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As anyone can tell you that has ever discussed the bible or religion there is no one Christian view on any topic and the purpose of this article is not to push one view or another but to provide a perspective that you may not have considered. There will be those that may say these scriptures are out of context but I challenge you to look them up for yourself. Obviously, our founding fathers quickly amended the constitution to provide the citizens a clear assurance that they could “keep and bear arms” but where did they get this view? Was it simply from their experience in dealing with the British or was there a scriptural basis for it.

Different Views of Scripture

There are two predominate views based on scripture that address preparedness. The first is that scripture warns us therefore, we should take practical steps to take care of ourselves and others. The other view is that God will take care of us so no need to prepare. Some simply believe the Lord will take care of them others believe that He will but that they must do their part. It is always important to look at scripture in context and with other relevant scriptures. A good example of why this is critical is this text in the book of Luke.

Luke 10:4 (NIV)
4 Do not take a purse or bag or sandals; and do not greet anyone on the road.

If we stop here it would appear that Jesus is telling them not to prepare, that He is going to take care of them and to rely on the mercy of strangers when they travel. As we read on in Luke 22 we find a much different view as again Jesus is speaking directly to his disciples.

Luke 22:35-38 (NIV)
35 Then Jesus asked them, “When I sent you without purse, bag or sandals, did you lack anything?”
“Nothing,” they answered.
36 He said to them, “But now if you have a purse, take it, and also a bag; and if you don’t have a sword, sell your cloak and buy one.

Here we have a much more complete and up to date picture, Jesus giving instructions for the future. Now he does not only address the purse (money), bag (provisions) and sandals (clothing) but also the sword (protection). He puts such an emphasis on the sword, such a level of importance that He separates it from the other items saying if you don’t have one go sell clothing to buy one! He does not say to sell the sword to buy clothes. This may not be for you today but Jesus is speaking of what the future will require. The future Jesus described for the disciples may just be your reality today. Jesus specifically indicates that the disciples are to take supplies with them when they go out to minister as well as a means of protection.

Personal Protection

Your first reaction to this topic might be to think “Guns” but for this discussion we are really discussing whatever means of personal protection you are comfortable with. Often we hear Jesus described as a pacifist and at times Jesus plainly chose that approach.

Matthew 5:39 (NIV)
But I tell you, do not resist an evil person. If anyone slaps you on the right cheek, turn to them the other cheek also.

Are there times to walk away from a fight? Absolutely yes, are there times when using a lethal weapon for a minor offense is simply not the appropriate response? Of course, yet just before His crucifixion, Jesus’ instructions are different from the often quoted “turn the other cheek” phrase used by some.

Luke 22:38 and 49 (NIV)
38 The disciples said, “See, Lord, here are two swords.”
“That’s enough!” he replied.
49 When Jesus’ followers saw what was going to happen, they said, “Lord, should we strike with our swords?”

Later that night in the garden where Jesus was praying he was betrayed by Judas and as he was being arrested Peter drew a sword.

John 18: 10 (NIV)
10 Then Simon Peter, who had a sword, drew it and struck the high priest’s servant, cutting off his right ear. (The servant’s name was Malchus.)

Jesus quickly had Peter put the sword away (Luke 22:51) but this brings up the issue of timing. Jesus never had a problem calling out his disciples if they were doing something wrong. He had done this on many occasions, chastising them or correcting their methodology and theology. So just moments earlier he had condoned them bringing swords but had Peter put his away when he used it. The speaks volumes as to the proper timing of when to use force to protect yourself or those you love.

The sword in its day was the equivalent of the semi-automatic pistol of today. It was the pinnacle of technological defensive/offensive close range weaponry and Jesus’ followers were carrying them with his blessing. This does not describe a group of pacifists!

Much like the timing of when to use the sword and when to put it away is when to turn the other cheek and when not to. King Solomon who was known for his wisdom and was known as a man of peace wrote Ecclesiastes. He addressed timing in Chapter 3 in a list of opposites.

Ecclesiastes 3:1,3,8 (NIV)
1 There is a time for everything, and a season for every activity under the heavens:
3 a time to kill and a time to heal, a time to tear down and a time to build,
8 a time to love and a time to hate, a time for war and a time for peace.

Deciding when to apply each of these apparently contrasting statements may be the essence of wisdom. In the book of Nehemiah, we are presented with an Old Testament view as Nehemiah prepares defenses for the city of Jerusalem. He is in a predicament where he must come up with a defensive system to not only protect Jerusalem but also the workers themselves. Many consider this a biblical model for mutual protection in small groups.

Nehemiah 4:13-18 (NIV)
13 Therefore I stationed some of the people behind the lowest points of the wall at the exposed places, posting them by families, with their swords, spears and bows. 14 After I looked things over, I stood up and said to the nobles, the officials and the rest of the people, “Don’t be afraid of them. Remember the Lord, who is great and awesome, and fight for your families, your sons and your daughters, your wives and your homes.”

15 When our enemies heard that we were aware of their plot and that God had frustrated it, we all returned to the wall, each to our own work.
16 From that day on, half of my men did the work, while the other half were equipped with spears, shields, bows and armor. The officers posted themselves behind all the people of Judah 17 who were building the wall. Those who carried materials did their work with one hand and held a weapon in the other, 18 and each of the builders wore his sword at his side as he worked. But the man who sounded the trumpet stayed with me.

It is important to note that Nehemiah set up the defenses by family. There are several practical points to this. He sets up the motivation for this in verse 14 encouraging them to fight for their sons, daughters, wives and homes. People tend to fight harder when they have a personal stake in the fight; Also they would be stationed in the area closest to their home to help rotate out the people staffing the defenses.

Note the verbiage in verse 18 “and each of the builders wore his sword at his side as he worked.” Each worker was carrying his own protection, not relying on someone else or using borrowed weapons but his own sword. Have you given your means of protection over to someone else? Are you relying on someone else to be there for you? It is important to see that these were “workers,” able-bodied people, not the sick, elderly or those unable.

Verse 17 and 18 are sometimes sighted by advocates of concealed carry of handguns but it can apply to any means of protection you may feel comfortable with. You may be opposed to or feel uncomfortable with others around you carrying firearms, if so hopefully this will give you some understanding as to why Christian gun owners may be so passionate about it. Many feel it is not just a Constitutional right but a right God has given. You can see if someone approaches a topic with that point of view there is little chance of changing their position.

Verses 13 and 16 could provide specific instructions on which types of firearms to obtain. A sword being close range offensive/defensive (handgun), a spear to be close/mid-range weapon (shotgun) a bow being long range (rifle) and armor being (defensive use of your surroundings or protective gear).

Luke 17:31 (NIV)
On that day no one who is on the housetop, with possessions inside, should go down to get them. Likewise, no one in the field should go back for anything.

Many concealed carry advocates quote this scripture as guidance regarding always carrying a firearm. If you cannot get back to your house and you must leave it would be prudent to have your choice of protection with you. When it comes to personal defense I have found Solomon’s words helpful in choosing who I associate with or receive instruction from.

Proverbs 14:16 (NIV)
The wise fear the Lord and shun evil, but a fool is hotheaded and yet feels secure.

Solomon is clear here as to who you should work with when it comes to preparedness, if you are a Christian or not, hotheaded people do not make good decisions. Training for whatever means of personal protection you may choose is critical. It can be basic or advanced depending on your comfort level but it is scriptural.

Genesis 14:14 (NIV)
When Abram heard that his relative had been taken captive, he called out the 318 trained men born in his household and went in pursuit as far as Dan.

Abram’s men were trained, or at least 318 were and he did not send out the untrained ones. If we follow this example to be prepared or the most useful in a difficult situation, training is a requirement for service. Protecting yourself and others can be an intimidating task. Going it alone can be done but incredibly difficult so find another like-minded person, help one another.

Ecclesiastes 4:9-12 (NIV)
9 Two are better than one because they have a good return for their labor: 10 If either of them falls down, one can help the other up. But pity anyone who falls and has no one to help them up. 11 Also, if two lie down together, they will keep warm. But how can one keep warm alone? 12 Though one may be overpowered, two can defend themselves. A cord of three strands is not quickly broken.

The reality is you must sleep so at some point having someone to stand watch if you are in need of rescue or must quickly defend yourself simply makes working in a team more effective.

The government has guns so do you need them?

Song of Songs 3:7-9 (NIV)
7 Look! It is Solomon’s carriage, escorted by sixty warriors, the noblest of Israel, 8 all of them wearing the sword, all experienced in battle, each with his sword at his side, prepared for the terrors of the night.

Solomon clearly demonstrates that rulers are prepared for “the terrors of the night” if your leaders are possibly you should be as well. Our leaders will be protected they have insured that but who will protect you? The resources available will be directed to protect those in authority, your protection in a time of crisis will be secondary.

Prepare but for the right reason

You may prepare because of guidance in the scripture but scripture also addresses motivations so it is imperative that we prepare for the right reasons.

2 Timothy 1:7 (NET)
7 For God did not give us a Spirit of fear but of power and love and self-control.

We do not prepare out of fear. There can be a fine line between concern and fear when we make decisions based on fear alone we often find ourselves out of God’s will. The Bible can be described as a book of balance. Have you ever spent time with a Christian who is out of balance in any area of their beliefs? If so you know you don’t want to be that person! Therefore living a joyous life while still preparing for the future and knowing you can protect yourself and loved ones is a prudent life balance. Firearms may not be your tool of choice but please consider these scriptures when limiting someone else’s ability to use a firearm as their tool of choice.

