Preparedness for when

[Deleted User]

If you still have your crutches you've got two basha supports for your shelter though!!! all is not lost and we'd take you with us in a wheelbarrow if you couldn't make it on your own pet!!!

[Deleted User]

MrsLurcherwalker wrote: »

I wonder if the little knowledge and experience we have as a collective will be enough to make the difference?

It will give us a head start, on most of the population.

GreyQueen

Thanks, Lyn.

I think that in a crisis, there would be a lot of trouble in the first few days as people suddenly deprived of the usual services and goods provided in a modern society may well panic if things go wrong.

F'rinstance, you could get caught up and trampled in a rush for food or water at a fast-emptying supermarket, or have a prang in a car which would scupper your vehicular bugout plan. You could be in short-supply of life-essential medications and come to grave or even fatal harm in a period of weeks of disorder before normal services were resumed.

You may never have had to do your business in the woods and may not be able to manage your waste in such a way that you don't give yourself a serious gastroentrital upset. These can so often kill babies and children and would debiltate an adult at a crucial time.

If you had some preps by you, in such a way that you could hunker down past the initial madness, you might survive a lot better than if you're charging around like a mad thing amongst a lot of other frightened and stressed people.

I remember watching a news report in the Bosnian war when it was explained to the TV reporter that it was too dangerous for us to send squaddies into the country through a particular route. Too dangerous, just not possible for trained soldiers in their prime. But some little old ladies had walked out along that same route in their slippers when forced to abandon their homes with only 5 minutes warning.

We will do what we have to do, to survive, but it's better to keep a low profile from a preptastic point of view, than charge about in the madding crowds fighting for the last bottle of water.

Bob, it's a mucky day here, with nasty stormy showers coming over, getting nearly dark in the afternoon. Don'tcha just love Spring?

[Deleted User]

Object lesson in being prepared isn't it? if you have the necessary stores in place, and keep them up to date at all times no one will see you coming back from the supermarket loaded up with supplies and with a little luck no one will consider it worthwhile to come raid your home for them. It's not an absolute guarantee but if you do as many of us do and bring things in a little at a time and not obviously at that and are never seen to do a huge stock up why would it occur to anyone that you had anything worth taking in the first place? Out of sight and out of mind is surely a better bet than a panic buy of things at the dawn of an emergency situation. Keeping your head down might just be the safest option.

GreyQueen

Heads down, ears up for trouble. Eyes wide, gob shut, all senses alert.

The Bosnian blogger who goes by the tag 'Selco' wrote about how the rich and well-fenced and gated homes in his city were targetted first for looting. And also about how one neighbour successfully hid in a home which was apparently derelict, by coming and going surrepticiously via a hole in the wall.

I have to hope that the tiny council flats of Shoebox Towers, inhabited by a bunch of working poor, the unemployed, the chronically-ill including some poor souls with severe mental health problems, wouldn't appear on the radar of looters as likely places to find valuables or even deep larders.

I derive considerable amusement from knowing what is stashed in this tiny flat without being visible to a houseguest, unless they went very determinedly snooping, and then they'd only likely see a fraction of it. As a former theatre person, I'm a dab hand at making things appear what they're not...........;) I like to appear as poor as the proverbial church mouse as part of my OPSEC.

In my neighbourhood there are several places where there are buildings from previous centuries which are almost castle-like in their potential defensibility, with only one or two doors. These would be excellent places to hole up, plus the warren-like streets of the inner city contain many boltholes, hidden yards, nooks and crannies which could lead you to some surprising places. And we could always try to re-take the Castle and hold it against all comers........I think they still have dungeons, not sure about portcullises (portcullusi?) and drawbridges, though.

The best was to handle trouble is to be like McCavity, and not be there. The best fight isn't the one you win, because you've risked harm by merely taking part; it's the one you never had because you avoided it in the first place.

