I came across a thread in one survival-prep forum recently where someone posted the suggestion that instead of buying allegedly more-expensive oxygen absorbers, why not buy iron oxide hand warmers, they said, since the hand warmers were cheaper and readily available in sporting goods stores and, they said, had the same active ingredients as food-grade oxygen absorbers? Well, that’s all fine and good if the hand warmers are cheaper and if they’re food-grade, but is cheaper necessarily what you want when it comes to food storage?
I’ve tried probably eight or nine different brands of food dehydrators over the years, and the only one I’ve tried that I would recommend to other people (disclaimer: I haven’t tried an Excalibur) is the one manufactured by Nesco, which has an internal fan for air circulation and helps food dry in half the time compared to dehydrators without fans. I like the Nescos so much that I’ve bought a dozen of them over the past several years just so I’ll have plenty of extra food preparation tools if I need them. (Shameless plug: You can usually get a Nesco on eBay for around $30 (plus shipping) if you pick your auctions smartly.)
Now, I could buy a Ronco or other model without an internal fan that would in fact use less electricity during the drying process…but if it takes the dehydrator twice as long to adequately dry food, am I really saving any money? I think it’s more than worth a few extra pennies of electricity to have dehydrators with fans so that I know my food will dry quickly and uniformly…and in the end, I have the security of knowing that I have plenty of food if I need it. (If you’re so worried about a dehydrator with a fan using more electricity than a dehydrator without a fan, maybe you should unplug the appliance in your house that uses the most electricity — your refrigerator!)
Which brings me back to the point about getting what you pay for.
In 1996, I bought my very first car, a 1984 Toyota Corolla. (Yes, a Toyota. The brakes worked on this particular vehicle…but nothing else did.) The car had about 162,000 miles on it, and the dealer was asking only $850 for it. The only warranty it came with was for me not to let the door hit me on the way out of the so-called dealership. More than $1,000 and 1,300 miles later, the car wouldn’t budge out of my mom’s driveway. Well, that’s not quite true…I could drive it three or four miles before the engine would overheat and I’d have to put more (and more…and more…and more) water in the radiator after it cooled down…and watch the water go right through the radiator to the pavement because the bottom of the radiator was rusted out.
I’d spent close to $2,000 and now had nothing to show for it. I was not a happy camper. But at least I could catch a ride on good days and hope I didn’t have to walk very far the rest of the time.
Which brings me back to my first point.
It’s one thing to shell out a couple thousand bucks on a piece-o’-junk car and have the thing eventually stop running altogether and then chalk up the experience to a lesson learned the hard way. But it’s a whole different story when your life depends on something.
And you can’t live without food.
Let’s say for the sake of argument that hand warmers technically do have the same oxygen-absorbing properties as, well, oxygen absorbers. I haven’t been able to try to vacuum-seal a jar yet with hand warmers because (at least according to the sporting goods clerk at Wally World) they are a seasonal camping-accessory item and won’t be available until later in the year. But do I really want something to heat up my food items as they are undergoing vacuum-sealing, and risk denaturing the vitamin content of the food that my life could depend on if TSHTF? Or would you rather use tried-and-true methods and materials that have been proven time and time again to work, so you don’t have to worry?
I’m not telling you not to buy that 1984 Toyota. I’m just asking you if it will get you where you need to go when you need it to get you there. If you’re buying cheaper food storage tools that you can’t be sure will do what you need them to do — keep your food fresh and safe until you eat it — are you willing to risk your health and maybe your life just to save a few bucks?
Showing posts with label FEMA. Show all posts
Showing posts with label FEMA. Show all posts
Sunday, May 2, 2010
Friday, March 12, 2010
Why should I stock up on stuff? Part 2: Buy it, then hide it!
I tend to think that if something is worth having, it’s worth hiding and protecting. Think about it: Burglars don’t break into places to steal stuff that nobody wants. And who in their right mind (especially with the economy in the shape it’s in right now) would waste their money on stuff that nobody wants?
