Originally published at Notes from the bunker…. You can comment here or there.

Here’s everything thats wrong with the economy in one simple Craigslist ad:

Upside down on the SUV. It sure is a nice truck.
I need a Ford F250 Crewcab with a long bed for my work.
I owe about 32,000, i bought it for 53,000 it sure is a nice truck.
I bought the 2006 in 2007, i have paid down 19,000 of the loan.
I am willing to keep it in my name and provide insurance on it.
For the right person, You pay all the payments and keep it or pay on it for a year or so and give it back.I will work it out nice and fair.
Truck is here in Delray.
Come by and see me and drive the truck home.

$53,000 for a truck seems a little…unsmart. A loan for $53k isnt a car loan, thats a mortgage. And yet someone a year ago thought “Yeah, I’ll pay fifty grand for a car” with no concern that perhaps this would be a bad idea. And now he doesnt even really want to get rid of it, he wants to loan it to you until he can get back on his feet…he’ll even pay the insurance. Which means he wants to continue “in a year or so” to pay on what will be then a four-year old truck that will still be worth even less than what is owed on it. I think I see why this guy is having a problem.

In the thread I was discussing all this in, I made a couple comments I wanna share. First, that its way too late to prevent this thing from getting worse. All we can do is prepare to make it through it as best we can. Its like that scene in Terminator 3: our destiny wasnt to prevent Judgement Day, our destiny was to survive Judgement Day.

Secondly, this may be the chlorine shock treatment that cleans up the economic hot tub that we’ve all been sitting around in. Or, to put it another way, this may be the asteroid strike that wipes out the financially irresponsible dinosaurs and paves the way for a more responsible and financially intelligent form of life. And as in both analogies, theres gonna be some carnage among the lifeforms until it gets straightened out. If you wanna make an omlette, you gotta break a few legs.

Whats this gotta do with being prepared? Do you really have to ask?

Edited to add: Further indication that things are interesting: US Mint suspends sale of 24-karat gold coins

Bet you didnt even know i had a filter, didja?
If youre reading this, then your on my filter either because you took part in one of the previous group buys or because I think its something you might have interest in.

Im toying with the idea of another Mountain House group buy. They are a termendous pain in the ass for me to do but I love you all so much that Im willing to go through the incredible hassle.

Oh…and…well…I like getting a discount ont he stuff so I can resupply.

Anyway, if youve done these before with me you already know how they go. This buy will be for cans AND pouches. That means much bigger selection. New additions this year include #10 cans of cottage cheese, strawberries, bananas and macaroni & cheese.

Minimum order this time around is $3000 so if I can get enough people willing to buy enough to add up to that amount, we can make it happen. If anyone is interested, email me at zero@commanderzero.com and I’ll email you the form letter with details.

Please keep this partiucular group purchase under your hat, hm? I really dont wanna read about it in a discussion forum somewhere. So, please…shhhhhh.

EDIT: How long does this stuff last? Ask this guy..he bought his in 1975.

Originally published at Notes from the bunker…. You can comment here or there.

You know what I really love about older houses and apartments? They have pantries. For the purpose of discussion, a pantry is a space designed for the storage of kitchen/food items. Most of the pantries I have seen are basically large closets lined with shelves. I have also seen some pantries that were as big as some peoples kitchens. Unfortunately my house doesn’t have a dedicated pantry. Oh sure theres the usual amount of cabinetry above the kitchen counters and stove but that’s not what a pantry is.

So where do I store food? I store the usual amount of food in the kitchen cabinets but it required some serious dedication to rearranging where I store pots and pans, blenders, etc. The short- and mid-term food storage, which is things like cases of pasta, canned goods, etc. Are stored in another part of the house on steel wire shelving. Its not my first choice for storage because since I like to cook, I want to keep my food near the kitchen. But, I don’t really have that option so I store food where I have to.

I store food for several reasons, the biggest is for the sake of saving money. Here’s an example…I was at Albertson’s yesterday and, as usual, I check the sales circular at the door. The canned chicken broth that I use a goodly amount of is on sale. Normally about $1.39 but for a few days it’s $0.50. That’s a savings of…uhm…about 64%. Put another way, what normally would have cost $33.36/case winds up costing me $12. So what? Well, that means that any meal I prepare with those components now costs less. Or, to put it in another light, I can eat twice as long for the same money. Because I found space to store food, I can take advantage of these situations and buy food by the case, by the drum, by the bucket. When I cook, almost every ingredient is something that was bought in bulk or on sale and I’d be very surprised if any meal I cook for the girlfriend and I costs more than a five bucks. Of course, one of the best things about this is that when I buy stuff on sale like this is that I buy enough to lay back in storage for those times when food or cash isn’t available for whatever reason.

