This has been an ongoing discussion in our house for the past few years...

When I built this house I incorporated everything I could to make it as energy efficient as possible and self sufficient. We have our own well. We have a 500 gallon propane tank and I have a whole house back up generator..

Ammo and guns, along with training have been stockpiled since 2008.

Food is the issue. We have a storage room with plenty of built in storage but my wife was resistant to the idea of stockpiling non perishable foods.....until this latest Covid nonsense. Now we are buying extras of our normal food items when we go to Sams or Costco and putting them on rotation so there is no loss. It might take us 6 months or so until we get to a stage I’m somewhat comfortable but we are working towards it. Our goal is to have at least 1 but hopefully 3 months of supplies...I know I’m a rookie.

Let's just say I'm on a first name, how's your mother, exchange birthday cards basis with the ladies at the Mountain House ordering dept.

I had a large chest freezer packed with meat in case the meat shortage had continued. Then sometime during or after my last vacation the freezer died, didn’t notice until it was too late. Now I’m doubling down on canned and shelf stable food.

Nope. Not a thing. I’m gonna sit down and wait for my Gub’mint to save me.

That’s my story and I’m sticking to it....

Yep, for a while now. Getting used to not eating every day. Converting as many dollars into physical silver. Generally making life as simple as possible. Staying healthy is #1.

I got 2 cases of ramen noddles and 15,000 gallons of water. I am ready.

I actually started during the Y2K thing. Not as the world is coming to an end thing, but I was younger and it was my awakening to start paying more attention of what could really happen.

Same here. Started right around the Y2K thing.

"Hoarding pallets of expired Soviet gas masks, stockpiling buckets of pre-1965 coins to melt down, and digging an underground bunker in the back yard" kind of prepping? No.

"Cobbling together a 120 pound bugout bag with 8 different guns and harboring the misguided idea that I can load up with it, wander off into the woods in a random direction, and 'live off the land' indefinitely" kind of prepping? No.

"Shrink-wrapping all my guns and ammo and burying them in PVC pipe tubes around my property in case the government tries to confiscate them" kind of prepping? No.

"Having at least two weeks worth of food/water/fuel, extra supplies, and a decent amount of cash on hand" kind of prepping? Sure. Been doing that for many years. That's just common sense.


"Prepping" means different things to different folks. Some of it makes sense. But some of it is way out there. I hesitate to label myself as a "prepper" due to that label being negatively associated with stuff like the abovementioned extremes. There was a period of time that I used to browse some "prepper" forums, and the prevalence of that kind of stuff is the reason that I no longer do so.

Been setting back ammo for about 5 years now. I'm starting to focus on MRE's, water and communications now that ammo is too expensive.

The wife and I talk about it often. I think the most important thing is to prep your body, to be physically fit to survive the arduous nature of what a survival situation would be like. Then, prep your house with food and whatnot. I don't think shit would go down like in the movies, with the grizzled old man surviving, or the massively obese human getting all slim and photogenic during all that apocalyptic starvation. If the "SHTF" as people are keen on prepping for, the old, fat, sick, and immobile would be the first to go. Always.

Imagine people who live in the deep south or in AZ with a mean case of diabetes, overweight, and no AC. Or the same situation in the North during winter with no heating fuel left, and no ability to chop and stack firewood. No thanks. I'd rather take what's coming right on the chin and be done with it.

I'm pretty sure our stockpile of NIB Beanie Babies (lots of the really rare ones too!) will allow us to trade for all the essentials after the collapse.

Started after Katrina. I had to go down there and work on systems for a month or so after the hurricane and learned a ton on what I should have on hand.

We have a few weeks of water stored that we rotate through, a bunch of #10 cans of freeze dried and dehydrated food, buckets of rice, beans, etc.... Not to mention a shallow well that we can pop the top on and get water with a bucket. Fuel, generator, ammo, case of toilet paper, etc... I think we can hold our own for a while if need be.

quote:

Originally posted by parabellum:
I got 460 cases of Charmin. The EXTRA-soft stuff, so...

