Already mentioned this on my other blog, but there is a Food Challenge over at Preparedness Pro. Started on the 1st of this month, and runs all month long, and is basically a challenge to stop shopping for necessities for a 2 week period. Just in case you are interested, the clock's a-tickin....
We went out recently into the wilderness (alright, it was a campground, with a firepit, but it was aways away from home, and wilderness sounds so much better when you're telling a story :) and cooked an outdoor meal. It was prompted by a requirement for an organization that one of my children is participating in, and it turned out to be a lot of fun. Since it was sort of short notice, I ended up going to the local national chainstore for supplies. Some of the things I learned from this experience:
--Buying campout supplies on short notice, when everyone else is out buying similar items for campouts/reunions/ insert weekend activity of your choice here is not my idea of a good time. Would definitely not want to be out trying to gather supplies in an actual emergency situation. Already knew that, but having a real-life reminder can be a really good thing...
---My husband and child planned the meal (the child was involved in the planning as part of the requirement being fulfilled) and I took the list. One of the items on the list was charcoal briquets. I spent time wandering around the store looking for charcoal in places I thought it was likely to be, or for an employee to supply me with such information, before I found someone who informed me it was in the home and garden section. If you have to wait until the last minute to purchase items, (it would be wonderful to purchase all of your emergency items in one shopping trip, but one's expenses don't always permit such a shopping trip) you would do well to know where the items are located and at least take care of that portion of the mad rush....
---Know ahead of time which kind of fuel you will be needing for heat, cooking, etc. When we got to the campout location, my husband took out some wood (left over from our last winter's wood storage) and left the charcoal in the car. I asked him why charcoal had been on the list, and he said that it was in case the cooking facilities at the campground required charcoal, and not wood. Since it was just basically a firepit, we used the wood. So know ahead of time what you will be using for your purposes, or just plan for every and anything....
*Bug spray would have been handy. The mosquitos only really seemed to be interested in me, however...
**Glad we carried in water to put the fire out.
So now we have charcoal, which we really should have had before. Need to get some more in, just for variety and options if/when it's needed. Cooking out can be fun if it's planned, so I guess it can be fun to cook out even in an emergency if we do the planning now, and not so much on short notice....
Showing posts with label survival preps. Show all posts
Showing posts with label survival preps. Show all posts
Friday, August 7, 2009
Monday, March 30, 2009
At long last...
Well, I just returned from an out-of-state milestone celebration family reunion, and while I knew that I wouldn't be able to have regular access to the internet, it turns out I didn't have access to it at all until I got home. Makes it pretty hard to write a post... :)
Soooo, if anyone comes back and actually reads this, thought I'd write about a little experience that I had while I was gone that kind of underlines what kind of position you put yourself in if you are not prepared for what is maybe not exactly an emergency, but definitely an uncomfortable situation. Turns out that I got some kind of cold while I was gone, one of those colds that make your head ache painfully from the sinus pressure. Not fun. Also not fun that I didn't have any Tylenol, (I don't work for Tylenol, nor know anyone who does, but it is usually my pain reliever of choice) and had hours of traveling ahead of me. I did, however, have a layover in an airport, and so I went to one of the shops that tend to cluster in such places. They had Tylenol available for a price--24 caplets for $9.99 + tax. Yeah, a little pricey (read: exorbitantly expensive) for my taste, but what choice did I have at that point? That, and $2.30 for a bottle of water from another shop, and I had what I needed. When I told my husband about the purchase, he had about the same reaction that I had about the pricing, but he was nice about it. Yeah, he's pretty great... :)
That little expensive bottle is now sitting next to my economy size bottle on a high shelf out of reach of my children. When I think what I could have done to avoid this situation, there isn't that much that I would change, because we were together as a family in a small space for an extended period of time, and I wouldn't have wanted to take such items that I would have worried about with the children around, with only a small chance that I would even need them. I rarely need to take Tylenol, and it wouldn't have made sense to take it and then worry about it and possible chidren's access to it for the entire trip.
If I wouldn't necessarily change what I did, what exactly is my point? This makes me think that if prices can be this high simply because you are in a confined situation and have limited choices, about what could happen if you are limited in your choices, whether because of lack of choices in your area, or because you find yourself without the resources to go out of a very small region to find what you need. Those who have what you need get to set the prices. And if you need it enough (i.e. your sinuses are making your life miserable) you will have to pay their prices. Doesn't it make sense to look ahead and avoid such a situation for as long as possible, and have extra of the things you may need, by putting some in storage? I was fortunate enough to have been able to afford it, but it sure would be nice to have that money in my pocket instead...
