A quiet Sunday morning…you’re listening to the radio, maybe getting ready for church, and you woke up in a world where your biggest worry was the oil leak in your car. And by the end of that same day the nation is marching to war and no one’s lives are untouched. Imagine what that must have been like…you woke up to orange juice and eggs and went to bed with a global war. The lesson there is that your whole life can change in just a moment. So..we prepare.
As I’d mentioned last year, it seems like tourniquets are sort of a ‘newest and coolest’ sorta thing for the ‘serious’ first aid kit. I’ve been into survivalism for a long time and any references in fiction and non-fiction to tourniquets was almost always of the ‘loop a belt around it’ sort of variety. There were no ‘dedicated’ or purpose-built tourniquets that were readily available for Joe Sixpack survivalist…or if there were, you seldom read about them or came across them.
Cut to today’s episode. I’m talking with a fella I know and ask what’s up in his world. Turns out, his adult son had to go to the emergency room last night. Why? He was home, had a deer hung up and was cutting it up when he came to a frozen part of it. He put some extra oomph into his cut to get through it and the knife went into his wrist and severed a radial artery. Being alone and not precisely sure of how much damage he’d just inflicted on himself, he wrapped a towel around it and applied pressure. And applied. And applied. And the puddle at his feet just grew larger. So, he walks over to his neighbors house where the neighbor takes one look at him and calls 911. Medics arrive and….they apply a tourniquet …since at this point he’s about a quart low. They hustle him to the hospital and stitch up the leak. How close was he to cashing in his chips? Hard to say, I wasn’t there. But I am told that the amount of blood loss was rather significant and without something stopping it he probably would have been in some big trouble.
So, apparently there is a reasonable chance of need for a tourniquet outside of the apocalypse. Its not something I ever really thought to add to the first aid gear I keep around here because…well…it never seemed terribly likely to be needed. That mindset has now, of course, been kicked to the wayside. I’ll be finding a reputable vendor (to avoid Chinese fakes) and ordering a couple up for myself and one for a friend.
In talking to a few other people, it seems that severe cutting injuries resulting from deer processing/skinning/butchering are not that uncommon. Makes sense. Some guy standing alone in his garage with a hanged deer or elk slips and cuts himself deeply…I can totally see finding him the next day or two later laying DRT on the floor. Never thought about it before, but I can see it happening.
This is how you learn.
You know how sometimes when your car is acting up and you take it to the mechanic you consider yourself ‘lucky’ if you get out of there without spending $xxx? Yeah. Another adventure in plumbing today.
I was going down to the basement to put away some ammo and right off the bat I knew something was wrong. I could smell water. Sure enough, theres a puddle on the floor. I hate plumbing problems. Hate them. An ancient gate valve had decided now was a good time to go ahead and give up the ghost. Trouble is, it could never be in an easy-to-access area. Nope. There’s ductwork hanging from the ceiling and, of course, the valve in question is right behind the duct. And, not just any duct. A duct that has another duct coming into it form the side. So thats a three-point F.U. to deal with.
Now, it wasn’t all bad. I managed to find a plumber who could show up today, rather than next Tuesday (looking at you Garden City Plumbing & Heating), and the kid did the job pretty well it appears, and so far everythign seems to be holding together. Replaced the ancient valve with a nice new ball valve (why, oh why, would anyone use anything else???) and now life can go on. I was expecting to drop between $500-$1000 because there’s always something that keeps it from being a straightforward and simple fix. But, knock on wood, it looks like escaped with only $175 left behind.
Fortunately, part of my preps include an emergency fund. So, it was just a matter of paying the man and life goes back to somewhat normal. Except…I have to try and put the ductwork back together.
The emergency fund, however, turned a potential Big Deal into an inconvenience. I deprive myself of some luxuries in life… new car, fancy clothes, latest electronics, basic medical care…just so I can have something in the bank for when these sorts of events happen. For those keeping track, this was another case where the crisis required greenbacks and not an AR and plates. Oh, someday the crisis will happen that does require M855 and that sort of thing, but by the time that happens there will have been a hundred crises that required the greenbacks.
So…prepare for The End Of The World, but also prepare for the smaller, more mundane and localized end-of-the-worlds…and that is almost always remedied with cash.
ETA: I was right. Complications. :::sigh::: Plumber is on his way back.
