Stuff that you really don’t wanna DIY in the apocalypse

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There’s a scene in the novel “The Postman” where the main character mentions that there is a ranching community that rallies around it’s doctor and protects him at all costs. Since it’s the end of the world, that makes perfect sense. (and, yes, I’m aware of “Where there is no dentist”)

Having just spent the last three hours in a dental chair so I can eat food again, I hereby add ‘dentists’ to that list of People I Will Look Out For In The Apocalypse.

Hot dental hygienists are 50/50 depending on how we’re doing on food.

I hate going o the dentist, but it’s a necessary suffering. Some people seem to enjoy it though….

Fenix E11/E12

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A number of years ago I was in REI and, as I was waiting in line for the checkout, there was a bin of closeout merchandise. On a whim I picked up a small LED flashlight and have been mightily impressed with it ever since.

The flashlight, a Fenix E11, has been supplanted by the newer E12 model which features a tap switch on the tailcap to adjust brightness levels. In pretty much all other regards, its the same as the E11.

When I got started in survivalism, the go-to flashlight was the MagLite. Big, beefy, and built for cracking skulls it was pretty much everyone’s first choice. Time goes by and with the development of LED technology we now have pocket flashlights that put out more light using AA batteries than the old-style MagLites ever did with D batteries.

When you really go all in and decide to get some top of the line photon blasters you often wind up at SureFire (or, to a lesser degree, Streamlight). SureFire is great stuff and I have a bunch of their weaponlights….but they are spendy. On the other hand, if you want to go all ‘poverty prepper’ and grab a fistful of $1 LED flashlights from a plastic fishbowl in the checkout line at WalMart….well, thats great for looking for the keys you dropped behind your desk but durability might be an issue.

SO…middle of the road – durable and efficient enough to withstand use and abuse, cheap enough that if you lose it you’re not heartbroken, but not so cheap that when you need it there’s a 50/50 shot it won’t work. As I discovered, this little light fits the bill perfectly.

How much do I like and recommend? Well, putting my money where my mouth is:

I keep several of these things because theyre so dang handy. Let’s hit the high points:

Battery compatibility – my battery logistics call for only three batteries: AA, D, and CR123. This light takes one AA battery, making it compact and efficient. I’ve taken to using rechargeable Eneloops for devices I foresee changing batteries in regularly. I do this for economics…I’ll use the rechargeables and save the stored lithium AA’s for when it really counts. Battery life seems pretty good. I change the battery out every month just to keep things at maximum efficiency.

Output – Advertised is about 115 lumens. For indoor use I find it to be amazingly bright. Outdoors its pretty good for the immediate area but it’s not a long-distance light…thats where the LED 3D MagLite comes in handy. The older E11 has two brightness settings, toggled by twisting the head of the light. The lower setting is perfect for close-in work like reading notes, ro doing work with your hands as you hold the light in your mouth. The E12 uses a tap switch on the tailcap to go through a couple different brightness settings.

Size – Perfect size for keeping in your pants pocket. I carry one around as my ‘everyday carry’ pocket junk and do not find it to be the least bit obtrusive. (But I do find it amazingly handy.)

Survivability – It’s gone through the washing machine, been dropped on concrete, sat on, rolled off tables, and has not flickered once. Theres a small attachment point for a lanyard and I highly recommend using a lanyard to keep the light attached to your gear in such a way as to allow you to find it in a hurry. I  keep one in my pack with the lanyard attached to a little plastic carabiner so I can find it in total darkness.

If I had the money, I’d have a pocketful of SureFire but, in practice, I really haven’t felt ‘undergunned’ with this thing as far as pocket lights go. I would definitely take it over the AA MiniMag light or some discount bin special. For the particular niche that I bought these for (compact, pocket-size, affordable, personal light that I can carry everyday) they are darn near perfect. Highly recommended.

Ruger PC9…the original

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Where there’s a will (and poor impulse control) there’s a way.

I’ve been wanting an original Ruger PC9 for several years now. They discontinued them a few years back and the prices skyrocketed. It was getting to the point that all the ones I found on GunBroker were traveling at an altitude of about $800-1000. This is simply stupid money for a carbine that virtually no one bought when it first came out, is simple blowback, and takes a proprietary magazine for a gun that is most commonly found in gun buyback bins and evidence lockers.

But..I wanted one.

I figured that with the reintroduction of the greatly evolved version of the PC9 the prices for the original ones might go down. It appears they have. This particular carbine, with one soon-to-be-thrown-away USA Brand magazine, was $500. Now, for $75 less I could have bought a brand new Ruger PC9 takedown that takes Glock magazines. So..why this original one? Well, mostly because I’ve a dozen P-series 9mm’s tucked away in the safe and I want a carbine to go with them. I think that two pistols, the carbine, half a case of ammo, a dozen magazines, a couple holsters, a cleaning kit, and some other support gear will fit nicely in a Pelican case to tuck away somewhere for that (very) rainy day.

