room sucked. It was easy for us as the upstairs was unheated, and there was no plumbing up there either. So we just had to slap a door at the top of the stairs and put up insulation. If you do seal up part of the house with plumbing, then be sure to shut off the water to that part, seal it off well and drain the water out.

You also can supplement the heating system in your house with another heating source. The most popular these days is wood pellets, but there is also geothermal, conventional wood, and coal. Kerosene heaters are pretty much out of the question with the price of fuel. Electric heaters are good for spot heating, but I wouldn't rely on them for a secondary heating source.

I don't have to space to go into the how's and whys on secondary heating, but I can give the pro's and con's of each with the exception of geothermal. I don't have it, nor does anyone I know. The few people I know that looked into it were looking at $18k for it. It basically pre-heated the air so the furnace wouldn't have to work as hard. If you don't have forced hot air, then you're screwed. Enough about that.

Coal is dirty, messy and a bitch to start if your home late from school and it went out. (trust me) We used coal to heat the kitchen for 5 years or so, with the added benefit of it reducing our heating bills for the rest of the house. Coal stoves are more expensive, and storing the coal takes a lot of space. Coal dust gets everywhere, and you need to shake the stove down at least 3 times a day, and empty the ashes 2 times a day. But boy did it crank out the heat.

The new pellet stoves require electricity. On the other hand, they are super -efficient. A ton of pellets goes for $300 or so right now, and most of my friends use 2-4 tons a year, which cuts their oil bills in half, total savings for them is about $500 or so a year, YMMV. The pellets come in bags, and need to be kept dry. Any water and they grow 5-10x in size and become a big, useless mess. Ashes need to be emptied once a day, but it's only a few cups. They fill the bin with pellets at the same time, and then don't have to do squat until the next day.

Conventional wood stoves have gotten a lot better than they used to. My mum still uses wood to keep the chill off, but it's a lot of work (mostly done by me). She uses about 4-6 cords a year of wood, and right now it's about $300 a cord delivered. Thankfully, I keep finding downed trees or cutting trees down in her yard so she gets some wood for free.

When I was a kid we had 2 wood stoves in the house because the furnace shit the bed on us and died. It was 1977, and we went through 11 cords of wood, all split by yours truly. I remember riding with my dad looking for downed trees, and cut them up and haul them to the truck to be split and seasoned as best we could before burning it. That was a cold year, nothing like hauling in 200-300 lbs of wood every morning while my dad scratched his ass and watched... At least I learned how to use a chainsaw, cut trees down, split wood, and drive at the tender age of 7. Anything that would burn went into one of the stoves. This includes raiding dumpsters at job sites for scrap 2x's, or collecting driftwood after a storm. Most of the ashes we pulled out were nails from the scrap wood, but it kept us warm. We passed on the plywood and beaverboard as the glue was quite toxic back then.

If you're using a conventional wood stove do not burn any softwood. We did it in a survival situation, but it was pretty dangerous. Softwood makes creosote, which can catch fire when it builds up. Every year a bunch of hoses are burned down in chimney fires. Be careful!

Whew! that took longer than I thought it would. I hope this information is useful in keeping everyone toasty this winter on the cheap.

Crazy Weekend

I am sorry for not posting on Friday, but the boss let me have a day off! Heavens to Murgatroyd! So I did nothing productive other than cleaning the house and slacking off for my Mental Health.

I was running out of what I felt was quality material to write about, but after the insane weekend I had, I have at least a months worth!

This weekend was a tax-free weekend here in Mass, where you don't have to pay sales tax on anything less than $2500. In my travels, I wound up hitting 4 gun shops looking for ammo for a new rifle (more on that in a minute) Every gun shop was mobbed with customers buying anything and everything. Now when passing by a furniture store, the parking lot was empty. Even Lowes parking lot wasn't any busier than normal when I passed by. Bass Pro Shops was very busy, and their gun counter, which is 60' long had customers 2-3 deep along it's whole length!

