Where Do I Start?

So you’re looking around at the state of things and thinking, “Man, I ought to do something.” You’ve heard about preparing, and you’ve heard a bit about survivalists and what they do in order to be ready for big and little problems alike, but you have no idea of where to start. You don’t have much free time or extra cash, but you know that things are only getting worse; so now you start to panic because you think that it’s already too late, or that you can’t possibly reach the long-term goals of having more than a year’s worth of preparations put away, or some other such thing.

First, relax and take a few deep breaths. Prepping isn’t something that you decide to start today and finish tomorrow afternoon; it takes time even if you have millions of dollars to invest in it. There are many different aspects of prepping because we humans are complex creations with many needs, preferences, and options – but don’t let that worry you.

Sit down and make a list. I don’t care how you do this because we’re all different; I like using Excel, but you might prefer a pen and paper or a smartphone or some other thing. It doesn’t matter because the point is to start making some lists, as they help you focus and figure out what to do and when.

I started by listing the different things that my family and I have to have for survival. We really need food, water, clothing, and shelter; the rest can go bye-bye and we’ll continue breathing, though we might not be quite as happy as we are with our electricity, Internet access, cell phones, restaurants, TV dinners, and other such crap.

Next, I started a new list for each category. Shelter, for example, includes things like climate control (to a degree, anyway – you don’t want to freeze or die of heatstroke) and safety, along with pest control and a few other things.

Eventually, the lists became more detailed. I added a new category, skills, because I like being independent and self sufficient. Knitting is a skill, for example, that I started acquiring a couple-few years ago. This year, I’m knitting scarves for peoples’ Christmas presents because I’m basically broke – and these suckers are useful even in my part of Texas because we do have cold wind and it does make a person miserable.

Then, at some point, you start fulfilling the lists. I like to keep a list of things we need that are likely to turn up at flea markets, as I enjoy browsing the local ones anyway. We do weekly grocery shopping that’s a combination of replenishing what we’ve used and stockpiling some extras – what we put into the stockpile depends partly on what’s most important, but also on what’s on sale this week.

Set short- and long-term goals for yourself, including daily goals, and work on them as best you can. It’s fulfilling to be able to cross things off a list every day, whether they’re big things like, “learn to make laundry soap,” or little things like, “order book from Amazon today.” As you keep doing things, you’ll get a better idea of what you can accomplish every day/week/month and adjust the lists accordingly.

And you’ll have some bad days mixed in with the good ones. Don’t worry about that, though – just keep going. Stockpiling, prepping, survivalism…none of ‘em have specific instructions. The general idea is to be ready for trouble and have a way to deal with it not if, but when, it comes. That means different things to different people so, as long as you’re moving in the right direction, don’t let the incidentals bother you too much.

One of the more-common sentiments I’ve heard lately is, “I’m running out of time.” People say that about everything from investing for retirement to getting to work on time today, but it applies to this prepping bit, too. Maybe you’re worried that it’s too late to even bother starting, but put the smackdown on that line of thought. Even if things go to hell one week from today, you’ve spent a week doing something constructive. That buys you a week to survive while you work on longer-term plans. It’s better than nothing and it beats the hell out of being one of the people who won’t give any of this even passing thought until after the trouble comes.

The final thought of the day: Buy one, store one, give one away. Prepping isn’t only about me; it’s about my family and the people in my community. While I’m not about to feed everyone, I have friends and neighbors who might be able to use a little help. One of the dangers of prepping or survivalism is the desire to focus too much on ourselves, which is kind of a crappy way to live life.

Labels and Canned Goods

Most of us are storing canned goods even if we also have fresh veggies from the garden; home-canned foods; and other alternatives. It’s not a bad idea to diversify the food stockpile for a variety of reasons, including the military’s “Two is one and one is none” concept. Another reason to get canned goods is the fact that they’re cheap; if you hit sales like we do, you can get a lot of canned veggies for just a few bucks.

And while Mom and I are both learning how to can things (she used to do it with her mom, but hasn’t been involved in a few decades or so – gotta re-learn old skills if you’ve let them lie dormant for too long), we go by the, “Buy one, store one, give one away” mindset. We’d rather give away tin cans of veggies than home-canned foods because we want the jars and, as far as we can tell, most people around here don’t can at home; they wouldn’t have good jars to trade us.

One of the things that I hate about canned goods is that most companies don’t stamp anything useful on the actual cans beyond a “best by” date. When I look at cans of corn, peas, and green beans, the cans are all alike other than which labels are wrapped around them. Green Giant is an exception, but we don’t buy that brand often unless it’s on sale for a better price than others.

So, folks, what happens if the labels are ruined? You get to play Tin Can Roulette, that’s what, which isn’t always a fun game to play. If a flood destroys some of the labels…if one of the cats finds its way into your food stash and pees all over the cans…if some other, unexpected problem takes out the labels…you don’t know exactly what’s in there. Even if your stockpile is neatly sorted, separated by what’s inside the can, what about the bug-out bag? What if you have to throw a bunch of your stockpile into the vehicle and bug out? The glue on labels isn’t the best ever, so don’t be surprised if some of the labels end up in the bottom of your bag or on the floorboard.

Here at The Homestead, we use a Sharpie on the cans’ tops, noting what’s inside and its best-by date. Even though that date’s already stamped on the can, it’s much easier and faster to read a large “10/12” (October 2012, of course) mark on the top of the can than it is to go looking for the smaller stamp.

None of the labels are vital, so we can still safely prepare and consume the food without them. I don’t need the label on the canned soup to tell me that I only need to heat it and serve because I eat that soup in everyday life and am, therefore, familiar with it. This is one of many reasons why the idea of storing what you eat anyway is a great one. If, on the other hand, you find that you really need certain labels, it’s not a bad idea to save a few of them from cans you open and use.

And while labeling each can does take a few minutes, we know that the five or ten minutes we invest after coming home from the store could save us some frustration later.

Cluck Cluck!

Bags of fryer quarters normally run about .79 a pound here so, when Mom and I found them on sale for .20/lb., we bought two big bags. That’s what we have room to store at the moment but, if we had room, we’d have grabbed more. I imagine that, after Mom and I make the chicken casserole tonight, we’ll have somebody go back to the store and pick up another bag.

Mom and I cooked the chicken in her big ol’ roaster oven because it’s a fast and easy way to take care of twenty pounds’ worth of quarters. The chicken’s chunked and in the freezer, aside from the portion that’s going into dinner tonight, so we’re happy. Also, the cats and dogs got the skin, which is just gross if you’ve boiled it (in my opinion), so they were thrilled.

As for the chicken stock, Mom poured it up into the half-liter bottles that we’ve had lying around for a while. I have a tendency to buy Mountain Dew in six-packs of these bottles because it’s convenient and the suckers are usually on sale for a good price. We started saving the bottles a while back because we figured that they had to have a practical use or two, but we weren’t sure what we’d do with them at the time.

They’re food-grade plastic and are subjected to a thorough cleaning before we re-use them, so they’re excellent for filling halfway with water and sticking in the freezer. I used one, wrapped in a towel, for an ice pack a few days ago because the two proper ones were being rotated (Mom needed them). I bash the bottles full of ice with a hammer, cut them open, and pour the ice into the cats’ water dish when it’s hot as heck, like it has been lately in this part of Texas.

But the bottles also work very well for chicken stock. We didn’t bother separating the fat because that’s easy enough to do later when we use each bottle. Just poke a hole in the bottom – it’s much like shotgunning a beer, really – and let the chicken stock drain out; the fat that’s left will stay behind.

We have four liters of chicken stock cooling off so that they can go into the freezer. That’s a decent amount for the six people we’re feeding here, but you might want more or less depending on storage space, family size, that sort of thing.

Cat Food and Your Stockpile

When you stockpile food for your cats, remember that they require a certain diet – one that doesn’t include dog food to a great extent.

It’s perfectly okay to occasionally let the cat have the dog chow, but don’t make a habit of it. Cats have to have more proteins, for example, along with some other things that either aren’t present in dog food or are not present in enough quantities to satisfy the kitty’s physical needs. Cats who’ve been fed a steady diet of dog food have gone blind before because their bodies weren’t getting what was necessary.

I’m bringing up all that because some people on tight budgets tend to buy one bag of pet food – dog food if they have dogs and cats – without knowing the consequences. It’s also easy to justify storing only one type of dry food because that costs less money and requires less storage space.

You can grab water- and airtight pet-food containers at Tractor Supply or the pet store. They aren’t too terribly expensive but do a good job of keeping the cats’ food safe. Alternatively, you can break out your Food Saver and make your own, custom-sized bags of vacuum-sealed pet food.

Of course, feeding the cat from your stash is not necessarily a terrible idea. Some people make their own pet food which, if done properly (i.e. including the right ingredients for the pet in question), can save you some money and storage space. There are plenty of good cat-food recipes online, including a few for kitty treats if that’s your thing.

I’m not even going to suggest getting rid of the cats before the world goes berserk because a) I love cats and really don’t want The Homestead to be feline free, and b) where I live, it’s very difficult to find good homes, even for the most-adorable kittens, because the economy around here really sucks. People are having to choose between medication and food for their current pets, so they aren’t likely to take in another kitty who needs a good place to stay.