What is fascinating here is the argument that since it is most likely no one has eaten this stuff, they cannot claim to have suffered damages. Kinda like saying its okay that your airbags are defective since you haven’t used them yet.
Any goober with a modicum of Google Fu can tell you that the usual 2000-calorie benchmark was nowhere near being met by these products. Or, really, anyone elses. And the ones that do have the high calorie counts usually get it by loading you up on potatoes or similar fare.
The biggest lesson here is that if you really want to do a long-term food solution you need to design your own package. You can use these guy’s products, sure… but YOU are the one who needs to calculate how much of that product you need…not them.
As for them divulging customer info. Well, its a class-action suit… without the names and addresses they have no idea who (or how many) are involved and where to send the legal paperwork. But, youre smart, right? You use other forms of payment and shipping info, right?
Although the idea that the .gov keeps a list of who ordered ten cases of Hormel seems rather tin foil-ish.
I’ll point out that if you go pay cash at the Mormon Cannery they don’t ask for ID. They may ask for a name but thats pro forma and no one cares to check if its legit.
Speaking as someone who just had an unexpected vehicle expense pop up, I can tell you that I ain’t in that 40%. Are you?
It’s not nearly as sexy, but it is true: you are far more likely to experience an emergency calling for your stash of US greenbacks than you are for an emergency that requires your plate carrier and NVD’s.
Part of preparedness is being prepared for the unsexy stuff: water heater failures, alternators, dead refrigerators, broken pipes, exploding appendixes, and other sundry crises.
It’s no secret that I try to follow the Dave Ramsey stuff….and I’ll be accused of drinking his particular Kool-Aid but..it’s worked well for me. The alternator died and what might have otherwise been an emergency was downgraded to an inconvenience. I just took the money from the emergency fund and threw it at the mechanic. Next day…functioning vehicle. No muss, no fuss.
Now I drop everything and work on topping off my emergency fund back to its normal level.
If you set back food, ammo, fuel, and meds ‘just in case’ then you really shouldn’t have trouble understanding that adding ‘money’ to that list is just as good an idea as the other items. The trick is having the discipline to do it and then forget that the money is there.
My financial goal, in case anyone is interested, is a years worth of money to cover my basic expenses – food, utilities, taxes, etc. It won’t be a huge amount since I can live without luxuries, but having a years worth of expenses tucked away gives me options I might not otherwise have in case theres a job failure or other ‘personal’ end of the world.
No lie, man…get a couple grand tucked away as soon as possible and forget that it’s there. It’s the best thing you can do to give yourself some peace of mind that allows you to worry and work against bigger things.
Tam very nicely linked back to this post and opined in her blog:
And no sooner had that post hit the light of day than my vehicle decided that it’s alternator had had enough of this mortal coil (get it? ‘Coil’?) and shuffled off to wherever dead car parts go. As a result, my vehicle very inconveniently puttered to a stop. In front of the homeless shelter.
Joy.
So, I called a buddy of mine to come help me push it off the road because I really didn’t want to ask the whiskey-for-breakfast crowd for a hand. My mood was already several orders of magnitude into the red zone and it wouldn’t have taken much to release some pressure in an unprofessional manner. So my buddy shows up and asks how long till the tow truck arrives. “Two hours”, I reply. He looks over at the homeless milling around aimlessly, goes back to his truck, and pulls a beater Beretta 96 out from under the seat. “Wanna borrow this until the tow truck gets here?”, he asks. I thanked him and told him me and my G19 were just fine. But…here’s the big takeaway from that: because he had what amounted to a ‘disposable’ or ‘beater’ or ‘truck gun’ available he was able to offer it to someone else. And a scenario like that is precisely why we have extras, and extras on top of extras – because someday a friend, family member, or other person you care about might be in a bad position and in this way you can offer them assistance. And thats not just guns, guys…. that could be food, ammo, batteries, money, or any host of other things that, when you don’t have it and really need it, are really important.
This is a big distinction from charity. Charity is generalized giving out of some sense of moral or religious imperative or duty. I generally don’t suffer from this particular quality, so my generosity is a bit more selfish – I give to those that add a value to my life, or I give for the satisfaction I get from the act of giving. It may seem like that’s a difference with no distinction, but I see a distinction. I suppose the greatest distinction, for me, is that charity often comes across as an obligation and I am extremely opposed to obligations being forced upon me rather than they being voluntarily assumed.