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  As anyone can tell you that has ever discussed the bible or religion there is no one Christian view on any topic and the purpose of this article is not

The mere mention of the words FEMA camps is bound to draw polar responses from our readers. Almost any topic that can be linked into a large list of what is routinely called conspiracy theories does that. It seems that no matter what the subject is, if there is some form of mystery around it, or possibility that the subject is completely made up, you will have those who will argue passionately for both sides. I think that the more sinister the underlying thought is behind the theory, the more passionate the arguing gets. If one side is seriously concerned about the risks of some dark plan to harm them, the other side will be giddy with excitement at the chance to shoot down theories and research.

For the people who believe in FEMA camps and see them as a very bad sign to watch for and fear, this topic engenders a wealth of responses and warnings about what to do if faced with the prospect. For those who think this is complete and utter nonsense, they will argue just as passionately to the contrary – that there are no such things and anyone who believes our government has plans to round people up and lock them in camps against their will is an idiot. I do agree with part of that and I’ll explain why.

What are these FEMA Camps you speak of?

To back up just a moment, for those of you who are completely unaware of what I am talking about let me give a brief explanation of what FEMA camps are. FEMA camps in this context are secretive government facilities all over the US that are supposedly being set up to house massive amounts of American citizens. The closest approximation to what these camps will be like is either a prison or a forced labor camp. Some would say that’s redundant.

Why would the government set up any camps like this in the first place? There are tons of theories, but the most common is usually to house people after either a collapse of our government/economy or some massive societal problem that displaces millions and removes the ability for the public to take care of themselves. I am not going to try and convince anyone of the plausibility of FEMA Camps and that isn’t what this article is about but I would suggest that if you are curious you do your own research. I am not advocating my position as either believing in the existence of FEMA camps or a sinister plan for their potential use or disbelief but I am sure that will be very clear as I write.What I want to do is describe how I think we could find ourselves in a situation where something very similar to FEMA camps would be possible and you would voluntarily go if you didn’t follow the steps below.

Let’s take the whole term FEMA camp out of the equation for a minute and talk about facts. In most natural disasters, there are settlements created for people who are displaced. If you look at the war in Sudan you can see refugee camps. In hurricanes, there are relief shelters and people willingly go to all of these. Is it such a stretch to imagine that some event in our country could compel large numbers of people to make their way to the same types of facilities? Remember Katrina when a lot of people flocked to the Superdome? Nobody made them go did they?

I maintain that nothing good can ever come from a situation like a refugee camp or even a relief shelter if this is on a massive scale. I am not talking about after a hurricane if your house is flooded. I am talking about a country wide problem where the only hope being offered is to make your way to a central location. I think we should all know how to avoid FEMA camps or any other camp for that matter for as long as humanly possible.

What could compel you to go of your own free will?

I think that there are a lot of reasons that people would willingly get on a bus or walk to a facility that has been set up by our government. If you think about it, things would be so much easier if people were asking to come in. Why fight with people when you can have them freely submit to whatever conditions you imposed on their stay because they were begging you to take care of them?

Hunger

I think this is the easiest one to predict. Let’s say there was some horrible event like an economic collapse. Now, this probably won’t play out over days or weeks, but eventually after so much time a massive economic collapse could interfere with your ability to put groceries on the table. Let’s imagine that most people in the US lost our jobs, companies closed left and right and everyone was facing worse than depression conditions. How long could you hold out on food if there were no unemployment checks and no jobs to work? I think for most parents, the thought of their children going hungry is enough to drive you to do things you wouldn’t normally do. This can swing to the violent side with robbery or even killing someone for food, but the path of least resistance could be the camp. If you just go to the camp, they will feed you and give you a bed to sleep in.

Safety

Building off the desperation subject above, I do believe if we have a collapse of society, the bad elements will rise up and join together. Criminality is a fact of life and it is an inescapable part of our history. People will be taken advantage of and bad things will happen. If the scenario I described above happens, you could easily see gangs of people stealing, raping and killing to either get supplies they want or simply because nobody is stopping them. If you lived under the threat of marauders invading your neighborhood and harming your family, would you consider going to the camp for safety? If you go to the camp, we will protect you and make sure nothing bad will happen. We will have security to keep any bad people from getting in to harm you and you can finally sleep safe at night. Sounds tempting right?

Medical/Health

What if you have a medical condition that requires medicine that is no longer available? What if you are injured and the hospitals are closed or it is more dangerous trying to get to the hospital? What if your daughter is sick with an infection she received when she cut her hand on a rusty can and you don’t have any antibiotics? Would you go to the camp where they have medicine and can treat her? Would you consider the cost of her living is worth any liberties you might give up? Would you turn in your firearms to the camp for treatment for your daughter? So how do I propose you stay out of the camps?

OK, again without going into what I think any camps might be designed for, I do think that there is a higher chance of people willingly going than being rounded up in the night. I could be wrong, but lets assume that we have an economic collapse. Maybe there is a war overseas or a biological outbreak that cripples our country and let’s further assume that going to any refugee or FEMA camp will not be good in the long run. What can you do to avoid the FEMA camps?

1. Be able to feed yourself – I have said this multiple times before and you can’t go to any other survival/preparedness website without getting the same advice. Make sure you have extra food so that you aren’t forced to go somewhere because you are starving. How much? I normally recommend starting with 30 days, but for this to really work I think you need as much as a year of food stored up. One year of food will enable you to last through the winter and get a garden started if you don’t have one already. Food is one of the easiest ways to prepare for any type of scenario that could affect your family. If nothing happens, you still have to eat every day.

2. Be able to defend what you have – I don’t mean counting on kindness of strangers either. If times get so bad that people are unable to feed their family, they will come for those who still can. You will need to have a means to keep your family safe and the determination to do what is necessary. That could mean taking a life. It might just mean making a defiant stand. Either way, history shows that expecting the best of people in times of crisis is foolish and if that is your plan, you might regret it.

3. Have a plan to provide basic medical care for yourself – This can be viewed two ways. I always recommend having a more than basic medical kit for every family and the knowledge of basic first aid. You have to know how to stop bleeding and it really helps to have bandages to do that. You have to be able to sterilize a wound and antibiotics are necessary for infections.  Your basic health is another aspect of this though. If you aren’t able to walk a few miles without getting winded, how do you expect to survive if we have a collapse? Make sure you are in great shape and that will make any stress like this easier to bear and the likelihood that you will fall by the way much lower.

I really believe that if anything bad happens like this, our society has overwhelmingly demonstrated that they desire to have someone take care of them. If that someone is the Government you will lose in some way. What will that be? Who knows – I leave that up to others to debate. I do know this though and that is that I will do anything in my power to stay away from any situation like that. I am taking steps now to prepare my family and am doing what I can to take care of them and make sure they can take care of themselves. The alternative is not attractive to me and I only see bad things happening if we go that other, easy, safe route.

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The mere mention of the words FEMA camps is bound to draw polar responses from our readers. Almost any topic that can be linked into a large list of what

The first question that some people might ask is: Why would I want to consider a human powered generator when I could use solar? This is a logical question given the latest developments in compact flexible/fold-able solar panels. The problem we all have with solar panels is that they don’t work when the sun is too low on the horizon or at night, and when there is real heavy cloud cover, the output is too low. Essentially, there’s a big power blackout window that occurs, and if you don’t happen to have a charged battery handy, you are out of luck. In a disaster, this can mean the difference between life and death. Additionally there are other indoor areas that have no access to sunlight, such as a bunker or a similar location, where these units can be valuable assets.

The K-TOR human-powered generators fill this ‘blackout gap’ and can power some devices directly or provide useful amounts of energy to charge small and medium capacity batteries for later use.

Recently I got my hands on a couple models of K-TOR human-powered generators; the Power Box, which is a pedal driven (like a bicycle) generator and the Pocket Socket, a hand cranked generator. And I gave both of them a whirl… and here’s what I found:

I am a stickler for quality… being old-school and all, and I lived a good portion of my life in the past era when quality and endurance minded products where the mainstay of our society, which is considerably different today, where many companies have a ‘use for a while and then discard or upgrade’ attitude.

The first thing I noticed about both units (Pocket Socket and Power Box) was that they were very well made yet extremely light-weight through the use of high-strength ABS plastic and corrosion resistant alloys. This in my mind makes both units great choices for Bug-Out bags where weight is critical.

The Pocket Socket is very compact and the unit performs as stated by the company; they have a nice video up on their website that shows the Pocket Socket in action, which I couldn’t possibly improve upon, so here it is:

It’s always a bummer when you get a product and it doesn’t quite work the way you thought…the Pocket Socket did not disappoint and even my grand kids could make use of it due to its versatile gearing, which allows ease of use by young and old alike!

And it’s really simple and easy to use! Just pull it out, plug in a device and start cranking! It puts out a very convenient 10 watts of power at 120 volts AC, which allows you to plug-in all kinds of devices (not to exceed 10 watts draw) as well as small battery chargers. This allows the use of a wide variety of devices, like radio receivers and small radio transceivers (walkie talkies), GPS, cameras, games, phones, etc. They even have an adapter to convert to the European 2-pin configuration!

So what’s the bottom line on this great little generator? It’s very reasonably priced at $65.00 online. Considering the compact-quality of this device, it represents good value. And I really like the fact that, like all K-TOR products, it’s made in America and was the brainchild of an American, Ken Torino the founder and president of K-TOR.