So it’s a pretty good chance that you’re buying what you want…but it might also be what someone else wants. As I noted in my previous post, not buying food, precious metals, firearms/personal protection or other important things because someone might (or might not) steal them just doesn’t make sense, because if you’re expecting the government to take care of you after everything hits the fan, I have a four-letter F-word for you:
FEMA.
If the FEMA debacle after Hurricane Katrina doesn’t haunt you to this day, it should. Because it perfectly illustrates the mess that can occur when people can’t — or won’t — prepare for their own safety, sustenance and survival WTSHTF and instead wait for the government to take care of them after the fact. (For you neophytes, “WTSHTF” stands for “when the fecal matter hits the oscillating rotary blade.”)
So if you’re not content with waiting for the government to “help” you after TSHTF…well, if you ARE waiting for the government, you might as well stop reading this now…but if you’re intent on becoming self-sufficient and stocking up on the things that can get you through whatever economic, natural or social disasters you’re most likely to encounter, here are some thoughts on how you can keep your proverbial “beans, bullets and Band-Aids” from being discovered by thieves.
What got me started thinking about how to hide food and other personal preps was a conversation I had with someone who was aghast at the thought of buying gold because they didn’t think they’d be able to put it in a safe enough place. After all, if you have an ounce of gold, which at the moment has a spot price of just over $1,100, WHAT IF SOMEONE STEALS IT???
Rest your brain for a moment.
There are two issues to consider: What you can do to hide what you have, and whether what you have is worth extensive efforts to hide it. But if something isn’t worth hiding, why do you have it in the first place? And if it’s worth hiding, why not go all-out to protect it?
A troy ounce of gold weighs 31.1 grams. If that amount of gold were put into a cube, it would measure less than half an inch on each side.
And if you can’t figure out a safe place to hide something that’s less than half an inch on each side, you really, really aren’t trying hard enough.
But if it’s as valuable as gold, isn’t it worth doing whatever you can to make sure it’s well-hidden?
So let’s talk about something that’s even more important than gold.
Food.
I don’t know many people who enjoy being hungry. And it’s well-documented that when people get really, really hungry, they will do stupid, destructive things to get what they want. So if you want to become as self-sufficient as possible right now so that you won’t be hungry soon, after several years of trillion-dollar U.S. budget deficits and the resulting hyperinflation leaves store shelves empty as desperate shoppers try to get whatever they can find while they can still afford it — look at what’s happening right now in Zimbabwe — here are a few simple things you can do to hide your family’s sustenance from would-be thieves.
Disclaimer: I am not a professional security consultant. I take no responsibility for any losses anyone incurs if they follow my advice. I’m just offering general suggestions based on the well-documented fact that most thieves want to get into a building, grab stuff quickly and then get out before they’re discovered. Putting a few food items or $20 bills or a few silver coins in plain sight might be incentive for the perp to grab what’s right in front of them and “get out of Dodge” now that they’ve gotten something they deem desirable and before the owner of the house gets home.
Buy it. Hide it. Protect it.
As I noted in this post, you probably have a lot more space than you think when it comes to storing food and other very important items. The issue isn’t really what space you have, but how well you use the space you have available and how well you can hide stuff where you’ve stored it. And what’s most important is not the hiding place itself, but how inaccessible or well-concealed the hiding place is so that people who shouldn’t find stuff won’t find it.
Think of the boxes of Christmas ornaments and other miscellaneous items that probably most of us have piled up in our garage or attic but that we rarely access. What thief in his right mind is going to go through boxes of Christmas ornaments or piles of junk to find valuables that may or may not be there anyway? Now take this idea one step further: If you have a safe installed in the far back corner of your house, or in the back corner of the basement if you have one, who’s going to go digging through boxes and boxes of Christmas ornaments to see if they contain valuables, or move those boxes of Christmas ornaments to see if you’ve installed a bolted-down safe in the concrete floor under all the boxes of your Christmas ornaments or other stuff you never use? Thieves aren’t going to waste their time picking through every last box in the house unless they have all the time in the world. All the more reason to make it as hard as possible for them to find in case they do have a lot of time.