Thus, the second reason I store food – security. I’ve had times where I didn’t have enough money for food and I pretty much ate one meal a day and often skipped eating completely. When I started getting my act together I started being real particular about food. It wasn’t a conscious decision..I just started refusing to throw out leftovers and I never turned down a free meal. Being hungry and despairing over an empty refrigerator makes an impression, believe me. In fact, whenever someone invites me to lunch or offers me a slice of pizza I usually accept and tell them “Never turn down free food.” If you cant feed yourself, or worse, cant feed your family, you’re in a pretty vulnerable situation. You’ll do things you’ll regret (like sell your beloved grandfathers pocket watch so you won’t have to watch your kids eat ketchup soup) and you’ll be more likely to hurry into a bad work situation just to get food on the table.

Theres a third reason to store food, although it’s not a reason for me since the first two are all the reason I need. However, it is a nice bonus – convenience. Years ago I made the mistake of trying to go out and buy the ingredients for a nice Christmas dinner on, well, Christmas. Good luck. Only thing open was the local Stop-n-Rob and they don’t exactly have a huge grocery selection. Nowadays if we don’t have the time (or inclination) to run out for groceries it usually doesn’t matter since we have plenty of food we like to eat on hand at home. That means I can shop when I want and if I don’t see anything on sale I can simply just not buy stuff and wait for a sale.

So can you think of any reason not to build up a decent supply of food?

Too expensive? No, it isn’t. Buy it on sale, buy the store brand, buy in bulk.
No storage space? You can find or make storage space if its really important to you. Boxes under the bed, on the top shelf of the closets, a large bookshelf in the living room. You always have space for at least a few weeks worth of food.
I can’t cook. Learn to cook. If you can boil water, know how to turn your oven on, and can read then you can cook.
I don’t think theres a need for it. Then you’re being, in my opinion, short-sighted and need to be more aware of the fragility of you and everyone elses lifestyle. Seriously,man…it can change like that.

There is one other, distant, philosophical reason for food storage and its sort of an existentialist touchy-feely reason – Personal growth (or perhaps politics). When you start taking the steps to take care of yourself and to prepare yourself against life’s uncertainties you start becoming what we euphemistically call ‘a rugged individualist’. You start thinking less about others taking care of you and more about taking care of yourself. You start developing confidence in your own abilities and a desire to develop those abilities further. You start questioning where individual responsibilities and society’s responsibilities lay. You basically start ‘unsheeping’ and become, in my opinion, a more thoughtful and careful and prudent person.

The drawback, naturally, is that then you’ll never be able to watch the news again without yelling at the television set.

Originally published at Notes from the bunker…. You can comment here or there.

Went to the LDS cannery the other day and it was a notable trip for the simple reason that nobody else showed up. Yeah..nobody else. It was just me, the guy I went with, and the older couple that run the place. To my way of thinking it seemed a little bit much to go through all the effort and cleanup for just two guys so instead I hung around and shot the breeze with the couple that run the place. We talked HAM radios and that sort of thing for an hour or so. Just so the trip wasnt a total waste, I got some already-sealed #10 cans of product off the shelves to bring home. Their shelves are much fuller than the last couple times I was there. In addition, they got a new portable can sealer for their ‘loaner’ program so if theres some goodies you wanna can that they dont do at the cannery you can take this thing home, along with the necessary cans and lids, and do it yourself. A more devious and twisted indivisual might stick a pistol and some ammo in a #10 can and then carefully remove the label from a #10 can of chili or somesuch and use it to make the other can look far more innocent and uninteresting thatn it actually is. As you can see, theres potential there.

The cannery has a decent selection of staples for dry-pack canning (meaning you are canning dry goods like rice, grain, etc). However, there may be stuff I want to can that they do’t offer…in which case checking out the portable unit would be nice.

=-=-=-=-=-==

I have very little to say about the economy simply because if you are reading this then youve been paying far more attention to the situation than the average American. All Im gonna say is that unless youre a zillion percent confident that youre not gonna get laid off anytime soon I’d start socking away the cash and goodies you’ll need to get you through a bout of unemployment. Me? Im trying like hell to keep expenses down and supplies up.
I was reading somewhere about how October 7th is some sort of critical day where a huge event of great significance will take place. *Yawn* I followed the threads on the forum I saw the initial post at and tracked it back to this. Ever hear of Godwins Law? It says that “As a Usenet discussion grows longer, the probability of a comparison involving Nazis or Hitler approaches one.” Meaning that sooner later in a discussion about, say, politics someone will bring up a comparison to the Nazis or Hitler at some point…at which point the discussion is over. I propose theres a similar maxim somewhere on the preparedness forums..”As a forum discussion about possible EOTWAWKI events progresses the probability of Art Bell/C-to-C AM being cited as an autoritative source approaches one”..at which point rational discourse logs off and the Tinfoil Beanie Brigade are all that remain.