I had a bit of an adventure trying to buy a generator, I didn't get one because they pretty much vanished! The local one had 6+ generators, and they sold out of the one I wanted in 12 hours or so. I had them call around, and they found a store with 5, but in the 20 minutes it took to get there they sold 2, and they wouldn't honor the price at the other store, so I told them to pound sand. I'll be watching craigslist and ebay and get my generator used.

What do these 2 facts tell me? When I see a guy buying 1500 rounds of ammo, and another with 2000 rounds of 2 calibers I tend to notice these things. Combine this with the lack of business regardless of how many commercials run at the furniture stores, which last year were packed. Well I think the sheeple are not so dumb after all. They are starting to notice bad things are happening, and they are starting to do something about it. Well maybe the sheeple are not all smartening up, but a small percentage are going through the transformation into non-sheeple. Maybe not full preppers, but certainly not the sheeple they once were.

So in my many travels I bought myself a Mosin Nagant rifle. Although I was intent on staying with only a few different calibers, I could not resist. I am a bit of a amateur military historian, with WWII in particular. The Mosin Nagant is the battle rifle of the Soviet army (and the Russians in WWI). It's a 7.62x54R cartridge, with the R standing in for rimmed. It's only $100, how could I pass up a rifle made in 1941, with a kick-ass cartridge, and it was never issued? That's right it was made in 1941 and never issued! It kicks like a mule, and I think all the wildlife within 100 miles of the range is now hard of hearing, but DAMN that's fun to shoot. It's a bolt action with an internal 5 round magazine. Mine is the full-length version with a 28 1/2" barrel. Effective killing range is 2000 yards if you can hit it. The iron sights are a bit tough, but scopes can be mounted. The kits are cheap and available through ebay. I will keep iron sights on this, for now.

All the practice at the range has paid off, with the rife zeroed in (using a drift and a big hammer) I was hitting a gopher silhouette at 75 yards 75% of the time freehand. On a military silhouette, I was consistently getting 'b' shots in the body at 100 yards. This is open WWII era sights. Gawd I love that rifle. I took part in a tactical shoot, and used the rife. I'll make a full post on that, because A) it was so cool, and B) I was laughing my ass off at the mall ninjas.

I did pick up a .22 target pistol, I'll post how much of an effect it has on my accuracy with my Sig P220.

This post is getting a bit long, I'll break it into two sections before my rambling causes Blogger's servers to crash.

Book Review - "How to Stay alive in the Woods"

Well the full title of the book is:"How to Stay Alive in the Woods: A Complete Guide to Food, Shelter and Self-Preservation Anywhere"

To sum up my thoughts on this book, I would dear say it wouldn't even make good emergency TP. First off, the book is way to large, there are huge margins on the printed page, and if that space was used it would cut down on the size of the book. In it's current size, there is no way I'd take it with me in the woods, it's at least 3 pounds of dead weight! The cover is some weird rubberized material that promptly warped both covers. Although waterproof, it means jack squat since the covers are bowed out 3/4" on all 4 outside corners.

As for the information contained therein, presumably to save your life, I would say a boy scout handbook has the same amount of information. The author's writing is at times hard to understand, and there is a noticeable lack of illustrations. I am no survival expert, but I learned nothing from this book. Perhaps, the book could be used as a deadfall for small game, that way it would be good for something! Some of the most basic survival skills are omitted from this book. Like how to use a map for orienteering, or using heated rocks to warm the bottom of your sleeping bag, or what to do without a sleeping bag. The list of gear to put in a survival kit is missing some very important items, like garbage bags. A survival kit without a garbage bag or 3 or 10 is like getting a massage without a happy ending!

I would say to save your money and buy another book. If the cover hadn't warped so bad I would consider shipping it back to Amazon.com.

Prep update

Well I guess it's time I sat down and review what I've been up to. For planning, I have been working on the punchlist of survival categories. I'm almost done with data security, and I'll put a very detailed post up soon enough. Since I'm an I.T. professional, it's the easiest one for me to bang out, that provides the most amount of information to you guys.

I also have been working on some woodworking information. What too keep an eye out for in the flea markets for old tools, and how they were used. I'm a "Normite" so a lot of this is new to me, so I need to digest it first before I can distill it and pass it on.

