Preparedness for when

bluebag

GreyQueen,

I live and was brought up in city centre stabs villes. I think you get a 'street smartness' about you.

Friends my daughter had from a lovely rural village just about needed to be hand held and baby sat all the time they were in the big smoke, their naivete was unreal.

maryb

I've had that feeling once walking home from the station in a London suburb, late but before midnight. I saw a taxi coming towards me and hailed it - a major extravagance. I apologised for it being a short fare but he was lovely and told me better safe than sorry. It had to go back the way I had come before turning and as we rounded a bend, there were the blue flashing lights and the local plod taking down the guy who had been about 100 yards behind me.

I remember reading somewhere on a US prepper site that you should pick the colour of your clothes to blend in with the landscape where you are likely to be. Green and brown in the country in summer but more greys in winter. Alternatively, in an urban environment, dark colours are less likely to draw the eye most of the year

bluebag

I generally dress like a bag lady when oot and aboot, my tartan battered trolley pulled behind me. If I am all gussied up then I go in the car or by taxi.

I never go out alone after dark unless I'm escaping a burning building.

GreyQueen

Yeah, I always walk around corners here at the Towers catfooted and alert. You never know what you're going to see; some horrible little erk shooting up or some dodgy characters. All my life, I've hated noisy shoes and like to walk around silently.

Sometimes, you come on something that it's prudent not to have seen, in which case if you're silent, you can sometimes make a smart exit.

I was gobsmacked last week when a pal and I were biking through the park near dusk. Somewhere I wouldn't have been at that time of day without a companion. Saw this young lass, prolly no more than 14 or 15. She was standing on a bridge playing with an i-phone, earbuds on, expensive phone hanging over the water, on her jack-jones and several hundred meters from the nearest home.

What is wrong with this picture, we ask ourselves? She's totally engrossed in an expensive trinket, silenced by music and with her back to such passers-by as there were, and there were very few. It would have been the work of moments to walk up behind her, hand over mouth/ blow to the head and drag her into the bushes. No one could have saved her from badness if badness had been on the prowl that night, and women have been raped in that park.

Jings, but for two pins I'd've given her a talking-to. Young women and girls are the favoured victims of violent men, it's like seeing a baby antelope in a pride of lions sometimes.

Ach well, I've only travelled the world solo safely so what the hell do I know about anything............?

ETA Well done, maryb, smart exit at the right time. Sometimes it isn't the hour of the night, it's just the wrongness. When I was a wild young thing (early Cretaecous) I was sometimes walking home alone in a large city at about 4 am in the morning with the birdies singing the dawn chorus. And I'd walk down the middle of 4 lane streets. My reasoning was impeccable; there was no traffic and it would mean I'd have several seconds warning if anyone came out of an alley or doorway at me. No one ever did. I expect the biker leathers, the being nearly 6 feet tall and having a serious pair of a$$kicking boots on probably acted as a disincentive.

maryb

It worries me that DD2 walks home from school with her Ipod on, but at least she sticks to main roads at busy times. I do tend to pick her up in winter when it's dark, even though it would be good for her to walk, safety apart. Some friends of ours don't drink mid week because their daughter who lives at home since leaving uni and who works silly late hours would have to walk down a quiet road from the station even though it's a safe neighbourhood. You instinctively look after them if you can

bluebag

My days and golly, I've just been on the back step for a cheeky fag and it's bitter, biting cold. We have just had a light dusting of the white stuff too.

As the one who grows sticks I must report that the seedy things are standing up in the pot ( very audacious I must say!) and have green stem things, most extraordinary. They seem to get all lively when the yellow ball shines on them and they do stuff when I am not looking.

More news on the growing of sticks as it occurs.

the_cake

Minus 10 here!! Thank goodness for my silly-looking-but-so-cosy fake fur trapper hat ... horses are nice and warm in double rugs, and the wood burner is my best friend.
I currently work in a shop which sells, amongst other useful things, wellies, and have learnt a bit about them which may be useful: only two makes, Aigle and le Chameau, are made in France, every other one (even the really expensive makes, I believe) is made in China, in the same town, from the same rubber, some of which is recycled, which sounds good, but apparently isn't. We get SO many returned to us, as they have split, and keeping horses, I get through loads of wellies too. This used not to happen: I remember having the same pair for years .... so, I am not sure what date things went so sadly wrong in welly-land, but you might like to keep a look out for "old" wellies at car boots, in cs, etc. as I was lucky enough to find an unused pair last week, and the quality does seem much, much better. I also buy real wool rugs and blankets when I find bargain ones, and store them through the summer in a blanket box, with lots of lavender bags to keep the moths at bay. Old stuff is often much better quality than new stuff, always worth buying in my opinion ....

vanoonoo

OMG soooooooooo cold in the stairwell at work! cant hold the handrail going up the stairs incase I get frozen to it!

hope you're all doing ok? my toes are cold again

I still have no internet at the new house and I had most of last week off work with a horrible lurgey cold thing which has left me feeling very low physically and emotionally PLUS I cant find my yaxtrax and think I might need them this week! argh!

keep warm, hydrated and safe everyone x

pineapple

Living down a dead end track with 15 households means 'strangers' are immediately spotted. The only strangers on foot are the occasional walker. Once in a blue moon we'll get a stray lost motorist who somehow went off the road. We had one crime all the time I have been here - a neighbour's mid life crisis motorbike got nicked. It was parked by the very first house so they wouldn't have had to go past any other properties - thereby evading the watchful eyes of the nosiest neighbour in the world :rotfl:
Just been watching the footage of motorists stuck in their cars. It wasn't exactly deep snow. It seems the roads weren't gritted even though we had advance warning. We have this scenario every year and every year we are told things will be different.
Milder than yesterday here and sunny. Just a light frosting of snow. A big hearty 3 day stew in the slow cooker and soda bread in the oven. All is well with the world! :j

thriftwizard

Bitterly cold even down here, too, now; the remains of yesterday's snow is frozen solid on the lawn & I've had to take warm water out for the birds, both domesticated & wild. But the yellow ball is sailing through the sky & it's possible we may get to see the comet tonight if it stays clear.

I was minorly assaulted in the street, back in the dark ages when I was just 17, and took care to find out how to avoid such incidents again. I learnt a good few self-defence tricks, but the most important one, which has clearly stood me in good stead, was don't look like a victim. Don't scurry along, hunched up, hogging the shadows & hoping no-one will see you; walk tall (not so easy at 5'4") stride down the middle of the road, be alert & look like you might fight back. So now I walk like Granny Weatherwax and look like Nanny Ogg, for those of you who indulge in the odd Pratchett. Seems to have worked...

Walking confidently & looking people in the eye actually does wonders for your confidence, too; people assume you know where you're going & what you're doing, and tend to defer to you. (Especially trainee daughters-in-law.) In a quiet little town like this, there are several known troublemakers & spots where trouble can brew up quite quickly; one glance or sharp word from someone like me who's known them since they were 2½ and the bravado melts away & they dissipate like scum on your washing up water. I know it wouldn't work in an inner city; I've lived there too. But it's a useful trick out here in the sticks.