Prepping

I'm sure most of you have heard of prepping and preppers, and you might have made fun of those people from time to time, and I expect that most of us are not in a position to grab our bug-out bag and flee to the woods, where we have caches of food and supplies buried, and maybe even a cabin hidden in the wilderness.

That almost sounds like fun to me, and I do have a cabin in the wilderness, but I don't have a thyroid and I'd run out of Levothyroxine in a month since, for some reason, I can't get anyone to write a prescription for more than a month's worth, although I doubt that it's a commonly abused drug.

Nevertheless, my wife would be ready to give it up before the sun came up on our first night there, most likely, if I could even get her that far. The idea of no electricity or running water would be a deal-breaker.

Still, unless you live in a big city or in a country where there's no place to run away to, you're probably aware of such people. I know one family who has an eighty-acre parcel of wilderness, and another hundred-acre parcel that includes an island in the river separating the US from Canada, and I know that they were well stocked and prepared. But he's older now, suffering from serious cancer, and is about to move to Michigan to live near one of his older children.

There have been television shows about preppers and about prepping. Sometimes they are portrayed in a friendly light but, in movies and television dramas, they are usually the people who die shooting it out with the police, or who are finally persuaded that they are loony tunes, after which we are led to believe they might live a more normal life after a stint in the funny farm.

Whatever our opinions of preppers, most of us probably don't consider ourselves to be preppers.

Of course, there are degrees of prepping. Using the definition that simply suggests being prepared for eventualities, I have always done some of that. When I first moved to California as a young man, I couldn't feel sure that my job would still be there next week. Although I've never had a history of losing jobs, this was my first time on my own, so there was a degree of uncertainty. Aware of this, when I did my shopping, I'd buy a little extra of things that had a long shelf life, such as, at that time, canned foods, dried beans, and rice. When I could, I would even pay a month ahead on my rent.

This wasn't stuff that I would pack away, never to be used unless I found myself in dire straits. No, in the course of regular meals, I would eat some of it, and buy other stuff to take its place. Although I didn't consider myself to be a prepper, I was just making sure I wouldn't starve before I could find another job.

So I have always had that mindset, which wasn't so different from what my parents did, canning vegetables and fruit, storing potatoes in the potato cellar, and having a meat locker full of beef, pork, and venison.

I didn't do that so much when I was living in Texas, mostly because my job was by no means going to be in jeopardy since I nearly always had a few offers that I could choose from if I ever wanted to make a change. Besides, living on the Texas-Mexico border, someone would just kill me for whatever I might have stashed away. I rarely even cooked at home while I was a paramedic, anyhow.

Since I have been in Maine, we have bought a fairly substantial stock of dried foods, dry beans, rice, and things with shelf lives from 7-25-years, including fruits, and when I come across a good price on something that I know we'll use, I'll buy it in bulk. Nothing crazy, I don't think, since we have a big house.

It would mean foregoing a lot of stuff that I enjoy eating, but I think we could survive for at least a couple of years without going to a grocery store.

This alleviates a lot of the concern over empty store shelves right now and, particularly since I also work from home, and I'm paid through PayPal so I don't even have to mess with banks.

If I were single, I probably wouldn't leave the house, but not because I'm panicked over the coronavirus. I have little doubt that I would survive it with or without medical intervention. It's just that people are so nutty right now, and I don't really have much of a reason to leave the house.

We did go to Bangor a couple of days ago because I wanted to sign the petition for a woman we know who is trying to get on the ballot to run against Susan Collins. We stayed in a hotel and returned home the following morning. There were no extra rolls of toilet paper in our hotel room, as there usually are. Since we started out with less than a full roll, we did have to ask for another, and that wasn't a problem. Apparently, guests are stealing toilet paper now as they have always stolen unused soap, shampoo, and conditioner.

At the restaurants, there were no regular menus, condiments, sugar, or napkins on the tables. They were available, but you had to ask for them. Abbreviated disposable menus were brought out. Other than that, things weren't too nutty. Of course, we didn't bother going to any of the stores.

Back to the point, although I don't consider myself to be a prepper, I was prepared, not particularly for this emergency, but for any unforeseen problem that might have resulted either in our being unable to purchase food and supplies, whether it be a matter of unavailability of goods or of the money to buy it with, and I am happy that we were.

I did not have a large stock of toilet paper or paper towels but I did think to order some while it was still available from Amazon.com, so I haven't felt the need to fight over them at the Dollar Store.