So picture the far back corner of your basement or other spot in your house that is rather inaccessible and made even more inaccessible when boxes of all kinds are piled up on top of and in front of that space. (Hint: This might be a good place to install a bolted-down safe in the concrete floor. Just make sure your basement is dry.) Pile up furniture, boxes of Christmas ornaments and all the other rarely-used junk in your basement in front of the area you’re wanting to keep safe. Chances are good that most burglars won’t bother moving all of that junk because, well, it’s junk.
Now let’s get back to food (because you can’t eat gold). As I noted at the link above, you probably have a lot more space than you think to be able to store food. And since you need food, and since large amounts of food can be stored in a relatively small area — 27 5-gallon buckets — 3 rows of 3 buckets stacked 3 high — can hold approximately 675 lbs. of beans and rice (about 25 lbs. per 5-gallon bucket) and take up an area less than 5 feet wide, 5 feet deep and 5 feet high. Or you could store a few buckets in your kitchen closet, a few buckets in your bedroom closet, even a few under your workbench in the garage. It might sound odd storing buckets of food in places like the bedroom closet or your work area in the garage, but that doesn’t matter!! What matters is that you utilize all the space you have and store things where nobody will bother them. If I’m looking for valuables inside a stranger’s house, the last place I’m going to look is in a 5-gallon bucket in the garage unless I’m really hungry. But if I’m really hungry, I’m also probably not going to dig through piles of Christmas ornaments in the basement to see if buckets of food might be behind all of those boxes.
I had one person point out that it would be a pain to try to get to the food or other items they wanted if they first had to dig through dozens of boxes to reach it in the back corner of the basement or other such places. Well, would you rather put all of your stuff where you can reach it easily, but where thieves can reach it just as easily? I don’t know about you, but I’m going to do all I can to protect my food and other supplies, especially as the economy gets worse and people do more and more desperate things to try to get what they want. I don’t care if I have to work a little to be able to reach my food. I just don’t want thieves to NOT have to work to get it because I left stuff where anyone else could get it as well. How badly do you want to be self-sufficient and protect those supplies and tools that will help you maintain that self-sufficiency? Your answer to that question will determine whether you’re willing to put very valuable things — food, ammo, precious metals and many other items are valuable things — in places that are as safe as possible because they’re a pain for thieves to get to.
Happy hiding!
So it’s a pretty good chance that you’re buying what you want…but it might also be what someone else wants. As I noted in my previous post, not buying food, precious metals, firearms/personal protection or other important things because someone might (or might not) steal them just doesn’t make sense, because if you’re expecting the government to take care of you after everything hits the fan, I have a four-letter F-word for you:
FEMA.
If the FEMA debacle after Hurricane Katrina doesn’t haunt you to this day, it should. Because it perfectly illustrates the mess that can occur when people can’t — or won’t — prepare for their own safety, sustenance and survival WTSHTF and instead wait for the government to take care of them after the fact. (For you neophytes, “WTSHTF” stands for “when the fecal matter hits the oscillating rotary blade.”)
So if you’re not content with waiting for the government to “help” you after TSHTF…well, if you ARE waiting for the government, you might as well stop reading this now…but if you’re intent on becoming self-sufficient and stocking up on the things that can get you through whatever economic, natural or social disasters you’re most likely to encounter, here are some thoughts on how you can keep your proverbial “beans, bullets and Band-Aids” from being discovered by thieves.
What got me started thinking about how to hide food and other personal preps was a conversation I had with someone who was aghast at the thought of buying gold because they didn’t think they’d be able to put it in a safe enough place. After all, if you have an ounce of gold, which at the moment has a spot price of just over $1,100, WHAT IF SOMEONE STEALS IT???
Rest your brain for a moment.
There are two issues to consider: What you can do to hide what you have, and whether what you have is worth extensive efforts to hide it. But if something isn’t worth hiding, why do you have it in the first place? And if it’s worth hiding, why not go all-out to protect it?
A troy ounce of gold weighs 31.1 grams. If that amount of gold were put into a cube, it would measure less than half an inch on each side.