On a side note, I had my Bag Of Tricks with me as well as my mountain bike sitting in the back of the vehicle so I could very easily have left the area and made it back to base with minimal inconvenience…if I was willing to just abandon the vehicle, which was not called for at that point.
The world is populated by idiots.
Im in the bank this morning and the teller and the woman next to me are talking about the power outages that continue in many areas around here. This woman is saying how she hasn’t been able to charge her laptop, that she has no water (well pump), that she’s going to lose the food in her freezer, and how she hates being in the dark.
I gently steered the conversation to ask her if, when this is over, if it will change her behaviors and perhaps she’ll keep some battery-powered chargers around for her cell phone. “Oh, no..this almost never happens.”
You know, your house almost never burns down, you almost never have your car stolen, you almost never get cancer, and you almost never get disabled from your job….yet you have insurance in place for that, so why not this?
For these… clueless idiots…. it appears it truly is better to curse the darkness than buy generator.
My buddy on the other side of town is still without power after a transmission tower (not a power pole, mind you…a transmission tower) decided to go horizontal not far from him. Is he inconvenienced? Yes. He has no internet. Is he still in the game? Absolutely. He has not one but two of the Honda generators. He’s got his freezer, fridge, lights, cell phone charger, and all the other accoutrements of civilization up and running. And he has some stored gas on hand to keep it that way. As his neighbors live out the lifestyle of “Home & Garden: North Korea Edition”, my buddy drinks hot coffee, has lights, has communication, and can continue to run his business. (And also the means to keep it if someone decides his bit of civilization needs to become their bit of civilization.)
I still need to do some after action things… I need to top off the tank on the generator, get all the cords in one place, put some emergency lighting in that one place, log the run time for the generator, pick up some accessories for the extension cords, etc. But, all in all, the generator did the trick.
The EU2000 is too small to run the entire house, but Im thinking of picking one circuit in the house and seeing if I can’t have an electrician come in and set that one circuit up with a transfer switch. That way, I can have one room of the house with the outlets running. The alternative, which I’m also seriously considering, is an entirely new circuit throughout the house of emergency ‘red outlets’ that are completely independent of the house panel and would solely be connected to the generator.
The Honda EU2000 usually runs right around a grand. Worth it.
It occurred to me, as I was talking to someone about the still-present situation regarding .22 ammo, that any lulls that we’ve experienced in the panic buying over the last year or so are going to be pretty much wiped out by the fact that next year is an election year.
The Clintons, Slick Willy or/and Hillary, are hardly friends of gun rights. They aren’t even friends of friends of gun rights. And as you hear Clintons name bandied about more and more as the nomination process approaches you’re going to see more and more panic buying going on.
Then, once the nomination process is on, it’ll continue as the election comes closer closer. Finally, depending on who is elected, it might start to calm down around March or April of 2017.
This stuff is actually highly predictable. The four stages of gun panics, as far as elections go, are:
Don’t take my word for it, your own life experiences should confirm what I’m telling you.
Now, I’m not nearly as stupid as I look (I couldn’t possibly be), but even I learned a long time ago to buy what I needed as soon as possible, as much as possible, so I could ignore this sort of thing.
“But, Zero”, I hear you cry, “I am a survivalist of limited resources. I can’t possibly get all my guns, ammo, and magazines before the election. I need both those kidneys!”
Well, that’s true. It’s a pretty intimidating list. That’s why you need to prioritize that mofo like no one’s business. Let’s look at it from a historical and hysterical standpoint – in the last, oh, say thirty years, what’s been regulated out of the realm of ownership by us simple peons? Chinese guns, Chinese ammo, steel core 5.54×39, steel core 7.62×39, imported rifle barrels for ‘assault weapons’, magazines that hold more than 10 rounds*, pistol grip stocks on semi-auto rifles*, bayonet lugs*, etc.
What else could come down the pike from the twisted gnomes in Washington? Well, almost certainly a magazine ban, assault weapons ban, and some restrictions on ammo. That whole wrist brace issue is living on borrowed time, IMHO. I expect there’ll be some fundamental changes to the DIY/80% receiver market and possibly some restrictions on mail ordering the other parts you need to complete your AR. (And before you say that ATF can’t regulate gun parts that aren’t serialized receivers, go try to import some AK barrels and let me know what happens.) And I fully expect there to be some restrictions on body armour coming along as well.