I love a good conspiracy theory as much as the next nutjob, but conspiracy theories are delicate things. Theres gotta be enough that can be proved, mixed within a proper ratio of what cant proved. Take Area 51/Roswell incident vs. alien abductions. We think something is going at at Area 51 since its got all the elements – .gov involvement, heavy security, mystery, etc. So we can look upon the conpiracy theories it generates as unlikely but maybe not impossible. Then we skip over to the alien abduction guys…not much eveidence except someone saying “there was this bright light and when I woke up I was naked and being probed”. Thats not a conspiracy, thats a date rape.

So…is October 7th anything that will be cataclysmic in its importance? I doubt it. Probably a hell of a lot less than November 4th will be.

=-=-=-=-=

Gas prices continue to decline a bit. About $3.50/gallon locally. I need to sock away more fuel and I’d like to think gas will drop to $3 before coming to a rest around $3.25. Goal is enough fuel for two complete tanks of gas for the vehicle. Thats enough to give us local mobility for a month or so and enough range to leave here and get some distance if we want.

Originally published at Notes from the bunker…. You can comment here or there.

The new Sportsmans Guide HQ milsurp catalog showed up today. A few highlights:

HK Flare pistols, 26.5mm – $39.97

26.5mm flares – $79.97/10

Flectar parka w/ liner – $29.97

Trioxane fuel bars – $39.97/100

A few other interesting items in there, but you can head over to their website and see what they have. I highly recommend the German flectar parks and liners. They used to be twenty bucks for the pair but even with the price increase they are worth it. They are warm, comfortable and superior to the US field jacket/liner combo. I’ve had several of them for years and I am very reluctant to wear anything else in the cold. (Reluctantly, I wear a Carhart coat for those winter situations where wearing milsurp is frowned upon.)
=-=-=-=-=
Was in the Goodwill store the other day nosing around and found a copy of WarDay. (Strieber & Kunetka, 1984, #0-03-070731-5) I read this book many, many years ago (probably over twenty years ago) and it made an impression on me. Succinctly, the book takes place a few years after a US-Soviet limited nuclear war. NYC, DC, and such places are obliterated, California is a fenced off paradise, the Mexicans have made good on their Reconquista plans, reconstruction is under way with the help of foreign aid, and salvagers make a living recovering materials from whats left of NYC. The book is about two writers who decide to travel across the recovering US to see how things are going. The most chilling part is the first chapter where one of the main characters describes his experiences in NYC when the bombs fell. He takes refuge in his childs Catholic school and church with other survivors as the city crumbles around them. Having grown up in NY it was very realistic to me. After two weeks of living on water and crackers, hoping to avoid the worst of the radiation, he emerges and the story begins.

I believe the risk of the classic nuclear exchange (between the US and an aggressor, anyway) is lower right now than it has ever been since Oppenheimer built the damn thing. However, I think the risk of nuclear attack is highest. (That is to say, I see the classic ‘suitcase nuke/dirty bomb’ scenario being far more likely than the Cold Ware-era ICBM strike.) Although the book deals with the after effects of a nuclear exchange, what makes the book interesting to me is its detail about how the infrastructure of America has changed as a result of the ‘War Day’. Air travel is reserved for .gov and the highly connected. Gasoline is still rationed and many families share cars. Food is imported since the grain belts are full of radiation. California is a walled off paradise that escaped destruction and American ‘illegals’ try desperately to get in. British and Japanese relief missions help out tremendously while advancing their own agendas for the new Third World United States. Health care is rationed based on the dosage of radiation a person received. Government control of most industry and services is the norm, and expected to continue for years and years. The average family survives on rationed electricity, rationed food and hope. Like “World War Z” this book is mostly first person interviews with various survivors, opportunists, foreigners, etc. that the writers come across on their travels. As such, it puts in some horrific and tragic personal stories. Powerful stuff.

As I said, I read it as a kid and while its no “Alas Babylon” I think its good reading for getting an idea of how infrastructure changes as a result of large-scale disaster. The sections where people recount their experiences at overwhelmed hospitals and the experiences of radiation poison were enough to push my impressionable young mind in this direction years and years ago. Re-reading those sections, actually, makes me want to head to the bunker and double-check supplies.