All joking aside, I was caught unprepared (at least to my normal standards) in March as I only had 15-20 N95 masks and not enough alcohol or hand sanitizer. These were items I kept putting off buying....so while I am certainly not "new" into being prepared I am now fine tuning my preparedness.

And as someone else mentioned, I am now having conversations with friends (don't have many local ones) about "what if scenarios"

For many years I have been doing this mental masturbation privately....lately I have been sharing a bit of the craziness (my misses words for it) that has at times kept me up at night.

One thing that I have been trying to work through is the old admonishment "don't train for the past's wars"....

What does the next threat look like? Since you cannot prepare for all of them (also some are just silly or impossible to prepare for...ie the comet) so you have to try and think ahead...

While I am taking steps to harden the homestead against the unlikely (highly unlikely??) event that we see roving bands of black clad pussies in NE TX. I AM looking forward to the lead up to the elections and the post spicyness.

This COVID BS taught me to not be complacent

quote:

Originally posted by darthfuster:
We started 30 years ago. Since then our preparations have become more sophisticated and broad. Back then we stored basic grains and beans.....some canned goods and expired MREs. You can live on it, but it tastes like crap. Now we have a freeze dryer. Have had for 4 years. Our food storage has gone from basic to fully cooked and freeze dried meals and so on.

The latest and likely final evolution is we bought a ranch. It is very remote. We are building a new residence on it with a barn, a shop and a green house. Did I mention is is remote? It is part of a co-op where we intend to be self sufficient and independent. The latest events have driven this decision. We expect to be ready for occupancy within two years. There will be enough room for each of the DFs and their families should distance from chaos be necessary. So yeah, we prep.

That's the stuff!

I used to occasionally joke that toilet paper would be a hot trade item in an apocalypse scenario. Seems it was more accurate than I realized.

As for food, we have tried to keep a manageable amount on hand. The problem is cycling it efficiently. Seems that really takes planning and a good bit of dedication.

Supplies for short term
One week to 6 months

Skills for long term
Six months plus

Silent

quote:

Originally posted by Oz_Shadow:
As for food, we have tried to keep a manageable amount on hand. The problem is cycling it efficiently. Seems that really takes planning and a good bit of dedication.

It's best if you simply buy more of what you already eat on a regular basis. It does you no good to buy a big #10 can of tomatoes if you never used canned tomatoes in your normal meals. It will just sit on the shelf for years until it expires, and then have to get tossed and replaced with another can that will just sit on the shelf for years. Wasted money.

But if you buy what you normally eat on a regular basis, and just keep a larger amount on hand, it's constantly being used. Then you just have to worry about making sure you're eating the oldest one first.

For example: Let's say your family usually uses one box of mac and cheese per week. The next time you go to the grocery store, instead of buying one box of mac and cheese, buy four. Put them on the shelf in a row. When it's time to use one, pull it from the front of the row and move the other three forward. As you use one, replace it the next time you go grocery shopping, and put the newer one at the back of the row.

That way, at any given time you always have about four boxes (four weeks' worth) of mac and cheese on hand, with the oldest boxes always being at the front for next use, and the supply being constantly rotated/refreshed.


Rinse and repeat for the various other canned/boxed items that you family uses on a regular basis. Or even a semi-regular basis. (Just adjust the amount you keep on hand to match its frequency of use. You don't need 4 bags of flour on hand if 1 bag normally lasts you a year; your supply won't be rotating much.)

quote:

Originally posted by InLoveWithSigs:
What strikes me as odd, is I’m not alone in my recent interest... I’ve finding a huge number of people I know are stocking up, buying guns, food. Supplies, etc...

In case you haven't noticed, the whole country woke up to "prepping" since March of this year. For a couple of months, long lines for toilet paper, beef, propane, bottled water, guns, ammo, etc. Berkey water filter have been sold out, hard to get. Precious metals were hard to get at one point.

I have been "prepping " for decades, having lived in CA, earthquake country. Toilet paper wasn't a big deal earlier this year because we always had a Costco pack of TP in the attic, a practice for almost 15 years.

quote:

Originally posted by parabellum:
I got 460 cases of Charmin. The EXTRA-soft stuff, so...

I have buckets of dried beans so together we'd be set.