I still very much plan on getting the new PC9 takedown carbines, especially since they use Glock mags and would therefore make an excellent companion to my Glock pistols. But getting the original carbine was on my list and the opportunity finally came together.

It is interesting to note that despite the small size of the carbine, it is deceptively heavy. Not surprising since it is, basically, just a modern version of the Winchester Model 1907….with a rather large counterweight housed in the forend of the gun. In fact, looking at exploded diagrams between the two, it’s hard not to think someone at Ruger might have played with the 1907 and thought “Time for a reboot”.

By the way, for you youngun’s out there, Marlin also had their hat in the ring with a pistol-mag-compatible carbine…the Camp 9 and Camp 45. The former took S&W mags and the latter took 1911 mags. One guess which model commands big bucks today. They were great guns, with Old-Marlin quality, but had a slight design flaw where, once the plastic buffer at the back of the stock ate itself from use, the reciprocation of the bolt beat the stock to pieces. (Aftermarket buffers are available.) After replacing a ton of stocks under warranty, and with the Assault Weapons ban coming in, Marlin dropped both guns. The 9mm turn up far more frequently than the .45 ACP….people hold onto those things with both hands.

As long as we’re flogging this particular deceased equine, I’ll also point that in the last twenty years we’ve had a handful of other pistol-caliber carbines that took popular(ish) handgun mags…incudingbut not limited to: KelTec, JR Carbine, HiPoint, Spanish ‘Destroyer’, Beretta, a handful of AR-ish 9mms that took Glock mags, and a host of pistol-to-carbine conversions.

But…while some of those are better than the Ruger, none of them take the same magazine as the Ruger…and that’s the bell I was trying to ring.

Spec-Ops closeout

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I loves me a bargain. Being a survivalist is a resource-intensive lifestyle when you’re getting started. Once you’v been at it a while, and gotten the major purchasing sprees out of the way, it’s really just a little hear-and-there upgrades and ‘nice to have’s. The guys at Spec-Ops are having a closeout on two products that I’ve found to be quite good. They are:

A three-mag MOLLE/PALS panel in your choice of camo for $12.50

And a very nice knife scabbard in either brown/coyote/whatever-the-new-term-for-desert-is or the hideous ACU for $11.25.

I have an extra G3 bayonet without a scabbard laying around, so this sheath is perfect for finding a home for that bayonet and keeping it with the bag of G3 support gear.

Floor porn!

I’ve used the Spec-Ops stuff for years and have been extremely pleased. It’s American-made (unlike Maxpedition and most Blackhawk gear), seems pretty durable, and is pretty basic no-frills stuff. I’ve been carrying their messenger bag as a bookbag to school for the last two years and have had absolutely no issues with it. I’ve been using their discontinued SOB buttpacks (make your own joke) for the last decade and found them remarkably rugged and durable.

Their designs are, for the most part, unimaginative but the quality and price is pretty hard to beat. And at closeout prices, even better.

You spent how much????

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TIme for you to play with my poll……

Whaddya think you spend on average per year on stuff to advance your level of preparedness?’On average’…so if you bought a BOV this year, thats not really part of the average unless you buy one every year, capice? And we’re talking items specifically towards your level of preparedness. ‘Dual use’ stuff doesn’t count…think of it this way, it’s specifically an item you bought for preparedness if you wouuldn’t have bought it otherwise.

[yop_poll id=”6″]

Patriots Day and 25th anniversary of Waco atrocity

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‘Tis Patriots Day!

You know what to do, you know where to do it! Get out there!


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It is also the 25th anniversary of the ATFE burning down a building full of women and kids in Waco Texas. This utterly inexcusable atrocity was the impetus for ‘militia movement’ that the 90’s was known for. To this day there are still a lot of unanswered questions from Waco. It continues to serve as an excellent reminder of what government can do when it wants to. As a result of this incident, and the Oklahoma City Bombing several years later, April 19 is a day of extra caution in some government agencies.

The classic survivalist’s dilema

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I had the weirdest dream last night (brought to me by some spicy chicken and rice, no doubt). I dreamed (or dreamt, I guess) that I was visiting a fellow survivalists place and he said i could stay in the guest house out back. Problem was, the place was lousy with grizzly bears and I thought ‘No problem, I have this handy PTR-91 in .308. I’ll just do a mag dump into the first one that gets in my way.’ And then I discovered that the magazine was empty. Awkward. After that it was hide-n-seek with three amazingly large grizzly bears.

This is the first dream I’ve ever had involving the usual gun problem (gun not working, bullets not having an effect, etc.) and the threat being an animal, instead of zombies or people.
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There are several problems for those of us who want to live the preparedness/survivalist lifestyle. One of the biggest is the often-at-odds-with-each-other desire to live someplace remote and quiet but still have a job/career to pay for it. Succinctly, the classic survivalist dilema is how do you live far enough out to have the security and privacy you want while still living close enough in to have a job?

