Author: laughingwolf_qh33q8

Getting hit by lightning is not fun! If you would like to help me in my recovery efforts, which include moving to the SW, feel free to hit the fundraiser at A New Life on GiveSendGo, use the options in the Tip Jar in the upper right, or drop me a line to discuss other methods. It is thanks to your gifts and prayers that I am still going. Thank you.

NOTE: This is a (very) rough draft

Expanding Your Resources

Alright, now that you have started thinking about food and water, let’s expand things a bit. The next resources to think about are light, the ability to cook or heat your food, and heating.

I really do think that if you could do a study, the lights (power) going out is probably the most common “disaster” we face on a regular basis. It is probably the most frustrating thing, because just as the water goes out right when you’ve soaped up, the lights always go out as you are doing something important. For a number of reasons, I want to focus right now just on light and we will tackle the larger issue of power later.

There are a number of options available to you. Just to name a few: flashlights, battery-powered mountable LED lights, camping lanterns (electric and gas fuel), candles, oil lamps, and chemical lights/glow sticks. There not being that one magical list of items that works for everyone in every situation, you need to decide what mix of items works for you.

For example, candles and oil lamps can be part of your decor. The latter are not just the old-fashioned kind, but newer ones that are very modern looking. With practical preparedness the idea is to have the items do more than one thing. It’s like Alton Brown’s rule on kitchen items: most kitchen items need to be useful for several things. Your choices for preparedness should do the same. While there are a few things that only have one use, most of what you get for preparedness should pull double or triple duty. Even if that duty is to be decorative.

Another bit of food for thought is that whatever you get, get spares and if batteries are used get spare batteries too. If you have a flashlight on a shelf at the top of the stairs, put spare batteries with it. Because if you go down into the dark basement without a light because the batteries are dead, you frankly deserve to have the monster get you, or find out the sewage is backed up the hard way. It’s about as bright as standing artistically in front of the archery targets in one of those teen camp slasher porn movies. So, unless you want the monster to get you, don’t do that.

A further bite of food for thought: it’s not a bad idea to have emergency lighting that can be used in a hazardous environment. There are any number of things that can cause gas pipes to rupture, fuel to spill, or otherwise create an environment where not only is the smoking lamp out, you don’t want cheap electronics or other items generating sparks. While you can spend as much as you want to on hazard-rated lights, you might be surprised at how many of the newer (and inexpensive) flashlights are actually sealed. Look around at what’s available, think about it, then choose wisely.

Back when I had a house in a more rural location, every room had a small plastic storage bin that contained scissors, utility knife, tape, tacks, brads, hammer, tarp, flashlight, chem light, spare batteries, and a small first aid kit. The idea being I had light and a means of covering holes/busted windows, and taking care of boo-boos at hand no matter what. If gas was an issue, I could use the chem light instead of the flashlight at need. Also, for long-term light, the chem light was the better choice.

Which gets to an important point in thinking about what mix works best for you: duration. Give yourself as many options as you can. Church pillars are designed to burn for hours, so used judiciously they can last for weeks at need. There are candle lanterns that use long-lasting candles (as well as bug repellent candles). My favorite brand of lights has an option of a USB rechargeable battery that I can even recharge using the hand crank on the emergency radio. Bit more on that when we talk power, but look at all the options open to you to make your light mix last.

Also, as you work up your plan, be thinking about where to put what type of light. Where practical, you may want to put a mirror up nearby to help bounce the light (or reflect sunlight further inside). In an emergency, when the lights go out, I’ve been known to put aluminum foil up on the wall behind candles and omni-directional lights to put as much light as possible out into the room.

Now, let’s look at using the light that comes out of your plan to do something extremely important: cook and heat your food and drink. Vehicles hit power poles and take down lines. Construction crews dig into gas lines. Things happen. I don’t know about you, but I’m not giving up my coffee or food because someone else did something stupid.