Moving on to the award-winning ‘Power Box’; given the compact design and relatively light weight of this unit, this powerful 20 watt (120 VAC) generator is a definite candidate for a Bug-Out bag! And from my chair it should be standard equipment in any bunker since it can offer a significant source of power when other systems fail. That said it’s a bit more complicated than the Pocket Socket in that it requires just a tad of assembly before you can begin pedaling this efficient little generator just like a bicycle! Here again the company has an excellent video that makes learning the assembly process a snap:

Basically, you just snap-on the pedals and then secure the support rails to unit and you’re ready to use it. Because pedaling this unit is so easy, even kids will find it a breeze to use, even for long periods. And the potent 20 watt output allows the use of multiple devices at the same time (not to exceed 20 watts total draw), or to charge a storage battery.

I have to say that I fully expected this unit to cost several hundred dollars given its power and versatility, however, the good news is the unit sells for $195.00 online, which in my book is a bargain!

One thing I know many people will appreciate is that K-TOR is an American company and its products are American made, thereby supporting American families! And of course, K-TOR warranties all of its products.

By having your own K-TOR human-powered generator you can bridge the ‘blackout gap’ and significantly augment the redundancy of your power sources both in emergencies and off the grid! I highly recommend both of these units.

 

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The first question that some people might ask is: Why would I want to consider a human powered generator when I could use solar? This is a logical question given

 

The Boy Scouts and Girl Scouts are two universally known organizations that many kids participate in growing up. As prepper parents, enrolling your kids in the Scouts is one of the first steps toward a preparedness lifestyle that we can do for our children. But not every experience in the Scouts is the same. Here are some excellent ways to get the most out of Scouts for your child.

Be The Troop Leader

Our lives are busy. We need to work, upkeep the yard and house, get groceries, run errands, and more. So naturally, parents often see activities for their kids as short-term daycare. It’s a great way to get a break from entertaining them and get needed stuff done. But doing so is a missed opportunity for many reasons.

As a prepper, there is no one better suited to lead a Scout troop than you. You’re already attuned to wilderness and preparedness ideas. So when you lead the kids in different activities, you’ll have a great depth of experience to draw from.

The Scouts are wonderful at providing their leaders with a vast array of ideas, activities, and badges to earn. So many that any one troop can only cover a small fraction of them. This leads to a huge degree of different experiences between troops. By being the troop leader, you can choose the best badges to work on for younger troops that will teach them the values you want. In an older troop, you can help guide them and encourage them to pick the badges that most reflex preparedness.

Leading a troop is also a great way to spend quality time with your children. Your kid will become more emotionally invested in the Scouts and the lessons learned there when you show them how much you like it by doing it with them. They’ll respect you more as they get to see you become a leader in the community, not just at home.

You also have the amazing opportunity to guide and shape the next generation as they learn from you. If everyone went to Scouts and grew up to be preppers, the world would be a much better place.

As a prepper, there is no one better suited to lead a Scout troop than you. You’re already attuned to wilderness and preparedness ideas.

Volunteer Frequently

If your schedule doesn’t allow for being a leader or co-leader of a troop, then do your best to volunteer frequently. Running a troop is hard work. You need to plan ahead and have everything prepared for each meeting. Almost every troop has two leaders, but the burden is still felt. So, I guarantee that your child’s Scout troop is always excited to accept volunteers at every meeting. They’re probably already begging for it.

Boy Scouts Handbook: The First Edition, 1911

By volunteering, you gain all of the benefits for your child as being the leader, except to a lesser extent. Some leaders will gladly let you pick the badge or topic for a meeting or two. This lets you guide which areas your child is learning.

If that’s still too much commitment, then just being at the meeting to help corral the children when necessary will lift a huge weight off the leader’s shoulders. It will allow them to focus on being prepared for each activity while you handle the dirty work.

It also reinforces the importance of Scouts and the lessons learned even if you’re just sitting on the sidelines and helping to pass out snack. When your kids are older, they will remember and thank you.

Attend Every Meeting

One of the good things and bad things about Scouts is that it meets much less frequently than other activities, such as sports. This makes it easier to make each meeting as they’re often once every two weeks or even once a month. But it also makes it easier to miss as you’re not in the weekly routine of it.

Make Scouts a commitment. Make it a priority to never miss a meeting for any reason. Because they meet so infrequently, each meeting is ever more precious and valuable.

In addition to making sure your child attends every meeting, make sure to attend them yourself. This way, you’ll always be around to volunteer when needed. You’ll also have a great influence with the leader in picking badges if they see your face every meeting.

Attending every meeting yourself is also a great way to make new friends. What better friends for you than parents of children that are the same age as your child in the same activities? You can start with play dates for the kids and then do picnics with your families together. Some of my best friends I met through Scouts when I was my children’s leader.

By being the troop leader, you can choose the best badges to work on for younger troops that will teach them the values you want.

Ask To Be In A More Active Troop

Every troop is different. They do different activities and meet at wildly different days and times. When you first sign up for Scouts, most people just give them your contact information and let the organization arrange which troop your child lands in. Often times they do this by geography and your kid will be in a troop with the children living closest to them.

This may be great. Or, you could end up in a troop that meets less and does less interesting badges. But just like picking which teacher your child get each year, you have a strong say in it. Don’t let the random whims of a stranger decide the fate you’re your child’s Scouting future. Take the wheel and find the best one for you.

Contact the Boy Scouts local council or Girl Scouts service unit manager and let them know you want your child added to a troop that meets more frequently and does more activities. If you ask nicely, they’ll be happy to assist you.

This is a little more challenging if you’re joining a newly formed troop as they don’t have the history to know. But this is especially important to know when joining an existing troop. The unit managers will know which leaders are more active in the Scouting community and will give great recommendations.

This will also serve your child’s future in Scouting. More active and exciting troops will often last longer before the kids start dropping out. Staying in the same troop with the same kids and leader always provides for the best experience.

Send Your Kids to Scout Camp

Most Scouting troops only meet during the school year. Thankfully there are a number of Boy Scouts and Girl Scouts summer camps throughout the country. Day and overnight summer camp are amazing experiences for children. There’s new activities like archery, boating, and obstacle courses that are rarely done during the year. Your child will spend more time outside enjoying the wilderness. It’s also a great chance for your kid to make new friends from different cities that they’d never meet otherwise.

Also, since these camps are tied to the larger Scouting organization, you’ll be confident that they’ll teach your kids the same values of preparedness. You’ll also find they are often cheaper than the YMCA camps as you’ll be able to use your fundraising dollars towards it, like Girl Scout cookie sales.

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  The Boy Scouts and Girl Scouts are two universally known organizations that many kids participate in growing up. As prepper parents, enrolling your kids in the Scouts is one of

Riots are certainly possible even over something as seemingly minor. We saw what happened when a glitch in the EBT system caused a run on Wal-Mart in two towns in Louisiana. In a short time, the looters with an alibi I’ll call them, had cleaned out the food section of the store leaving nothing for anyone else to eat. The Washington times reported:

“It was definitely worse than Black Friday. It was worse than anything we had ever seen in this town. There was no food left on any of the shelves, and no meat left. The grocery part of Wal-Mart was totally decimated,” said Springhill Police Chief Will Lyn.

This foreshadowing of what a crowd out of control can do was under different circumstances than what is predicted to happen on Friday. These EBT owners at Wal-Mart were being told that the magic cards that give them a monthly budget for groceries suddenly had no limits. Not wanting to miss this opportunity, they figured that they should take advantage of their lottery winnings and stock up the freezer. Imagine what would happen if the EBT card said instead of “get anything you want”, the message was “you can’t get anything at all”. Do you think the results would be better or worse?

All of this talk of riots got me to thinking about large protests and the eventual destruction we have seen for a long time played out in large cities and foreign countries. Get enough angry people together, the riot-police will come out and then things will get broken and people will get hurt. We have not heard a lot of riots in the news recently; perhaps the global outrage has cooled off with the onset of fall. The Arab Spring is now the quiet of Autumn or maybe the news simply stopped reporting it. Riots are social protest taken to another level and they can be dangerous places to be.

Obviously, riots can get out of hand and even our armed forces train to control riots. Army publication FM 3-19-15 even lists as potential causes of a riot, events that seem eerily similar to the food riots predicted above.

Community unrest results in urban conflicts that arise from highly emotional social and economic issues. Economically deprived inner city residents may feel that they are treated unjustly or ignored by people in power and authority. Tensions can build quickly in a community over a variety of issues, such as hunger, poor employment opportunities, inadequate community services, poor housing, and labor issues. Tension in these areas creates the potential for violence. When tensions are high, it takes a small (seemingly minor) incident, rumor, or act of injustice to ignite groups within a crowd to riot and act violently.

I came across a manual when I went looking for more information about Riots and Riot control tactics. I wanted to see if I could understand the perspective of the police and military Riot control units and learn what they are trained to do when they are called out to put down these mini rebellions. One manual I found is called the “Warrior Crowd Control and Riot Manual” which you can purchase for $5. I don’t know who wrote it and I haven’t been in a riot so I can’t vouch for the information but it is an interesting read. If you search for it, you might be able to find a free version to download. Everything in it points to a source advocating for rioting and this book seems to be a guide for how to carry out a riot, not how to manage one.