Virtually all the survivalists I know who live in the ‘perfect’ locations are all either a) retired, b) made enough money to live off investments, or c) live a life of desperate poverty.

I’m far from being able to retire, my investments don’t provide enough to live on, and I’ve gotten rather used to hot water on demand and not crapping in a compost toilet. As a result, for the time being, I live in an environment that is not 100% conducive to The Lifestyle..the big deficiency being that I live in a fairly large population center. Oh, compared to San Francisco or Chicago it’s darn near a podunk small town, but it’s still too many rats in one cage for my taste.

Telecommuting? Well, thats wonderfully attractive but those sorts of gigs are few and far between. And, its something of a risk since if you lose your job you are now sitting in the middle of nowhere with no job and a greatly reduced prospect of finding another one given your remote location.

Alternatives? Well, I suppose the first thing is to lower your expectations. Don’t think that youre going to live at the end of a five mile gated road in the middle of nowhere and make $50,000 a year doing engineering consulting over the internet. After that, it seems the best compromise is to live in an area where you’re close enough to the smallest population center that will still provide you a living, but still small-townish enough to give you the isolation you’re after.

Let me give you an example of what I mean… in the town I live in, someone doing, say, a welding or diesel repair gig for a large company in this town can knock back around $40k. But…you have to live fairly close by to keep your commute realistic…as a result, you live in a populous place and your cost of living is commensurately higher. SO, you pack up the kids and move to some ‘Northern Exposure‘ type of small town. Your earning potential takes a heavy hit of 35-50%, but your cost of living offsets a bit of that since the expenses are a little cheaper. But an AR15 is still about $750 no matter if you live in the big city or the small town, so you’re going to have to lower your expectations of your purchasing power, or you’re going to have to work twice as hard to earn the same as if you’d remained in Big City.

There is another alternative I’ve seen where you have someone from someplace like California, New York, Chicago, Denver, etc, sell their home(s) and move out here. They usually wind up getting the same size home or bigger for about half the money and then use the other half to either set themselves up in a business, or invest it and live off the dividends. That has usually worked out fairly well in the instances I’ve come across it.

And, finally, I’ve met at least two people who did it the old-fashioned way – they worked like mules in The Big City for as much as possible, sucked it up for a few years, and then hit the EJECT button and relocated here.

I suspect at some point in the future I’ll be in the group of ‘moved to smaller town and earns less but improves quality of life’. In a perfect world I’d stick a million bucks in the bank, live off the dividends and interest, and have my quiet little place out in the sticks. But if you’re going to try for that sort of thing, you need to have started much, much more earlier than I have.

Frickin’ lasers!

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Some people like them for the ‘intimidation factor’…the idea that the bad guy sees the little red dot sitting on his sternum and he suddenly decides it’s time for a career change. Others say its a crutch for poor marksmanship. And some day it’s just another gimmicky geegaw that’ll go Tango uniform when you need it most.

Assuming we are talking about daytime visible lasers (‘Red dot”) rather than IR lasers that are used with night vision.

What say you, hive mind?

[yop_poll id=”5″]

Admin – Fifteen years of blogging

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It is, approximately, the 15 year birthday of the blog today. Fifteen years is a long time. The natural impulse is to look back but there’s a lot in there I’d just as soon not dwell on. Oh, sure, good and bad….but but it’s never an even mix. People..good and bad, experiences…good and bad.

Initially the blog was simply a space on LiveJournal that I had for posting about preparedness. Then, for a very short while, I tried HTML’ing my own website that incorporated the blog. Then I switched to WordPress and it’s been that way ever since. While WordPress has been a pretty stable platform over the years (knock on wood), I cannot say as much about some of the hosting services I’ve used. (The moral of that story, by the way, is that if you have a blog that you’re fond of running….back that sucker up frequently.)

Originally, the blog wasn’t about disseminating preparedness info, rather it was about what I was doing in my life for my own preparedness. Notes to myself about things I needed to get, or my impressions of various gear and guns that I’d picked up. From day one, the blog was really just a sort of journal to keep track of my experiences and thoughts on preparedness. Things evolve and while it still is mostly about me and my efforts, there’s also a strong undercurrent of ‘hey, you should take a look at this.’

One fascinating aspect of having been doing this for this long is that I can glean interesting info..I can see how prices of things (as well as availability) have changed over time and, most importantly, how forecasts of things (gun laws, metals prices, political changes, etc.) have turned out. There aren’t many actual blogs on preparedness I’ve found that have the same length of time at it as I do. That’s not to say there aren’t any, just that I haven’t run across them. However, in the time the blog has been kicking around I have visited hundreds, if not thousands, of other preparedness blogs…some interesting, some not…some ran for quite a while, some disappeared quickly….but a few have had legs and are still around (and I read them daily). [Most notably ,Rawles’ SurvivalBlog which popped up about two years after I opened this place….I knew I should have registered that domain name!]