Again, there are a number of options. The portable butane chef stoves you see at a lot of brunches, or events where cooking is being done on the spot, used to be relatively inexpensive though I hear that’s changing. Keep in mind butane does not work in cold weather. There are a number of propane or liquid-fuel small camping stoves available. Better yet, there are even multi-burner propane stoves and ovens that can handle large scale cooking. Grills make an excellent option as well. Got a fireplace? Guess what, it’s can be fun to cook over a fire.

Find a mix that works for you while giving you both flexibility and durability. By durability I don’t just mean the product lasting, but the ability to get fuel for it even in an emergency. For example, a good charcoal grill can also handle wood, which is likely to be available no matter what (even if you have to go cut it). Having more than one type of fuel is also a good thing for your ability to handle moderate to major disasters.

To help with your planning, allow me to share a real-life experience that may help. Where I’m currently living, we experienced a power failure which took out the lights and stove. My bedroom and bathroom are in the basement. I needed to get to work. So, I broke out the camping lanterns and used one to light my room, one to light the common area of the basement, and one to light the bathroom (yes, I already have hooks in place to hang them at need).

I put up two in the kitchen, pulled out a propane camping stove and set it up on top of the regular stove. I cooked breakfast, cleaned up, got my shower (water was still going) using the remaining hot water in the water heater (note: a number of gas appliances will not run if the electricity is off, “safety” feature). As I did all this, I turned off lights when not needed and otherwise minimized my resource usage.

Net result, I had my regular breakfast and coffee, and had no issues making it to work on time. For all that I might be a bit of a coffee head, one of the reasons I use a French Press to make my coffee is that I’m not dependent on electricity to make it. For all that I like the taste better anyway, it doesn’t matter if the water is heated on a stove or over a fire as I huddle in the ruins of civilization, you just need hot water. And coffee, of course. If I did engage in preparedness, you can be sure I would have some tucked away. Cough. Remember the first rule of preparedness club…

The last truly crucial element for survival, and the start of surviving in style, is heating. Cooling, while I do love my air conditioning, is not essential. Even in most temperate zones, having heating comes in handy in an emergency, especially if you are wet or cleaning up after flooding. In large swaths of the world, heating is essential so that you don’t freeze to death in the winter.

Again, there are options for you to explore. Do you have a fireplace? The option to add a wood stove? Portable indoor-use kerosene and propane heaters are available at most home supply stores. They may also be useful for keeping water warm or hot, or even doing some light cooking over them. The key is going to be the ability to store fuel for them so that you can use them as needed in a moderate or major disaster.

Just be sure that what you are looking at are rated for indoor use. There are a number of heaters that are not, and require extra ventilation if they can be used inside at all. You don’t want to freeze, but you also don’t want to either burn up or die of carbon monoxide poisoning. If battery-powered smoke and carbon monoxide detectors are not already a part of your life, make them part of you preparedness planning. They are essential now, and critical in the aftermath of a disaster.

I would also highly recommend good cold weather clothing be a part of your preparedness planning. Fuel shortages, regulations, and other delights can impact anywhere, and even if you are prepared you need to consider wearing extra clothing to cut down on use of your preparedness resources. Get extra blankets and throws now as well, as there may be a run on them in the not too distant future.

Guess what? You now have the basics in place to develop a plan that will provide you water, food, light, the ability to cook, and the ability to heat in the face of disaster. In other words, you have the basics of survival at your fingertips. Now, in the next chapter, let’s look at adding some other resources to your planning mix to take that up to surviving in style.

The book as it goes:

Preparedness Pays: Draft Introduction

Preparedness Pays: Draft Chapter 1A

Preparedness Pays: Draft Chapter 2A

Getting hit by lightning is not fun! If you would like to help me in my recovery efforts, which include moving to the SW, feel free to hit the fundraiser at A New Life on GiveSendGo, use the options in the Tip Jar in the upper right, or drop me a line to discuss other methods. It is thanks to your gifts and prayers that I am still going. Thank you.