I'm up to about two weeks of stored food, not including the dehydrated stuff. I also have about a weeks worth of water, with my kaydyn filter I can get another 100 gallons so I'm all set there. I definitely need to pick up the pace with the food storage. I really want to have at least three months of food stored before the winter. I'm still trying to figure out how I'm going to heat the house this winter, $5 a gallon oil is going to hurt a LOT.

I'm happy with the progress of my vehicle preps. I have a big toolbox with come-alongs, tow straps, tire repair kits, basic tools, etc. I need more stuff, mainly a 12v air compressor and a cheap socket set. I also would like a small inverter so I could charge the cellphone or run my laptop. I probably will have to get tires to pass inspection, so if I can find the cash I want to get a 2" lift kit, and get more aggressive tires for my Jeep. I'd like to toss them on deep-dish rims, so I'll be hunting craigslist and junkyards for them. I'm hoping a $20 bribe will let the tires slide a little while, my sticker is up this month. I need to grab spare spark plugs at some point too. Then a spare alternator from a junkyard, water pump, spare belts... it never ends.

I have 10 gallons of fuel stored for now, I'd like to get at least 15 gallons more stored before the winter. I also bought 6 more bottles of 2 stroke oil so my chainsaw has plenty. I do need more chain oil, so that's something to get, but I had all my chains professionally sharpened, so I'm ready to rumble.

This tax holiday I'll be buying a generator, I'm probably going with the 3500 watt one because my needs are so small. One fridge/freezer, a few lights and two computers and a projector. I plan on buying some marine batteries and an inverter and running the generator to charge them while running the fridge, then using the batteries for the lights and computers. I don't see how I'll get the $ for the batteries this year, but who knows? I bought 2 mega millions tickets! Don't worry Mayberry, if it hits I'll hook you up :)

I've been shooting a lot, but it shows. I can now put my rounds through the 7 ring on a 25 yard target (most are in the black). When I started, I was having trouble keeping them on the paper. The second purchase for the tax holiday is a .22LR pistol so I can reduce the amount of cash I'm spending on ammunition.

Right now I have the following in my ammo locker:
50 rounds of #7 1/2 12 gauge target load
45 rounds of 12 gauge slugs
100 rounds of .45ACP 230gr. FMJ
~75 rounds of .45ACP 230gr. JHP
50 or so rounds of .45 200gr. semi wadcutters for practice
~ 500 rounds of various .22LR

I need some buckshot, and I'll use the #7 1/2 shot for trap practice. I'll need some goose hunting and duck hunting loads for my shotgun, and some turkey loads too for giggles. But that is way down the road, the buckshot is pretty high on the list right now. Also loading up on slugs is important since I don't have a battle rifle yet. I've been getting 50 rounds of .45 JHP's every other week once I found some cheap enough. Once I have 200 rounds stored of the JHP I'll be happy.

To increase my knowledge, I've gotten three books that are survival-related. "How to survive in the woods", "The ABC's of Reloading" and "Square foot Gardening". A diverse reading list to be sure. I'll write reviews on all of them soon.

The last few weeks I have not been able to exercise as mush as I should have. I am losing weight from cutting back on my portions and not eating crap every day for lunch. I need to start a regular exercise program. No excuses!

I did pick up a few "barter items" recently, and to be honest it's a mistake. I need to stock up on food, so no more of that! I picked up safety pins, needles, and some travel bottles of hand sanitizer. I also grabbed some rolls of aluminum foil for use/trade. I grabbed a big ass box of #10 common nails at lowes, but I don't feel so guilty about that. I'll use them around the shop, or for house repairs in addition to trade stock. That reminds me I should buy a roll of tar paper and galvanized roofing nails.

Well this post was longer than intended. But it helped me figure out what I need to do. Things have been quiet on the financial front. Oil is dropping like I figured it would before the winter. Seems like everyone has their finger in the air waiting to see which way the wind is blowing before they hit the panic! button or not. One item that is of note is that jobless claims are up by 7k. That's never good.