Like I said, not exactly an emergency, and if I hadn't had the means to buy it, I would have had to suffer through hours more of travel with no relief. In the case of having no food or water on hand, for whatever reason-- disruption of the economy, transportation of goods, or just plain lack of products to purchase-- you/I/we would have an absolute emergency. And if we aren't prepared with some kind of storage, the resources available will likely go to whoever can afford them at a very high price--and if we can't afford the price, the resources will go to someone else, and we, unfortunately, will go hungry....
I hope that everyone who has the means to stock up will do so, even if it's just a little bit at a time. In the state that we were visiting, the price of living is much higher, and I got a little bit of sticker shock just looking in the canned goods aisle. Puts a new perspective on what I consider to be expensive here in Idaho. If you do have expensive prices on just basic canned goods, it would be difficult to get in a lot of storage, but please do what you can. Every little bit helps, and hey, if you are reading this, thanks for coming back! :) Now I get to catch up on what everyone else has been writing....
Soooo, if anyone comes back and actually reads this, thought I'd write about a little experience that I had while I was gone that kind of underlines what kind of position you put yourself in if you are not prepared for what is maybe not exactly an emergency, but definitely an uncomfortable situation. Turns out that I got some kind of cold while I was gone, one of those colds that make your head ache painfully from the sinus pressure. Not fun. Also not fun that I didn't have any Tylenol, (I don't work for Tylenol, nor know anyone who does, but it is usually my pain reliever of choice) and had hours of traveling ahead of me. I did, however, have a layover in an airport, and so I went to one of the shops that tend to cluster in such places. They had Tylenol available for a price--24 caplets for $9.99 + tax. Yeah, a little pricey (read: exorbitantly expensive) for my taste, but what choice did I have at that point? That, and $2.30 for a bottle of water from another shop, and I had what I needed. When I told my husband about the purchase, he had about the same reaction that I had about the pricing, but he was nice about it. Yeah, he's pretty great... :)
That little expensive bottle is now sitting next to my economy size bottle on a high shelf out of reach of my children. When I think what I could have done to avoid this situation, there isn't that much that I would change, because we were together as a family in a small space for an extended period of time, and I wouldn't have wanted to take such items that I would have worried about with the children around, with only a small chance that I would even need them. I rarely need to take Tylenol, and it wouldn't have made sense to take it and then worry about it and possible chidren's access to it for the entire trip.
If I wouldn't necessarily change what I did, what exactly is my point? This makes me think that if prices can be this high simply because you are in a confined situation and have limited choices, about what could happen if you are limited in your choices, whether because of lack of choices in your area, or because you find yourself without the resources to go out of a very small region to find what you need. Those who have what you need get to set the prices. And if you need it enough (i.e. your sinuses are making your life miserable) you will have to pay their prices. Doesn't it make sense to look ahead and avoid such a situation for as long as possible, and have extra of the things you may need, by putting some in storage? I was fortunate enough to have been able to afford it, but it sure would be nice to have that money in my pocket instead...
Like I said, not exactly an emergency, and if I hadn't had the means to buy it, I would have had to suffer through hours more of travel with no relief. In the case of having no food or water on hand, for whatever reason-- disruption of the economy, transportation of goods, or just plain lack of products to purchase-- you/I/we would have an absolute emergency. And if we aren't prepared with some kind of storage, the resources available will likely go to whoever can afford them at a very high price--and if we can't afford the price, the resources will go to someone else, and we, unfortunately, will go hungry....
I hope that everyone who has the means to stock up will do so, even if it's just a little bit at a time. In the state that we were visiting, the price of living is much higher, and I got a little bit of sticker shock just looking in the canned goods aisle. Puts a new perspective on what I consider to be expensive here in Idaho. If you do have expensive prices on just basic canned goods, it would be difficult to get in a lot of storage, but please do what you can. Every little bit helps, and hey, if you are reading this, thanks for coming back! :) Now I get to catch up on what everyone else has been writing....