I had originally planned to do Chapter 1 a bit differently, but am opting for now to try smaller chapters, possibly focused on a single concept, to make it easier for those new to preparedness. We will see how it goes, meantime, onwards!

NOTE: This is a (very) rough draft

Building With Our Blocks

Now that we have our basic building and planning blocks, let’s take a look at how to use them to create the preparedness plan that works for you. To do so, why don’t we take a look at what most of it boils down to: ensuring people have the resources they need.

As noted previously, resources include (but are not limited to) things like  food, water, power, fuel, and other resources necessary for life, much less modern life. So, let’s start with the most critical items for life: food and water.

Most people in first world countries (and even many second) take clean, safe, and abundant water for granted. We cut the tap on, and sweet, sweet, water flows out into our glasses, sinks, or tubs. While there are exceptions everywhere, overall we have gotten rather spoiled about water. Even the most minor of disaster or emergency becomes a real issue when it effects our water.

Most of the time, that impact is an annoyance. The water goes off while you are in the shower and you need to rinse. You can’t do the laundry or dishes because the water went off. It’s not the end of the world, but it impacts your day. Thing is, the longer it is off the greater the impact. Given that you can live for days to weeks on little to no food, and only a very few days without water, water really needs to be your top priority for preparedness. So, let’s look at it in terms of our planning blocks on the three lengths of disaster.

For minor disasters, those lasting minutes to a week, stored water comes in very handy. Caught bathing and need to rinse off? A bottle of water or maybe part of a gallon jug of water takes care of that. I keep both bottles of water and gallon jugs of distilled water around personally, as I use the latter for making coffee (the water around where I currently live being a fluid phase of limestone) and the former for general use. During any emergency, don’t throw out the empties: they have important uses we will get into later. For planning, while you have to have two liters of water a day from drinking and food to survive, you are going to find life a lot better if you have three to four liters per person per day.

For moderate to major disasters, storage really isn’t practical. Though, one should plan for ways to increase your storage if there is warning. Collapsable containers, tub bladders, even your cookware can and should be used to store water if there is warning of a coming moderate to major disaster. If you have freezer or other containers, fill them up too. If it will safely hold water, fill it up!

So, what can you do to prepare for water during a moderate to major disaster? You are going to need one or more water purification systems. No, I’m not talking systems for cities or such, but the small, mostly portable systems used by campers and backpackers. Those systems are designed to take water from lakes, streams, or other sources and turn it into pure, clean, safe water for drinking. Some of them can even handle various types of grey water. Wait, what? Grey water?

You are going to deal with three types of water in life, much less during a disaster. Clean water is what you are used to drinking. Grey water is water that has been used for things like showering, cleaning, technically even cooking water like pasta water is grey water. Dark/black/other-term-here water contains sewage or other organic or chemical contaminants. There are ways for you to deal with filtering and purifying grey and black water, but we will get into that more later.

For now, you’ve got enough information to begin planning for your water needs. Given that things never go to plan, I recommend being a pessimist and planning on storing enough drinking water to get through a minor disaster if at all possible.

That may not be possible. Each of us has a different situation in terms of space, storage space, and other delights. I’ve heard of some apartments or rentals that have it in the lease that you are not to store water or other fluids in the structure. In your planning, get creative. There are a lot of odd spaces and places you might not think about, but will work great for storage.

For any and all disasters, look at water storage options. There are a variety of collapsible containers out there for camping and emergencies. Some hold just a gallon or three, and others can hold a hundred or more gallons. The tub bladders are a great idea since that part of the house/apartment is build to hold that weight, and you will be amazed at how much water you can store in one.

For longer term preparedness, research water purification systems and find what works for you. If you have the budget, or can budget for it over time, I highly recommend a portable system for each person, and a larger camping system for the home. It gives you maximum flexibility and capability at need. Also, get replacement elements for each system, at least a year’s worth if possible. Plan for the worst, hope for the best.