I'm watching to see how much stock the Federal Reserve buys of Freddie Mac and Fannie Mae. Then again it's Friday, or bank-closing-day. We should start a weekly pool of how many banks fail, we can bet cans of beans instead of money.

Survival Preparation Phases

So I have been giving some major thought in the last few weeks to line up a system of priorities on what to do and what to buy for survival. It has been a daunting task to say the least. I'm trying to keep this as generic as possible, so it can be used as a common baseline for everyone. I will do my best not to pick specific items or classes for this list, as part of this exercise is to pick what works best for you and your family.

Each of these items is a tree of other items, like the folder structure on your computer or an outline. There is probably a better way to lay this out, but for now, this works for me. the further up the tree you go, the more specialized the decision making will have to be. I tried to put this in a general order of importance in regards to what's needed first. This is (obviously) tailored for my area, the New England area. Enough of that here we go!

∞Shelter
∞Water
∞Food
∞Education
∞Training
∞Security
∞Sanitation
∞Intelligence
∞Health
∞Transportation
∞Finances
∞Maintenance
∞Community

Like I mentioned, these are as broad as it gets. I will be going through each of these items in detail in different posts. The need for myself to come up with this is because I started wearing my ass for a hat, and was spending too much money on preparing. I don't use credit cards, so I basically had to eat PB&J sandwiches for lunch this week so I could pay my bills. Lesson learned.

I welcome any and all comment on this project. If I overlooked something let me know and I'll fix it. This is for everyone's benefit, so I'm hoping to get it right for anyone new to the survival mindset. Hopefully they won't get lost as bad as I have recently.

With any suggestions on a new top-level item, make sure it doesn't fit under one of the other ones. For example, "Communications" is missing from the top level because it's a form of Intelligence.

The Alaska Experiment

I just got done watching the whole series "The Alaska Experiment" which aired on Discovery Channel. I have to say that it was a really good show.

It's only eight episodes long, and chronicles the effects of four groups of people dropped off in the middle of Alaska in late fall. These groups are provided a staple of rice, beans, flour, salt, etc. but NO protein. They have to get that themselves.

None of these people had ever been more than a weekend camper. No hunting skills, one of them was going to become a vegetarian! To see the amount of fat stripped off of these people in 3 months is incredible. Burning 5k calories/day and eating 2k will do that to you though.

It is definitely worth recording and watching sometime. One of the funniest moments is the look on a girl's face when the gut a rabbit. She looked like she just learned where babies come from - the hard way! ZOMG I had to rewind a bunch on that scene. Like Caddyshack it kept getting funnier the more I watched it.

There is some good info in the series for survivalists. Not the "how to skin a rabbit" stuff but how groups of people band together, what dumb things NOT to do, how cabin fever plays tricks on the mind. It even gives me hope, because one of the guys was tubby like me, and did just fine... Reminds me I need to go for a bike ride more often.

Firestarting

So I feel that part of being prepared is having the skills to back them up. Anyone can make a fire with a lighter, or matches and ample tinder and kindling, but what if you had limited items?

So I took out my fire-steel I bought a while ago, and figured I would practice making fires with what I had in my BOB(besides matches and lighter), and what I had in my back yard. I had a section of newspaper, a container of dryer lint, and my fire-steel. Let's just say that I considered myself well-schooled in how to make a fire. I was COMPLETELY wrong.

First off dryer lint is not as good a fire-starter as you would think. It lights, but then because of all the dog hair, and synthetics I wear for work, it did little more than burn the outside layer of the lint. Even if I pulled it all apart and made it fuzzy I wouldn't be able to make a fire from it.

The second option was to try to start the newspaper from the fire-steel, but that is a no-go. It just will not catch. I did try some of the TP I had, but it's the fancy stuff that wouldn't catch either.

Now I could have cheated and used the whole section of newspaper, but I was determined that if I did need to bug out, that I would need more than one fire on the way. So each attempt used a little lint and a 6" square piece of newspaper. I could make about 30-40 fires from the amount of lint and newspaper I had.