The manual is broken into two sections. The first deals with Crowd Control and this is written from the perspective of the police or military CCU (riot squad) team most of the time. I think the manual flows back and forth between the Crowd Control being directed at you and others. The second section is called Riot training and goes into some pretty interesting details about how protestors should conduct a riot. Maybe, more accurately the section deals with how to stage a riot without getting hurt or captured. I think this information is valuable if you are faced with a WROL scenario and find yourself dealing with a large and hostile group who may be trying to riot outside your home or neighborhood. It could also be useful if you find your self caught up in the middle of a riot in your city.

Individual Riot Control/Protection gear

Before I continue, I would recommend that you DO NOT get into any of these situations. Avoid riots at all costs unless your own values tell you that there is no other option. This manual and others dealing with the rioter side of the confrontation usually advocate violence in some fashion. In all of the cases I have seen at least in the US, that violence is taken out on businesses by the agitators listed in this guide. You don’t want to be the loser busting in the window of a department store and stealing clothes if you are mad at a politician.

The flip side is that if you are in a WROL situation, these tactics might quickly go out the window. If I am defending my home from a mob who is intent on taking our lives, I won’t be as concerned with showing restraint if you understand what I mean.

Crowd Control

Crowd control is a generic term for getting a large group of people to do what you want them to do. In a riot, this is usually to stop what they are doing or to move away. The people responsible for crowd control have to make decisions based upon what the crowd is doing, the energy of the crowd and what direction the crowd is heading. If the crowd is heading for your home, the objective would be to stop them before they get there and send them off where they came from without any violence.

Crowd control weapons – There are a lot of weapons and equipment to consider if you are part of the riot squad in charge of dispersing the crowd. Primary to any offensive weapons would be defensive in the form of protection. Helmets are vital to protect your head from flying objects like rocks or bottles and be anything from Military Kevlar to skateboarding helmets. You can easily pick up a surplus Kevlar helmet at your local army navy store or on EBay. Shop around because prices are all over the place.

Once your head is protected, you move down to shin and forearm guards, heavily padded gloves, face shields and a striking weapon. Usually the weapon is a large baton which can be made from any good solid piece of wood. You can get inch and a half poles at your local hardware store or the old standby – a baseball bat. Pepper spray is also a good close quarters deterrent if people are coming towards your line. Lastly you would round out your personal protection with a firearm in most cases.

Crowd behavior and Psychology – Crowds are living breathing animals and their moods change based upon a lot of factors like how long they have been protesting, the injustice they are railing against, weather, frustration. Most of the riots we see on TV are comprised of a lot of people watching, even more taking photos and a small percentage acting up. It is the agitators that you have to be mindful of and that is who the CCU’s will try to take out of the equation.

The agitators are the ones who will instigate the crowd to action and these are the de facto leaders. If you remove the agitator, in many cases, the crowd will lose its steam. Riots by their definition are large and unorganized. A well-organized riot control team can manage a much higher number of protestors. I will point out that this concept correlates directly with the reason the crowd is rioting in the first place. If there is a piece of legislation that the crowd wants passed, the violence is likely to be low. Kill a few people or take away freedom and liberty and then you have a different dynamic. At a certain point, when people have nothing else to lose, all bets are off and the crowd could easily go on a rampage destroying everything in its path.

Lethal Over watch

Communications during a riot – It is vital that you are able to maintain communications with the rest of the riot squad or your group during the course of the event. Radio communications might not work so hand signals should be your fall back. Having hand signals for how to line up and constrain the crowd will make communicating even in a highly noisy environment possible.

Lethal Over watch – Controlling the high ground offers time tested advantages over almost any opponent. Governments will always have snipers on the roof tops to monitor the situation of any riots. That is great news if they are protecting you, bad news if they aren’t. The lethal part of this element is the ability for the sniper to take out anyone who poses a threat to life or safety of the Riot Squad. Snipers are also able to help watch over the crowd from a better advantage point and see actions that the people on the ground aren’t able to. If you find yourself in a riot, take a look around and see how many places you are being watched. With drones now, there is virtually no way to keep yourself out of the eyes of someone.

Containment vs. Dispersal – The person responsible for running the CCU will make the call in a riot as to what the goal is of the riot squad. Usually, the intended result is to either disperse the crowd or contain them for arrest. There are various methods of containing crowds but in most cases, the CCU wants the riot to disperse. For this reason they will leave an escape route and start driving people out away from the primary zone.

If you are in a riot and find yourself getting backed into a dead end, you may find yourself on the wrong end of a whooping.

Snatch Squads – Snatch squads are 4-6 man teams designed to run out from the line of riot squad or come from behind, grab protestors, usually leaders or agitators and remove them from the protest. This is a highly psychological move meant to intimidate and disorganize the protestors. Snatch squads are usually in the back of the line and they don’t have shields or weapons.

Snatch Squads for quickly arresting agitators

Constructing Barricades – The last line of defense is usually a barricade and are used by smaller forces to funnel the action of a larger crowd. Barricades are best placed at choke points to block passage of the riot and can be constructed from all manner of items. Barbed wire or concertina wire is a great deterrent for a barricade as is cars, downed trees, or fences. You can also use virtually any other large item like wood, stairs, doors, refrigerators, etc.

The goal of any type of riot control should be to disperse the crowd peacefully, but violent and even lethal force is allowed in the right circumstances. Don’t find yourself on the wrong side of a riot and keep an eye out Friday for what may happen. I think I’ll hit the grocery store tonight just in case.

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Riots are certainly possible even over something as seemingly minor. We saw what happened when a glitch in the EBT system caused a run on Wal-Mart in two towns in

 

From August 25th 2012 until over a year later, I slept and lived in my car in Los Angeles, California. I moved to Los Angeles for a dream and did not realize how expensive it was to live there. So I began planning in my head and thinking how I might save money and how I might get out of the frustrating living situation I was in at the time.

I decided living and sleeping in my car would be an idea that would satisfy both of those things I wanted for my life in Los Angeles. It was truly a survival experience.

Throughout my time sleeping and living in my car, I learned a tremendous amount. It was a very tough time as well. But it did in fact help me achieve my goals of saving money and being able to live on my “own” in my car. It didn’t come easy getting that life though. There were many learning experiences.

There are many different aspects when it comes to sleeping and living in your car successfully.

Living in your car takes a plethora of survival skills. It truly is a “survival” experience attempting to live in your car.

How to Live In a Car, Van, or RV

I was doing this so I could save money and get ahead in life. You have to sacrifice in life if you want to get ahead in life. That’s what I have learned. Especially in this economy today, you never know when hardship may hit and having these survival skills in your pocket may just save your life one day when you experience hardship.

I saved a great deal of money and had extra money I wouldn’t have had if I was paying rent somewhere.

I am going to go over a few key aspects it takes to successfully live in your car. Even if you never have to live in your car in your life, it’s good to be prepared. You never know what life may throw your way one day.

What to do for Food:

When it comes to food, there are many options when living in your car. My purpose living in my car was saving as much money as I could. So I keep that in mind when thinking about food.

  1. Canned Foods: There are canned foods such as beans, pastas, and tuna. Have a can opener ready or preferably have an easy to open top. That makes things much easier. Like canned fruits or fruits in plastic cups work as well. They store well too.
  2. Peanut butter and Jelly sandwiches are easy to make in a car. Just have a plastic knife to use to make it.
  3. Homeless shelters: Sometimes or much of the time homeless shelters give free food away as well. Just find one in your local area.
  4. Protein Bars: These are pre-packaged, somewhat healthy and easy to eat on the go.
  5. Fast Food: This is a somewhat cheap and accessible option but I generally went for the foods that were in a grocery store as they were cheaper.

In grocery stores, they usually have a bakery or already-cooked foods section and these are somewhat affordable as well. I used to get 2 pieces of fried chicken and some potatoes and it was decently priced and nice to have some “real” food for a change sometimes.

A good sleeping area can make or break you living in your car.

Where to Sleep:

Where to sleep is probably one of the most key elements of sleeping in your car. A good sleeping area can make or break you living in your car. You have to find a place that is safe but also a place where you can stay on the down-low enough to not be noticed.

I personally slept at a 24-hour grocery store I used to work at. I lucked out. But I’d say if you can manage to sleep at a 24-hour store somewhere that would be good. Or in a neighborhood that is safe where you can stay under the radar.

Once you do find that place you have to make sure to do everything you can to not be noticed.

Your car has to be primed and ready.

I had dark tint on my windows some of the time I slept in my car. If you don’t, you can put dark towels up in front of all windows. You have to be conspicuous though and make sure no one is around when you put them up. Just go to your spot, park, shut the car off and set the towels up. That is what I did. Make sure you choose the same place for sleeping every night. It makes things a lot easier. Don’t tell anyone where you sleep.

Have the radio off long before you get to your spot so you don’t draw any attention to yourself. Additional tip: do not open your doors once you get to your spot or get out of your car at all. It only draws more attention to yourself.

Where to take Showers:

Keeping your hygiene good is absolutely key to sleeping and living in your car and staying unnoticed. The more you are noticed the worse it is for you. You have to give an appearance you are not homeless. If not, you will be kicked out of a lot of places you may hang out at. I took showers at a gym. I got a monthly gym membership. It was only $40 a month. So it was not much. I got to both work out and get clean. I recommend having a backpack with everything you need for the shower and a combination lock to lock up your stuff while you are in the shower.

Where to Spend Your Spare Time At

There are a few options of where to hang out on your day off work or when you have free time.

