THE Prepping thread - a new beginning :)

littlemoney

GreyQueen wrote: »

Hear, hear, Karmakat.


The last time I had to sign on (2004, very briefly), DWP required sight of my passport. I am living in the county where I was born, all of 20 miles from my birthplace and in a city which has been my home for about 30 years and they still wanted to see my blinking passport as if I'd just stepped off the boat. Unbelievable!

I use my photocard driver's license as proof of ID, it is universally acceptable by Royal Mail, the Police etc.

I hired a car three months ago from a company nearby where I have been a repeat customer. Each time they want a recent utility bill/ bank statement, proof of NINO (I still have the orginal red & blue plastic card with that on which I was issued with in the early 80s).

I only have one paper bill (water) which is twice yearly but can print off a .pdf energy bill if necessary. Certain things which are local authority does for the public require a proof of residence (utility bill) which is no more than 3 months old, which can be a problem for some.

One of my thoughts about the terrible events at the Grenfell tower block fire is that most of those people would have fled with no ID. Life without ID is very difficult - imagine having to get past the security at your own bank to access your own money with no debit/ credit cards and no ID.

The blogger FerFAL has written about the importance of having a small bag of essential documents which can be grabbed in seconds if you have to evacuate your home in an emergency. Mine is in my BOB. When I visit the 'rents, that folder of docs goes with me so, if the worst came to the worst and my flat was robbed/ burned, they would not be lost.

Excuse my ignorance but what is a BOB and what should it contain. Some of the posts on this thread is giving me food for thought and made me realise how unprepared I am. I rely on my computer but I don't have off site back up, only a separate drive in another room, I have no back up in the event of a disaster so if the house goes I have lost all my infomation. I can't even remember who my house/car insurance is with, let alone any policy details.

GreyQueen

Hi hun, BOB is a generic acronym for Bug Out Bag. An americanism, as you might not be surprised to hear. Also there is a GAG (grab & go).


The concept is that you may have to evacuate your home with seconds' warning. Literally no time to do more than grab one pre-packed container and run out the door.


It's happened IRL in the tower block where I live. A neighbour did something incredibly negligent with his gas cooker late at night and triggered an explosion which took out several flats on several floors. This was just before I moved in but I heard all about it from the eyewitnesses and also from the housing officers who had to deal with the fallout.


It was close to midnight, it went kablooey, the fire brigade were here in two minutes running around all the landings pounding on doors and yelling at everyone to GET OUT NOW. Emergency evac to nearby venue with most folk in their nightwear.:(


Several people lost their flats and the contents, other people were let back into their homes several hours later. If you have to bail out, there may be 5-10 seconds' warning in a time of terror. You keep your BOB handy and you grab it on the way out the door. HTH.


Ideas for contents;change of clothes, small toiletry set, your documents backed up to a USB stick, paper documents, some cash, maybe a water bottle and some snacks, essential meds if you use those.

DigForVictory

Karmacat wrote: »

Those are the distinctly prepperish ones - personally, I'd want my family photos, and my genealogical research.YMMV.

Given that I am digitising the family photo albums (1st 5 of 30 done), that is definitely in my BOB, along with the GEDCOM of the family tree to date.
Not at all prepperish but as a reason to keep on struggling In The Event, more potent than real tea...
Address book - both physical addresses & emails & phone numbers? Phone SIM backup if that can hold names & numbers? "Spare" SIM ditto presuming mobile telephony operational & credit likewise?

Colleague opined that at all fire drills, he takes jacket, phone & keys presuming (mildly hoping) he may not be let back in. His keyring includes a starbucks fob with two-coffees-worth on. An interesting minor prep for the minor inconveniences?

Witless

Witless wrote: »

That's one way of putting it ..................

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-cornwall-45459913

.... even more interesting? ....

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-lancashire-45490444

jk0

I bet some of you thought this was impossible, but I had another instance of it yesterday...


I settled in a new tenant at a flat. Nowadays landlords have to prove the smoke alarm works at the start of a tenancy, so I took two new 9v Duracells over to fit in the alarm, and put it back on the hall ceiling.


The thing started beeping as if it had flat batteries. I took them out again, cleaned the contacts... same again.


Eventually in desparation I put the old batteries back in place, but could not get the thing to beep when I pressed the button.


I brought the Duracells home to test, and they are fine. Being very confused I posted the above on Landlordzone, and someone suggested the smoke alarm must be faulty. I concurred, so went over today to replace the smoke alarm with a new one.


I brought the old one home to test with the Duracells, and it works fine. It even works fine with the old batteries my old tenant left.


I guess there's no way of prepping for some things!

Cappella

Hello Joshua. Nice to meet you

FINALLY back online after dropping the iPad face down onto a concrete floor three weeks ago. I've just skim read. Will think about GQs scenario later but in the meantime . . .