So, man of limited resources, where do you put your money to get the most bang for your buck in a world where political expediency directly challenges your ability to own thundertoys? Guns, mags, ammo, in that order. Since it is reasonable to expect that as we slide further and further down the timeline prices will go up and availability will go down, it would seem to make the most sense to purchase the most expensive and least available items first. Actual guns are outnumbered by magazines and ammo, so get the guns first. After that, get the magazines. After that, ammo. For every AR, there are probably hundred of AR mags, and thousands of rounds of .223….so get the guns first.
Stripped lowers? Sure, if you can’t afford the actual complete gun I’d grab as many stripped lowers as I can. I suspect that at some point the upper receivers and what not will be regulated as well but until that time you’ll at least have the serial numbered part sitting away waiting for you to complete it…or use it as trade for other stuff.
Magazines are simply a buy-as-many-as-you-can item. For those of us who remember the ’94-’04 ban, we can tell you youngsters stories about $750 BetaMags, $100 Glock mags, and $30 AR mags. It was a time of great chaos, and great(!) profit making. Even if you don’t have the gun, get the mags.
Unless you’re on fire or swimming, you can’t have too much ammo. Any surplus ammo still coming into the country, as well as the Russian stuff, is probably first in the crosshairs of those who would do evil to us. While we all have a magic number in our head about how much ammo is the recommended amount per gun, the truth is that you really can’t go wrong with buying as much as you can afford. If you don’t think so, look at the the folks who are sitting on thousands and thousands of rounds of .22LR right now. Or cases of old Chinese 7.62×39 when it was nine cents per round.
At this point I’m sure there is some genius hitting the comment button about to say something deeply profound like “It’s because of idiots like you encouraging all this hoarding that I can’t find .22LR ammo, and when I can find it it’s at ten cents a round!” Actually, it’s not because of me..it’s because of basic economics, laws of scarcity and demand, and federal asshattery. (How many ‘t’s in asshattery, anyway?)
Having been to this dance before, I’m pretty much immune to a bunch of it. I already have a goodly amount of guns and mags stashed away, and ammo is always on the shopping list anyway. But it is my opinion that if you’ve been waiting for prices to ‘return to normal’ or for ‘availability to return to normal’ you’re going to be left with a full wallet and empty shopping cart. As the political season heats up prices are going to go up, availability will go down, and today is going to be looked back upon as the day you’ll wish you had started shopping.
* = yes, that law sunset and we can now enjoy normal-capacity magazines and ‘evil features’. But do you really think they’re gonna make that mistake again?
Years back,I used to have a bicycle that would, at irregular intervals, try and kill me by locking up the chain for no particular reason. I eventually got a newer, better, bicycle but the old Death Machine taught me to keep a first aid kit handy. On my bike I have one of these
Well, here’s the lesson for today… I left my bike chained up in the yard over the winter. As a result, the rain and snowmelt made its way through the bicycle bag and through the first aid pouch. Check this out:
Thats not dirt, kids….thats mold. Most first aid stuff is packaged in sterilized paper envelopes and those are less waterproof. So, virtually everything was moist/damp/moldy and had to be discarded. However, some things were not damaged. Observe:
Basically, anything packed in foil or sealed in plastic weathered it just fine.
So, by now, you’re thinking “No problemo, just seal up all the individual contents and you’ll be good to go.” A reasonable way of thinking, but it overlooks a big issue – when you need a first aid kit, theres a pretty good chance you’re under stress, your hands might be a little shaky, and you may only have one hand to work with since your other arm/hand might be injured. So, sealing things up in a manner that required two hands to open (or requires several repeated pouch-opening-procedures) might not be conducive to effective use of your gear.
Now, I rather like the Maxpedition FR pouch. It’s reasonably compact, fairly easy to organize, and has several methods for attachment to other gear. I’d hate to give it up. So, to me, the choices are two: a) individually seal the contents of the kit or b) put the whole kit into a waterproof container of some sort.