Also, when researching those systems, keep in mind they are not all the same. Some basically just filter, so you don’t get mud and any large parasites or other delights. Others will filter out even smaller things. Yet others will purify the water as well as filtering it. You can even look at getting water purification tablets and using those on the water before putting it through a filter. Not a bad idea to plan on having some of those around anyway, just in case. Also, for a major disaster, you also want to research sand filters and how to make them, for possible inclusion in your planning.

Now that you’ve got the basics so that you can plan for water, let’s take a look at food. As with water, there are some basic minimums to consider. While you can technically survive on as little as 800 calories a day, you really need around 1200 calories a day, and about 1400 a day if you are going to be active.

Those calories need to be balanced, in that you need about 72 trace elements, 20 essential amino acids, and some essential fats to live. Amino acids are the building blocks of proteins, as well as a good bit of the human body. Our body can actually produce 11 of the essential amino acids we need to survive and thrive, but we need to get the remaining nine through our diet.

Now, there are foods that contain complete proteins, that is they have all 9 of the essential amino acids needed by the body. When you eat fish, poultry, dairy, eggs, and meat you are getting complete proteins. In grains, quinoa is a complete protein.

You can also “mix and match” to get complete protein. For example, legumes with rice can do the job, but if you mix legumes, a veggie, and a grain, you can as well.

You also want to research essential fats. Yes, you need a certain amount of fat each day to survive, and there are some fats you really need. It is much tastier and easier to include such in your supplements and food than to catch and eat six to eight medium to large moths each day.

Just as there is no one magic list for preparedness, there is no one perfect recipe for nutrition. You have to find what works for you and yours, and any known dietary problems or needs. Now, when I say dietary problem I mean a diagnosed medical condition, not that you hate X, Y, or Z or avoid them because of virtue signaling. While I find low-carb works well for me right now, in an emergency I’m an omnivore and will eat whatever I have to ensure proper nutrition.

For moderate to major disasters, you also need to consider supplements to ensure proper nutrition and health. There are a lot of supplements sold that claim many things, but those things may or may not be verified. My favorite is still the calcium supplement that did indeed have several hundred times the amount of calcium of any other supplement. Only thing was that it was a form of calcium that could not be absorbed by the body…

For long-term nutrition and survival, you really need to be focused on those things that provide you trace elements and other compounds you might not get from tight rations. Things I will recommend: a good multi-vitamin, Vitamin C, and Vitamin D.

A good multi-vitamin gives you most of those trace elements in the recommended daily amount. Go generic and you can get a multi-year supply for a reasonable amount. No, it’s not perfect but it gets you most of the way there. Yes, right now you are urinating most of it away. In a survival situation you likely won’t be. You will be glad to have it.

Why Vitamin C? Scurvy for one thing. In a true disaster, Vitamin C can end up in short supply in your food (or lack thereof), which can and will result in scurvy and other delights. Just ask the British Navy, who finally figured out that a lime a day kept the doctor away. Again, inexpensive and can prevent a number of health issues.

Why Vitamin D? You may or may not be getting much sun for a while in a nuclear war or similar disaster. Low D-levels have been found to be linked with a host of medical issues, and no one wants to see rickets and other delights return. Again, D3 is inexpensive and can prevent a number of other health issues.

What else do you need? You really need to sit down with your doctor to work that out. If you trust your doctor, get with them and ask what you should look at getting and taking.

For a minor disaster, it’s not that hard to stock up enough food to make it through the week. It’s the moderate to major length disasters that you need to consider all the above discussion. One more small bit of food for thought in your planning: be sure to include a lot of soups and stews. They are a great way to get some of that water you need to survive, a great from a nutrition perspective, and can allow you to make the fullest use of ingredients. Especially if the power has gone out, and will be out for more than a few days, and you have things in the refrigerator and freezer. Yes, you do need to think about things like that in your planning.

Now that you have the basic blocks to begin planning for the most essential part of preparedness, we can turn to the next two most essential things: light and cooking.

The book as it goes:

Preparedness Pays: Draft Introduction

Preparedness Pays: Draft Chapter 1A