Heck, you don't need TEOTWAWKI; folks get beaten to death and drowned in the river down by clubland in this city every year, and that's just a night on the town, FGS.

mrsmortenharket

Ahh GreyQueen, I must have disturbed an ants nest. They were most unhappy. I've left the raised bed alone today.

x

daz378

call myself a prepper.... i dont think i own a whistle.... there are so many variables to wether a person would survive an event... dependant upon severity ... where you are... do the grubbyment monitor sites like these? i would like to think any such info would be lost post event.... say the fictional love child of captain america and mrs bear grylls(poetic licence) stood a 95% chance of surviving(cos even comet of 66million years ago would do it) i reckon we are 20 to 40 points in front of your average joe , dependant upon personal qualities, location and degree of warning, but there are so many variables .... it boggles the mind

GreyQueen

daz378 wrote: »

call myself a prepper.... i dont think i own a whistle.... there are so many variables to wether a person would survive an event... dependant upon severity ... where you are... do the grubbyment monitor sites like these? i would like to think any such info would be lost post event.... say the fictional love child of captain america and mrs bear grylls(poetic licence) stood a 95% chance of surviving(cos even comet of 66million years ago would do it) i reckon we are 20 to 40 points in front of your average joe , dependant upon personal qualities, location and degree of warning, but there are so many variables .... it boggles the mind

Whistles are good things to have and might be a life-saver in a certain particular set of circumstances, but we won't pull your card if you haven't got one.

Sadly, a lot of what was once considered just commonsense, good housekeeping and good husbandry has become so uncommon that it can be called 'prepping' in this day and age.

Because we human beings have memory, and can anticipate change, we automatically prep. You don't think Oh the weather's warm now, I shall throw away my coat, hat and gloves.

Nope, you think to yourself Great, warmer now, won't need those things for a few months, so will put them away.

If you're organised, you may well launder them before packing them up until the chilly weather, and put them somewhere you can drop your hands on them in seconds, or you may have them lying around somewhere in a muddle and struggle to find them come late autumn.

It's like that for a lot of things. A friend of mine with very bad osteoartritis, who lived alone, always had cartons of UHT milk in the cupboard and bread in the freezer. So that if she was having a particularly bad flare, she wouldn't need to go without such things. She also slept with a charged mobile phone on her bedside table, because she had had several episodes of acute attacks come on overnight and found she couldn't get out of bed at all the next day. She had friends like me, with door-keys, on call for emergencies.

In terms of survival, there's what's predictable and what isn't. I have safely taken part in a tandem skydive. Noooo probs, big fun. I have also been in a big plane full of tourists which had to do an emergency landing at Gatwick. Not part of my holiday plans, I can assure you.

In terms of surviving any crisis, there would be several stages; the initial whatever it was (accident/ global meltdown/violent assault/whatever) then there would be the subsequent stages of survival. Perhaps with injuries, emotional trauma, separation from family and home, crippling fear, dwindling resources such as food.

At any time in a crisis, you could come to serious harm. Heck, you can have fatal accidents in your own home any day of the week already- it's happening to other people.

The trick of prepping, for me at least, is to anticipate the commonest risks and take reasonable precautions to minimise them.

nuatha

Wise words GQ, though I have a bit of a problem understanding this bit

GreyQueen wrote: »

Because we human beings have memory, and can anticipate change, we automatically prep. You don't think Oh the weather's warm now, I shall throw away my coat, hat and gloves.

Nope, you think to yourself Great, warmer now, won't need those things for a few months, so will put them away.

You must have a different climate down in Provincial City.
In these parts, you consider yourself lucky if you don't need them for a few hours.

I'm a common senser just doesn't have the same ring to it

GreyQueen

We have been known to be able to go without the heating for 5 months of the year in Southern Englandshire, nuatha.

The downside is that there are an awful lot of peeps down here and the scenery isn't so spectacular. I was 13 before I saw a mountain IRL.

Righty, off to earn my crust. Laters, GQ xx