Talking About Prepping

To me, it’s important to talk about preparedness with neighbors, family, and friends. That’s because, the more people are prepared, the easier my life is going to be when we have to actually use those preps. There will be more people taking care of themselves, so there won’t be as many panicking, clueless folks running around. Those of us in the survivalist/prepper community will have more allies, too, which is usually a big plus. I’m thrilled whenever I hear about another prepper joining the “movement,” even if her progress is limited to buying an extra five bucks’ worth of groceries each week, because that’s one more person I don’t have to worry about when things go terribly wrong.

However, I don’t run around telling people, “Hey, the world’s going berserk – let’s all stockpile a year’s worth of food and other stuff!” Frankly, I don’t want the rest of my small community to know that they could, in theory at least, drop in on my family and me when things finally go completely insane and there isn’t easy, affordable access to essentials like food. If God sends someone my way, I’m happy to help – but I don’t want half the county knocking on my door when things go terribly wrong.

However, I encourage people I know to be prepared for other, lesser situations. Most of these folks are very receptive to the concept of shopping grocery-store sales and buying extras, for example, because they see rising food prices and know, intuitively, that crap’s only going to get worse. They aren’t convinced that everything will be just fine, so they’re happy to follow my family’s example of getting extras when they’re cheap and putting away as much of that food as we can.

Everyday situations are fantastic things to discuss, by the way. I tend to focus on rising food prices because my part of Texas is rather poor. Lots of us are at or below poverty level, and grocery-store bills are not always easy to afford. Even neighbors who don’t have much to worry about re: basic bills nod their heads when we talk about how everything is getting more expensive – and some of these people are starting to show concern because they’ve figured out that, at some point, the rising prices will become real problems for them, too.

However, I’m not a doomer when I talk about this stuff. I don’t segue into my, “the world’s going berserk” speech because I’m trying to avoid a) causing panic, and b) earning a reputation as the community’s chief nutjob. Sorry, folks, but a lot of our neighbors and friends aren’t going to believe us right now when we talk about end-of-the-world scenarios. They’re struggling to accept the reality of higher grocery bills…and some of them are still fuming over having to drop to a basic cable package several months ago. If they haven’t yet processed the everyday problems, they’re not going to have an easy time grasping the huge things that some of us are so concerned about.

I also talk about situations that my family and I have actually faced. A creek crosses the only road leading in and out of The Homestead, and said creek floods when there’s enough rain. This year alone, we’ve been stranded here at home more than five times because of flooding.

When I talk about the flooded road, I always add that I’m glad we have plenty of stuff at home to keep us fed, clothed, warm, etc. despite not being able to go to the store. Even when we’ve been stuck here for two days in a row, we’ve never missed a meal or gone without any of the other essentials. There’s always plenty in the house to get us through even the longest flood.

People tend to react positively to all that because they see that being prepared for these situations really does pay off, at least in my family’s case. They can see, for themselves, that we’re right to always have plenty of groceries at home: we’ve actually had to use the provisions, so our preparedness paid off.

But try telling these same folks that you’re stockpiling against the possibility of the Antichrist showing up while you’re still alive…or that you’re convinced that hyperinflation could hit this country…and, well, you’re a nutter.

So…I’d suggest sticking to basic, real situations that actually happen, like natural disasters and short paychecks. However, we also have to accept that some people simply will not listen. I recently spoke with one guy who is convinced that, regardless of what happens, he can just take his debit card to Walmart and grab anything that he needs. He does not understand that a whole bunch of other people will get the same idea; the shelves could be empty by the time he gets there; the debit card may not work when he swipes it; roads might be impassable when he decides to get off his butt and go shopping…so forth and so on.

I just leave those folks alone because they aren’t going to listen no matter how reasonable and logical I am when I present my point of view. Even when I offer solid evidence for prepping – like being stranded at home with a flooded road – guys like that have the, “It can’t happen to me” attitude. This guy in particular is convinced that his road could never flood because he lives in a city, not the middle of nowhere, and therefore has better maintenance as well as city workers who can fix the problem.

Whatever…I hope that he can take care of his family should something go wrong, but I doubt that he’ll have that ability. He doesn’t want to take even simple, reasonable steps, and that’s his choice and problem.

Fortunately, most of the people who hear what I have to say are more receptive than that. Many will agree with the basic, simple things that I talk about, and some will actually go out and start doing them – like getting extra food, or making sure that they know where their flashlights are in case of a power outage. That’s why I’m so optimistic about discussing the ideas: they’re well received more often than not, so there’s hope that we can continue spreading the ideas and helping more people take care of themselves.

Finally, A Blog Entry!

As far as survival goes, I don’t have much new to say right now. My family and I are still doing what we normally do: adding to the stockpiles; learning how to be a little more self sufficient than we were the week or month before; and hanging in there.

Dad’s facing big cutbacks at work, so we’re anticipating smaller paychecks. Everyone else in the house is facing the same situation…recession’s over, my foot. We haven’t done proper, full-fledged grocery shopping in a few weeks now because money’s been so tight lately, but we’re surviving. Nobody’s missed any meals, so we aren’t complaining. Like I told YB: “It’s real tough to gripe with your mouth full of food, huh?” He agreed. We go into the survival stash, grab what we need, and make a meal – this is why we prepare, and everyone’s grateful that we had the opportunity to build up the stockpile before finances started to get really tight.

The chickens are just about ready to start laying – finally! We’re working on the final chicken coop because the one that we put together for the interim just isn’t big enough. They obviously couldn’t live in their little cage forever, so we did what we had to do until we could get plans and materials together to build the big, permanent coop. This coop’s going to be a little closer to the house, and we have plans to put access doors on the outside of the roosting area: that way, we can reach in and get the eggs without necessarily entering the coop. Naturally, there will still be a proper door because we do want to go in there with the chickens sometimes.

There just isn’t much going on beyond the usual, everyday stuff. Mom’s current project, now that we got her laser printer up and running again, is updating her cookbook. She prints out full-page copies of her recipes, puts them in plastic sheets, and then sticks those in a ring binder. She likes this because she doesn’t have to worry about getting flour, or other stuff, on the actual pages – and because she can change the recipes whenever she wants.

My brothers are still working on collecting firewood – for us, but also for our neighbor. He’s really sick, and just can’t deal with that this year. His two sons are worthless: they’re old enough to buy beer, and therefore should be capable of making sure that their dad stays warm, especially now that he’s so sick (in and out of the hospital and all that unpleasant stuff). But no…they’re too busy riding their BMX bikes, or going out to the honky tonk, to bother with Dad.

Sis is busy with work, mostly, but she and I are trying to work out some free time on weekends so that we can hit local garage and yard sales together. She has to work Wednesday through Sunday, and I have school and homework, but our schedules are bound to coincide sooner or later.

As for me…work and school are taking up most of my free time, but it’s finally the right weather for knitting. Dealing with a bunch of yarn just isn’t as pleasant when it’s hot and humid: I’d much rather knit when it’s cooler. I’m doing the washcloth thing – I think that I wrote about that already, right? There are some great, free patterns available at About.com if you’re interested.

Still Sick; Still Surviving

I’m still sick, which is really ticking me off. It appears that I have a nasty chest cold, which is making it insanely difficult to breathe or move very far without running short of breath.

Lately, my family and I have been preparing for the coming winter. We’re doing things like pulling out electric blankets and winter clothes; checking the wood-burning stoves to make sure they’re clean and in good working order; and making sure that we have plenty of winter-related gear (firewood, for example).

We’re also, of course, still stocking up on as much food as we can buy. There’s a few months’ worth of food stashed here at The Homestead now, but prices are still going up. We want to get more as quickly as we can, if only because we don’t know when price increases will stop…if they ever do.

Mom’s trying to find a local source for powdered, whole milk because she’s tired of wasting valuable refrigerator space on the two gallons that we consume just about every week. Nobody in this family likes skim or nonfat milk, so we aren’t buying those in powdered form. That’s the only stuff that the local Walmart carries, but we’re looking at different stores to see what else is available. If we can’t find anything locally, we can shop online: we do that often anyway because, in this tiny community, lots of much-wanted things just aren’t available.

I’m still looking for cast-iron cookware, but am not willing to pay full retail prices. Like I’m really going to cough up thirty-plus bucks for a skillet at Walmart when I can find a perfectly good one at a flea market or garage sale for a lot less than that. My philosophy is that, if you can find something that’s used but still in good condition, you should probably go with that in order to save money. I buy used clothes, used books, used cookware, used cars…and I haunt thrift stores and flea markets, along with garage sales, just to see what neat things I can find.

However, I do buy some things new. I decided, recently, to start knitting some wash cloths. I didn’t have any cotton yarn, so I went to Walmart and found some on sale. I grabbed all four skeins and will start knitting sometime soon – probably next week or the week after, because I might have some extra down time after mid-terms are officially over.