Tea. This week the price of tea has just stunned me - and not in a good way. At her request I've bought 4 x 480 bags of tea bags to take over to my sisters in France next week. Three weeks ago they cost me £7 a bag. This week the price has soared to an eye watering £11a bag and 240 tea bags of the same brand are now £7 a box instead of the £4 I've been paying in B 'n M.
I was prepared for steep price rises in February/March but surely this is ridiculous? Has the tea harvest failed? Have I missed something? We drink tea a lot here. We're not huge coffee lovers. Loose leaf is lovely but fiddly for MrC and I'm not apologising for preferring a named brand, because it's one of only three name branded things I still buy. Or at least it was until this week. We're now trying Lidl's own. It's not too bad. I'm sure we'll adjust to it given time. And if not we'll just have to drink corporation pop.
But what a gap in my prepping!! No tea at all in my own stockpile and its a little late to take action now.
Joking apart though I am now a lot more concerned than I was a week ago about future price hikes. Im auditing my Armageddon cupboard today and making serious lists.
Time to think ahead I think.

[Deleted User]

What's a NINO :huh:

candygirl

Jojo_the_Tightfisted wrote: »

Another new duty for work. I've been put forward for Fire Marshall training. Which involves watching an interminably long online presentation and clicking a few questions before being issued with my very own HV vest. If I accept that, I've got good reason to persuade them to send me to a first aid course; it's always useful to have a refresher and I'm not financially in the position to pay to do it myself. (plus it's two days paid to be off work - always a bonus).

Visions of Keith Lard off Phoenix Nights :rotfl:

DigForVictory

Bedsit_Bob wrote: »

What's a NINO

I really hope it's a National Insurance Number, or I've been filling forms in wrong for decades.

Capella - what a *horrific* surprise! I shall cite you as Why I Need Another Box next a son rolls his eyes as I burden him further. (I choose & pay, they lug. They occasionally point out things I might have missed, like that can of Mountain Dew, or pack of Reece's Pieces, that go such a long way to easing crippling backache in the young.) I only -rarely- send them for another trolley so I can really stock up - baked beans (before Costco started carrying Himself's preferred brand) and Lucozade (my young care assistant doesn't drink tea or coffee [yet] so we're propping him up with Lucozade bought on promotion).

As for their future diabetes - they're disgustingly Young - they burn though calories much as I go through tea & one has already declared that he's not that fond of sweet stuff really (well, he's discovered cheese, and berries & seeds - all good healthy nutrition and even rougher on my wallet. So if you see a little old lady pointing to More Tea imperiously and a young lout obediently loading up, then in turn gesturing towards the wheel of Wensleydale with Cranberries? It might be me.)

Jojo - the first aid course has got Much Easier in the last 2 decades, no sudden death exam at the end & realtime practice with a defib, so you totter out clutching the revised manual feeling much more au fait with what might happen.
Then Life happens & you're left wondering what the devil is a hamstring anyway (as it wasn't in the index of my book!). Happily this is where the gentle art of talking to your casualty comes in - and after I'd assembled a refreshing handful of icecubes in a triangular bandage [wonderful bit of kit!], I handed it to my casualty saying, "hold that against the pain & we'll see what more we can do", - oh his Leg... Phew. Elevation, reassurance etc & we all survived & I now have a better idea of where a hamstring might be, but will still prepare the cooling pad and let the casualty decide What Hurts Most.

GreyQueen

NINO = National Insurance Number, a generally-used abbreviation, at least in organisations where I have drawn my shilling's worth of pay.


Feeling a bit wobbly at the thought of Tea becoming more expensive. I got the 'rents to stock up * on 10 pkts of Red Label loose tea at Sainsbugs last month and am already on the second of those. Might be time to review prices and it's still the £1.4/ 250g it was last month. Best not get complacent and get stocked up, if there wasn't a builder's brew to be had, my mornings would be less joyous.


* they live near Sainsbugs, I don't - I paid.


Gosh, wondering what else might be about to go silly money and where my spare shopping £££ should be invested. I already have a Sardine Mountain but think it might be about to acquire some Foothills - one can never be too careful.


My local chippy has had to stick 20p on a portion of chips, their supplier of 40+ years' standing has had to hike prices dramatically. It will be tough finding affordable taters. The 'rents passed the farm gate where they can normally get taters at about £6 per 25 kg sack and there were none to be had.


My 2019 allotment harvest is going to be majorly involving potatoes, I am readying the ground already. Grains to the forward, with lots and lots of goodness in and lots and lots of taters out.


I still treasure the comment that two passing youths made to themselves a few years back, when seeing me dig up what were, let us be quite frank, some monstrous large tubers; would you look at the size of those effing things?!

Forever after, pals and family will enquire whether the harvest was effing or not.......... :rotfl: