Getting Ready

It has been almost exactly one year since my last entry in this blog. I was not sure that I was going to continue writing it. However, with this country going the way it is going, I feel I have to come back and at least try to help some get ready for what I see coming. I am getting a very bad feeling about the direction this country is headed. With all of the scandals going on in our country's capitol and all of the cover up taking place I see things getting worse. With a narcissist in the oval office that is trying his best to change this country into a socialist utopia, we have no idea what he might do. However, with all of the things I see happening, both out in the open and partially hidden, I believe that we could be on the verge of a civil war. Another possibility is that things will get so bad that martial law will be implemented and in that case we would all be in plenty of trouble. It is with these possibilities that I restart this blog. Hopefully I will be restarting my political blog either this week or next week also. There are many entries in the archives of this and my other blog that are still pertinent. You may want to browse through them and pick subjects that you would like to know more about. However, I will be covering much of the same topics as in the past and in many cases with a slightly different take on things as times keep changing and we need to change with them. Please leave any comments that you deem appropriate. 

this week I am going a few things that I think are important to being ready. After this weeks tornado in Oklahoma I would like to suggest that everyone that can have an underground shelter. While I had one at my last residence, I have been lax about getting another one where I currently live. I hope to rectify that this summer. This shelter can serve a dual purpose. You can use it for storage of many of your survival supplies and it will be there when you need it. For those of you who live in cities where it would be impossible to build an underground shelter, learn where the closest one is. There are many methods of building these shelters and I may get into plans and building instructions as I build my own. If you live in a city and have a vacation place or retreat, build your shelter there. 

Again, I will say that food and water are the most important survival items that you can have. If you have not started to lay in a food supply there is no better time to begin than now. For those that just starting to lay in a food supply start with a three day supply, increase it to fifteen days, then to three months, next to one year and finally to the ideal I suggest which is two years. I will be covering this much more in the future but do not get suckered into having nothing but MREs or other freeze dried meals. I will get it to it more when I do a blog or two on food. Also on food, if you live where you can raise a garden, do so. A garden can extend your food supply by adding to it every year.

The next thing to make sure you have is firearms and ammo. You may for hunting and for self-preservation . Do not worry if you do not have a Bushmaster or and AK47  or AR15. While these are excellent weapons and if you can afford one and can practice with it enough to become proficient with it, by all means you should have one. However, if you already have firearms, bolt, pump, single or lever action, and cannot afford   one of the above do not worry about it. the important thing with any weapon is to be proficient with it and know how to care for it, including minor repairs. The second thing is to have enough ammo for the weapons you have. In the coming weeks I will be doing articles on firearms and will cover ammo. Many people severely underestimate the amount of ammo that they may need. 

The last thing I am going to mention today is the need for first aid and medical supplies. There is no telling on when or even if you could get to a doctor in an emergency. In the case of martial law you may not even be allowed to go to see a doctor. There are many things that you can do for yourself if you have the right equipment and the know-how. Again, I will be covering this much more in future blogs. I will be covering nature's many healing medicines, vitamins and supplements that can be used to replace prescription drugs, and many more interesting topics. 

I hope this is giving some of you something to think about and will help you in the near future. I am looking forward to getting back to writing this blog with fair regularity and look forward to some of you becoming followers and leaving comments for me. Hope to be back next week. 

                                                                              Books

As you noticed if you check this blog fairly regularly, I have not posted in some time. One of the reasons is that I have decided to only post when there is something that I feel is relevant at the time. I have so many posts already that I feel that I just wind up repeating myself. Anyone who would like help with anything only needs to leave a comment at the end of this blog and I will do my best to cover that subject within a week. Also, some of my posts may be shorter than in the past as I intend to cover only one subject and only exactly as much information as is needed to cover that subject.

I am writing on books this week as I believe there is a getting away from the printed page and going to electronic forms of information. Now, I am all for the electronic forms of information and use them myself. Thus I often get asked why anyone should take the time and space to have printed matter. It takes up room and it is outdated by the time you read it.

Lately I have been seeing more and more about the countries that are working to use computer software to take down our electricity grid, our communications, our water departments and anything else that would cripple this country. So far the names I have read are Russia, China and Iran although there are supposedly a couple of more. Possibly North Korea and who knows which of the Arab countries. This is the coming cyber war. Is it coming? I cannot say for sure, but I believe that the next war will be started by a cyber attack. That would be followed by a more conventional attack with planes and troops. Hopefully, this will never happen but if it ever does, we all need to be ready. We never know what rogue countries like Iran and North Korea will do and if Russia or China thought they could get the upper hand on us, well, they just might give it a try.

This is where books come in. If the power grid and communications are taken out, we will be left on our own. Then it will not be possible to just go online to get the information we need. If you have a library of how-to books on hand there will be a lot less that you will not be able to do. I own books on survival tactics, wild food, hunting, fishing, carpentry, welding, blacksmithing, automotive and many other subjects too numerous to mention. Counting our fiction books my wife and I have a library of over 3,000 books. I keep many of the fiction books as this would be recreation if all electricity and communications were down.