Staying in the house would almost certainly save me from any chance of getting a virus except for one thing. My wife is out and about every single day so she is certain to bring home whatever might be out there. She had a cold before I caught my last one, and she had the flu before I had the flu last year. In fact, she's out searching for the coronavirus right now and, if she finds it, she will bring it home to me like the dead mice my cat carries home.

I'm not overly concerned, however. I had a cold when I saw my doctor for my annual checkup, and she didn't feel the need to test me for COVID-19 and agreed that the biggest problem with the coronavirus is panic and that the media is the most at fault. The same was true at the hospital, where I went to have my blood drawn. No one here has caught the virus but most people have caught the panic.

 

You just summarized every conversation that has ever been had on the subject.

Entry-level prepping (where most folks live): Stock up on things you normally use to help tide you over during the bad events you are most likely to experience: job loss, regional weather events (snow, flood, etc.), short-term supply disruptions.

TEOTWAWKI: The End Of The World As We Know It, aka The Zombie Apocalypse. This is where all theories are equally valid, since it's all speculation. Essentially the questions are: (1) Can you survive it, and (2) Do you really want to?

The icing on the cake is that the illusion of control is just as good as the real thing as far as one's emotional health is concerned, so prepping for prepping's sake is still beneficial.

All the rest flows from there.

 

Well said, @John Brunner ! I think that most of us realize and believe everything that @Hedi Mitchell Mitchell is talking about, and Bobby and I have certainly talked about it.
We live literally across the street from the Redstone Arsenal; so if any kind of war started (let alone Armageddon ), we are right where some of the first bombing would occur, and we would never even know what happened, let alone have to worry about how we were going to survive.

What I am preparing for is a temporary food shortage, similar to what happened back when no one could buy toilet paper, and some people were hoarding it .
I think that Biden will be gone by the end of this year, we will have President Trump back in office, and things will be looking better by early 2023; but I think that between now and then, the food shortage could get a lot worse.
If truckers are shut down; then store shelves, gas stations, planes, trains, busses (everything that carries people and products) will either not be running, or on very limited ability to deliver anything.
All fuel is delivered by the truck drivers.

I can see where this is a difficult thing in your position, Hedi, because you not only live in an apartment, you are looking at the likelihood of having to pack up and move, which usually means we eliminate everything except necessities to have to take on the move.
If you are not moving right away, then you might want to do a little more stocking up on storable foods, and if you are moving soon, then probably you will need to wait until after the move. You said you might be moving to a house with more room, so then you would have space to stock up more if you wanted to do that.

 

I lived 8 miles outside of DC from 1963 through 2010. Like many here, I grew up with Duck & Cover. I used to look at those maps showing the level of fallout within certain distances of DC, and realized that even if there weren't the unavoidable traffic jams, I can't outrun nuclear fallout no matter how fast I drive. I pretty much decided a long time ago that if I saw the flash of light on the horizon, I'd run towards it...at least there would be no traffic.

-No one can predict what future events will be or what the world will look like
-At this stage of my life, I think I'd just as soon share what I have than spend the tail-end of my life being a selfish S.O.B. (or even take a life) merely to eke out another day of existence
-If I had a family whose survival I was responsible for, my attitude would be a lot different

But it all depends. All of the above is theoretical. You also have to understand that we're not talking the aftermath of a nuclear war that drives much of this sort of talk, we're talking about our government shutting off supply lines in one way or another. That's a way different scenario. And it ain't happened yet.

While I'm not certain I'd want to live in a post-apocalyptic world, I also know to never underestimate my survival instinct. I want to have options should the worse happen. I'd rather be in possession of the supplies and not need them than realize I'm not ready to die just yet and failed to put myself in the best position I could. But it all depends. All of the above is theoretical.

 

Well. I don't know what to say.

I tried to search on who this guy is and found this on another website: "Gregory Mannarino is a high level Scottish Rite Freemason. On Friday he sent out a coded message to other Illuminated Masons through one of his videos. Discover what that Message was." It was a 20 minute video made by Tony Koretz, "a dedicated musician and audio engineer with a passion for all things related to sound and music, with a desire to see these things used for the Kingdom Of God." After watching the vid you posted, I did not need to watch a longer vid by some part time End Times guy.

So, can I do anything about this, or is it "curl up into a fetal position" time?