Tuesday, December 28, 2010

Learn A Survival Lesson From NYC

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The dollar crashed..........

The stock market tanked...........


The Arabs shut off the oil faucet............



Trouble is much closer to home folks:

Learn a lesson from the folks in New York City.


You are on a subway, and it stops. The lights still work, but the train is stranded. So, are you responsible for being ready for that? Well, Bunkie, who else is going to watch out for you?


Did it ever occur to a NYC freak to carry a back pack with some dry food and water whenever they travel by subway? 


Stupid idea, right? Until the train stops.


When the technology dumps, and there is no switch to flip, and no mouse to click, YOU get the results of YOUR choices BEFORE the world stopped. Americans have become absolutely dependent on their Nanny in Washington, City Hall, or the college President's office. 


Entitled people in the south side of Chicago make NO provision for disaster. But, smart people are just as dumb sometimes. The vast majority of companies have NO survival plan for such crises. If you are stuck at work, YOU had better have made provision long ago. 


I met a man who lived through the New Orleans hurricane event. He said several of his neighbors all got into one house and pooled their resources. The barely made it through until they were rescued. He said down the street in every direction were other such collection points. They invented survival on the fly. They communicated with each other and warned each other when some criminal types were around. 


But thousands in New Orleans were NOT prepared, had no back up plan, and went to the stadium and freaked out. Some went insane, while others preyed on the defenseless. It is beyond belief that people would live behind a dike below sea level and not be prepared. To me, New Orleans is the ultimate micro-photo of all the the USA today.


I bet you feel real good about yourself though. 


Tell me, Oh Wise One, how much food do you have on hand? Three days? OK, that is what the average American has on hand. That is also what the local super market has on hand-- three days, and that is a published fact. How much drinking water do you have set aside for the unexpected? Where will you relieve yourself when the water stops? That toilet will fill up pretty fast. Has it ever occurred to you to have flush water in a barrel out back?


Are you getting a bit nervous now? Good, I may not have wasted my time here. Read on Oh Wise One.


You see, Nanny knows you and your neighbors are not prepared. There are a handful of sho nuff, bright as a star, civil servants at FEMA and in Washington who know you are not ready for a crisis. You wonder why they are doing all these seemingly clandestine things like setting up huge areas with single wides and stocking up on coffins. 


You see, most of you would not have a clue how to bury your family members in a crisis when someone died. You may not even own a shovel. You have no food to survive, you have no independent communications options like Ham radio or even walkie talkies. No short wave radio (battery operated) to listen to the news from outside the USA, which may be down. 


You have no gun because you think they are dangerous, so you would be THE victim of any criminal who wandered into your neighborhood during a crisis.


How much cash to you keep on hand? What will you use to buy food from the local store if the bank is closed and Visa and MasterCard are down. Wampum is not usually taken by most grocery stores, you see. The shells in your fish tank might have worked 500 years ago in Tonga Tunga, but not in Omaha, Nebraska today, Bunkie.


Do you realize that YOU will have to feed your babies by using your wits? Do you have a gun to shoot game? Have you ever killed and dressed an animal? Have you ever talked to your family about the things people need to do when a crisis hits? Have you talked about the Chinese who eat dogs and like them? The idea should have been dealt with long ago. 


Do your kids think meat comes in a Styrofoam tray with plastic wrap over it? Have they ever seen an animal prepared for food? After you shoot a squirrel, you will not only have to dress the thing, and figure out how to cook it-- you will have to force it down your kids throats as they scream because one of the Muppets has been murdered by Daddy. 


What is YOUR plan, Daddy? You are at work, and Mom is at home with the kids. You may not see each other again for weeks. You can do NOTHING to help them. Does Mommy know how to use a gun? Has she ever shot one? Have you talked out the priorities a person needs to set BEFORE it is time to react in seconds? What if you are killed, or Mommy dies? 


Have your older kids ever read stories about kids who kept their world together without Daddy or Mommy? I know one from Tennessee, and it is beyond belief. I talked to the Black gentleman whose thirteen year old sister ran the child protection people off and raised eight kids on her own. Daddy had run off, and Mommy died. He told me his sister is really his Mom today, and he is a well healed gentleman doing just fine.