“Alas Babylon” was written by a vocal Civil Defense supporter and, unlike many stories of that time, showed nuclear war as a survivable event. “War Day” shows it as a survivable event, but at a terrible cost and makes the subtle message that war is to be avoided at all costs. The message is not dissimilar to the gloomy “The Day After” movie or the incredibly depressing movie “Threads”. Arguably, there is no way to ‘spin’ coughing up blood and having your intestines leave your body with every bowel movement. While Im certainly no advocate of jumping to war I see these stories as compelling reasons to advocate strong civil defense programs, not as cautionary tales urging us to sit down at bargaining tables and give away the store to avoid getting nuked.

However, as I said, the likelihood of the storied ICBM exchange we grew up fearing actually coming to pass is, for now, far less likely than many other horrible scenarios. So my interest in re-reading “War Day”, other than nostalgia, is to read it with a more critical eye now that I have a different way of thinking about preparedness than I did at the impressionable and highly immature age of 19.

If you can track down a copy of this book, I recommend it. Its intresting and a very good companion to “World War Z” in terms of telling the stories of individuals in (albeit fictitious) times of total apocalypse.

Originally published at Notes from the bunker…. You can comment here or there.

This arrived in email today:

#10 CANS ARE BACK

To place an order click here or go to

www.mountainhouse.com

“FREE”
Mountain Oven Flameless Heating Kit
with any $25.00 order

“Thank you for your support and patience during these last several months. We really appreciate your business!”

Sincerely,

OREGON FREEZE DRY INC.
CUSTOMER SERVICE DEPARTMENT
1-800-547-0244

Thats the good news. The bad news is that MH has apparently decided that you can order pouches of product all day long but they are going to guard their #10-packaged product like it was gold. Dealer requirements, minimum pricing and , of course, a new pricing schedule.

Heres part of the dealer pricing program info:

I am pleased to let you know that we can start taking #10 can orders
from you again. You do not need to re-apply based on our phone
conversation. However, I have two things I need to let you know about:

Pricing – We did have a price increase on our cans. We will need you
to update all of your pricing based on the attached price list.

Discounting – We no longer allow any discounting on our #10 cans,
except for short sales as explained in the policy. I have attached the
policy in regards to our can pricing. We will need this policy letter
signed and sent back to us prior to your first order. In addition, as
stated in our new policy, we will allow short sales 3x a year on our cans.
However, we must have a sale event form sent to us prior to the sale.
I have attached that form as well.

Please note that we are strongly enforcing this policy and those not
following the new policy, their account will be suspended immediately.

Thank you so much for your patience during these last 3 months. I know
it has been hard to adjust and we are continuing to do everything we
can to stay ahead of cans.

What are those policies? Lets look:

Effective September 1, 2008

Oregon Freeze Dry requires retailers selling Mountain House products to maintain a high level of service quality, product knowledge and professionalism.

Oregon Freeze Dry has determined that resale of Mountain House products below the Suggested Retail Price has a negative impact on its goal of maintaining retailer service, quality, product knowledge and professionalism, reduces consumer satisfaction with Mountain House products and damages the image of Mountain House. Accordingly, it is the policy of Oregon Freeze Dry that Mountain House products be marketed and sold for no less than the Suggested Retail Price, except for short periodic sales and promotions, as described below.

Failure of any dealer to comply with this Minimum Retail Price Program will result in cancellation of existing orders without prior notice and/or termination or suspension of the dealer relationship.

Please be additionally advised:
Ø Mountain House staff monitors the worldwide web regularly and enforces this agreement strictly.
Ø Mountain House publishes the Suggested Minimum Retail Price and it is available on the Mountain House printed price list.
Ø This policy does not apply to product or special packs, which have been discontinued or sold as excess or over runs.

Periodic Sales and Promotion Guidelines:
Ø Maximum of 3 sales per year allowed
Ø A discount is not to exceed 25% off SRP
Ø A sale can not exceed 14 days in length
Ø An official “Sale Event Notice Form” must be filled out and submitted to Mountain House prior to any sale event

ACKNOWLEDGMENT OF RECEIPT

By signing below, you acknowledge your receipt of the Oregon Freeze Dry Minimum Retail Price Program Policy:
Account Name:
Account Signature:
Date:

Amazing, isn’t it? Im a firm believer in free enterprise so, to me, once you buy a product from your vendor you should be free to re-sell that product however you want. On the other hand, these guys are, generally, the only game in town so playing ball by their rules is kind of necessary.