Fast food chains. They usually have free WiFi for laptops. If you keep a low profile, it’s likely you will go generally unnoticed. Just make sure to keep to yourself for the most part. I didn’t even buy anything much of the time and no one cared to be honest.

Public libraries are great places to hang out in your spare time especially if you have a laptop. There is free WiFi that does not expire like many food places. There are usually a good amount of seats. It is nice and cool inside or warm depending on the climate where you live.

Malls are a decent area to hang out at as well. To find a seat and read a book or walk around. Just as long as you don’t have to pay for parking to be at a mall then it’s great.

The gym is a great place as well. You can work out for a while to kill time and be inside.

Also, if you have made any friends or anything like that, then that will help a ton as well.

Creativity can go a long way toward finding room in your car for necessities.

Key items to Keep in your Car:

  1. Gallon of drinking water: It’s important to always stay hydrated when living in your car. You are always going, always on the move much of the time. There were many times it was after work and I hadn’t had any water. It was always nice to have my gallon of water in the backseat under a towel. It costs about $.25 to fill it up at a grocery store.
  2. Pain medicine: Very useful when you have any kind of pain. There were many times while I was living in my car, it was late at night and my head was throbbing. It was nice to reach in my little soccer bag and take some pain medicine and be able to sleep peacefully after that.
  3. Car Fan: At night time I find it tough to sleep without some background noise, so a car fan came in handy. It costs about $20 at an automotive store. It is enough wattage to be on all night and not kill the battery. Many nights it is too hot to sleep in a car without a fan. In the summer time, if I didn’t have a fan I would have suffered greatly.
  4. Power Inverter: This is a device you can plug into your cigarette lighter and charge your laptop, cell phone, or any other electronic device as long it is a small enough wattage. It costs about $20 at many stores. Be careful what you charge. Some things will kill the battery if you charge it too long. Try to charge things while driving when possible because it doesn’t use the battery. The one I had had was 100 watts, which means anything you charge has to generally generate less electricity than that.
  5. Sleeping Bag: A good sleeping bag is key in any environment. Even in Los Angeles, in the winter and many times other seasons of the year as well I needed it. If I hadn’t had a good sleeping bag, I would have frozen and been very uncomfortable the entire night.
  6. Snacks/ Food: It is important to always have some sort of food in your car. Preferably on the floor on the passenger seat side as I did. I used that section for my food. It was easy when I got hungry, I could just reach over and grab a banana to eat when I needed it. It’s crucial to always have at least some stuff ready to eat anytime you may need it. Not eating can cause many problems. There were many times after work I was extremely hungry and was leaving work and had a piece of fruit I reached for and ate right from my car.
  7. Jumper Cables: Sometimes for a couple different reasons, I found that my car battery died and I needed a jump. Most likely because I left the lights on or I charged my electronics too long without driving. It was a pain standing in front of a store asking people if they had jumper cables. I eventually got some jumper cables so when my car battery died, all I had to do was ask anyone who had a car around me if they could give me a jump rather than also having to ask them if they had jumper cables too.
  8. Vitamin C: Living in your car is not a normal thing obviously. There is more wear and tear and hardship than if you had a place to live. So it’s important to keep your immune system up. Vitamin C boosts the immune system. Anything you can consume with a lot of Vitamin C is great. Oranges or any drinks that have vitamin C in them are great. You cannot afford to get sick in your car when you already have enough other things to worry about.
  9. Spare Keys Container: Having spare keys around are very important while sleeping in your car. You never know when you may need them. I kept a spare key for my car always in my wallet. Also, I went to an automotive store and got 2 containers for about $10 that store keys and have a magnetic cylinder on the back so you can connect it to any metal at the bottom of your car for when you lose or lock your keys in your car. Make sure to put it where no one can see it. Make sure no one knows it is there. Only you.

There are many important aspects to surviving living in one’s car. These are a few of the key ones. The key thing is keeping a low profile in all you do. That way, you can have the longevity to stay in your car as long as you need to.

You have to stay mentally strong and continually aware and focused of everyone and everything around you. Keep your head up. Always know it is not forever and is only a temporary situation.

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  From August 25th 2012 until over a year later, I slept and lived in my car in Los Angeles, California. I moved to Los Angeles for a dream and did

I wrote an article titled Pray for the Best but Prepare for the Worst and in it and I asked a question of the reader. The question was about how you view prepping. One of the possible suggestions was that you may look at prepping as some type of insurance policy. One of our readers, Larry had this to say:

“I like the idea of looking at prepping as a kind of self-insurance policy. It’s the best kind of insurance; even if you never need it you still have something to show for all of the “premiums” paid over the years.”

I thought that was great conclusion and I agreed completely. Larry took my hypothetical to its logical conclusion and he is totally correct in that this insurance (prepping) actually gives you something even if you never have to use it. With traditional car or home insurance you pay money for peace of mind; for the off chance that something may go wrong. If nothing goes bad, your money or investment is gone isn’t it? You may pay for car insurance for years without ever using it and for those of us who haven’t been in a wreck, how many years of insurance payments have you made? I know that in the entire time my wife and I have been married we have never claimed anything on the car insurance. Part of me says, what could I have done with all that money but still I have and see the wisdom in insurance. I do agree it is smart and something we need to do for those just in case times.

I know there are some who may say, well you can get a Whole Life policy and if you want, you can get your money back at maturity. Others will say what if something would have happened to your cars or home – you would have appreciated that insurance then, right? Fair enough, but the point I am trying to get to is that some people (maybe your spouse?) look at prepping as a giant money pit and that this stuff we are purchasing, or storing up could be worthless if nothing bad ever happens. Why buy any supplies on the slim chance that you will need them? To me prepping is so much more than a simple insurance policy for disaster. It is an investment for your family. I believe that if you do this right, prepping could be the only investment that never fails on you and always pays dividends.

You Need To Diversify

Most of you will remember Y2K and the noise that we heard for years leading up to that time in our lives. As a brief recap, there was a general consensus from “the experts” that at the stroke of midnight on December 31st 1999, the computers all over the world would flip to 2000 and not know what to do because the year would be 00. This would confuse them so much because they would think it was 1900 or 1400, not 2000 and everything would cease to work. Planes would fall from the sky and power plants would shut down. Cats and Dogs would be living together and mass Anarchy would ensue. By now you all know what happened when the clock struck midnight.

Y2K – The disaster that wasn’t

I remember the run up to that New Years because of all the buzz that we had been subjected to for years about that date and the potential for pandemonium. Also, because I grew up listening to Prince’s ‘1999’ and felt that it was my duty to send this year out with a bang. I wondered what type of epic party we should have to commemorate the end of the millennium and pay homage to this anthem of my youth. The evening of December 31st rolled around and we had invited some friends over. I didn’t buy into the hype of Y2K too much but since I was the responsible father and husband (and thus I didn’t really party at all like Prince was telling me too) I had some candles, canned food and a few gallons of water stored. With our survival supplies safely tucked away in the cabinets of our laundry room, we watched the countdown. As the ball dropped in Times Square I was glued to the TV waiting for the end of the world to happen. I expected the TV to flick off, the power go out and the street lights to stop shining on our street. Instead, the ball hit the bottom, everyone yelled Happy New Year and I kissed my wife.

I was a little disappointed.

Not at only being able to kiss my wife, but the hype we had been hearing about for years turned out to be largely unwarranted it seemed. Nothing at all happened and while that is a good thing, there were people who had seriously worried about this event. They had purchased all of the survival weapons they needed, backup generators and months’ worth of food. Most of the same things that I recommend more or less on Final Prepper. The problem was they purchased everything for a specific event and when that event didn’t materialize the way they expected, some of these preppers felt like fools.

Since that time, I have heard from more than one person who got their start in prepping by finding someone who was selling all of their Y2K purchased supplies cheaply on Craigslist. Since the world didn’t end, why would they need a generator anymore? If the computers didn’t think we were all still in the 1900s why would they need all that survival food? Forget the garden; grocery stores are still open so why bother?

You have to have a long-term investment strategy

I want as many people as possible to be prepared and that is the main purpose of Final Prepper. There are reasons that people find our site and get into what I like to call the lifestyle of Prepping because I for one don’t think you should plan for any single event. Prepping for me is a way of living for all manner of circumstances. You don’t have to have the world end on you to need some preparations and the computers don’t have to stop working for you to experience an emergency.

Preparing for a single event does two things in my opinion. First, it blinds you to other possibilities and narrows your focus when you should be expanding it. I really like the TV show Doomsday Preppers even though it has a lot of flaws. I like this show because I get ideas from the people and situations portrayed, but I don’t agree with how they showcase a lot of these people. I think that in an ideal world each of these preppers should have someone there to tell them if they are doing anything that is going to reflect poorly on them. Can’t anyone stop them from making those mistakes? I digress… Each prepper that is shown is preparing for something. The “event” usually falls into one of several buckets (economic collapse, nuclear war, natural disasters on steroids caused by global warming, pandemic) and all of their preps seem to be geared toward surviving these specific events.

What if none of those things ever happen? Will you or their families looks at all of these efforts as a waste of time? Remember the last event that was supposed to wipe out the world? 2012 was the new Y2K. The Mayan calendar ended at the year 2012 and so the world was supposed to end also, but just like Y2K, nothing happened. The people who planned for this event and told their friends and family about this event appear to have egg on their faces right? Now all the supplies they bought are worthless because the world didn’t end. I don’t agree at all but to counter this I think you have to look at prepping differently.

