Knowledge and Skills

Ok, you've covered the big 4, stocking water, food, amenities and you've created a list of likely situations that will affect you and started preparing for them, now what? If you haven't already, now is the time to go beyond stocking and learn how to purify your own water, grow, find and kill your own food and find alternatives for a amenities.

Gaining the knowledge and developing the skills necessary is really the gist of almost everything else in survival and preparedness. The amount of things you can learn and skills you choose to develop are literally endless, and that's daunting to many n00bs to survival prep. In fact, it's the focus on these things that people inevitably overwhelm themselves and think it's impossible to be ready. I plan on going into this crazy bucket of skills as best I can and having others help write articles to populate this blog with that info, but it's important to be realistic.

Starting with the next blog post, this blog will take a direction that focuses almost exclusively on knowledge and skills because outside those 4 basic building steps we introduced with stocking, everything else is about knowledge and practice. For example, you can spend all the money you want on an amazing gun, but if you don't know much about it, how it works, how to fix it in a jam, how to maintain it, what it's most practical applications are, and how to shoot it indoors effectively versuses outdoors effectively, you're more dangerous to yourself than anyone you might use it against. There's an old adage, 'Fear the man with one gun'. It refers to the idea that he is so familiar with his gun that it's second nature to him. But, you can apply this thought to all major skill-sets.

So, starting now, I will put out an open invitation to any contributors who would like to help develop this blog. If you have an area of expertise and you would like to share that knowledge, please feel free to write an article about it and send it to me. I'll post the article here with you as the contributor, attribute it to you and your website if you have one, and if you become a regular contributor, provide you with free advertising space on this page.

Prioritizing

It's easy to flip on the news and see whatever current disaster is in the news and freak yourself out into preparing for that one very unlikely scenario. Right now, as of this writing, it is the Japan earthquake/tsunami/nuclear plant meltdown/severe cold/no food situation. A quick StartPage search (mypreferred search engine, for reasons we will get into A LOT later in the progression of this blog when we start talking about digital security) revealed to me that there is a Nuclear Power Plant 30 miles northwest of my location (St. Clair County, IL) on the New Madrid fault line. It would be easy to convince myself that I need to save up iodine tablet and b12 and blah blah blah... but really, what's more likely? An earthquake AND nuclear meltdown or the loss of my job? It's important to not get carried away. Be practical and evaluate your local conditions.

For example, here's a way to approach what takes priority. I've already stocked against a potential job loss but I live close to a flood plane outside of St.Louis and we've had a particularly heavy winter. The likelihood for flooding this spring is higher than it would normally be. So, my focus for spring of 2011 is to make sure I have the ability to get up and leave should this become a problem. A bug-out bag, or a bug-out cooler or a stocked bug-out location at a family members or friends are things I should be trying to put in place. In your area, the circumstances may be different. Think about the things that could effect you and prioritize them based on likeliness. This will help you organize your next preparations.

Since I cannot tell you what situations are most likely to affect you personally, this will be a short post. Things to consider when prioritizing this list of most likely scenarios is:

Your lifestyle. Is it excessive? By this, I mean are you living beyond your budget? Is your financial situation fixable (even finances are involved in prepping... it does you no good to max out your credit cards buying food and water and then have a hurricane take it all away and leave you with no means of purchasing food and water wherever you evacuate to)? Do you go out a lot (this could increase your likelihood of being mugged, what can you do to prepare for or prevent that)? Are you a hermit? Are you paying for things that you don't necessarily need to pay for?

Your career. Is it stable (someone in IT will have a more stable job than someone in say, banking... as of the time of this writing). Do you have the capacity and/or time to get or create an additional income? Do you have stuff you don't need and have been meaning to get rid of that you could sell to create an additional 'rainy day' savings?

Your location. Do you live in the city, the burbs or something more rural? If you're in the city, what's the crime rate? What's the history of riots like in your area? What are the economic conditions in your area? Are you in a company town that is facing a potential closure? What sorts of natural disasters do you experience on a seasonal basis? A yearly basis? Are their other disasters in your area's history? What are the energy considerations like in your area?