Most of the how-to books which I own were purchased used. Not a month goes by that I am not in some used book store or thrift store looking to see if there is something there that will fill a blank spot in my library. It is getting harder and harder to find things that I do not already have. I also go to several library old book sales a couple times a year and auctions that advertise books. Many of the books that I have purchased I only paid fifty cents or a dollar for. Many of them are old and talk about things that are no longer done in the way we currently do things and tools that are written about are no longer the tools that we use today. However, I feel that that is good because we may have to go back to using them when all of our power tools no longer have power. While cordless tools will be great, just make sure you have a solar charger for the tools.

So go out and buy some books about the things you feel that you are short on knowledge of so that you will have them in the future if needed. That is what being a true survivalist is all about, having what you need in an emergency. Go to Goodwill, Salvation Army, St. Vincent de Paul or any other thrift store and you will usually find many books. Get the ones you need and want and you will still not spend a lot of money.

I will next be writing about other things such as tools, radios, etc. that you need to stock up on for this type of a war. Stay tuned and as I stated, if you have questions or suggestions, write a comment. Until next time SURVIVE.

Check out my other blog at:
http://www.therealamericanpolitics.blogspot.com

and my online store at:
http://webstore.com/~knifeman
   

Lunch

Here we go with some more suggestions on what to take with you on your bug out. We covered breakfast a couple of entries ago so let's cover some items for lunch.

First of all let me say that lunch should be very light. It many times should be something that can be consumed on the go. If you are on a true bug out you may not want to take the time to stop and cook a meal. Having items in your pack that can be eaten on the run will be a blessing. Much of what I have is items I have prepared myself. First of all you should dehydrate as much fruit as you can to carry with you. I dehydrate apples, bananas, pineapple, tomatoes, peaches, pears and anything else that is in season that I can get. I dehydrate throughout the year so I wind up getting whatever is in season and keep it on hand. After I dehydrate one kind of fruit I like to put it into a quart Mason jar and seal it tight. After I have five or six different fruits on hand, I go out an purchase some mixed nuts. If I have a total of four quarts of fruit, I like to add one quart of mixed nuts. After I have them thoroughly mixed together, I then put them into individual vacuum bags of about one cup in each bag. This gives me twenty bags of vacuum sealed bags of the mixture, a supply of ten days for two people. Each year I use them on hunting and fishing trips and continue to rotate my stock by making more.

Pinole is another of my bug out lunch foods. This was a staple of the American Indian when they traveled. You need a pint of dry, sweet corn and you spread this on a cookie sheet. Place this cookie sheet in the oven at 350 degrees. This will parch the corn. When the corn is light brown, sprinkle two or three tablespoons of brown sugar evenly over the top and reheat until sugar begins to melt. Cool, place in home food grinder and grind. Put pinole in vacuum bags or in sip locks that are also sealed with wax. Pinole will last virtually forever and can be stored almost anywhere. You will probably want to make a half dozen batches of this.

Another thing I take along is Melba Toast. This is a hard dry bread product that you can vacuum seal and it will last a long, long time. It is great to munch on while you are hiking. Raisins are another thing that I take along, although I actually now prefer Craisins. These are cranberries that are dried and made like raisins. I sometimes put these in my fruit and nut mix but also carry some of each separately. These I usually carry in the little packets that they come in. This way I can just munch on them as I move.

There will be times that a hot meal is needed at lunch. For these times I carry Ramen Noodles and other items that all you need to add is hot water. Bullion cubes of both chicken and beef are always in my pack along with tea bags and instant coffee. Just having a cup of beef bullion soup along with one or two slices of Melba toast (I pack mine two to a vacuum bag) makes a pretty good lunch. The instant coffee is either in the individual packets or packed in a zip lock. I usually also take along a zip lock with some Tang orange juice powder in it. This is to kill the taste of water after purifying it, either by boiling or, preferably with purification tablets.

I have also used things like dried beef that comes in the small jars. I remove it from the jar and vacuum seal it in vacuum bags. This makes a nice treat from time to time. These are just a few of the things that you can get ready for your bug out pack. I talk about using them and taking them with me and I do. The reason I do this is that I use my hunting and fishing trips to check out different items for use. There are many more items that you can find right on your grocer's shelves. One thing I did not mention, which I have made, is pemmican. I will try to include the recipe either when I do the main meal menu or in another future entry.

Unless something comes up in the meantime that I feel is really important my next entry will be on items for the main meal of the day. I will then do one on what to put in your bug out pack besides just food. Until next time I hope you will check out my political blog and visit my web store.

http://www.therealamericanpolitics.blogspot.com

http://webstore.com/~knifeman

A Review

I know that last time I said that I would be doing a lunch MRE menu this time, but there is something that I thought was more important. I think it is time for each and every one of us to check our readiness. We all need to review where we stand as far as readiness goes. For instance, my food supply is now lower than I prefer it to be. The reason is that we are eating up some of the older supplies to rotate the stock and due to some financial difficulty, have not replaced all of it yet. One of the reasons that I am concerned about readiness right now is that I expect something to happen in 2012. No, I do not mean the end of the world according to the Mayan calendar. If that happened it would not matter what we had stored up. I am speaking about some political disaster taking place. Think about rioting, civil war, martial law and those type of things. With the election coming up and our first black resident of the White House up for re-election it is hard telling what will take place.