This highlights the second problem with prepping for a single event. If that event doesn’t happen you give yourself the chance to feel like you failed, or that you overreacted and others will have a way to say you were wrong. Unless you have really thick skin, this can get almost anyone down and demoralize you when that shouldn’t be the case at all if you are prepping.

I have said it before on Final Prepper that I am not prepping for any one specific thing. I am prepping for anything. It doesn’t matter what happens (or doesn’t) my preps are geared to keep my family alive and safe. If nothing ever happens, the primary preps I have made are still valuable and my investments in time and money aren’t wasted.

All of the food we have purchased can be eaten and is eaten so that it is rotated. The worst case scenario is that we have to eat some freeze dried food for dinner. Our water, even if we never run out can still go into our garden to grow the crops we eat or to hydrate our animals. Our firearms that have been purchased will almost never lose value and can be sold if I so choose but most likely will still be used to hunt with each year and provide protection for my family. The backup power is always available for camping or social events and the outdoor gear is perfect for guess what? Getting outdoors. Its the same with extra medicine, first aid supplies, tarps, duct tape, tools and vehicle survival kits.

I can’t think of anything except maybe a gas mask that would not have a use in the real world regardless of whether we ever see a disaster or not. All of our supplies have multiple uses and I will not feel like a failure if nothing ever happens. I won’t be disappointed if our economy doesn’t collapse. I will not feel like I wasted money if the zombies never show up on our street.

Prepping is something I do to invest in the security and safety of my family. Prepping is what I do to enable our family to be more self-reliant and that will never be a bad strategy in my opinion.

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I wrote an article titled Pray for the Best but Prepare for the Worst and in it and I asked a question of the reader. The question was about how

Far too long ago I was given a copy of the book  “More food from small spaces” by Margaret Clark to review. Her book has been staring at me for well over a month even though I have been reading it off and on I kept delaying the review. Finally I was able to sit down and put my thoughts to word document on this very interesting and valuable resource for anyone trying to start a garden or preppers who are looking for additional resources and ideas for their existing plots.

The premise of Margaret’s book is a concept she came up with for growing food if you are limited in the space you have to use. Most of us feel that if we don’t have 20 acres of plowed fields we won’t be able to feed our family and that isn’t necessarily true. Having less room like most suburbanites and definitely city dwellers shouldn’t mean that you can’t grow a large variety of healthy food in abundance. Margaret was faced with a similar problem of limited space after a remodel of her home and used the methods she describes in her book to full advantage. The end result was “More food from small spaces”.

Before I get into the actual review, I want to briefly describe why this concept is appealing and pertinent to a wide variety of people. If you are prepping, chances are you want to be prepared for any one of a number of events that can disrupt your lives. Outside of the fear of bodily injury, food is probably the next biggest concern. Having your own supply of food you can grow and eat pays you back in several ways. First, it makes you less reliant on grocery stores and the fluctuations of any market prices or availability. Disruptions in the food supply would be less severe if you were growing your own. Secondly, growing your own food is healthier and if you don’t believe me just wait until you have eaten the first tomato you grew in your own yard. The flavors and nutrition of vegetables you grow yourself will blow away anything shipped from other countries in containers.

Margaret has created an excellent resource guide that gives anyone looking for tips and ideas on how to grow more food smarter. Less is more in her book and she does a great job of explaining with plenty of examples and photographs of how its done.

Denser, Deeper, Higher, Longer

Without giving away all of the details, Margaret’s concept is called the Center Square Plan. Using this plan you increase the available square footage you can grow in. This gives you more productive land per square foot and makes maintaining your garden easier at the same time. One of my biggest gripes about gardening are the weeds. In her concept, weeds don’t have any room to grow. By placing your growing areas closely together and growing up instead of out you can increase yield and reduce the amount of maintenance you have to spend pulling weeds.

By using simple plans for a PVC greenhouse anyone can build she increases the length of time she can grow vegetables too. All of her plans are clearly documented in her book. There are very descriptive photos and you can see some of the benefits of her system in this movie below.

You can watch several other movies on her YouTube channel as well.

In addition to laying out the garden area, building the greenhouse and managing all of the finer points of growing in small spaces, Margaret offers a lot of additional information that you need in addition to growing food. She covers how to make your soil more fertile and gives an excellent recipe and instructions for making your own EM Bokashi to break down your compost much faster by using Microorganisms. She covers seed saving and gets into other normal garden issues like discouraging common pests, harvesting rainwater. She also covers what you need to know when your garden starts bursting forth with all of your delicious bounty. How to can, freeze and dehydrate food is covered in a very easy to follow way again with simple instructions and documented with a lot of photos.

I was really surprised at the level of detail in this book and it fits perfectly with the type of information I am looking for. It is not an encyclopedia of knowledge but this is an excellent guide that not only gives you a detailed overview of her method but has tons of useful information for storing and living off of your garden. That should be something that anyone can use.

You can purchase More food from small spaces on Amazon an if you are looking for ways to make your garden more productive or just starting from scratch, this book will give you a great plan for getting there and would make a good resource that you can learn from over and over.

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Far too long ago I was given a copy of the book  “More food from small spaces” by Margaret Clark to review. Her book has been staring at me for

I am always refining my prepping plans and the associated tools and gear I think will help improve my situation if the worst should happen. Some people go through life believing that nothing bad will ever happen but that isn’t the audience of this site. You are here because you want to proactively take steps to ensure that if something bad does happen, you will have a plan for how to survive or even just cope better than people who do nothing.

Coping without power is one area of my preps that I have a few different options but my 100,000 KW solar array that pivots with the rotation of the Earth is still just a pipe dream for me. I do have a generator and a decent supply of fuel and oils to keep that going for a while, but generators have their own drawbacks. For starters, they need fuel and in a real disaster, getting fuel might be next to impossible. Secondly, they are noisy and when the power is out, the sound of a generator carries for miles.

Maybe you don’t worry about the noise, but it is something I consider. Solar is about the best option I can think of for grid down power but to replace the electric company you need a pretty expensive system. Also, you can’t take a decent sized solar array with you easily. There are smaller more compact options though and I am always curious to hear about them.

The Dynamo Plus is a lightweight battery pack with an integrated 25W, flexible solar panel. The P3 Solar rep told me that this system was being used by the military and I can believe it from my initial use and experience. When I opened the pouch I was already thinking about how this would work in my bug out bag.

The two best features of this offering are the battery and the solar panel, but the entire kit comes with just about any connector you could reasonably need for charging a device.

When I received the Dynamo Plus it was already charged to about 75% but I wanted to test out just how many devices I could charge off the battery in a single charge so I plugged the battery into the wall and brought the charge up to 100% pretty quickly. It must have been very nearly already fully charged.

The next day I threw the battery into my bag and went to work and proceeded to run my iPhone into the ground. It’s funny how downloading a couple of movies will drain the battery and I wasn’t too far into Hotel Transylvania (before anyone comments, it was for my kids) before my iPhone 6S shut off due the battery being dead.

Using the P3 Solar to charge your devices

I hooked my phone up to the Dynamo with the included adapter cable and stared charging. My phone was completely charged in about 2 hours. Speaking of cables, the Dynamo Plus comes with quite a few of them for various needs.

  • Wall Charger: AC/100V-240V
  • Car Charger: 15V/1A
  • Jumper Cables: 12V—200A auto start
  • Notebook Connectors: 8 sizes supported
  • Solar panel Converter: 14.5V regulated
  • Just about any Apple cord you could need.

The battery still showed almost ¾ of a charge so I decided to drain the battery on the family iPad too. Again, Hotel Transylvania was played, repeatedly in this case to drain the battery and then I started charging the iPad.

The charge on the iPad only got up to 64% but that was on top of the iPhone’s full charge. I didn’t try another phone but I would assume on a full charge this battery could top off a few phones or one iPad completely. Either way, this was a good option to have if the power went out. But the real benefit isn’t just the battery; it is the ability to recharge that battery with the sun.

So, with the battery completely dead, I set up the solar panels in the yard and walked away. Once the cable was connected the battery started showing it was charging by the lights on the side almost immediately. My plan was to leave the panel in the sun for 4 hours to see if I could charge it fully, but something else happened.

Backup Battery for your car

As fate would have it, one of my kids was trying to start a car that I have that has been sitting for a couple of months and the battery had died. This was the perfect opportunity to try out the jump starting feature of the diminutive Dynamo Plus system so I unhooked the battery from the solar panel and grabbed the jumper cable adapter.

I had only been charging the battery in the sun for about 2 hours so I didn’t know if I would even have enough juice to jump the car, but after connecting the terminals and giving the key a twist, she started right up. Pretty impressive.

What is even more impressive in my opinion is that it did it again. Right after we jumped the car the first time, I took it out to wash it and mistakenly turned off the ignition. Fortunately my wife was right down the street and instead of using the jumper cables I had her bring me the Dynamo which still had only been charged for two hours and it fired up my car again.

Overall Impressions of the Dynamo Plus

Having a source of solar power and a battery that can hold a substantial enough charge to power multiple devices or even jump-start your car is a good prepper supply item in my book. If the power goes out, we can pull this handy device out to top off our phones, recharge batteries for ham radios or headlamps or GPS units or run radios or laptops.