Puritan.com is running another pretty good sale on various vitamins and other supplements, so you might want to check out that site if you’re looking for that kind of thing. Mom’s placed three or four orders with that company so far and has been very pleased with the service and the products every time. I’m not officially affiliated with the Web site, but I’m happy to tell you all when we find something that we like.

This week, Mom also decided to reformat her computer – finally. Make sure, folks, that you back up your data on a regular basis. That way, if something goes wrong, you don’t lose everything. You can find CD-Rs for almost nothing now, so burn CDs if that’s what you have to do. You can also buy a converter cable that turns an inexpensive, internal hard drive into an external model. I paid roughly thirty bucks for the cable, and have been backing up all of my important files to that “external” drive ever since. Another option is to burn to DVD. You can use thumb/USB drives, too, or an online-backup company. Heck, e-mail the vital stuff to your own Web-based e-mail account if that’s the only thing that you can do. Any backup method is better than nothing at all, especially if your collection of survival-related information is important to you.

Anyway: I’m out of here because I just took yet another dose of cold medicine and will probably crash in bed pretty quickly. I hate being sick, especially when it’s drawn out like this chest cold has been. Take care, folks, and don’t forget to enjoy the present while you’re preparing for the future. Survival isn’t supposed to be a grim, doom-filled lifestyle: we can still have a great time, and laugh, and enjoy being alive, while we make sure that we’re prepared to survive whatever happens next.

Fulfilling Your Survival Wish List

I imagine that most of us have wish lists full of survival-related items that we have yet to acquire for whatever reason, but would like to get in the future. My family’s list includes things like a solar oven; more food in storage (that’s a constant, though, because we keep extending the goal when we reach the current one); and a solar-powered battery charger for the cell phones and rechargeable batteries.

One way to go about completing your list is to follow my family’s “One for now, one for later” rule, which applies to most of the groceries and other essentials that we buy. It doesn’t take long to get into the habit of adding two to the cart or splitting up the one item when you get home.

If you buy a six-pack of tighty whities, throw three pairs into the stockpile so that you’ll have them later. Of course, it helps to keep an eye on your size as you go – it would suck if you lost twenty pounds between now and the end of society as we know it and, therefore, couldn’t wear your nice, new underoos.

When we need a container of salt or pepper, we buy two and put away the extras. If we can afford only one bag of beans or rice, we halve it and use the Food Saver to seal the portion that goes into the stash. Right now, my family and I are cutting back on how much sugar we use because we really can’t afford to buy a bunch of it – but still want to put half in the stockpile.

Should we find a fantastic sale on something – a grocery item or some other essential – we buy as much as we can possibly afford. Closeout sales are great ways to get these great deals: stores will put perfectly-good stuff on clearance because the package design changed; the stuff is on the verge of expiring; or next year’s version is about to hit the shelves. I recently bought the mother lode of canned pinto beans because of such a sale, for example.

Some big-ticket items are exceptions to the “One now, one for later” rule. I’m not going to go buy two computers, for example – obviously. However, nothing says that I can’t acquire some extra parts so that, should my PC crap out, I have a good chance of fixing it. I can’t afford to buy two handguns, but I CAN keep mine in good working order and accumulate spare parts so that I might be able to fix it if something goes wrong. There isn’t an extra car sitting in the driveway, I’m sorry to say, but we can repair the ones that we do have, right? Right.

You can offset the extra cost of stockpiling and buying extras by shopping sales. Supermarkets, hardware stores, and pretty much every other retail outlet have “loss leaders,” or heavily-discounted sale items that are designed to lure you into their stores. They can afford to take a hit on this merchandise because they know that a good number of shoppers are going to stick around and buy regularly-priced stuff as well. If, however, you go in and buy just the loss-leader merchandise, you end up saving a big chunk of cash.

Also, take a look at weekly store circulars. In many areas, these show up in your mailbox, or with the Sunday paper. You can also check them out online at SundaySaver.com, of course. My family and I use these ads to find out what’s on sale and plan the weekly menu around that. There have been a few nice surprises some weeks – like pork chops being half off at one store. Oh, man, was that Monday’s dinner awesome. And the pork-chop sandwiches the next day? Fantastic.

Of course, with the economy sucking like it is at the moment, all sorts of stores are closing all over the place. Earlier this year, I grabbed several memory cards for a fraction of the retail price because the Circuit City near my university was having a closing sale. Just last week, a popular chain of grocery stores closed one location: they sold off all of their store-brand groceries for at least fifty percent off, which presented a fantastic opportunity to go spend some serious money on everything from canned goods to paper towels.

So: Save money, buy more than what you need right now, and be happy knowing that the work you’re putting into this will pay off. Even if nothing ever goes wrong as long as you’re alive, you’re going to eventually eat the food and use the other stuff that you’re accumulating. If nothing else, the stuff that you’re buying today is cheaper than it will be in six months when you rotate your stockpiled food.

Fun with Search Queries

Note: Last week, I suggested making lists of the “little things” that you might overlook when you add to your stockpiles. My family added some interesting things over the last few days: shoelaces, for example, and small sewing kits. We also realized that you really can’t have too much duct tape.

Fun with Search Queries

Today, as a bit of a break from the usual routine, I decided to see what search terms people are using to find this blog. Because I’m the helpful sort, I’ll also try to figure out what these folks want, and come up with an answer or two.

Bad toothache; antibiotics not working
How long have you been on the antibiotics? They don’t do away with the pain the first few days, especially if you’re hurting a LOT. Oh, and see a dentist: that bad tooth needs treatment, unless you want to pretend that you’re in “Castaway” and knock it out yourself with an ice skate and a rock. Having never done anything of that sort, I have no advice for you about it, but I imagine that removing your own, infected tooth would be a bad idea, considering that you would be spreading an infection around. That could be, you know, bad.

What are four sources of water?
Let’s see: The magical tap in your kitchen; the stockpiled barrels or jugs of water in your cache; the creek or river if you have a way of purifying the water; and the toilet tank or water heater if you’re in a bad way.

Alternate answers include: Rainfall; the magical tap in the bathtub; the water well, provided that you can access the water (no electricity means no pump, unless you have a backup plan); and the bottled-water section of the grocery store. Not all of these sources will be available all the time, of course, so be sure to have backup plans for your backup plans.

Natural pest repellents
My family and I have had success with horse apples, as I’ve said before. We’ve also learned that ground cinnamon, sprinkled around the area we want to protect, repels everything from roaches to scorpions. Bay leaves also repel a variety of critters as long as you remember to grab said leaves every week or so and crumple them a bit between your hands (keeps the pungent smell vivid, it seems).

If you’d like a solution that you can spray directly on anything that you’d like to kill – black-widow spiders, scorpions, etc. – go find cold-press orange oil. We get ours at the feed store, but we’ve also found the stuff at organic nurseries. Mix one part of this with two or three parts water (either mixture works fine, I’ve noticed) in a spray bottle and you have a nice-smelling firebomb for those nasty critters. It’s even better than dousing them with Raid – trust me.

Oh, and while we’re on the subject of organic pest control: roosters and chickens eat all sorts of critters, including the dreaded scorpion. Our rooster roams near the house. This works out because he has plenty of room to move around and because he eats things that we don’t want around the house. He LOVES scorpions. Loves them. Good, good rooster!

How to avoid taking the swine-flu vaccine
Just…um…don’t take it? But seriously, if you’re in a position where you could be required to take this shot, you’re going to have to weigh the consequences of refusing against the consequences of being vaccinated, and then make a decision.

Alternatively, you and a whole bunch of other people in the group can collectively refuse, seeing as there’s usually some strength in numbers. When I was in the Army, that sort of attitude would get you into deep trouble, but most of the rest of us can refuse. Just say no, folks.

Can you boil an MRE in a pot?
Yes! Take the entrée out of its cardboard box and drop it in a pot of boiling water: a few minutes later, you have a piping-hot meal. You can also heat the MRE in the sun, which works best if you put the food on a dark surface (still sealed in the bag, that is). Ideally, though, you’ll have the MRE heater, which requires only a tiny amount of water to operate.

However: I don’t stock up on MREs, at least not at this point, because they’re a bit overpriced. If you’re in a place where you can boil a pot of water, you can make all sorts of inexpensive, but nutritious and filling, foods: oatmeal; rice; noodles, that sort of thing. None of those foods take up much room, depending on how much you pack and how, so why not?

Survivalist scams
Well…I’m not exactly sure of what this means, but my first thought is “overpriced gear.” Folks, you don’t have to have an AR-15, Mountain House freeze-dried food, or ten thousand acres in the middle of nowhere. It’s entirely possible to work within your budget, whatever that may be, and come out ahead in the end. Survival is more about the preparedness mentality, which includes acquiring knowledge and skills, than about the gear anyway, as evidenced by the fact that more than one “adventurer” has died despite having a pack full of crap.

That being said: I highly encourage you to buy good books about the things that you’re learning to do. Oh, sure, most information is free if you have Internet access and decent search skills, but there are times when a “real” book is best. I love books anyway, so this isn’t a burden or a challenge for me.

Thoughts for the Week

Well, howdy, folks. This entry’s later than usual because my class schedule got switched around this semester. I’m at school on Mondays and Wednesdays, so I’m a little behind today – sorry about that!

