Luckily, my wife is on board and we are slowly increasing our stashes. We both had some grandparents that made a living off the land; canning, drying, etc. She's a 1/2 country, 1/2 city, so i try not to burn her out on it. I am always glad when she tells me, that we should get more of this or that, and i let her know that i already have more of it than she knows. She is ready to pack up and head to the country when the SHTF.

As far as people at work, I do not generally disclose my preps, until i am sure that they do about the same. Even then, i do not disclose how much i have. Why make myself a target later? i do not prep so that i can feed the masses. Most people at work would not understand why i need so much ammo and i would waste my breath to try to explain.

Funny that FROZENNY mentioned Boy Scouts. I was the one who carried 40-50 pounds in my pack on the ten mile hike while everyone else was pushing twenty at the most. However, by the end of the day, everyone had plenty to eat, mainly because i was not stingy with people who came unprepared. I am still the guy who carries a few extra ponchos instead of just one for myself. No matter how little i have, i am willing to split it. But, when i have to split my family's food because some other jerk did not prep, i will be a little more reluctant.

When people try to crack on my preps by saying that they are coming to my house, i usually shut them up with "If you are not BRINGING food, you ARE food!"

Quoted: "Gas, grass or ass. Nobody rides for free!"

The classics just never get old, do they??!!  


My kids and my wife are reluctantly giving this lip service...  pisses me off when they dismiss my concerns... so, they just play along.

But, that is fine... play along or there is hell to pay!!!   I'll tell the wife tonight...  Gas, grass or ass and see what kind of response I get!!!      

I'll tell the wife tonight... Gas, grass or ass and see what kind of response I get!!!

Dibs on your guns if you do this...

My wife is totall on board, she even suggests things that we may need.
I don't really have any one who is close to me that I am comfortable discussing anything with so I just keep it to myself.
On the other hand my wife likes to make remarks about all the beans and bullets to people she knows, really pisses me off. I tell her don not talk about preps, I think she finally got the message.
My son and grandson would be looking to me for help so I prep for them as well but they are the only ones who would be welcome and they really don't know the extent of what I have stashed.

Quoted:    You must also have a skill that I or the crew don't already have i.e. growing corn on asphault, turning old tires into water, healing the sick with soap. If you can't, then I feed you to the hogs. Sorry about your luck. Start now and you may have a chance on your own.  This weeds out all but the most sheepish. MMMMM....Sheep, it's what's for dinner.

:-)  Just about my philosophy as well.

Reminds me of a ice & snow storm we had here a few years ago. Power must have went out shortly after I went to sleep and the cold woke my frozen ass up at 6am, so I immediately fired up my little vermont castings wood stove. In short order I had the house nice and toasty.

Well, after all this effort I start getting hungry and grab my iron skillet and perculator coffee pot out of the camper and fix a typical hunting season breakfast.

About 5 minutes before breakfast is ready and the whole house smells entirely like bacon & eggs &  Coffee, my neighbor, who is a very good guy, he just lives in a world of numbers, ledger sheets & account balances and just doesn't "get it" stops by the house to check up on me comes in and immediately begins drooling like Pavlov's dog and says " I was checking up on you, but you seem to be doing better than anyone else on the street" I had tried talking him into putting in a woodburner but his wife wouldn't let him because they are "dirty and smelly"

In as subtle a way as I could I asked him how cold his house was, he says about 40. Still hasn't put in a woodburner. Power was out about a day and a half.

BAAAAAAAAA sez the sheep.

Ed

somewhere around age 18 i simply stopped worrying about how other people viewed me.

ar-jedi

Our nearest family is 1,700 miles away. My m-i-l likes to talk about prepping with me kind of like she likes shooting when she visits - it's an "adventure" that she doesn't get to engage in during her regular life and she really doesn't do a damned thing to retain what I teach her (aside from the safety rules). I end up answering the same questions year after year. Same with storing food and water. My family is almost all down in FL now and have weathered a number of hurricanes. One brother is a fatalist, another thinks all problems are solved by buying more and scarier-looking guns and body armor and my sister is somewhere in between. My mom, of all people (going 80 years old and a lifelong anti-gunner... until I took her shooting a few years ago ), has become her community's resident "survivalist". Sent her a bunch of gear (Coleman stove, coolers, headlamps, radios, etc) a few years back and she used it to great effect during the last two hurricanes.

None of them think I'm nuts. Then again, my mom is about the only one I can discuss things frankly with. The others talk in hyperbole or are just in denial.

We haven't really said a damned thing to any of our local friends. One other couple saw our "camping gear" and broached the subject to us. We taught them alot of what we learned, especially the mistakes, and we have a "bring your gear and skills and you'll be welcome" arrangement with them. They don't think we're nuts but they don't seem overly motivated to actually do anything to prep - acquired two family heirloom firearms (WWII .380 pistol and a 12ga over/under) and bought a 15-gal aquatainer but don't seem to have the time or money to do anything else. I talked to a very good friend who lives back in NY and he does think I'm nuts. Sees nothing wrong with it "for you guys" but has given me no indication that he intends to take steps to, well, survive. I'll miss him.

All this reminds me I need to buy a few more flats of... hell, everything... at Costco this weekend. Wish they sold ammo....

Jericho Smericho. When MI was hit by the big NE power failure that went from NY to OH there was only one home that had a working fridge, lights and fans in the middle of summer peak??? The power failure knocked out the water pumps so there was no city water either. After the second day there started to be small mobs at the grocery stores fighting for bottled water and canned foods. At night there were some large groups of unsavory characters breaking into houses with no alarms, ability to call police and temporarily evacuated for a hotel or some other place that still had power. SO who was the one who had all the firepower to make sure the punks knew not to mess with my neighborhood??? Most of my neighbors didn't have so much as a flashlight or were out of batteries.

I have actually got more people prepared on my block now. While most did not pursue the weapons path, they do have flashlights, water, food. My HOA also ponied up for a few generators so that we we can run extension cords to keep fridges and some lights going.

Wanted to say hey to everyone here. Been looking in preparedness forums for a while.
I am a single father with 4 kids. I am an Emergency Department charge nurse. This is my thoughts of everyone thinking Im different. If you will look around, most of those being critical are in debt up to their eye balls. I believe every one would like to keep a couple months of extra food, regardless of who they are. It is easier to call us "crazy" than to stop spending all their money on Chinese junk at Walmart.

I can do a little of everything, fix almost anything. All my friends come to me when they need to get a creative idea. I'll bet all of you are in the same boat as me. We are a special breed. Maybe even a genetic passdown. Think about all of the natural disasters over the thousands of years. Who do you think made it through drought, abnormal freezing, earthquakes etc... It was the people like us, and natural selection has ensured the suvival of humans with these traits. I think a village with 1 or 2 preparedness minded leaders would probably do better than another village without.

Think about it this way, humans began to florish in population after the transision from hunter gatherer to farming. Ill bet the first few guys who did not migrate and "buged in"
everyone thought they were crazy. somone had to do it!!!

Sorry for the rant, this site is great. I dont care what my friends think if I build an AK in the garage, or buy all the tuna on sale at Target. I love my life!!