Thursday, July 17, 2008
Turned away
The other night I went to a national chain store near me (and it is highly likely that there is one near you as well, as they seem to be everywhere) and there were very few cars in the parking lot. Like scary few, because the parking lot is usually close to full. I could see a couple of employees hanging around outside, and thought that maybe with so few customers, even the greeters had little to nothing to do. So I went up to the front and one of the ladies there told me that they were closed because the electricity had gone out. They didn't know what had happened, but it was what it was, and sorry for the inconvenience. She was very nice about it, and I went on my way.
I had only gone there for nonessential things (i.e. spices for something that I want to make from scratch--you could still eat food without the spices, but where's the fun in that? :) so that wasn't a big problem for me. Inconvenient, yes. But not really a major issue. Some parts of it did bother me, though, among them:
1) The way I felt when I saw so few cars in the parking lot. Those cars probably belonged to the employees and a few other clueless customers such as myself who had to go all the way to the front of the store before noticing that the windows were perhaps a little darker than they should have been for people to be shopping/working inside. I sat there for a minute before getting out of my car, and thought, "Is the economy really that bad? To go from bustling and nearly full to nearly empty at a time when it is usually busy?"
I'm sure that it is that bad for some people. I think about the stories that are all over the internet and the newspapers about people having hard times making ends meet. If anyone reading this is already in a situation where it is impossible or nearly so to put any food into storage, please just do the best you can. Anything you can put away for future use is better than nothing. Prices are going up, but even a bag of beans for under $1 is a start.
2)What would happen if suddenly all of the stores that we can just run to now were closed--no warning, just a couple of employees standing out front to turn us away? Not just one store, but every store? How prepared am I? How prepared are you? This is a very personal question, and every person must answer it for him/herself. You may have noticed that some of the poll questions I put up aren't exactly food related, but they are preparation-related, for lack of a better phrase. Sometimes I think about all the things that are needed to be prepared for emergencies, and there are a lot. But every little thing we do crosses one thing off of a long list. I'm working on my list (which is still long), and I hope everyone is working on theirs. Every little step counts.
If the situation ever happens that we are turned away from every source that we usually turn to in order to get the things that we need to survive (food, heat, shelter) for whatever reason (job loss, the economy, natural disaster) do we have what we need to make do for ourselves and our families? I would hope that the answer swings more toward yes than no. I would hope that the situation never arises in the first place. If we're prepared, however, that kind of situation will still be stressful, but hopefully we won't have to experience being turned away when we have to go looking because we have stored nothing at all.
I had only gone there for nonessential things (i.e. spices for something that I want to make from scratch--you could still eat food without the spices, but where's the fun in that? :) so that wasn't a big problem for me. Inconvenient, yes. But not really a major issue. Some parts of it did bother me, though, among them:
1) The way I felt when I saw so few cars in the parking lot. Those cars probably belonged to the employees and a few other clueless customers such as myself who had to go all the way to the front of the store before noticing that the windows were perhaps a little darker than they should have been for people to be shopping/working inside. I sat there for a minute before getting out of my car, and thought, "Is the economy really that bad? To go from bustling and nearly full to nearly empty at a time when it is usually busy?"
I'm sure that it is that bad for some people. I think about the stories that are all over the internet and the newspapers about people having hard times making ends meet. If anyone reading this is already in a situation where it is impossible or nearly so to put any food into storage, please just do the best you can. Anything you can put away for future use is better than nothing. Prices are going up, but even a bag of beans for under $1 is a start.
2)What would happen if suddenly all of the stores that we can just run to now were closed--no warning, just a couple of employees standing out front to turn us away? Not just one store, but every store? How prepared am I? How prepared are you? This is a very personal question, and every person must answer it for him/herself. You may have noticed that some of the poll questions I put up aren't exactly food related, but they are preparation-related, for lack of a better phrase. Sometimes I think about all the things that are needed to be prepared for emergencies, and there are a lot. But every little thing we do crosses one thing off of a long list. I'm working on my list (which is still long), and I hope everyone is working on theirs. Every little step counts.
If the situation ever happens that we are turned away from every source that we usually turn to in order to get the things that we need to survive (food, heat, shelter) for whatever reason (job loss, the economy, natural disaster) do we have what we need to make do for ourselves and our families? I would hope that the answer swings more toward yes than no. I would hope that the situation never arises in the first place. If we're prepared, however, that kind of situation will still be stressful, but hopefully we won't have to experience being turned away when we have to go looking because we have stored nothing at all.
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