Originally published at Notes from the bunker…. You can comment here or there.
Well, its officially one month until inauguration day for the Carter II administration. The panic buying we’ve been seing is going to come in four waves:
- When he gets elected
- when he gets inaugurated
- When new anti-gun legislation is proposed
- When new anti-gun laws take effect
Wave One is history, Wave Two is on deck and Waves Three and Four are warming up.
Guns are a small part of being prepared, but they are an important part. Theyre the part that keeps all your other preparations in your garage and not rolling down the street in some thug’s El Camino. Usually, the best gun for the job of protecting ourselves and our life-saving stashes of gear are the guns that are evil-looking and take those notorious ‘high capacity magazines’. Succinctly – part of being prepared means having suitable firearms. If you dont have those suitable firearms now you will probably be unable to get them in the future when they are banned. Therefore, buy ‘em now, and buy alot of them.
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Our trip to Helena was uneventful for us, but not for some others. We saw two vehicles that had skidded off the road. Both remained upright but they were still reminders that there’s very little worth driving too fast for. I’ve noticed that many times the vehicles in the ditches are the four-wheel drive SUV type of rigs. Im guessing the owners, feeling smug about having four wheel drive, figured that they were immune to the effects of ice and snow because of that magic ‘4×4′ decal on the side of their truck….and were quickly brought back to reality by gravity and simple physics. Overconfidence….it ain’t just a river in Egypt. Drive carefully.
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While packing for the trip, I needed to throw some food in the box for those ‘just in case’ moments. Lets think about the requirements of that….it has to be something that can be eaten cold, won’t freeze, has at least some nutritional value, is somewhat cheap, and doesnt require utensils. Fresh fruit was out of the question…might freeze solid and would go bad after a while. Canned tuna was out for the freezing and utensil reasons. Dried fruits had a great deal of appeal but I worry that when the summer gets the vehicle temp into the triple digits the storage life will dwindle quickly. Then, like a thunderbolt, the idea came to me. A food that can be eaten right out of the container, won’t freeze, can last almost indefinitely, and tastes good.
Sooooo….right next to the HK flare gun and GPS is a big box of Cap’n Crunch. ALthough, really, any breakfast cereal would do but..hey…its the Cap’n. Who doesn’t want to have an experienced military mind around in a crisis?
Seriously, man…think about it. Breakfast cereal has almost no moisture in it to freeze, doesnt need to be thawed or heated, can be eaten right out of the box, has some nutritional value, is a familiar food, even the kids will eat it, and is cheap.
On a slightly more serious note, long-term food for a vehicle is always a problem. Anything stored in a vehicle is subject to heat/freeze cycles and these cycles can be hell on almost any stored food product. Even MREs, vaunted for their military use, have cautions against freezing/thawing cycles.
If the freezing/thawing cycles don’t destroy the packaging and turn the contents to mush, theres the environmental factors of the food. Will it freeze in the winter? Will it spoil in the summer? Is it thirst provoking? Can you eat it without utensils? Will you get tired of eating it? All things to consider. The most ‘neutral’ food product for this sort of duty is, unsurprisngly, the ‘lifeboat rations’ we see floating around the itnernet. Like a cross between a PowerBar and the sweepings from a cabinet shop, these things are taste/texture neutral (if youre lucky), come in a foil vacuum-sealed pouch, are impervious to temperature and are as exciting to eat as a rice cake. However, it most certainly beats starving.
Theres no easy answer to the ‘food to keep in the car’ question. One way to do things would be to simply not leave food in the car but rather grab something from the cupboards when you leave home. This would assure you relatively ‘fresh’ food and be more appetizing than the Datrex food bars. Drawback is that this means each time you undertake a journey you have to open the kitchen cabinets and go ‘Hmmmmmm…..’.
So, for me, the nutritionally questionable foods seem to be the leading contenders. Sure Breakfast cereal and Pop Tarts arent going to be doing your body any great favors but when it’s -15 and you’re on Day Three stuck in your car, burning a jillion calories to stay warm, that processed food is gonna be pretty darn welcome.
And, yes, I did think of the old standby: beef jerky. While an excellent choice for the winter I have my fears about it in the summer. I think I’ll stick with breakfast cereal and the like for now. Although I can and do just rotate a few complete MRE’s through the truck gear bag … but then again, Im more diligent about that sort of thing than most people.
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I’ve got MREs in the back for long-term. On the reinspection / expiration date, I swap out the case and use the older one for camping / trip food. For what you’re talking about, I don’t do long-term storage. I keep a six-packer cooler under the center console / tray, with cheese / peanut butter crackers, Atkins bars, mixed nuts, and SlimJim+Cheese snacks. Since I munch those on the road on a regular basis, they don’t go bad on me.
Re: SUVs in the ditch, one of our local station’s traffic-and-weather people said it best: “Remember, folks. Four-wheel drive doesn’t necessarily mean ANY wheel stop.”
As to the 4-wheelers, yeah, I notice that quite a bit also. . .The SUV’s and 4X4 pickups go flying past me. . .apparently thinking that they can’t skid. . .really, 4X4 only helps you get OUT of trouble—soft ground, a snowbank, being plowed in, etc. . .
Emergency food in a vehicle: Peanut butter! Good calorie input. . .a bit thirst inducing, and you might need a plastic spoon. .
Did you forget about your MRE heaters?
I’ve been sticking with the foil sealed lifeboat ration packs. They are nutritionally dense. They aren’t all that in terms of taste, but the stability is why I keep them around.
I keep MRE snacks from Long Life Food Depot as my “truck food.” It doesn’t get too terribly cold in the winter, but it gets blazingly hot in the summer (and neither of my trucks has air conditioning). The peanuts, pretzels, pound cakes, pretzels, and cookies seem to withstand living in a truck year round well. (I also have some FDs and stoves in my truck BOBs if the need for serious food arises, and of course, a block of those icky lifeboat survival bars in each bag.)