Once you've prioritized a list of most likely scenarios, think about necessities vs. luxuries. You can organize your list of what-to-get and what-to-do's around this so you don't overwhelm yourself and start developing simple plans of action based on this knowledge.

If you find this overwhelming, that's ok.  There is a simplified and very effective method for preparation that sounds very silly, but actually works.  Just prepare for a Zombie Apocalypse.  I know, it's ridiculous, but think about what that includes:  food & water incase you have to hide indoors... which is the same in case of a flood, civil unrest, joblessness, a blizzard, power outage, etc... weapons to defend yourself, the same as mass civil unrest, power outage, police state conditions, etc... medical equipment to protect yourself from infection like a pandemic, biological terrorist attack, etc... And frankly, it's a lot more fun to plan for a zombie attack that try and plan for each and every possibility in your area.  It makes the process of learning about preparedness more entertaining and less stressful.  Check out Zombie Squad if you think this could work for you.

Good luck if you choose to accept this mission. This message will self destruct.

Amenities

Ok. You've stocked water and you're learning how to purify it so when your storage runs out you can still rehydrate, bath, wash clothes, clean... etc... You've stocked food. You're learning how to garden, forage, hunt and fish. You're learning how to can your leftovers; dehydrate, dry and keep your food. You're buying extra dry and canned goods when you go grocery shopping and if you catch them on sale. Food and water stock piles will take you a while to build up and because you use them, their attrition will require that you always restock them, so expect that. Once you have it mastered and you feel comfortable with your new stocks and skills, you take the next step. Now what?

Amenities.

Amenities encompass things like toilet paper, soap, toothbrushes, etc... Is there a whole lot of sense in buying a toothbrush for 60 cents a few years ago and $1.24 today... and $2.37 a few years from now if you can buy them all at today's prices? It's not like they're gonna to go bad. If you know you go through a couple tooth brushes a year, why don't you buy 50 or 60 toothbrushes at today's price instead of wasting more money later? Boom! Winning.

What about toilet paper? As the cost of toilet paper keeps going up as fuel prices rise and the lumber industry diminishes under oppressive EPA restrictions, what benefit do you get by paying more money tomorrow for the same quality of product you could get today at a lower cost? Remember, time is money and our money is being inflated, making it worth less. That means everything will cost more. That means you will have to work more hours to pay for what you have later. It simply makes more economic sense to buy what you can now at today's prices instead of tomorrow's inflated ones. Econ lesson for the day accomplished.

Amenities stocking is something people have a tendency to overlook because we habitually keep these items in closets and cabinets. Out of sight, out of mind. But knowing that, does it matter if you have one bottle of shampoo or 15 in the closet? Not really. What's better is, you don't even have to change whatever you system is right now. If you shop when you run out, you still add whatever you're out of to your shopping list and back stock your storage. If you shop once a week, every two weeks, once a month or longer, you shop the exact same after you buy your stock of amenities. You just back stock your storage now.

Here's a simple list of common things most people use:
toothbrushes
toothpaste
soap
shampoo
conditioner
deodorant
toilet paper
paper towels
batteries
bleach (non-scented)

There are certain storage considerations with all of these that also need to be considered, such as toilet paper and mice. Everyone and every home is different, so you'll have to decide if you have the room to keep toilet paper in plastic Rubbermaid bins or up high on shelves to keep from getting wet in case of a water break.

Also, it's possible to make all these items or find some sort of replacement in nature (except for maybe batteries and bleach) so if you're interested in learning to make soap or finding soap plants, making reusable towels and what not, the internet is your friend. As I continue this blog, I'll eventually expand into these areas... but not in step 3. That's just overwhelming.

Oh, and don't worry too much about cleaning supplies, if you stocked vinegar for your food stores, then you can always you some of that... some of the bleach you store or just plain water.