It’s been interesting to see how things have held up over time..for example, I have posts where I mention putting some food away for long term storage and then ten years later I have a post about opening it up and using it. Thats kind of a rare thing in the blogosphere.

Expenses? Well, I figure it’s been a couple grand for hosting, bandwidth, domain registration, etc, over the last fifteen years. Spread it out over 180 months and it doesn’t seem so painful, but when I look back on it as one lump sum..well…thats a few AR15’s that never were. (And if you’d like to kick in a few bucks for housekeeping expenses around the blog, there’s a link right here…




Every dollar you spend does not go to a starving child in Africa, a baby seal rescue organization, or to a GoFundMe for some kid with cancer. Instead it goes to a blogger in Montana who uses it to pay for website expenses, .223 ammo, freeze drieds, and lap dances from morally-challenged and financially-illiterate coeds. (Well, mostly the first three things.) Ah, but seriously….I try to not put the arm on folks more than once every several years. But, some folks want to help keep the lights on and I appreciate that greatly. Some folks take it up a notch and actually make a repeating monthly donation (sort of a subscription) and for that I’m really grateful. And thats the end of the infomercial part of todays post.

The advent of cool stuff in those fifteen years? First and foremost is the expiration of the assault weapons ban…that annoying bit of Clinton legacy that gave us things like this: Many of you are too young to remember, but there was a time when the M4gery you paid $600 for today brought $1500. And your $12 PMAG was worth about $50. Second mortgages were the order of the day if you wanted something like a Beta 100-rd drum. Fortunately that nonsense expired in 2004, one year after the blog opened for business.

Gas prices ran the gamut from $1.75 to darn near $4, silver bounced between $6 and near-$50, and we all somehow managed to make it past half a dozen end-of-the-world scenarios including but not limited to: 2012, Hurricane Katrina, Hurricane Harvey, Peak Oil, Birld Flu, SARS, Ebola, Anthrax scares, and a few others that escaped me. Still no sign of Xenu, zombies, assorted religious returns, UN troops, alien overlords, or space Nazis.

Gunwise there have been some pretty forward movements…most notably the ‘arm brace’ fad, the somewhat-mainstreaming of the non-NFA 14″ not-a-shotguns, and the massive post-2016-election gun market slump that saw factory AR’s as low as $400 and AR mags cheaper than a Starbucks coffee. We also saw at least a half dozen panic buying episodes that we never really fully recovered from (if $15 bricks of Federal .22 are anything to go by. [or go buy]).

I suppose a very valid question is: how long can you keep blogging about a topic before you’ve exhausted every possible idea worthy of posting? Beats me…life has a bizarre way of throwing a curve ball (right at your head, usually) when you get to feeling complacent. I’ll keep blogging as long as I have internet and a pulse, I suppose. If the traffic dropped to near nothing I’d still blog…it’s something I really do for my own enjoyment rather than for the accolades and attention. (Although it’d be disingenuous for me to say that I haven’t enjoyed the very small level of notoriety that sometimes comes from these posts.) I suppose there’s never really a shortage of grass to graze on when it comes to preparedness topics. There will always be a hurricane, earthquake, riot, pandemic, or what have you, somewhere in the world that makes us re-examine the survivability of our existing systems.

Someday, though, I’d like to be able to make a post about how I’m sitting on the front porch of my little concrete hacienda out in boonies, watching the clouds drift by, listening to the creek, and occasionally popping off some ammo at whatever target of opportunity happens to pass by. Hey..it could happen.

At this point of introspection, the blogger would usually make some sort of comment like “I couldn’t have done it without you, the readers…and for that I am grateful.” Well, that sounds nice but it really isn’t true. Even if not a single person read this blog, it would still be here today and probably just as good (or bad) as it is now. But…the readers do make me enjoy blogging more than if it were just me yelling into the emptiness. So…theres that. I like to think that people who have hung around here a while have enjoyed the postings and in some way have felt a bit of a connection. That’s probably the biggest enjoyment I get from blogging – the connection. You see, back in the old days, before the interweb, we survivalists could very easily think that we were the only ones. We never really met other survivalists, or had a efficient way to communicate and meet  with other like-minded individuals, so it was very easy to think that you were unique and possibly a little weird in your outlook. Over the years, through the blog, I’ve had the immense satisfaction of encountering other people who had the same darn outlook.. and that sort of reinforcement is really useful at times. So…if nothing else, I hope I’ve helped to make some folks feel like they weren’t alone in their concerns and interests.

Thats about it, I guess. Back to our regularly scheduled brain droppings.