So…here are my thoughts for the week. They’re a little disorganized because school’s been insane so far, but I’ll do my very best to get back on track as soon as possible.

A good holster makes concealed carry more comfortable…and easier. You don’t have to spend tons of cash on a good holster, either: mine was only eighty bucks, including shipping, which is downright cheap when you look at how much some of the other holsters out there cost. Mine’s custom molded to my firearm’s model, too, which is a huge plus when it comes to retention.

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Be sure to actually wear the clothes that you’re going to put away for the future…or stash in your bug-out or get-home bag. I say that because I just bought two dozen pairs of socks at Payless – they had a “buy one, get one half off” sale, so I figured that I might as well stock up.

The socks turned out to be total crap. I’ve worn only twelve pairs so far, but two of them have very-weak stitching around the toes. In other words, I have holey socks, and I’ve worn the suckers only once. This is the first time that I’ve ever had new socks fizzle on me…weird. Fortunately, I noticed the problem, and will be replacing the pair of unworn ones from my get-home bag – because, frankly, they could be a bigger pain to me than they’re worth if I ever need them in a crisis.

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Mom received her order from Puritan.com today – a crapload of D3, along with a few other things that she wanted. Because this order showed up so quickly, and was exactly what Mom wanted, I’m giving the Web site both thumbs up. If you’re looking to stock up on something like D3, give this site a look: they’re currently having a fantastic sale.

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Have you checked out AllRecipes.com yet? I have no affiliation with the site whatsoever – I just use it to find new recipes. It’s free, easy to use, and even lets you search by ingredients (things that you want as well as things that you don’t). If you’re stockpiling staples, which you probably are, it’s a good idea to have a variety of recipes that use these things. Trust me…you want a somewhat-diverse menu.

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Unfortunately, I have to get busy with homework if I want to pass this semester and, you know, graduate. I’ve spent too much time in school to fail now, so I’m off to study. In the meantime, I leave you with a thought about the future:

When things go wrong, pretty much everyone will rush to the stores to grab all sorts of stuff that they just realized they’re going to need. This is why we have extra food on hand, but what about the little things? Mom and I were talking yesterday, while we were hanging clothes on the line, when one of us said, “You know…it would suck if we couldn’t buy more clothespins.”

The other agreed, and said that getting a few extra packs would be a good idea – just in case. Even though we bring in our (wooden) clothespins at the end of the day, the things still wear out and break. They aren’t made of the best materials, unfortunately.

So…this week, my family is focusing on the “little things” that we regularly use: stuff that we might overlook when we stockpile. Perhaps, this week, you can join us? Keep a small notepad on you and write down everything that you use – especially small things like clothespins, or the eyeglass-repair kit. Even if you use this stuff only once or twice a year, it would still suck to have only one, right? Right. Maybe this week of observing and list making will help us all figure out how to be better prepared in the future.

My Family's Progress

The last several days have been good for stockpiling, because my family and I came into a little extra cash – nothing big, but enough to make some progress toward our food- and gear-storage goals.

We shopped sales, like we normally do. One of the local grocery stores had all sorts of great stuff on sale. Canned goods that are normally two bucks or more were ten for ten dollars, so we stocked up on everything from canned pinto beans to tomatoes. We also got a buttload of bacon because it was on mad sale. Extra salt, pepper, and other spices went into the shopping cart, along with staples like rice.

I grabbed a crank-powered, LED flashlight because, even though we have batteries and several flashlights, diversity isn’t a bad thing. However, the marine flashlight is still with the get-home bag, because the body’s square (and weather resistant). If I have to put it on the ground to, say, change a flat tire in the dark, I don’t have to worry about it rolling into a ditch, or running out of juice because I didn’t crank it long enough.

There are even more Ziploc bags here now, too, along with tin foil and wax paper. We added more sandwich bags, too, for lunches. I’ve decided, this semester, to take lunch to school instead of hitting the dollar menu at Wendy’s. I’m saving only two bucks a week, but still: that will buy a few cans of veggies, or some rice. Why spend the money on a crappy burger when I can contribute something to the family’s food stash, right?

The local Walmart is finally carrying a store-brand version of Excedrin Migraine, which is fantastic news. Walmart’s version comes in two packs of 100 pills each…for four dollars. I can’t get one tiny bottle of Excedrin Migraine for that price, so I grabbed two boxes. If this stuff doesn’t work (that, however, is doubtful) for me, someone might barter with me for it later.

Mom and I stopped in at the flea market. We filled two plastic grocery bags with paperbacks for about twenty dollars: a great deal when you consider how much we love books around here. When there’s not much else to do but read, we’ll be basically set, I think.

While we were there, I looked for cast-iron cookware. We found a pan that was made in Taiwan, and didn’t look very sturdy or well made. A skillet from China was automatically ruled out because it didn’t look any better than the other one. Mom prefers Wagner or Lodge for cast-iron cookware, because she knows and trusts those brands. Do any of you have other suggestions? Is there another brand that you’ve found to be reliable, well made, etc.? Mom prefers cast iron without wooden handles, incidentally, and she has no problem seasoning the cookware herself.

I did, however, find an IBM “M” model keyboard for two bucks. For those of you who don’t know: these keyboards are the “clicky” kind, and hold up for years and years. Some people are still using the same ones that came with the IBM computers they bought YEARS ago. I had to order an adapter as well as a replacement buckle-spring assembly (a key on the number pad is stuck). However, I still made out like crazy with this one, because these old keyboards cost at least fifty bucks on eBay and at sites that specialize in refurbishing and reselling them.

Besides: I can’t get a new keyboard for two bucks, plus my other expenses, and new ‘boards definitely don’t hold up to all the typing that I do. (English major…freelance writer…survival blogger…I’m at the keyboard several hours a day.) The new ‘boards – even “nice” ones – die within two years, if that long, despite good care and maintenance.

When you come into a little extra cash, take it to the grocery store: even if it’s only ten extra dollars, that money will put you closer to your food- or gear-supply goal. Buy extra batteries for the flashlights, or stock up during one of the local grocery store’s canned-goods sales.

But even when you don't have that bonus money, buy something extra - give up some small thing that you don't have to have so that you can afford to put away some food or other necessities. It might not SEEM like you’re doing anything when you come home with only a small amount of extras every week, but keep going. Every time you add to the stockpile, you’re giving yourself extra time to either ride out the situation that we’re facing…or get the other plans up and going (like the garden).

Stay focused, stay motivated, and stay safe, folks. Every time I look around, it seems like the world’s getting nuttier and nuttier. We don’t have to be part of that, though!

Things are Changing

Some observations about my small, Texas community in the middle of nowhere:

The local Walmart’s not very large, at least by Supercenter standards, and therefore can’t stock the biggest selection. However, they’ve been adding some items over the last few weeks that we survivalists/preppers might like.

Recently, I noticed that this location now stocks concentrated whole milk. This is a fantastic addition to the inventory, because nobody in my family likes powdered milk, which is plentiful at this Wally World. The powdered stuff is skim milk, which just isn’t our “thing,” so we’re going to pick up some of the new stuff and give it a try.

There’s powdered buttermilk now, too. This is another item that my family and I want to try, because we love dairy products – and, of course, the idea of having buttermilk even without electricity or grocery money.

A few days ago, I wandered into the sporting-goods section – specifically, the tiny camping area that takes up all of half of one aisle – and noticed bags of Mountain House food on the shelves. There aren't any number-10 cans, of course, but the "main meal" pouches hold two servings of food each - or so it appears. There are a few choices, including a ready-to-eat, Mountain House version of strawberry ice cream in a pouch. These are, of course, expensive meals and desserts, so my family and I won’t be buying too many, if we grab any at all. We prefer using the Food Saver to vacuum seal various foods: it’s cheaper, and we can control the amount of food in each bag.

More and more generic or store-brand items are selling out in grocery stores all over this area. Weekday mornings are usually great times to shop because the stockers tend to put out plenty of items the previous evening (or overnight, in Walmart’s case). Now, though, it’s getting difficult to find these items, even during the “prime shopping times.” However, it’s getting easier to find the brand-name stuff.

We've been shopping at this Walmart for nearly twenty years. Some of the cashiers have been there longer than that, and know my family and me very well. They happily tell us things that can be useful, even going so far as to give us competitors' sales prices on items even when we don't have the ads with us.

One of these cashiers told us, recently, that shoppers have been stealing other shoppers' ads out of their carts. This, the cashier said, has never been a big problem before. Lately, though, this sort of thing happens a few times a week, if not more often. The cashier's getting lots of complaints from the customers coming through her line, so she told us to keep an eye on our ads.


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I go through pocket change to see if I can find old coins. They could very well be a good hedge against inflation because they contain precious metals. I’ve been finding more and more old change all over the place. When this sort of thing happens, it usually means that people are spending their old, accumulated change. If things are hard, and stay that way long enough, people will take giant containers of change to the bank or Coin Star machine so that they can put gas in the cars, buy some food, et cetera.