My only problem was with the cable that connects the jumper cables to the battery unit. The plug sets deeply into the battery unit and when I pulled it out, I must have pulled the wire because my ground wire pulled out of the socket. I think I can fix this with some simple solder work but it is something you want to be mindful of. Don’t pull the wire.

The battery also has a light on the end so it can also double as a flashlight if you need it to. The whole package sells for $399 on the Amazon site and if you are looking for a backup battery option with solar charging ability to boot, the Dynamo Plus might be worth looking at. I consider this a great addition to my overall preps.

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I am always refining my prepping plans and the associated tools and gear I think will help improve my situation if the worst should happen. Some people go through life

 

In an ideal world when a SHTF scenario takes place you’d be wearing your bullet proof vest and have immediate access to your hand gun and assault rifle. Unfortunately this may not be the case because of several factors. The laws in your country might prohibit you from carrying any weapons or the place you are attending might not allow you to carry weapons, such as universities and hospitals. So how do you defend yourself using unarmed combat skills if you get stuck in such an unpleasant situation? This article will go through the steps involved in defending yourself from the initial assessment of the threat, how to avoid or eliminate the threat with your bare hands or with any improvised weapon that you’re likely to come across in everyday life.

Assess the threat

As with everything else, the first step is to assess the situation. The extent of your assessment will obviously depend on the prevailing circumstances. You can’t take out pen and paper and start drafting an action plan if there’s a hyped up guy slashing with a machete right in front of your face. Each situation warrants a different level of assessment. An imminent threat requires split second decisions that are mostly based on muscle memory acquired through hours of training whilst a hostage situation requires careful planning. Whatever the situation, the aim of your assessment is to identify any weaknesses of your opponent, availability of improvised weapons and escape routes. We’ll cover all these aspects in the sections below.

Basics of Self Defense

When faced with a threat you have two opposing options; fight or flight. Backing off from a confrontation might make you feel like a pussy but it’s better to feel that way for a few days rather than being killed or injured because of your pride. If you decide to run away from a confrontation/threat you have to be sure that you can run faster than your opponent, avoid any weapons he may attack you with whilst you are running (mostly applicable to firearms), and find adequate shelter before he catches up with you. If this is not possible then you’d better stand your ground and fight because once you turn your back on your opponent you’ll become much more vulnerable.

The human body has multiple weak spots that you can target to your advantage.

Once you’ve decided to fight, or are forced to fight your way out, there are some basics you have to keep in mind. The fundamental principle of self-defense is to reduce to the least extent possible the damage your body receives in the attack. Key areas to protect are your entire head and face and vital organs in your torso. However do not underestimate the importance of your limbs. You won’t be able to attack with enough force if your arm/s gets injured and you’ll have problems standing and moving about if your leg/s gets injured. How you protect yourself will depend on how you’re being attacked. We’ll go through these in the coming sections.

The next principle is to stop your assailant from what he is doing. This is achieved by hitting a delicate part of your opponent’s body with a tough part of your own body (or any hard object that comes to hand). Your attack should be vicious and aggressive. This is not the time to have sympathy. You want to cause intense pain and damage in as little time as possible in order to neutralize the assailant.

Tough Parts of the Body

  • Knuckles
  • Elbows
  • Knees
  • Sole of the foot
  • Forehead

Delicate Parts of the Body

  • Temple
  • Eyes
  • Nose
  • Jaw
  • Neck/throat
  • Solar plexus
  • Ribs
  • Kidneys
  • Groin
  • Knees (when hit from the sides)

Unarmed Assailant

When your assailant is unarmed it’s a fight on equal par and the outcome will depend on strength, stamina, technique, aggressiveness and as always a bit of luck. Although it’s important to be aggressive don’t forget about defending yourself and protecting your vitals. If you get injured, you drastically reduce your chance of winning that fight. Once into the fight do your utmost to knockout (make unconscious) your opponent or cause an injury that makes him harmless. Do not start throwing useless punches and kicks in the air like a drunkard. Instead aim all your shots and focus on making contact with most if not all your attacks. Hit with all your strength but make sure not to lose your balance. Do not opt for fancy spinning kicks and that stuff unless you’re a professional kick boxer. Aim your kicks to his knees to knock him off-balance and aim your punches to his face and ribs if you get the opportunity. Do not unnecessarily expose yourself whilst attacking and always be ready to block his attacks. Follow these basics and you’re likely to be the one standing next to an unconscious body.

Armed with a Knife

When faced with an opponent with a bladed weapon you must concentrate on that weapon and move in such a way that it never contacts your body. Keep at a distance and let your opponent slash and trust in vain. You have to wait for your opportunity to move in swiftly and grab hold of the hand holding the weapon. Do not grab the weapon from the blade. Your best chance of moving in is when he has swung the blade and is about to slash back. Once you gain hold of his weapon bearing hand hit him with all you’ve got but never let go off the hand. When you feel that he’s become weak enough, grab the weapon bearing hand with both your arms and twist it ferociously to break as many bones as possible. At this point he should drop the weapon or loosen enough his grip such that you can safely take it away from him. Once the weapon is in your hand, it’s up to you how to proceed but keep in mind there might be repercussions, both legal and psychological, if you decide to end his life.

Armed with a Firearm

An assailant with a firearm is much more difficult to disarm due to the extended range and deadliness of the weapon. Here your initial approach will be drastically different in that you want to come in physical contact with your assailant. You’ll have to do this gradually whilst distracting your assailant with conversation or a decoy. Once close enough your objective will be to grab the gun by the barrel and hold the gun pointing away from you and ideally away from other people. Movies and some martial arts experts demonstrate techniques to disarm an assailant with a gun pointing towards your head/torso. I am not judging the capabilities of these individuals but I strongly suggest you do not try this technique. All the assailant has to do is squeeze the trigger. This only takes a split second and your attempt to twist the gun might actually be what causes the trigger pull. The approach I suggest is much safer. Wait for a moment when your assailant points the gun in another direction. This is likely to happen whilst he is shouting instructions and uses the armed hand to point towards what he’s talking about. As soon as the gun is pointing in a safe direction, grab the gun by the barrel (obviously without any part of your hand obstructing the barrel’s end) and hit the assailant with all you’ve got. It’s interesting to note that if the firearm is a pistol it will shoot the loaded round when the trigger is pulled but it will not cycle another round since you will be hindering the slide’s motion. Be careful in the case of a revolver due to the hot gases escaping from around the cylinder. If it is a long firearm, grab the barrel with both hands so that you can exert more leverage. Obviously in the latter case you’ll have to attack with your lower limbs.

Arm Yourself – Improvised Weapons

Even a fire extinguisher makes an effective weapon. Spray the compound to blind your attacker and then bash them over the head with the empty cylinder.

This article is about unarmed combat in view of situations where you’re not carrying any weapons. This however doesn’t mean that you shouldn’t try to arm yourself with whatever might come handy. The following are a few ideas of easily obtainable weapons in everyday life.

Sticks such as a broom, billiard or long umbrella-You can swing such sticks to keep your assailant at bay but usually such sticks are fragile and immediately break upon impact dealing very little damage to the target. Instead use ‘weak’ sticks like you would use a lance. They will be less likely to break and will deal a lot of damage due to the low surface area which results in a lot of pressure.

Metal pen-This has a very short reach but you could easily incapacitate someone by stabbing him in the eyes or neck. You can also use a metal pen for pressure points techniques to subdue an assailant. This however requires training.

Stones or any other hard object such as a soda can (full)-These can be used as projectiles especially when you have an ample supply of them. If you’ve got only one it might be better to hold on to it and use it for battering your opponent.

Chair or stool-These can be used as a shield and to keep your assailant at bay as well as for striking. Obviously they can be thrown in the typical western movie style.

Fire extinguisher-You can direct the escaping gas (CO2 will be extremely cold), water, foam or powder in your assailants face. You can also use the cylinder as a battering device or throw it at him. You could even approach the assailant from above and simply drop the fire extinguisher on him.

Stiletto Shoes-If you or anyone accompanying you is wearing stiletto shoes, take them off. You’ll be able to move with more agility (be careful if there is glass or other sharp or hot objects on the ground) and you can use it for stabbing just like you would with a metal pen.

Conclusion

You never know when things are going to turn sour. We do our best to always be prepared to defend ourselves but we might end up in a threatening situation whilst we’re officially unarmed. That doesn’t mean we’re all gonna die. It means that we have to prepare for that scenario like we would for any other. Always be alert of your surroundings and book yourself for a few self-defense classes and keep practicing those techniques. You’ll be glad you have if the need ever arises.

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  In an ideal world when a SHTF scenario takes place you’d be wearing your bullet proof vest and have immediate access to your hand gun and assault rifle. Unfortunately this

This is not your uncle’s camping axe!

I am not an expert with edged weapons, even though I have a trunk-load of them, including the old Buck hunting knife that my Dad gave me when I was a teenager many moons ago. So with that said, I wanted to share my latest prize, which was a Christmas gift from my son-in-law who is a serving USMC Officer who enlisted in the Corps and became a sniper. After his combat tour he was ‘mustang-ed’ into the officer’s program, and our entire family is very proud of him.

So back to my ‘gift’… I have seen and held a few axes, including what are known as ‘battle axes’, which have little utility in survival situations. The particular axe that is in the photos herein was designed and is built to USMC specs as a tactical survival axe by Elite Tactical. The USMC Tactical Survival Axe is no ordinary survival axe… it carries in its design the experience of the USMC.