And if you can’t figure out a safe place to hide something that’s less than half an inch on each side, you really, really aren’t trying hard enough.
But if it’s as valuable as gold, isn’t it worth doing whatever you can to make sure it’s well-hidden?
So let’s talk about something that’s even more important than gold.
Food.
I don’t know many people who enjoy being hungry. And it’s well-documented that when people get really, really hungry, they will do stupid, destructive things to get what they want. So if you want to become as self-sufficient as possible right now so that you won’t be hungry soon, after several years of trillion-dollar U.S. budget deficits and the resulting hyperinflation leaves store shelves empty as desperate shoppers try to get whatever they can find while they can still afford it — look at what’s happening right now in Zimbabwe — here are a few simple things you can do to hide your family’s sustenance from would-be thieves.
Disclaimer: I am not a professional security consultant. I take no responsibility for any losses anyone incurs if they follow my advice. I’m just offering general suggestions based on the well-documented fact that most thieves want to get into a building, grab stuff quickly and then get out before they’re discovered. Putting a few food items or $20 bills or a few silver coins in plain sight might be incentive for the perp to grab what’s right in front of them and “get out of Dodge” now that they’ve gotten something they deem desirable and before the owner of the house gets home.
Buy it. Hide it. Protect it.
As I noted in this post, you probably have a lot more space than you think when it comes to storing food and other very important items. The issue isn’t really what space you have, but how well you use the space you have available and how well you can hide stuff where you’ve stored it. And what’s most important is not the hiding place itself, but how inaccessible or well-concealed the hiding place is so that people who shouldn’t find stuff won’t find it.
Think of the boxes of Christmas ornaments and other miscellaneous items that probably most of us have piled up in our garage or attic but that we rarely access. What thief in his right mind is going to go through boxes of Christmas ornaments or piles of junk to find valuables that may or may not be there anyway? Now take this idea one step further: If you have a safe installed in the far back corner of your house, or in the back corner of the basement if you have one, who’s going to go digging through boxes and boxes of Christmas ornaments to see if they contain valuables, or move those boxes of Christmas ornaments to see if you’ve installed a bolted-down safe in the concrete floor under all the boxes of your Christmas ornaments or other stuff you never use? Thieves aren’t going to waste their time picking through every last box in the house unless they have all the time in the world. All the more reason to make it as hard as possible for them to find in case they do have a lot of time.
So picture the far back corner of your basement or other spot in your house that is rather inaccessible and made even more inaccessible when boxes of all kinds are piled up on top of and in front of that space. (Hint: This might be a good place to install a bolted-down safe in the concrete floor. Just make sure your basement is dry.) Pile up furniture, boxes of Christmas ornaments and all the other rarely-used junk in your basement in front of the area you’re wanting to keep safe. Chances are good that most burglars won’t bother moving all of that junk because, well, it’s junk.
Now let’s get back to food (because you can’t eat gold). As I noted at the link above, you probably have a lot more space than you think to be able to store food. And since you need food, and since large amounts of food can be stored in a relatively small area — 27 5-gallon buckets — 3 rows of 3 buckets stacked 3 high — can hold approximately 675 lbs. of beans and rice (about 25 lbs. per 5-gallon bucket) and take up an area less than 5 feet wide, 5 feet deep and 5 feet high. Or you could store a few buckets in your kitchen closet, a few buckets in your bedroom closet, even a few under your workbench in the garage. It might sound odd storing buckets of food in places like the bedroom closet or your work area in the garage, but that doesn’t matter!! What matters is that you utilize all the space you have and store things where nobody will bother them. If I’m looking for valuables inside a stranger’s house, the last place I’m going to look is in a 5-gallon bucket in the garage unless I’m really hungry. But if I’m really hungry, I’m also probably not going to dig through piles of Christmas ornaments in the basement to see if buckets of food might be behind all of those boxes.