Of course, this influx of old change could also mean that people are dying, and that their survivors are spending the buckets and buckets of change that the now-deceased folks left behind. When my family and I cleaned out my grandmother’s home a few years ago (she moved), we found change stashed all over the place. She’s a Depression survivor and, as such, hordes anything she could possibly want or need, including money.

We found Shedd’s Spread tubs in all sorts of strange places, often at least half full of coins. There were coin banks all over the house, too, with a few bucks’ worth of change in each one. We found coins in closets, in milk cartons, in the pantry. I don’t know how much we found, because none of us were interested in messing with Grandma’s things; we were just there to help her pack up and move.

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Our local community college is running out of seats. This has never happened before – not at this school. They’re capable of accommodating a few thousand students, which is a small number to most people. However, this is a small community. School officials are recommending that students register as early as possible, just to be sure they can get into the classes that they need.

Unemployment, or the threat of it, often encourages people to get more credentials in an effort to either get, or keep, jobs. A two-year school is very affordable, and many campuses offer night classes for those who can’t be there during the day. It doesn’t take much money or time to earn an Associate’s Degree, which is usually a good investment for those who are trying to keep earning money.

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Times are hard and, judging by the things that I’ve seen around here over the last couple of weeks, aren’t getting much better. If you aren’t preparing, now would be a fantastic time to start. Even if we’re all wrong, and the economy rights itself overnight (unlikely, but almost anything is possible), we’ll have extra food and other gear for future use. We’re going to eat all those groceries anyway, regardless of what happens tomorrow or six months from now, so I can’t think of any good reason to neglect stockpiling.

Chicks, School Supplies, and Spreadsheets

Well, what’s happened since last week’s entry? Not a whole lot, to be honest, but stuff is moving forward, which is what really matters.

The chickens are getting big. (Roughly the same size as an American football.) The roosters aren’t big enough to turn into fried chicken, chicken pot pie, or king ranch casserole, but they’re getting there.

Our little garden is starting to come up. The head gardener – Middle Bro – is doing most of the work because he enjoys playing in the dirt. The rest of us contribute, sure, but he does the majority of the work. The rest of us help, sure, but we all have our own strengths and preferences. Middle Bro can play in the dirt all he wants, with help when he wants or needs it, and the rest of us will focus on stuff that he doesn’t care to do, like cook or research projects and ideas.

Middle Bro recently came home with a fig tree. The sapling’s spent the last few weeks taking root in the ground and growing slowly, but surely. Fig trees, by the way, need lots and lots of sunlight, in case you’re dreaming of having your very-own figs right in your yard. You can find more information at http://www.crfg.org/pubs/ff/fig.html.

Future plans include peach and apple trees, because both can do very well in our part of Texas. And, of course, we all love these fruits. Right now, the nursery where Middle Bro does most of his shopping is waiting for a shipment. I don’t know what’s going on with that, because that’s Middle Bro’s thing, but I’m looking forward to more trees.

In an effort to be more organized re: food stashes, I created an Excel spreadsheet that will help us figure out what we have (and lack). Oh, sure, we know what we have, and we know that we need more, but we didn’t have anything written down until recently. My family and I aren’t overly organized as far as the paperwork side of things goes, but we’re trying to change that.

The computer version gets updated as often as possible, but we’re relying mostly on the hard copies that I’ve printed out so far. You never know when your computer or electricity will go down, after all, making all those files worthless. (Backing up data on a regular basis isn’t a bad idea, either.)

If you don’t have Microsoft Office, you can get Open Office for free (legally, even). That’s a pretty-good office suite, actually. It’s compatible with Microsoft’s version, and has the benefit of open-source support (meaning, basically, that anyone who wants to change something can do so – you aren’t stuck with one guy’s or team’s idea of what the software “should” be like). I don’t use it because MS Office was free with my PC, and already installed, so I didn’t see the point in bothering. In the past, though, with other computers, OO has been good stuff.

Speaking of stashes: School supplies go on sale soon. A package of notebook paper is typically about a buck fifty here: during sales, the same item can cost as little as ten cents. Two-pocket folders with brads, which are fantastic for storing information that you print from the Internet, cost us about a dime each during the sales (versus about a buck apiece the rest of the year). We also save money on the markers and other writing instruments we use around here.
Last year, Mom spent something like twenty bucks on notebook paper and spiral-bound notebooks. We still have some left over, and will be replenishing the stockpile like we do every year. We use lots of paper for school, Bible study, and making shopping lists, among other things, so we go through more than enough to save a decent wad of cash by stocking up during the sales.

You might not use all that much notebook paper, but what about pens and pencils? Are you looking for a good backpack to serve as a bug-out or get-home bag? Have you been printing out interesting and useful information that you find online, which is really eating up your printer-paper stash? All of these things, and more, go on sale shortly before the kids go back to school. Here in Texas, we even have a “tax-free weekend,” during which we don’t pay sales taxes on qualifying supplies. You might save only a few bucks here and there, but that cash will certainly add some more rice, flour, or sugar to the food stash.

Oh, and as far as storing notebook paper goes: heat isn’t good. The thin, plastic wrapper tends to shrink up, leaving you with curled paper. It’s still usable, of course, but it’s a pain in the butt. We learned this the hard way because, one year, we didn’t really think about where we put the storage container full of paper and notebooks. Our bad.

NEWS FLASH: I was about to finish up this entry, but there’s some breaking news that we all need to know about:

Michael Jackson is still dead.

When the media will stop kissing his butt is beyond me, but I’m fairly certain that there are more important things to discuss right now. Let’s talk about the cap-and-trade bill, perhaps, or the violence in Iran re: their recent election.

Griping Despite the Plans

The last week’s been a bit intense here at The Homestead. It’s nothing serious, but the family and I are getting a little ragged.

Dad’s not typically one to take action. He’s not a good leader, in most situations at least, so the rest of us tend to just work around him. Instead of preparing, Dad tends to sit around and gripe about the way that things are going. He’s had quite a few complaints about the U.S. government lately, of course, just like many of the rest of us. However, you won’t catch Dad doing anything – not even sitting down to write a one-page letter to one of his representatives – because that takes valuable time that is, apparently, better spent complaining and ranting.

Now, I’m all for a good rant and all. I have a few good ones in me, and will let them loose when appropriate. However, I’m also all for taking action: rant and complain for a bit, then do something about the problem…or rant while you take care of business. Instead of sitting around and complaining that hyperinflation is practically guaranteed because the U.S. has been printing money in the basement for, you know, YEARS AND YEARS, the family and I (minus Dad) are redoubling our efforts to stockpile food and other essentials. This way, if a one-pound bag of rice costs twelve bucks in the future, we don’t have to buy it...or, at worst, we won’t have to buy very much of it.

Incidentally: We’re also stockpiling other things that might not be vital to our continued existence, but are very nice to have on hand. Mom and I both have dentures, for example, so we’re building up a little stash of the effervescent cleaning tablets. These are not strictly necessary – you can easily clean the dentures without them, after all – but the tablets leave the dentures nice and fresh, and also kill off quite a bit of bacteria. They’re cheap right now, but will cost a small fortune should hyperinflation become a reality.

This week, Dad’s been particularly unhappy about the economic situation, and has been doing quite a bit of griping. Knowing him as well as I do, I would wager that he's downright terrified right about now. He’s afraid that, if a five-pound bag of flour costs seven bucks, we’ll go hungry. So he’s griping more and more often about the problems that he sees coming, even though the rest of us are actively working on a solution that we hope and pray will get us through whatever comes next.

So, even though there are buckets and shelves and such all over the house with extra food in them – and even though Dad’s sat there and watched the rest of us prepare the food to go into these storage areas (vacuum-sealing the pasta, for example), he’s still convinced that we’re all going to starve to death, like, ten seconds after hyperinflation sets in. He hears the rest of us talking about the problems that we see coming, and about our solutions. He's right there, sitting at the same table with Mom and me, when we make the weekly grocery list, including both food we eat now and food we put away for later.

Part of this is because we haven’t been actively stocking up on food and other necessities for the last two decades. Dad requires a lot of time to get used to something, whether the change is large or small. He’s still confused by the fact that yes, we have a DVD player in the living room, even though that sucker’s been sitting there for more than a year.

Dad tends to not notice things when he’s afraid, too. Like the buckets full of rice, pasta, beans, et cetera. Like the extra toothpaste and other sundries. Like the extra sodas (because we refuse to usher in the Apocalypse without caffeine, thank you very much).

So, over the last week, Mom’s been trying to reassure Dad that we have plans, and that we’re working toward bigger things. The chicks are quickly turning into chickens, for example, and the food stash is growing. Our garden went in recently, and is doing fairly well.

Dad’s not buying it, though. He’s convinced that we’re all going to die, like, three days after hyperinflation sets in. My thinking, though, is that his perspective is skewed, because he’s not doing anything productive about the perceived problem. Obviously, if he’s sitting around, doing nothing but complaining, then there’s no plan, right? Well, that’s his point of view, anyway. He isn't the only one with this perception problem, though: I'd bet that most of us have done the same thing, even if only on a very-small scale for a brief moment or two.