I’m on the fence about whether Im going to go through all this effort and headache to put together another group purchase. Last year I needed at least $2000 to get the free shipping, so we’ll see if theyre at least still offering that. They have added some new products but I dont really need more freezedrieds although Id like to have some more to round out the current stockpile. Guess I’ll just see how things go and see if any of the local LMI have any interest. Local LMI, and you know who you are, can check with me at your convenience.

Originally published at Notes from the bunker…. You can comment here or there.

I received a comment to an earlier post and it had some math in it, calculating that 5,000 rounds of .308 ammo would cost about $2500~. (The 5000 rounds was based on the persons idea of what was a good amount to keep on hand…your mileage may vary on that one.)

$2500 is a lot of money to come up with at once. Some of use won’t have too much trouble doing it (that would be the evil ‘yuppie’ survivalists..you know, the people that actually got real jobs), some of us will have to do it over time (raises hand in the air…hello), and some will laugh hysterically and sneer that we’re fools since that $2500 would buy us the entire Bulgarian military’s supply of 7.62×54R for the $70 Mosin Nagants.

As usual, theres a middle ground.

How much ammo do I have? Honestly, I have no idea. I have an idea of how much there is at minimum. I know that right now theres at least 18k of ammo in the bunker, not including .22 ammo. Theres actually more than that but once it gets past the ‘minimum amount I like to have on hand’ I don’t worry about it.

Isnt that expensive, you ask? Sure it is….if I bought it all at once. Lets use the 7.62×39 as an example. Back in the good ol’ days that stuff was about $75 a case. So I picked up a case here and there. Six months go by and the price has jumped to $95 a case. I bitch and whine about it and buy another case or two. A year goes by and now its $125 a case. I’m annoyed,  but I buy another case. This goes on for another year or two until finally I’ve got at least 5k of the stuff on hand. Nowadays the stuff is around $225-250 a case. I stopped buying it when it went north of $175.

Do I wish I had just plunked down a grand and bought 10k rounds when it was less than $100 a case? Of course! But I can count the times Ive had $1000 in disposable cash on one hand.

Simply put, for me the best way to buy things that are needed in large quantity is to buy it over time. A case of .223 every year, 2 bricks of .22 every other month, etc, etc. If theres some sort of cash windfall that dumps a lot of money in my pocket (like the gift card I got last month) then I’ll do a big purchase but normally it’s a nickel-n-dime acquisition process. Isnt it cheaper to buy it all at once and get the big bulk discount? Absolutely…if you have the cash. Im lucky if I can divert $100 a month into being prepared. While I may save money if I bought a pallet load of ammo at once, the fact is that if I don’t have the money it wont matter how cheap it is…the money simply isn’t there.

There have, however, been exceptions. The biggest exception has been the group purchase. A few years ago I wanted some Mountain House #10 cans. They aint cheap and although not heavy, they are bulky so shipping was pretty spendy too. The solution was that MH would give free shipping on a $2000 order. So I rounded up a bunch of folks on the internet, collected the money from everyone and made the big purchase. When the palletload of MH showed up I boxed up folks’ orders and sent ‘em out. Everyone, including myself, got a smoking hot deal on the freezedrieds and saved huge amounts of money.

If you can get a few like minded individuals together who have the same needs as yourself you can take advantage of those huge wholesaler-size discounts. Get your buddies together and ask who can kick in $100 (or whatever) towards something all of you need (like spare magazines, ammo, lithium batteries, body armour plates, knives, etc, etc.) If you’re really disciplined, and really on the same page…you and your buddies could ‘collect’ from each other every month towards a common goal. Maybe everyone chips in $50 a month and at the end of the year you go into a big purchase on a bulk package of ammo, surplus rifles or the like. Tricky business though…us preparedness types tend to be very individualistic and getting us all to agree and act on a plan of action can fit the definition of cat herding.

Every so often someone posts about whether they should go into debt to finance their preparedness. Its an attractive proposition…you max out the American Express card on survival gear and then when you need the survival gear Wall Street no longer exists so you wont have to pay it back. Problem is, TEOTWAWKI isn’t something as predictable as Haileys Comet. There’s some ethical considerations, which I don’t particularly get worked up over but some do. I would say that theres no reason to get into debt for being prepared when you can do what you need to do over time. However, if some absolutely unbelievable deal came down the pike (cases of Wolf 7.62×39 for $50 a case, Mountain House at $5 a can, new Honda generators for $169.95 ea.) then it might not be unreasonable. But, generally speaking, I don’t think you need to go into debt for any of this stuff.

Originally published at Notes from the bunker…. You can comment here or there.