The USMC Tactical Survival Axe

This axe is the real-deal, bad boy! The first thing I noticed when I picked it up is that it is a balanced instrument. As I said, I’m not an expert in edged weapons, but I strongly suspect that this axe could be effectively used as a throwing weapon (with practice). It is built like a tank and utilizes a combination of a corrosion free heavy-duty nylon fiber handle and a special stainless steel alloy for the axe-head. In addition to the large edge for chopping and splitting wood (etc.), the opposite pick end is effective for a host of uses, including piercing light gauge steel. So as we see, this unique axe is a hybrid between a camp axe and a battle-axe.

There’s more to this tactical axe than expected

But there’s more to this axe than meets the eye… the end of the handle has an ‘O’-ring sealed threaded cap complete with a very useful length of paracord. And when you remove this robust cap, set inside the heavy alloy handle cap is a high-quality compass! Inside the axe handle is another spring-loaded container that protrudes when the cap is removed, and inside that cylinder are additional goodies; a stainless steel fishing hook, a nice long length of fishing line, a bandage, a striker and half-dozen waterproof matches. There was room, so I added a curved sewing needle and nylon thread suitable for suturing flesh wounds or mending clothing to my kit.

You can get more details about the USMC Tactical Survival Axe by going to this specs page.

Being prepared today means being ready for tomorrow.

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This is not your uncle’s camping axe! I am not an expert with edged weapons, even though I have a trunk-load of them, including the old Buck hunting knife that my

I received an email the other day asking for advice on how to get a loved one on board with prepping.  This is a subject I have wanted to write about for a while because I have had these same thoughts and struggles with various loved ones in my own life as each of you. I won’t try to convince you that I am an expert and there is no book forthcoming, but I do have personal experience of my own challenges of trying to convince someone about prepping and wanted to share this and my perspectives with you. I share these like most of my articles in the hopes that someone reading can gain some small bit of knowledge or a suggestion that may help you in your own personal prepping journey and that this information can equip you to be prepared or make your life easier.

Why do we care about this in the first place? It should be perfectly obvious to everyone the reasons for prepping, shouldn’t it? They make perfect sense to me and it is just logical. I mean how can you not see what I am worried about? If you haven’t caught on by now, everyone isn’t like you. No matter how close someone is to you they have their own opinions, their own experiences, fears, doubts, stresses and priorities. Even two people who live under the same roof and who have been married for years can see things completely differently.  A lot of things…

When I started to “wake up” to the realization that our society is pretty fragile and notice the everyday threats that I was ignoring, the first person I wanted to tell was my wife. I didn’t break it to her slowly either. I think I read a few books and did a ton of research on the internet and then one night as we were getting ready for bed I hit her with my whole list of concerns and everything I needed to purchase before the grid went down. This did not go over well. As you might expect, or have possibly even witnessed yourself, my wife pretty much looked at me and said “That’s crazy”. It was my first attempt at convincing someone else (who I cared for) of something I was so sure about and I failed miserably.  The sting was worse because if anyone would understand and support me it would be my spouse, right? Wrong.

When I started prepping in earnest it drove my every thought and it still occupies a good part of my daily plans. To me, this new perspective helped my family to become more prepared, but I didn’t have a lot of support or understanding at first. Convincing someone of a new or completely foreign concept is not an easy task. Especially when that concept takes them well outside of their comfort zone, costs a lot of money or could cause them embarrassment.

Understand your audience

I have a lot of people I care for in my life or I should say a lot of different types of people I care for. There is my immediate family which I consider as my wife and kids. Our parents and siblings are the second tier, and then close friends, casual friends or co-workers and everyone else.  I want each one of these people to be aware of the threats that could disrupt our lives and to prepare accordingly. However, I can’t talk to a casual friend with the same openness as my spouse obviously. I wouldn’t tell a co-worker all of my plans hopes and fears with the same comfort as my siblings or parents.

Understanding your audience is a key factor to consider anytime you are having a conversation in which you are trying to persuade them to your point of view. The more you know about a person the better you will be prepared to discuss prepping with them in a way that is going to keep them comfortable and open to conversation. Some of this plays out for me in subtle ways like asking leading questions or using current events to sell a point. If I had a co-worker that I wanted to talk to about prepping I would first wait for the right opportunity. If a situation presented itself, like the recent bombings in Boston, and the subject came up you could broach being prepared with them. How you do that though is going to be different than how you would be with your brother or sister. Try to match your fervor and energy level to the level of interest you perceive in the person you are talking to. Actually, I try to keep my tone one step below where they are at. Here is an example.

Your co-worker comes up to you and brings up hurricane Sandy and how tragic it is that people were without power for weeks and had to wait in gas lines. You could offer words like “I feel sorry for them. That’s why I have some extra gas stored for emergencies” because “you never know what could happen”.  I think it’s important to say this with a humble attitude and not a “those people are idiots” tone. This may lead to other questions or it may die right there, but you left the impression on your co-worker that someone has thought about things like this and won’t be as out of luck if the same scenario were to happen to you. They may come back to you later with other questions or this could just be a spark that gets them thinking. Sometimes I think that the first step to thinking about prepping is hearing that someone you know and respect is thinking about the same thing already.

Focus on the need, not the reason

Many times I have tried to convince my spouse of the impending doom or disasters lurking around the corner and I believe that in some cases this isn’t the best approach. My wife would have two initial reactions to my conspiracy theories or inflated statements about the quickly approaching end of the world. First, she would want to convince me that I am wrong about whatever my subject was. My wife is very smart and knows a fair amount of history so she has a wealth of knowledge to draw upon which takes us further away from where I am trying to go. In my mind I am only trying to get her on board with my prepping. But by telling her some of the reasons (the more alternative reasons) for prepping, she forgets about the need and focuses on debunking my theories. Secondly, she did not want to believe that anything is hopeless. For her, if we truly were headed for a disaster or economic collapse, what was the point in trying? In this situation, rather than convince her what we need to do to live, I was making her feel more helpless. My job was to reverse that thinking quickly.

I have learned through many of these discussions that my wife simply doesn’t have the same view on a lot of things that I do but that is perfectly fine. She can easily see the benefit in having food after watching the shelves empty after the threat of a snow storm. She can appreciate having a few dozen gallons of gas when the gas station pumps are no longer working. She can imagine going without toilet paper because we don’t have any and the stores are closed or having to have an alternate plan for cooking if the power is off. It is sometimes easier to let the person you are trying to convince think about the end situation you are describing (hunger, gas rationing, cities on lock-down) than the potential reasons for these scenarios.

After several arguments about the various forces I believe that are conspiring to create our very own SHTF future, I switched tactics. I didn’t try to convince my wife about zombies coming to eat everyone’s brains out, but I used real people reacting to real natural disasters to highlight what I wanted her to understand. When you can see on TV people who aren’t prepared and imagine how they must be suffering it is easier to picture yourself in that same situation. What I had been struggling with was not as big of an issue anymore. My wife started to imagine her family being without food because the power was out or the roads were closed and then me stocking up a month worth of food wasn’t such a big deal anymore.

Be happy with small victories

When I first told my wife all of my grand plans and concerns about the world, I had a fantasy in my mind that she would jump up immediately and say “OK, let’s get going. What do we need to do?”. I thought surely she would see the urgency of what I saw and would instantly be 100% behind me. That didn’t happen at all and I have had to content myself with a lot of smaller victories.

If you have someone in your life that you really love and are concerned with, you have to look at everything as a work in progress. Your marriage is not something you put a days worth of work into and then spend the rest of your life coasting. It is similar sometimes with prepping. You may be able to agree on storing up a month of food or making sure you have plenty of stored water, but firearms for security takes a lot longer. They may be perfectly fine with you building your own Get Home Bag, but balk at you wanting to get a concealed carry license.

Expect that you may not win this person or any person over immediately, but your actions and the way you live your life will be viewed over a period of months or possibly years. If you can get your parents to purchase a firearm for their security, but they think you would be insane to store any food, be happy they have a gun. Don’t discount everything because they aren’t riding next to you in your bug out vehicle with full-on camo ready for the end of the world. Like I said everyone has different views and priorities. You should be steady in your convictions, loving in your concern and let them see that you take this seriously. Over time, the people you are trying to convince will see how you act. It will ultimately be up to them to choose how they want to live.

Maintain respect and dignity

No matter how hard you try there will be some people who you may love very much who simply don’t see things the way you do. They may disagree with everything you say and as much as it hurts to do it, you might just have to let it go. Don’t try to convince them anymore, but you don’t have to shut yourself off from them. I have had disagreements with my father for instance.  I think I always treated him with respect even though I think he is wrong on some things. I am sure he feels the same, but it doesn’t matter what he believes because I still love him and hope that I never have to say “I told you so”. Now, I don’t think I would ever say that regardless of the situation but people will disagree with you and what will you do then?

At some point, hopefully before you have escalated things into a full-blown argument, you can simply agree to disagree. This is only going to reflect better on you and may make you more approachable later. Treat people with respect even though you think they are wrong or naive and they will think better of you for it. And, it will make you a better person too. Humility and knowing when to drop something are excellent traits.

At the end of the day, your job should be to prepare yourself and your family. Part of that responsibility as a leader is to get people on board with you. It may not happen overnight, but you have already decided to do everything you can to survive, right? You have to have the same conviction with the people you love. Never give up on them and always be there if they need you.

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I received an email the other day asking for advice on how to get a loved one on board with prepping.  This is a subject I have wanted to write