So, what do you do? You keep stockpiling, and you keep telling the worried family member that the rest of you are working on the problem. Invite that person to help out in some way, too. Dad works, and Mom spends part of the check at the grocery store, so Dad IS helping. He just has this idea that he isn’t doing anything, because he doesn’t go to the grocery store, or notice the extra food (even though it's right there, and even though he hears us talking about it regularly). We’re trying to gently encourage him to help out in some other way – one that he can see for himself. Mom wouldn’t mind having Dad build a few shelves for the canned food, for example, because Dad’s good at that – and his shelves would be sturdier than the ones we’re currently using.

We haven’t, however, had much luck with that. Dad might pick up that project later, but there’s no guarantee. We’ll see what happens and, in the meantime, keep showing him the plans that we’re fulfilling as we go. Maybe, eventually, he’ll get the idea.

A Variety of Food

It’s really important to store what you eat – as survivalists/preppers keep saying over and over – because you’re going to want something that’s familiar to you when everything else is falling apart. Just don’t get too comfortable with only two or three foods, because that’s going to end up making life very, very difficult in the end.

Trust me: having six hundred pounds of rice might seem like a great idea right now, but unless that’s all you eat in your everyday life, you’re going to need some variety. Stockpile different kinds of rice, for starters: white rice is good for some things, but brown or wild rice is better for others. If you have that variety, you can make more kinds of meals, and that’ll keep everyone a little happier.

There should be a variety of food in the stockpile: that way, you and your family won’t get bored and cranky when you’re eating the same old boiled, white rice for the fifteenth day in a row. And don’t kid yourself into thinking that you’ll all be grateful that you have SOMETHING, even if it IS crappy old white rice, because that’s not what’s going to happen. Personal experience taught me that, after you eat the exact-same food enough times in a row, your body starts to reject it. It’s tough to gag down white rice, even if that used to be one of your very-favorite foods, after you’ve eaten it for too long. You get to the point where you just don’t bother eating anything, and that’s not a good situation at all.

We stockpile all sorts of food…after learning that crappy little lesson, that is. Along with the rice that I just mentioned, we stock up on beans, pastas, and vegetables, along with some snacks here and there. There are tons of foods out there that are easy to store, and can be prepared without electricity or other modern conveniences. You don’t have to have a working refrigerator or freezer, either, if you’re stocking up on things like peanut butter and canned vegetables.

Get a good variety of foods, and pay careful attention to ingredients that make lots of different meals. If, for example, you have plenty of flour on hand, you can use that in everything from pepper gravy to a cake. If you get your hands on some powdered milk, you can use that for all sorts of things, too. Beans can be very flexible, too.

Also, don’t forget the comfort food. I’m not saying that it’s a good idea to forego nutritious food in favor of stockpiling candy bars, or some nonsense like that. It is, however, a good idea to have some of the comfort stuff on hand. You’d be surprised at how much of a difference a few bites of chocolate will make. Yeah, I know: that’s going to be one of the last things on your mind when the world’s gone crazy, right? Well…no, actually. Even though I don’t turn to food first for comfort, a few of my very-favorite foods make me feel better, and I really enjoy them when life’s insane. There have been times when tiny things, like a Little Debbie snack cake, have made a huge difference in my outlook.

Let’s not forget beverages when we’re talking about variety, either. Water is vital to our continued existence, yes, but it gets very old after a while. I like powdered lemonade and iced-tea mixes, as well as powdered Gatorade. They’re all easy to mix up, and they don’t require anything special. However, my family tells me that warm, or even cool (versus cold) beverages suck out loud. I actually like room-temperature drinks, including Dr Pepper and Mountain Dew, because I couldn’t have cold stuff for a long time thanks to my teeth. I actually dislike cold sodas, because they don’t taste right to me. So, you might have to think about cooling off the lemonade – that’s honestly something that I don’t think about, so I don’t have any thoughts.

If you get a good variety of food, that you can prepare and keep fresh even without electricity and your refrigerator or freezer, you and your family should eat well for quite some time. You don’t have to get so much variety that you see the same food only once a month or anything like that, though. If you have several basic ingredients on hand, like flour and sweeteners and such, then you can easily work things out so that you don’t see the same meal more than once, maybe twice, every week. That’s enough variety to keep everyone happy for months, if not years, depending on your family’s preferences and tastes.

Don’t worry, though, if you don’t have that huge variety just yet. Keep working on the stockpiles: you’ll get there soon if you move forward one step at a time. Expand your stash as you can, adding different things whenever possible, and you’ll be better off than most people out there.

Preparing Food

Unless you just love the idea of slurping cold ravioli from the can after the world’s gone berserk, you’re going to need some semblance of a plan for food preparation. Ideally, you’ll have more than one solution, because variety is good – and because something nasty can thwart Plan A.

There are lots of ways to continue eating even when the power or gas aren’t working. I’ve had to make food without such luxuries before. Honestly, it’s not that difficult to do if you’re prepared beforehand. But if you wait until things have already gone wrong to figure out how you’re going to turn your stockpiled food into meals, you’re just adding more unnecessary stress to your life.

When I was in the Army, I did of course eat my share of MREs. If you can get your hands on MRE heaters – the funny-looking green packages that sometimes come with the food – do it. They’re fascinating little things, and work very well whether you’re in the field or at your dining-room table. The heaters require only a small amount of water, which does not even have to be potable, to function. You can pour water from your toilet tank or a creek into the heater pouch and be fine, because the food bag that you then drop into the heater pouch is sealed. Just be sure to clean the food bag off very well before you open it, that’s all. Rinse it with potable water, then wipe it down with a clean rag if you have one.

If you can’t acquire the heaters – eBay, for example, does not like for sellers to ship them with the MREs – boil a pot of water or put the sealed food bag in the sun. You can even stick the entrée bag on your car’s engine block if necessary. The bags are very tough, so don’t be afraid to put them in hot places. They are, after all, designed to sit in boiling water.

I do not, however, stockpile MREs. As much as I appreciated the food when I was in the service, it’s more expensive than “normal” food. I’m a civilian, so Uncle Sam doesn’t hand me a case of MREs for free anymore. The civilian brands, usually marketed to hikers and other outdoors types of people, just don’t appeal to me, either. But if you want a compact, nutritious meal that’s easy to store and tote around, by all means get MREs. The food’s not bad at all, for the most part. I was quite fond of the ravioli in particular, and pretty much any meal that came with the Snickers Munch bar. Mmm…peanuts.

My family and I do most of our cooking with the electric range. We bake cookies and casseroles, cook chili, et cetera with the stove. It’s a fantastic appliance, and we use it almost every day, so we’re quite used to the convenience. However, we know that a power outage is going to ruin this for us, so we have other ideas. In the past, we’ve had to do without all of our appliances, so we’ve figured out a few basic things about “alternative cooking.”

We have a wood-burning smoker, which usually cooks burgers and other meat. But when our power’s out for too long, we’ve put that sucker to good use on leftovers and other foods. Because our smoker uses firewood (and, therefore, open flames), we have to be careful when we choose the cookware. Cast-iron cookware is best, in our opinion, because it doesn’t get messed up when you put it on the grill. Hit yard and thrift sales or Goodwill if you don’t have suitable cookware. It would really stink if you couldn’t boil your frozen veggies before they went bad in your useless freezer because you didn’t have a way to safely put them on the smoker or barbecue pit.

In an emergency, though, a metal coffee can will do. Also, keep in mind that you can remove labels from food cans, and open them up, to cook the contents. We’ve heated more than one can of green peas, ravioli, et cetera this way. For the peas, stir in a pat of butter and a pinch of salt right before you dig in.

Speaking of opening cans: how’s that electric can opener going to work out for you without juice? We have two manual openers, which cost us between four and eight bucks each. I’ve never liked electric models, myself, because they seem like a waste of money to me. Then again: some canned foods come with pull-tab lids now anyway, so you don’t have to worry about an opener if you can buy only those types of cans.

Another cooking option involves the wood-burning stove. We have a box-shaped stove in the living room, which is perfect for stovetop cooking. There’s no such thing as incredibly-accurate temperature regulation – you get either “hot” or “hotter” with a wood-burning stove – but it’s very easy to heat or cook various foods. We’ve made scrambled eggs, rice, macaroni and cheese, et cetera on the stove, and everything tasted just fine.

Years ago, when I was six or seven, we had a Coleman camp stove. This was tucked away in storage, because my parents weren’t using it anymore. When our electricity was disconnected, which led to a fourteen-month stint without it, Mom and Dad had to dig out the stove. This enabled them to heat water for coffee, cook basic meals, et cetera. The problem was that, because they hadn’t anticipated the long-term power outage, they had not stocked up on Coleman fuel…or maintained the stove. Soon, the stove broke, and there was no way to fix the thing. We were almost out of fuel anyway at that point, so my parents had to go to other methods, like the barbecue pit.

Making a cup of java without a Mr. Coffee is easy, by the way, for those of you who’ve never done it. When we don’t have electricity here at The Homestead, my parents grab the coffee pot and the basket. They boil water on the wood-burning stove and pour it through the basket (which, of course, has the filter and grounds in place). The water drips through and into the coffee pot, which makes my parents happy. My sibs and I very much prefer happy parents, so we sometimes volunteer to make the coffee for them, just to get on their good side.