I have, so far, missed not one but two classes on canning that have taken place here in town. The first was a three day course on food preservation, including canning, that was held by the county extension agency. The other was an evening class that was free, but full up, at the local HippieMart. I’m not full of myself enough to believe that I know everything so I would be interested in taking these classes and seeing what I actually do and do not know. However, I was unaware of the three-day class until after the fact and the one at HippieMart apparently filled up early. Maybe next time.
=-=-=-=-=
I see that hurricane Gustav was basically a non-event. In fact, I was reading that authorities are concerned that it will make people less willing to follow a mandatory evacuation next time. I suppose that makes sense. However, I still find it fascinating that some people simply Will. Not. Learn. I would imagine that being forced to shelter at the SuperDome during Katrina would make anyone serious about either getting the hell out of New Orleans or be very prepared for the inevitable hurricane that will come along next time.

However, if theres one thing that comes close to being an absolute truism in this topic, it is that some people are sheep (the sheeple) and will blithely go about their lives doing nothing to increase the odds in their favor. They’re going to make careers out of being victims and I feel only the smallest amount of pity for them. Man jumps out of a plane without a parachute you have to expect he knew what he was getting into and when he hits the ground we’ll wonder why he did such a foolish thing. Same theory. You live in a city that is below sea level, regularly floods, is subject to very predictable and very powerful hurricanes, has already had one epic (and likely repeatable) disaster and you don’t prepare to take care of yourself? That’s like leaving your parachute back at the hangar. You’re poor and on welfare and cant afford a parachute? Then don’t get in the plane. Move out of New Orleans and continue your welfare existence someplace less likely to flood…the food stamps will follow you, so move to Iowa.
=-=-=-=-=-=
The Farmers Almanac predicts that this will be a very cold winter. Predicting the weather in Montana more than a few days ahead of time is literally the same odds as flipping a coin. “Might rain, might not”. Predicting weather a year in advance ranks right up there with horoscopes and a trip to Lourdes in terms of scientific accuracy. However, better safe then sorry, yes?

I picked up an extra kerosene heater last year and still have about 60 gallons of the stuff in storage so If for whatever reasons we wind up with some sort of problem that precludes use of the normal heating system I think we’ll be okay. Same for cooking and lighting. It’ll be rustic but it’ll beat the heck out of sitting in the cold, dark eating cold Spaghetti-O’s outta the can.

Additionally, theres plenty of extra sleeping bags and blankets in storage in the bunker. Military surplus blankets, if you air them out to get rid of the naptha mothball smell, are excellent values and I recommend them highly. Get a couple ‘blanket’ safety pins and you can fashion a very decent bedroll for yourself.

Historically, in the twenty some-odd years Ive been here in MT I have never seen an outage that affected us for more than eight hours. Sure, other parts of the state that are more rural may be down for days while crews replace lines, but here in town its never been anything near that. No reason not to be prepared though.
=-=-=-=-=
Speaking of cooler weather, its getting close to time to put the cold weather gear back in the truck. You do keep some emergency cold weather gear in your rig during the winter, don’t you? Don’t you?

Fella up in the Big Hole valley got stranded in his truck for about a week. This was about two years ago, I think. Rescuers eventually found him and his dog and although a little hungry they were doing fine, thank you. Why? The fella had some emergency gear in his truck. So he stayed with the vehicle and waited for someone to find him. Happy ending. Contrast that with the stories of families that take wrong turns and wind up on closed seasonal roads and die of exposure after trying to hike out. (And in one case tried to sue the the highway folks for not posting signs that would have warned them to stay off closed roads. Go figure. Another case of blaming everyone else for your own failures.)

By the way, in almost every case of a motorist getting stranded the vehicle is almost always found before the poor slob’s body. So if you get stuck stay with the vehicle. Stay with the vehicle. Stay with the vehicle. And its a lot easier to stay with your vehicle if you have the gear you need.

When the girlfriend was driving back and forth to Helena every weekend during the winter I was, naturally, concerned she’d wind up in a ditch. So, I packed up a Rubbermaid container with MRE’s, water, flashlight, batteries, radio, spare ammo, candle lantern, candles, matches, warm clothes, and that sort of thing for her. Duct taped the whole mess shut so it wouldn’t pop open, and paired it with a military extreme cold weather sleeping bag as well. Took up very little space but gave tremendous peace of mind.

I’m not going to go into the whole ‘winter survival’ spiel. You can Google “winter survival car stuck” and get all the info you will ever need. However, you gotta actually put the crap in the back of the car for it to make any difference. Don’t just think about it, think about it and do it.

Originally published at Notes from the bunker…. You can comment here or there.