I’m leaning towards ‘A’. Best method? Well, there’s this:
Those are heavy-duty mylar bags with ‘tear away’ tops and zip-seals, and a 6″ heat sealer that I picked up off Amazon. The bags, in various sizes and thicknesses, are from Sorbent Systems. I got them expressly for the purpose of making small, weatherproof, resealable, firs-aid kits for my hunting and outdoors gear. For example:
That pouch contains most of the important stuff…gauze, non-stick pads, compress bandage, antibiotic ointment, bandaids, aspirin, tape, etc, etc. Not enough to do surgery or fix a detached aorta, but for the cuts, burns, scrapes and bloody messes that sometimes happen from bicycle accidents, knife slips, falls in blowdown snag, etc, its pretty good. And, it is now completely waterproof. Tear open at the upper corner there with your teeth and open it like a bag of chips. When done, you can reseal it with the ziploc-type closure. When the crisis is over, since I have a stack of these bags, I can simply transfer the contents to a new bag to seal. I’ll wind up getting a larger back, drop the Maxpedition FR into it, throw in a few oxygen absorbers to snug it up tight, and tuck it into my bike bag.
Now, if you have a vacuum sealer, you can very much accomplish a similar setup using your sealer and bags. Two big differences though: the mylar pouches pictured have a ‘tear notch’ to allow easy access (which a vacuum sealed bag does not); and the mylar pouch, in this heavy thickness, is much more puncture resistant than a vacuum seal bag (however, you can always wrap the vacuum seal bag in something to protect its integrity).
I have learned my lesson and won’t be leaving this gear outside over the winter again, but walking around in a solid rain for a few hours would have probably induced the same amount of moisture into things. Waterproofing/weatherproofing an important bit of gear like this makes sense. Fortunately, today I noticed it because I was thinking I should probably check to see how the gear fared over the winter…it would have been a different story if I was a couple miles down the road, sitting on a rock, trying to bandage a gash in my leg with wet and moldy 4″ gauze and pads.
More CrossFit. Behold, a sweat angel:
This is what happens when after the workout you flop down on your back on the floor to try and get your breath back. This is also what it looks like, I would imagine, after the paramedics peel you off the floor and ship your carcass to the hospital.
But, more interestingly, the fella instructing the class had his own ‘lost in the woods’ survival experience that I was curious about. He got turned around while out hunting and wound up having to spend the night in the sticks as it dumped 13″ of snow on his position and the temperature clocked in around 0 degrees. He survived with no apparent injuries and was helicoptered out the next day. I asked him what happened:
Him and his hunting buddy drove up a forest service road way back into the boonies, they then parked and rode their mountain bikes further in, they then parked the bikes and hiked in on foot. They then split up, one guy heading up one ridge and one guy heading up the other. After a while he broke for lunch and as he was eating he spied a mule deer out of the corner of his eye. He chased after it and by the time he came up for air he realized he had gotten turned around. He wandered for a while, back tracking, climbing up and down the hills, before realizing he was well and thoroughly turned around.
The weather was starting to change and daylight was fading fast. He built himself a big fire , broke out his mylar blanket, and settled in for the night. He would alternate between getting wood for the fire and sitting on heated rocks to stay warm. His cellphone was dead and had minimal signal. At one point he tried it and it had just enough charge for him to get a GPS coord and to text those coords to his wife. But…he would have to make it through the night before help could get to him. The next morning he tried wandering towards what he thought was a road and as he did so the rescue ‘copter flew right over him on its way to the coords of his campsite. He was sure he’d screwed the pooch but they circled around again and he waved ’em down with his space blanket. The recovered him and got him to safety.
I asked if he had carried any special survival gear and he said it was just the mylar, nalgene bottle, celphone, firestarter, and the usual hunting gear….no extra clothes. He said he normally would have carried a spare cellphone charger with him but it was in his truck and they had taken his buddys rig to go hunting. What he did do, which made all the difference in the world, was once he realized he was well and truly lost he made camp while there was still light to see what he was doing and got a big fire going. He did mention that he will make sure to take his GPS along next time. (I’d go with map-n-compass as a backup, but Im not going to armchair quarterback this guy to his face.)
As you know, even when cell reception is too spotty for voice, text messages can often get through. In his case it made all the difference.
It was an interesting conversation, mostly because this is the first time I’ve actually gotten to talk to someone who had one of these experiences and it was quite interesting to hear the first-hand account. He also says, by the way, his subsequent hunting trips have not been as deep into the sticks as that one. His wife keeps him ‘on a short leash’, as he says.
My own experiences hunting and getting caught in bad weather tell me that while it is very easy to go overboard and encumber yourself with too much gear, there’s definitely a possibility of undergearing yourself as well. Its a tough balancing act to keep things light enough for tromping up and down mountains all day and having the gear you need when things go sideways. Something to think about.