The good old sun is great for heating pre-cooked food, at least in my experience. We’ve used that giant, burning ball in the sky to warm all sorts of things. Just put the food on a dark surface and let nature work. Some people have gone so far as to build solar or cardboard-box ovens. I’ve yet to give this a try, but I certainly don’t rule out that possibility for the future.

There are plenty of ways to cook your food even without electricity or gas. The main thing is to think ahead and plan before things go crazy. That way, you can test your ideas and figure out what really works – and what’s going to require some fine tuning. The next time you crank up the wood-burning stove to heat your living room, why not try making a couple of scrambled eggs on it? We might as well practice our skills before they’re actually needed. That way, we have some extra confidence when we do have to use them.

We Have Chicks!

A few years ago, we had a few roosters and hens here at The Homestead. They were adopted from people who didn’t want them anymore, because said birds were older and not doing anything “useful.” I liked having them around, even though the hens didn’t lay any eggs, because they kept the outside pests at bay. We didn’t see many scorpions around the house when the birds were around, which pleased Mom to no end (she despises scorpions). We didn’t really want to butcher them, either, because they were really nice to have around – they were old, so we figured that we’d just let them live out the rest of their (short) lives in relative peace.

So, after the last one finally died of old age, we sort of forgot about having chickens for a while. We had other things on our minds, and other projects going, at least until earlier this week. Now, we have a couple of roosters – again, great for pest control – and eight chicks. This is going to be beyond awesome, because Mom and I have been talking about getting some chickens for the last few months. We finally got started with that, so let’s see how this turns out.

First of all: we’ve never cared for chicks before. The good news is that one of our neighbors has been doing this for a long time, and is giving us lots of advice. We have the four-day-old chicks in a small cage – but big enough for them to move around and get to food and water, of course – with a heat lamp to keep them from getting too cold. There’s newspaper lining the bottom of the cage, topped with a layer of hay. The chicks seem to like the setup so far, so no complaints.

So, we have a to-do list with chicken-related things on it for a change. While I’m watching the chicks hop around in their current enclosure, peeping like crazy, I’m thinking about things like the coop we have to finish building…how great these fresh eggs are going to taste…that sort of stuff.

We need to finish the coop, of course. I’m trying to find the plastic, five-gallon buckets that one or two of my brothers moved into an as-yet-unknown storage location – because I’d like to build the maggot bucket that I’ve read about on other blogs, just to see how well the chickens take to it. Because the family and I have been planning to get chickens for the last few months or so, we’ve been saving the egg cartons from the store. Oh, I know – the chicks aren’t going to start laying eggs tomorrow or anything like that. But you really can’t have too many egg cartons, because they will eventually wear out. We’ll keep most of them in storage so that, when the ones that are out finally need to go in the trash, we’ll still have some.

And next week, being finals week, is when every prof wants the final, huge projects (writing assignments, of course). I’ve been working on papers and stories and all sorts of related stuff all week in an effort to go ahead and get finished. If I put this stuff off, it’ll never get done, and won’t that be a fine waste of nearly four months of my life?

So, I’m very sorry that this entry is so short. I’m trying to get the chicken stuff together; deal with the last bit of school; and make the migraines go away. They didn’t bother me at all this year until…this week. Apparently, ongoing sinus problems, like I’ve been having for a while now, can lead to migraines – which would explain everything. I’m working on that, so we’ll see how next week turns out.

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In the meantime, here are some Useful Links that I’ve found over the last week. They’re a bit random, but they should be interesting.

Pepsi and Mountain Dew are now in “throwback” mode! They’re using the real, natural sugar instead of that high fructose corn syrup garbage. Go. Consume. Enjoy.

A blog about…chickens! (Mostly.)

A very strange-looking sawhorse – that you can build yourself if you’re so inclined.

Tips for Shopping at Walmart

Kid Sis works at Walmart, and has some tips for you re: grocery shopping and saving money. She’s passed them on to me, and asked me to spread the word, because she really wants those of us who could stand to save some money to get the best-possible deals. There’s nothing too shocking or secret about her tips, but I didn’t know all of these things until she told me about them. Maybe you’ll find them useful as well.

Walmart honors advertised prices, including online circulars. Go to SundaySaver.com and browse the ads. Be sure to hit up only stores that are somewhat close to your local Walmart. “My” Wally World won’t honor ads from Winn-Dixie, for example, because that chain does not have stores anywhere in my entire state (not anymore, anyway). It’s important to take the printed ads with you, because some Walmart managers insist on having them. Others don’t care, but being prepared is what this is all about.

Speaking of printing: Some store Web sites will let you print PDF versions of their circulars’ pages. The small print on these tends to be clearer than the Web-page version, which makes the cashier’s life a lot easier. You can also use the “shopping list” feature at each store’s site. When you see an advertised item that you might want to buy, add it to the list. Print this, along with the actual circular pages, and the cashier will probably love you.

I didn’t know this until recently, but Walmart substitutes another store’s in-house brand for their own (Great Value or Sam’s Choice). The catch is that the quantity/amount must match. So, don’t hesitate to take in circulars that offer another store’s own brand instead of a name brand. You can still get the deal – you’ll just get Walmart’s version, which usually isn’t too bad. (Some of their stuff is actually good, in fact.)

There are a few exceptions to Walmart’s price-matching policy. I can’t tell you if this is a company-wide deal, or if it’s local management’s decision. Whatever the case, when I shop at Walmart, these things are true:

One: Walmart will not honor store-issued coupons – just ones from manufacturers. Also: don’t expect double or triple coupons, because Walmart just does not do that sort of thing.

Two: “Mexican stores” (Fiesta, for example) often advertise insanely-cheap prices on various meat. Don’t expect Walmart to honor these prices. Ask anyway, because this could be true only at my local store.

Three: Walmart will not honor specials like “Buy one, get one ____” or “X percent off.”

You should also know that, in some situations, a sale will be quietly extended. Politely ask the cashier if the sale price on whatever you’re trying to buy is still in effect – even if the sale ended yesterday, or the day before. One example: holiday-themed items. After the post-Christmas sales on Sterilite storage containers ended (the Christmas-colored ones, that is), we still got several for the sale price. The manager wanted the things out of his store because, for some reason, customers want to buy red storage containers only around Christmastime. Personally, I don’t care. My books and preps store well in the box no matter what color it happens to be, so I’m happy to grab the container when it’s on sale.

Big tip: be polite to the employees. The nicer you are, the more helpful most of them will be. One very-nice cashier who’s been at the local Walmart longer than my family and I have lived in this community is happy to chat with us while she’s checking us out. She’ll also go ahead and automatically override the store’s price on things that are on sale elsewhere, whether we bring in the circulars or not. She does not, however, do this for all of the customers who come through her line. She has to kinda-sorta like you, or at least not dislike you, before she’ll bother.

When you buy refrigerated or frozen foods, dig down into the pile and bring up a package that’s closer to the bottom. Officially, employees are supposed to restock unshelved items – the groceries that shoppers discard wherever they want – only if those packages have maintained a “safe” temperature. Unofficially, some Walmart employees just don’t care, and will restock pretty much anything. In some cases, they don’t even check before they toss the stuff back on the shelves. Dig down into the stockpile: you’re more likely to dodge the potentially-unsafe foods that way.

Another interesting thing about frozen foods is the fact that ice crystals form on the outside of the packages. This is usually a good sign that the product, at some point, reached a warmer temperature than it should have. I actually received this advice from Dad, who used to drive an eighteen wheeler for a frozen-food hauler. Still, it applies to grocery shopping, so it seemed like it belonged here.

Don’t even bother buying things like bread at Walmart. If a certain product needs to be really fresh, Walmart’s not going to come through for you. The bread at my local store is never, ever fresh, even on delivery days. We go to the Mrs. Baird’s Outlet store up the street from Walmart instead, because even their few-days-old bread is fresher than Walmart’s crap. Sometimes, the money that you might save at the really-big store just isn’t worth it, because what you buy will suck.

You can save a good bit of money every shopping trip by doing these things. If nothing else, doing one-stop shopping at Walmart – instead of going to several stores to grab their advertised sales – will save you some time, which is even better than saving money as far as I’m concerned.

And, finally, I know that some of you are wondering why we would support Walmart of all stores. The answer: they are, quite literally, the only game in town for some items. There is no other place here to buy athletic socks, unless I want to go to the shoe store and pay five dollars for a three pack. No, thank you. The local Wally World has better prices than the competitors, too, which is good because our budget isn’t very large.

Dumpsters are Awesome

Note: I'm setting up auto publish for this one. When this goes live, I'll be at one of the Tea Parties near The Homestead. Hopefully, my American readers will be doing the same.

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I don’t go Dumpster diving very often, mostly because the Dumpsters within reasonable distance of my house are useless. Household garbage? I have plenty of my own, thanks. However, I keep an eye on the trash when I’m in better places, because I never know what useful thing I’ll find.