Run around the blogs often enough and you get to see the ‘survival guns on a budget’ posts that pop up from time to time. Usually the theme is that you don’t have to spend ‘leventybillion dollars on a ‘yuppie black rifle’ because for only $5.95 you can have a Mosin-Nagant rifle, a single shot 12 ga., and a TokaMakaBersarov pistol. And if you buy it used you’ll only pay $4.95 and have money left over for plenty of surplus ammo.

So…its 4am, the floodwaters are steadily rising, the radio says Katrina is the worst disaster in US history and you’re sitting on your porch keeping an eye open. Down the street you hear a car full of raucous ‘young men’ go by and the sounds of breaking glass and a dog barking. Yelling and shouting follow and then a gunshot or two. After about twenty minutes a car creeps down the street and four sets of eyes hungrily look at your house as they slowly cruise by.

Good time to have saved a few bucks, huh?

Dealer cost on a quality (not assembled on someones kitchen table) Ar-15 is $850. This means that a used one should be about the same price. Used Mossberg 500 shotguns can be had for $150 at a lot of pawn shops and gun shows. A used police trade-in Glock is $400. A trade-in police revolver is half that.

I can appreciate saving money, I’m pretty tight with a buck. But theres also some things that I grit my teeth and shell out the money for because sometimes you just can’t get away with Bob’s Budget Battle Rifles or Steve’s House of Discount Ballistic Nylon. Even the gets-no-respect $175 SKS is, in my opinion, a far better choice than a bolt-action shoulder-beater like the Mosin Nagant. “But my Mosin can shoot through a car from four miles away!”, says the diehard M-N fan. Terrific. And when you find three guys walking up your driveway with baseball bats and hammers you’re going to…get them to line up in a straight line? Bayonet them to death before they crack your skull like a walnut? Maybe you’ll get off a round from your bargain 12 ga. $89.95 H&R singleshot…that’s one down and two to…ouch, hey stop that! Maybe you can save the day with your Norinco TT-33 pistol assuming it works and doesn’t jam on every third round.

Some very simple math. Current federal minimum wage is about $6.55 an hour. This means there is no job you can legally have that will give you less than that. (Or, as one comedian opined, “Minimum wage is your bosses way of saying ‘Id pay you less if I could, but its against the law!”) Assume you lose 15% in taxes, your $6.65 is now about $5.60. Barely a combo meal at Wendy’s, but you’re not supposed to be supporting a family of four on it anyway. You would need about 160 hours to buy a basic quality AR-15. Wanna knock off from work early? Get an SKS for 35 hours. My point is that ‘I cant afford it’ isn’t a very good excuse for equipping yourself with less-than-ideal gear. If you can hurl a newspaper at a doorstep, wash dishes or stock shelves you can, in less than two months, have yourself a good semi-auto rifle, pistol and pump gun.

Is there a place in preparedness for ‘Deep Discount’ guns? Absolutely. They’re good for unexpected guests, as ‘last ditch’ guns far down the list of backups, probably a great choice for turning over to ‘the authorities’ so they don’t look too deep and find your FAL, and they are excellent ‘disposable’ guns for those places that are prone to break-ins and theft (vehicles, remote cabins, etc, etc). But if you had the choice, would they be your first pick if someone told you that tomorrow you’re going to have a home invasion?

If someone were to ask me what to buy, I’d tell them to get an AR or AK, a Rem 870 and a Glock in .40 or 9mm. Get the spare mags and accessories and you’d be better off than 95% of the population when the lights go off and the 911 operator says “you’re on your own”. To me, thats a reasonable setup on the average person’s budget. It represents about $1500. If you’re just not willing to spend the money then get an SKS, a Mossberg 500 and a quality .38/.357 double-action revolver (Ruger, Smith, Taurus, Colt)…thats about 1/3 the price of the previous package, but still a very good little bundle of firepower.

If you can’t afford better, than there is nothing wrong with getting yourself a Mosin Nagant, some cheapo break-open singleshot 12 ga. And a Makarov. But…if you can afford better but refuse to spend the money, then I think you may want to objectively revisit your rationale for those purchases.

A valid question here is “Why three guns? Wouldn’t I be served just fine with only a [pistol/carbine/shotgun]?” That is, I think, a valid question. My reasoning, and your mileage may vary, is that a pistol is great for when I have to be discreetly armed (like when the cops knock on the door, heading down to the Red Cross emergency communications center, when Im standing at the curb chatting with neighbors, etc) but it’s a poor choice for the 4am banging-on-the-door goofed-up gangbangers looking for fast and easy money. The AR or AK is a wonderful choice for that scenario. The shotgun..well, nothing says violent brutality and tell-the-ambulance-guys-they-wont-need-the-siren like a stubby 12 ga. It’s a good option for when the multiple attacker scenario moves in close. So..that’s why three guns – because one gun isn’t the best choice for every situation…I wish it was, it’d save me a lot of money. But the facts don’t bear it out.