I had one person point out that it would be a pain to try to get to the food or other items they wanted if they first had to dig through dozens of boxes to reach it in the back corner of the basement or other such places. Well, would you rather put all of your stuff where you can reach it easily, but where thieves can reach it just as easily? I don’t know about you, but I’m going to do all I can to protect my food and other supplies, especially as the economy gets worse and people do more and more desperate things to try to get what they want. I don’t care if I have to work a little to be able to reach my food. I just don’t want thieves to NOT have to work to get it because I left stuff where anyone else could get it as well. How badly do you want to be self-sufficient and protect those supplies and tools that will help you maintain that self-sufficiency? Your answer to that question will determine whether you’re willing to put very valuable things — food, ammo, precious metals and many other items are valuable things — in places that are as safe as possible because they’re a pain for thieves to get to.
Happy hiding!
Monday, March 8, 2010
Why should I stock up on stuff if people will just steal it anyway?
I’ve read this argument far too many times, that stocking up on food, ammo, precious metals or anything else probably isn’t worth it because people could come in and steal your stuff — so why stock up in the first place?
So let’s take this thought one step further.
If I stock up on food or anything else to help sustain me and my family in the event of a long-term economic downturn, the possibility exists that whatever I’ve stocked up on could be stolen. But I could also be mugged on my way home from work, carjacked while stopped at a red light or robbed at an ATM. So should I stop going to work, driving or using an ATM?
Or should I just wait for the government to take care of me and protect me in any and every situation?
Most Americans are well-aware of the federal and state governments’ stellar job in coordinating “relief” efforts after Hurricane Katrina. Quite to the contrary, it was an absolute disaster. Coordination among relief agencies and organizations was overlapping or nonexistent, food and other necessities were in short supply and those people who either couldn’t or wouldn’t leave the affected areas severely strained the available resources.
Oh yeah, then there’s another annoying little detail that seems to come up a lot these days: Congressional budget analysts are predicting nearly trillion-dollar deficits each year for at least the next decade. TRILLION. One thousand billion. In red ink. Every year.
And I’m thinking about trusting these bozos to take care of me when they not only can’t get stuff to the right places when the stuff needs to get there, but they’re spending themselves off a cliff at terminal velocity??
It’s like those ghastly videos around the Internet showing skydivers whose parachutes didn’t open. The fall didn’t kill them — hitting the earth at 180 miles per hour did. These people looked like the epitome of perfect health until the point of impact. But the impact ruined their day. Having a properly packed backup parachute would’ve been a good thing before it was too late.
Your food storage, water storage, precious metals and personal protection are your backup chute. YOUR food. YOUR water. YOUR PMs. YOUR personal protection.
Not the FEMA rations, trucks of potable water (if there are any) and absolutely no personal protection if you wait for the government to “take care of you.” And if you didn’t bother with the first three items, you probably didn’t buy any precious metals in the first place.
“He looks so natural!”
Depending on who the deceased is at a funeral, I’m either mildly amused or somewhat disturbed…sometimes both…to hear someone proclaim that the dearly departed “looks so natural.” We’ve seen pictures of the 50-year-old who looks 15 years younger because they’ve taken care of their body, exercised and done other things that promote good health. Then there’s the other 50-year-old who looks like he’s about 70 because he’s been chain-smoking for decades and lives on a steady diet of Mickey D’s. I wouldn’t trust the chain-smoking McConnoisseur to give me advice on how to live a healthy life. Yet too many of us implicitly trust that the government will take care of us if disaster happens. So we do nothing. And hope our parachute will open in time.
I don’t remember putting on a parachu…KERSPLAT!!
Which brings me back to my first point.
The worst-case scenario isn’t that you prepare for emergencies by stocking up on food, water, personal protection and everything else and then have people break in and steal everything — if you’re well-prepared, you’ll have your preps well-hidden and you’ll have protection to defend yourself, your family and your property. The WORST-CASE scenario is waiting on the government to help you.
So what if you prepare, only to have someone break in and steal everything?
But what if nobody breaks in? What if everything you’ve stocked up and stored for yourself and your family is well-protected and stays right where you put it?
Then you have the things you’ll need for your and your family’s well-being in the event of possibly long-term crises.