If you want to salvage perfectly-good items – even if you just sell them for a nice little profit – there are plenty of great Dumpsters out there. My best suggestion is to hang out on or near a university campus during the last week or two of school. Students are leaving their rented housing, and some will trash perfectly-good things.

You can find food in these Dumpsters, because students will just throw away twenty, fifty, a hundred bucks’ worth of canned goods and other such items. This is easier than hauling that food back home, or donating it to a local food pantry, which would be the responsible things to do with one’s resources. If you’re observant and cautious, you won’t poison yourself with canned goods that you fished out of a dorm’s Dumpster. Common sense tells you to bypass cans that are stained, dented, leaking, or otherwise not right, right? Right. (Heh. Three “rights” in a row, and pretty much grammatically correct. Awesome.) Avoid the foods that you’re not sure about and you’ll be fine.

Students trash all sorts of other goods, too. School supplies are common, including outdated textbooks. Do you home-school your children? Do you want something interesting and, hopefully, useful to read? Check out the Dumpsters. If the campus bookstore won’t buy back the book, some kids will throw it away. It’s still good, and the information in the thing is still accurate. It’s just not the publisher’s latest edition, that’s all. I have a 2003 edition textbook that’s still perfectly good. It just wasn’t worth even one penny to the bookstore, that’s all.

Students will sometimes throw away almost-new furniture. Do you need an end table? Are you looking to replace your couch? Hang out at the university. Many students will try to re-home, store, or sell their furniture, but some will just put it all out at the curb. This is particularly true at “nicer” schools, where the students’ parents tend to pay the bills. If you look around, and you’re fortunate, you could very well furnish a good bit of your living room and family area with discarded items. One of my professors FULLY furnished a rented house during graduate school by watching the curbs and picking up furniture that other students discarded.

Grocery stores also tend to have good Dumpsters if you’re hungry. Some stores lock up, and guard, their trash, but others don’t. If you can get in without risking trespassing charges, it’s worth a look.

Look for construction, demolition, and remodeling sites when you’re out and about. One of my brothers once took on a side job for his boss. His task? Hauling off the old materials from the boss’ home. Boss man was remodeling, and wanted all the old things gone. My brother got paid a little bit of cash, on the side, to dispose of all this stuff. However, we kept a good bit of stuff – like the almost-new water heater, the perfectly-good hot tub, the bathroom and kitchen sinks, et cetera – because they were still in fine condition, and we could put them to good use. My brother brought home doors and windows, too.

Oh, sure, there was some broken Sheetrock, and a pile of useless wood, to haul off. But we had a bonfire in the side yard and just burned all that junk. That’s a small price to pay, I think, for a big pile of good building materials.

One of my other brothers, the carpenter, sometimes brings home scrap materials. They aren’t any good to other people, so he sometimes gets them from his boss. Lately, he’s been bringing home pretty-good pieces of lumber, which are always useful around here. A good bit of the wood is new, in fact, and long/large enough to actually be useful.

Can you get into the city dump? My Dad used to do this when we lived in South Texas. One of the dumps in that area had a chain-link fence around the perimeter, but it had a hole that was almost big enough for him to drive his cargo van through. At night, he’d back up to that big hole, hop out, and go see what he could find.

Dad brought home everything from solid-wood desks and chairs to small items, like lamps and building materials. Nobody wanted these things anymore, even though they were still in fine condition, so Dad loaded them into his van and gave them good homes. American society is full of wasteful people, even when the economy sucks. People will throw away things for bizarre reasons, or no reason at all. When you realize, then accept, this, the treasure hunting can begin.

That applies even now, with the economy looking like dog poop. There are still people out there who are remodeling their homes, cleaning out their storage buildings, et cetera – and discarding things that could be sold or given away. Take advantage of their wastefulness and use their unwanted resources to get a big pile of things that you can put to good use.

Useful Links:

On Dumpster Diving, by Lars Eighner. This gentleman was homeless in Austin, Texas for a while; this personal essay is crammed full of his firsthand knowledge of Dumpster diving and related topics.

StillTasty.com. Pretty much everything you could possibly want to know about food safety. How long are those canned goods really safe to eat? Find out here!

Tough Decisions During Food Shortages

Late last year, Walmart shoppers in New York were caught up in a Black Friday stampede. Their fellow shoppers trampled them underfoot because everyone wanted to be the very first in line to buy cheap televisions, DVDs, cameras, and vacuum cleaners. A maintenance employee died in the stampede, which of course caused Walmart to shut down.

And then…some of the people who were part of the stampede started yelling and complaining that the store wasn’t open. They had just stomped a man to death – a person who was just trying to do his job – and all they could think about was consuming unnecessary crap. Heaven forbid they not get those cheap movies, right?

All this happened because of consumer goods: garbage that is not necessary to our survival in any way, shape, or form. People turned into savage beasts because they were getting really-good deals on these items. They actually killed for this crap, and the most uncivilized members of the crowd showed no remorse for what they had helped to do.

I’ve been thinking about that event lately, mostly because I’m convinced that we’re going to see people acting that way when it’s difficult to find, or afford, food. All sorts of events could mess up the food supply: hyper inflation…a natural disaster…economic collapse…you name it and it’s probably going to have some sort of effect on our food sources.

What are the unprepared folks going to do when you have to line up outside the grocery store, much like so many people do on Black Friday, in an attempt to get into that place before all the food is gone? They’re going to curb stomp each other, of course. Some stampedes will be accidental – fueled by the panic of thinking that you might not, in fact, be able to get your hands on that lousy sack of potatoes and bag of flour.

But other problems will be intentional. Some will feel the need to eliminate a few competitors, so to speak, in an effort to survive. I for one wouldn’t want my grandmother, or my Mom, or any other loved one for that matter, standing in a line, exposed and vulnerable to a bunch of thugs who would gleefully punch, stab, or even shoot their way through the line.

And if you think that law enforcement will be able to keep the peace, you’re probably wrong. Every grocery store, farmer’s market, convenience store, and other place that sells any sort of food in the affected area is going to be overrun by hungry people. There just aren’t enough LEOs in any given area to control a festering, starving, pissed off crowd. Even if there were enough people to do that job, can they really prevent problems? Of course not. They can try, but there will still be violent outbursts. The LEOs could, at best, step in after the violence starts – when it’s too late for the little old lady who’s been shoved into the asphalt and now has a broken bone or two.

The LEOs might be hungry too. What’s to stop them from rolling up and cutting to the front of the lines? Nothing, of course. Oh, sure, they might be brought up on charges after order is reestablished, but what are you supposed to do in the meantime? Stand there and starve, that’s what. The justice system won’t do you any good if you’re hungry now, right?

You and I have thought about all that unpleasant stuff, though, which is why we’re stocking up on food and other essentials as quickly as we can. We see the coming meltdown, and we know that we want to stay at home, away from empty stores and barren shelves, when that happens. We don’t want to be caught up in that situation, so we’re readying ourselves for it now.

The point here, though, is that some of your family members probably aren’t listening to a word you say. They might think that you’re paranoid. They could have excuses, like, “I can’t afford to do what you’re doing,” or “I’m not worried – the government/God/Bono from U2 wouldn’t let that happen.” Or maybe they just don’t care, because they figure that you’ll be there to feed them if it turns out that you’re right about all this doom and gloom stuff.

Should you feed the family members? I mean…why should you? They’ve been ignoring you, and some are actively mocking you for making your plans and putting them in motion. Frankly, some people are just jerks, and probably deserve to suffer because they’ve been so rotten.

But do you really want those loved ones to be out in that crowd, trying to fight off thugs and other unsavory types in an effort to get their hands on a few canned goods? Do you really want them to be out there in the elements, waiting for hours on end, for food that they might or might not be able to get? Do you really want them to suffer to that extent?

As much as I despise taking care of those who don’t even try to care for themselves (I loathe welfare with every single atom of my being, for example)…family is family. If Wayward Brother – the guy who lives a few hours away and wants little to do with us most of the time – shows up on the doorstep, he’s coming in and getting something to eat. He’s my brother. Even though he’s an obnoxious pain in the entire family’s ass, and even though we usually can’t stand to be around him for more than about a day and a half, two days…he’s family. We aren’t going to leave him out there to try and fend for himself if he shows up here.

I’m not saying that we all have to care for everyone we see. I’m not even necessarily saying that you should take care of the most-obnoxious relatives in your family tree. I don’t know your family’s dynamics, and I don’t know just how rotten some of your relatives really are. Maybe some of them really do deserve whatever happens to them.

I am, however, saying that we have to make some tough choices sometimes. It’s not easy to decide what to do in this type of situation. You have to figure it out now, though, because you need to have time to get used to the idea. Even if you’re going to welcome your own wayward brother with open arms and a huge smile…you have to adjust to the idea of helping the guy who’s been tormenting and mocking you for months, if not years, about what you’re doing. If you don’t want to help, you’re going to have to get used to the idea of telling him “No,” and being firm in that decision.

So…figure out, now, what’s really best in your situation, and give yourself time to make the mental adjustments. This is one less decision that you’ll have to make when the meltdown is actually happening, which frees up some of your gray matter to address other, more important things.