Sweep, is that you? OMG, he's sort of back!

LOL

Hope all is well with you

Sure am.  Just been on vacation working on my boat.  Going to pull her this fall and overhaul her.  

Right now she won't start.  No fuel getting to the carb.  Had a motorcycle accident that laid me up so the boat sit for two years.  Amazing how when you get laid up family and friends will work on your house or your car but a boat, forget it.  They all want to go out on it but nobody want's to work on it.  I guess they figure you don't need it.  

Good news is I'm better, not only better but way better.  Got my weight down to 165 that down 50lbs from my high.  I haven't been in this good a shape in twenty years.  Most of the guys from the board that know me personally wouldn't even recognize me.  

Nothing special.  Instead of doing fad things to lose weight, I simply started counting calories.  You can eat what you want just save up the calories type of thing.  Its just like budgeting money or in our case budgeting food in a crisis.  At first you use your cell phone or computer to look things up and read labels but after a while you kind know an egg is 65 cals white bread is 130 cals etc.  

Something I learned, what we store back in food if you used a calorie method, we're all going to get fat. LOL  I guess that's a good thing that we have some buffer built into our planning.  

You need to drive up and come see me old buddy.  I think of our camps down Chatooga Gorge often and got pictures of this Ninja guy.  

Tj

                    Sweep and TJ! In one thread!

                        















        

Well guys a big part of it is 10-15 years to prep, you kind of prepped already.  

Some things I still am.  I'm still a flashlight whore.  Found a neat 300 lumen AA aluminum case at Lowes no less, got two of them.  Got a crap load of the new Chinese single AA high outputs.  Knives just replaced my Gerber MKII I broke after the war, yes, Vietnam War.  Man, these new ones are killer good, much better.  Paid $20 less than the early 70's too.  

Food, generators, tents, bags, cots, stoves, NATO cans, not so much.  Got all that stuff, so you do you all.  

Maybe us older guys at this should do some tutorials?  I'll tell you one thing I wouldn't have bought, all those damn tray rats.  Things like that.

TJ

I'm very very bad.  I have so much stuff, our plan is to open a flea market booth when I retire and sell a lot of it off.  Not just sell it, but I have so much stuff we'll run themes.  One setup for awhile will be sporting goods, another gun stuff, another musical instruments, etc. etc.  I have multifuel stoves still in the plastic wrap.  

The good news is a lot and I do mean a bunch of it, I bought way back before prepping was popular and since then the price has quadrupled.  For example, you guys remember the $6 Swiss mess kits with alcohol stoves?  Priced those lately?  They're like $50.  A lot of that stuff I can make a modest 20% and they'll grin like a fresh pumped cat.  

I'm still shooting 5.56mm US Surplus I bought $150/1,000 and 7.62x39mm I bought $59/1,000.   Have you priced those surplus $60 Nagants and Mausers even in piss poor shape?  

Even giving away my tray rats that were at expiration, it was a lot of fun.  Some of those folks were tickled to death.  One couple on a fixed income last power outage that were way out in the country so no stores open were posting on facebook for food to feed the neighborhood kids.  The homeless shelter was flabbergasted for that type thing was perfect for them.  That was a tax write off too.

I'm not going to sell off or give away my generator or the bulk of my long term storage food.  Over the years though as I bought this or that to find out what's the best for my needs, I've acquired a lot of stuff.  Its been a hell of a fun thing.  Influenced even changed others lives that never thought about needing a flashlight let alone a lantern or auxiliary heat and I've had far worse investments in my life.  

I have a way better idea now of what works and fits my needs.  I even enjoy "Holy Shit! I'm coming to your house".  

We are way overdue the camps we use to do.  Those are a blast and I have many good memories of you guys.  

Tj

Well other than the hike in thing and 94 degree heat, that wouldn't be a bad idea.  Ops is down way now and the mid-west and SE guys had a lot of crossover during the height of the camp years.  A trip to FL during fall or winter wouldn't take much encouraging.

I'm just enjoying my place up here in the Potomac Highlands.  Most of my prepping here revolves around not having to make trips to town when I start a project.

I fish in the cooler months and swim in the river with the dog when it's hot like now.

Been slowly meeting and making friends with some of the locals. Mostly nice people around here.  Only 7000 people in the whole county, so there aren't a lot of them to begin with.

Might have to do a truck camp over this way once it cools off enough to sleep in a tent at night. Too damn hot now.

@swingset 

Yeah, we need to hook up guys.