Do you have life insurance so your family will be provided for in case of your death? Do you have car insurance in case something happens to your vehicle? Do you have health insurance to help cover medical expenses in case of illness? If so, then what’s your excuse for not stocking up on food, water, personal protection and other vital necessities in the midst of economic turmoil, high unemployment, political uncertainty, natural disasters and other situations you can’t predict?
Your well-being is in your hands. Don’t wait for your terminally ill, bankrupt Uncle Sam to take care of it for you.
So let’s take this thought one step further.
If I stock up on food or anything else to help sustain me and my family in the event of a long-term economic downturn, the possibility exists that whatever I’ve stocked up on could be stolen. But I could also be mugged on my way home from work, carjacked while stopped at a red light or robbed at an ATM. So should I stop going to work, driving or using an ATM?
Or should I just wait for the government to take care of me and protect me in any and every situation?
Most Americans are well-aware of the federal and state governments’ stellar job in coordinating “relief” efforts after Hurricane Katrina. Quite to the contrary, it was an absolute disaster. Coordination among relief agencies and organizations was overlapping or nonexistent, food and other necessities were in short supply and those people who either couldn’t or wouldn’t leave the affected areas severely strained the available resources.
Oh yeah, then there’s another annoying little detail that seems to come up a lot these days: Congressional budget analysts are predicting nearly trillion-dollar deficits each year for at least the next decade. TRILLION. One thousand billion. In red ink. Every year.
And I’m thinking about trusting these bozos to take care of me when they not only can’t get stuff to the right places when the stuff needs to get there, but they’re spending themselves off a cliff at terminal velocity??
It’s like those ghastly videos around the Internet showing skydivers whose parachutes didn’t open. The fall didn’t kill them — hitting the earth at 180 miles per hour did. These people looked like the epitome of perfect health until the point of impact. But the impact ruined their day. Having a properly packed backup parachute would’ve been a good thing before it was too late.
Your food storage, water storage, precious metals and personal protection are your backup chute. YOUR food. YOUR water. YOUR PMs. YOUR personal protection.
Not the FEMA rations, trucks of potable water (if there are any) and absolutely no personal protection if you wait for the government to “take care of you.” And if you didn’t bother with the first three items, you probably didn’t buy any precious metals in the first place.
“He looks so natural!”
Depending on who the deceased is at a funeral, I’m either mildly amused or somewhat disturbed…sometimes both…to hear someone proclaim that the dearly departed “looks so natural.” We’ve seen pictures of the 50-year-old who looks 15 years younger because they’ve taken care of their body, exercised and done other things that promote good health. Then there’s the other 50-year-old who looks like he’s about 70 because he’s been chain-smoking for decades and lives on a steady diet of Mickey D’s. I wouldn’t trust the chain-smoking McConnoisseur to give me advice on how to live a healthy life. Yet too many of us implicitly trust that the government will take care of us if disaster happens. So we do nothing. And hope our parachute will open in time.
I don’t remember putting on a parachu…KERSPLAT!!
Which brings me back to my first point.
The worst-case scenario isn’t that you prepare for emergencies by stocking up on food, water, personal protection and everything else and then have people break in and steal everything — if you’re well-prepared, you’ll have your preps well-hidden and you’ll have protection to defend yourself, your family and your property. The WORST-CASE scenario is waiting on the government to help you.
So what if you prepare, only to have someone break in and steal everything?
But what if nobody breaks in? What if everything you’ve stocked up and stored for yourself and your family is well-protected and stays right where you put it?
Then you have the things you’ll need for your and your family’s well-being in the event of possibly long-term crises.
Do you have life insurance so your family will be provided for in case of your death? Do you have car insurance in case something happens to your vehicle? Do you have health insurance to help cover medical expenses in case of illness? If so, then what’s your excuse for not stocking up on food, water, personal protection and other vital necessities in the midst of economic turmoil, high unemployment, political uncertainty, natural disasters and other situations you can’t predict?
Your well-being is in your hands. Don’t wait for your terminally ill, bankrupt Uncle Sam to take care of it for you.
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