Teach your family to think "What if?"


I have heard several stories of people, stone sober, coming from opposite directions on a country road, who met at the top of a hill and went head on into each other. Amazing! I am thinking of two women who did this, and they had flat pasture land on both sides of the road. If they had thought BEFORE HAND about such a possibility, one of them at least would have headed into the field. Roll the car-- probably, but that is a lot easier to survive than a total effect of 120 miles an hour into a brick wall.


So, what if your world collapses? 


You need to talk about this with rational friends BEFORE THE EVENT. 


Do not bother with friends who look at you funny. They will trust Nanny, and you will end up being a fool to them. Talk to other friends who think about these things. Read books about how people survived the Great Depression and the Dust Bowl eras. A survival book is useful, but most of them are written by people who have never been in a really horrendous crisis. Do some thinking for yourself.


Will Nanny be mad if you learn to take care of yourself? NO. There is a myth going around, probably started by witless diddle heads, that the US Government wants us helpless. 


Wrong! The Feds are always delighted to call someone on the phone after a big crisis, and you say, "We are OK for another week." Why would they be mad? The last hundred people they phoned were starving and using the shower curtain for toilet paper.


I wish you well my friend. 


I wish you many happy push button smooth running days ahead. But, PLEASE, if you love your family, have a few conferences and ask, "What would we need to do to get ready for X?" DO NOT waste your time talking about all the possible ugly things that could happen. Leave that to Glenn Beck and Alex Da Joik Jones please. After the conference with the family, be UNLIKE 75% of the people who ask that question-- take action on your answers.


Try to do things that will be useful if there is no crisis. Example: Do not store that horrible dry food. It tastes horrible. Store canned meats and vegetables, and rotate them as you buy from day to day. Make beef jerky. Dry milk is good. Flour is insane unless you have a solar oven also. Buy dry breads, and rotate them. Make if fun for the kids. When the jerky is down to absolute minimum, you will say, "Billy, we cannot eat anymore until we make more."


Did you catch the point of that last sentence............


If you never have a crisis, do you realize what you have done? You have given your kids the most precious thing they can inherit-- a working brain-- an instinct to be self-providing-- to think OUTSIDE the box.


After thought: I will give you one small but critical thing to illustrate my point. Do you have a dog? Is it a Chihuahua? If so, that yapping maniac will give a thief about as much trouble as a mosquito. How about a boxer or German shepherd? Pit bulls are great, but they terrify the neighborhood. You say, "Those big dogs are expensive to feed." Right, but the price is all paid back when Fido takes the leg off the mugger at the front door. Given the choice of bags and bags of dog food versus Mommy being raped........... I think I got your attention that time, right?


THINK-- It may be good for you.



Jeremiah 17:17 (KJV) Be not a terror unto me: thou art my hope in the day of evil.
18 Let them be confounded that persecute me, but let not me be confounded: let them be dismayed, but let not me be dismayed: bring upon them the day of evil, and destroy them with double destruction. 


Elijah was fed by the ravens at the Brook Cherith. That is a great miracle. God still does miracles. But, I read nothing about ravens in the New York City snow storm. The cavalier attitude assumes that God will rain manna from heaven is NOT biblical thinking:


Proverbs 6:6 (KJV) Go to the ant, thou sluggard; consider her ways, and be wise:
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 Which having no guide, overseer, or ruler,
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 Provideth her meat in the summer, and gathereth her food in the harvest.
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 How long wilt thou sleep, O sluggard? when wilt thou arise out of thy sleep?
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 Yet a little sleep, a little slumber, a little folding of the hands to sleep:
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 So shall thy poverty come as one that travelleth, and thy want as an armed man.

The man that "travelleth" is the hobo who has to leave home in desperation. The armed man is the soldier who is left in the field after the battle is over and his side was defeated. He is far from home and destitute.


By the way, do not forget to include some provision for the widow next door please. You are healthy, and you and your kids need to also think about neighbors who simply cannot provide for themselves.


Go on, push a button, click the mouse, have fun............ 

But, get your fanny outside the box just once, OK?

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