Can you spend more? Sure. If you live in a world of ‘money is no object’ or your personal goals and ambitions put you above living in a van down by the river then by all means get yourself a DSA FAL, a Wilson/Scattergun Technologies shotgun and a couple of Glocks. More power to ya.

The bumper sticker saying is “First rule of a gunfight is: have a gun”. And certainly any gun is better than no gun when you have an unplanned violent encounter. However, I think preparing for such eventualities with an eye towards doing it as cheaply as possible seems like shopping for discount parachutes or ‘slightly irregular’ replacement heart valves. You don’t have to spend gobs of money, but you do have to spend some. Suck it up, spend the money, and be done with it so you can move on to other things like food, fuel, shelter, and the like.

Originally published at Notes from the bunker…. You can comment here or there.

I see that municipal failure and not-so-subtle racist Mayor Nagin of New Orleans has a mandatory evacuation order up. This means that citizens are urged to evacuate, highways are opened in one direction for evacuation, buses are brought in and 40% of the police department suddenly packs its bags and disappears.

It’ll be interesting to see how this goes. After Katrina you can bloody well believe there were some folks down there who got religion real fast in regards to being prepared. I look forward to the news stories that start of with “Although not everyone was left in the dark. Some residents were prepared like New Orleans resident ….”. Naturally therell be the same idiots sitting around saying “We ain’t go no money to go nowhere” and there’ll be the hue and cry that the poor and black were ‘left behind’ and ‘fell through the cracks’. We’ll see. If you go through Katrina, survive, and then do the same stupid things at the next big hurricane you probably are just too slow a learner to live

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So…made a couple gallons of the missus’ favorite soup.

And while she likes it very much, theres no way she can consume all of it before it starts to get funky. Even throwing it in the fridge will only gain it a few days. Now, I could freeze it but I lose a bit of convenience by having to wait for it to thaw. Plus, I dont want to squander all my freezer space. If only there were some way to preserve food safely so it can be stored in a room temperature environment. If only..if only…wait! What have we here….

This would be an excellent time to try my new uber pressure canner. And, fortuitously, I just happen to have a couple dozen pint jars and lids. Good planning, that. Since these jars were purchased at WalMart and therefore could have been handled by any trailer-park mutant its a good idea to clean and sterilize the bloody things. Everybody into the pool for a nice relaxing bath in some boiling water.

Once they been cleaned and sterilized, they are set aside for use along with the usual tools of the trade – a jar lifter for lifting hellaciously hot jars without burning myself, a funnel to fill the jars while keeping the outsides and rims sanitary, and a magnetic wand to lift the lids out of the hot water they are waiting in.

Okay, soup is at a boil so we turn it down, jars are cleaned and ready, lids are patiently waiting…time to fill ‘em up and close em up.

In this case I filled fifteen jars and had enough soup left over for immediate usage over the next few days. First layer of jars is stacked in the canner. Make sure that canner is positioned where you want it ’cause once its full it aint going anywhere. This new canner has plenty of room for two layers and thats what I did.

After that it gets sealed up, looking kinda like something form the Manhattan Project, and I patiently wait for the pressure to get up to the desired 12# for 75 minutes. (In actuality the pressure fluctuated between 12#-#13 but as long as it never went below 12# and it was the full 75 minutes, we’re cool.

And the finished products. The stuff comes out of the canner so hot (since the pressure allows contents to become hotter than boiling) that the contents of the jar will continue to boil for about twnety minutes even after being removed. We have hard water here so theres some mineral residue on the jars from the process but it wipes off with a towel. At this point I am not touching these jars if I can help it…they are extremely hot. Thats why the jar lifter..its like lifting fuel rods in a reactor. After a while the contents cool enough to form a vacuum that seals the jar and pulls the lids into a seal, causing little metallic ‘ping’s to be heard. After that each jar is very carefully examined. The lids should all be concave from the vacuum. All fifteen looked good.

They’ll get stored in the classic ‘dark, cool, dry place’ for optimum storage but in reality she’ll go though these in a month or two.

As for the canning process itself, yes its that easy. If a complete klutz like me can do it, you can do it.

Recommended reading:

Ball Complete Book Of Home Preserving, Robert Rose Press #9780778801313 or #0778801314
Canning and Preserving For Dummies, For Dummies #0764524712 or #9780764524714

A bit of notekeeping for my own references – 1 doz. Kerr pints with lids was $7.00 at Walmart