After an hour, I could reliably get a small fire going from a bit of lint and a 6" square of newspaper. Now this was perfect conditions, in heavy rain or such I would have to use a firestarter. I also limited myself to the back yard which only has oak and maple, where the front yard has some pine trees. Pine makes firestarting a cinch!

I think it was a good exercise. If I was in the woods, the additional tinder available to me would make it easier. At least now I know I could make a fire when bugged out, even if the spare lighter, and matches were lost. The way I look at it, the more confident you are in your skills, the less likely your going to panic when and if the SHTF on any scale. Whether it's a blizzard, a hurricane, power outage, or even TEOTWAWKI.

When was the last time you practiced making a fire?

Preparedness

Over the last year or so an idea has peculated through my conscious mind from my subconscious mind that I need to be better prepared. Now I am generally a very down-to-earth person, not given into any fad or craziness. Usually it's my first instinct to cut across the grain, to zig when everyone is going to zag. I tend to listen to these subconscious suggestions as over the course of my live it's saved me a lot of trouble. If I go "with the flow" on these instincts, then lots of good things usually go my way.

For example, I was out registering my truck at the DMV when I saw a gun store that I never knew was there, and decided to stick my head in and look around. When there I asked pretty much out of the blue about the FID and Handgun saftey class that the nanny state makes us take to get a LTC (license to carry i.e. CCW). Turns out for $94 I get the Mass class, the NRA class, and get to shoot a bunch of firearms - next class starts in 10 days. Coincidence? I think NOT. I have since filled out the paperwork and submitted it to the local police for processing, and I have an interview on Monday with the Chief. I'm a little nervous because he has the final say on what I can or cannot get. Maybe I'll post how the process works here in Mass so everyone can see how lucky you are in other states.

Recently, Every time I go to the grocery store I've picked up some extra canned goods, and I got about 10 days worth of food - it's a start.

So why bother? Here in the northeast we get hit with hurricanes, blizzards, and nasty storms called nor'easters. In a 5 year span, it is 100% guaranteed we will be hit with them. Most of the time it's no big deal, but every now and then, we get hit with a really nasty one. We lose power, and life sucks for a few days maybe a week. Ten days or so of food means I can help out one of my neighbors if they need it, until the power comes back on.

I personally feel that everyone in America should have food and water in their home for at least a week. Canned goods are cheap enough that there is NO excuse not to have this done. Poop happens. Look at those who were buried in snow in the Midwest this most recent winter, they had food stored so they survived without FEMA screwing things up because they had common sense enough to say "Gee, it snows in the winter, I might get stuck in the house!" As I recall there were only a few deaths when hundreds of thousands were affected. Good job!

Now I'm on a limited budget so I cannot mail order a year's worth of MRE's, expensive water purification rigs, 55 gallon drums to store extra gas, etc. I just cannot do it. However, I will slowly increase what preparations I have, and eventually I might have some of those items. For now, I am going to stick with the percentages. Some gear does double duty. I have a lot of camping gear already as I love to go camping so I have propane lanterns, stoves etc. Just need to stock extra propane so I can run these for a week instead of the 3 days of a camping trip.

So, basically, there is a 100% chance I will lose power in 5 years. I should be 100% prepared for that catastrophe then. If there is a .0001% chance of global nuclear war, then I should put my budget's $ into something that's probably more likely to happen. Buying NBC gear without having a bicycle to commute to work in case of the Peak Oil crash (.1%) is just silly. I agree that having some nice land somewhere outside of the beaten path is a great idea, but I am unwilling to sell of everything I own, abandon my career and move out to the sticks. If you have, then my hat is off to you, I just cannot do it myself.

So I urge everyone to prepare. Start with the most likely scenario for your area, hurricanes, earthquakes, etc. and make DAMN sure you and your family will be ok. Then re-evaluate. Counting on the chuckleheads at FEMA for anything is about as smart as playing in traffic, Boston traffic at that. In my links I've linked to a few of the survival blogs I read every day. I might not agree with them on everything, but I do agree with them that the time to prepare is NOW!