First look at your location. Are where you will most likely be out of harms way? If not, do you have a place to go? Do you have enough supplies at your getaway to keep you going long term. Do you have at least a year's food on hand and where you will be? Is your place, either where you are now if you are staying or, your getaway defensible? Are you ready to defend it at all cost, including shooting to kill if necessary? Are you able to hunt, fish and trap to obtain food if that becomes a necessity? Do you have a good supply of guns and ammo to take care of all eventualities? That means for hunting, self-defense and anything else that should come up, such as defending your area from wild-dog packs, etc. Do you have a complete medical kit and do you know how to handle medical emergencies? Do you understand some about the healing power of natural plants that grow in your area?

One of the things that not too many survivalists think about is the fact that they may have to take to the woods for a week or two. This is true even if they have what they consider a safe home or a safe getaway spot. Your spot may become hot for some unknown reason and you just need to leave for a short time for it to cool off. I keep a backpack packed with a two week supply of necessities. All I need to do is to grab it and go and I am good for a long time in the woods. The two week supply of food can be supplemented with hunting and fishing. My next entry will give both the homemade MREs for lunch and dinner. After that I will do at least one entry on what I believe should be in that two week pack. I will pretty much go by what I have in mine.

There are many other things that I could ask. Do you have a good supply of ammo? Are you well practiced with all of your weapons so that you will not need to hesitate? You should be so familiar with all of your weapons that the become part of you when needed. Do you know enough woods lore to survive if need be? Can you trap or snare animals and birds for food if needed?

There are many things to think of when thinking about survival. I could go on and as twice as many questions and give twice as many suggestions, but this should get you thinking. Step back and take a look at your complete survival plan. Does it need tweaking any place? Can it be improved? You want to improve your plan until you KNOW that you could survive in any given situation. Then, and only then are you ready. So take a look at where you are and I will be back soon with more information. Until then check out my political blog and my store.

http://www.therealamericanpolitics.blogspot.com

http://webstore.com/~knifeman

MRE Meals

You hear a lot about MRE's in most survival writings. They are talking about either the military MRE's or the freeze dried meals sold in camping stores and catalogs. While these are a convenience, I do not hold that they are the best way to go. If you have a lot of extra money and want to put some away that is fine. However, if, like me, you are watching your pennies and want to get the most for your money, there are a lot of ways that are cheaper and will do the job. Let's take a look at one of them.

Let's look at a breakfast that needs little or no preparation. If you want something that you do not even need to heat, put one or two ounces of cold cereal of your choice in a Zip Lock bag. In a smaller bag put enough powdered milk to make one cup of milk. Put the smaller bag inside the large bag with the cereal, zip it shut and seal the closure with sealing wax. Now you have a breakfast cereal in a bag with the milk and all you need to do is add water to the milk powder. Mix the milk in its own bag and pour as much as you need in the cereal. The rest can be used as a drink or to put in your coffee. If you want something that needs heat like instant oatmeal or instant Cream of Wheat, you can do the same only you can vacuum pack it if you want to. You could vacuum the cold cereal but the process crushes the cereal, although things like shredded wheat, Chex, Cheerios and some others could stand up under the vacuum sealing. However, my way calls for more yet.

In another small Zip Lock put enough Tang powder for an eight ounce glass of juice. Another small bag will contain enough instant coffee or tea to make one or two cups, depending on how much you think you will drink. You can skip this if you do not want to heat any of the water. You will also need another small Zip Lock to put some dehydrated fruit (which you have hopefully dried yourself) into, so you will have something extra to eat. In my Breakfast MRE I like to add two slices of Melba Toast. The reason I use Melba Toast is that it will stand the vacuum without crumbling.

Now you put all of these small Zip Locks into a large vacuum bag and vacuum seal the entire meal. So, you have cereal, milk, juice, toast, fruit and if you desire coffee or tea in one bag. Not much different than a commercial MRE only a lot cheaper and fresher. You just need to be careful about what type of cereal you put into the first Zip Lock so you do not wind up with crushed crumbs of cereal. You could easily put in sugar if you desire. Also, if you put everything in a large vacuum bag, you do not need to do the wax sealing on the cereal.

You can vary your meals by using instant hot cereals, different fruits, etc. If you want to do a little cooking there a lot of other choices. There is Spam to use for meat, which can now be gotten in soft packs that could be put into your vacuum bag. You could buy large containers of powdered eggs and have Spam and eggs for one breakfast, that is if you want to cook.

Today's supermarket is a veritable, survivalist's stock-up store. If you look around there are many things that you can do. I just gave you a small idea of what can be done for breakfasts. You should be able to come up with many more ideas. Next entry I will do a lunch MRE and follow that the following time with a main meal dinner. Until then think about ways to do more for yourself to save money and survive in style.

Check out my other blog and my web store at:

http://www.therealamericanpolitics.blogspot.com

knifeman@webstore.com

Who are the Haters?

Nowadays you hear a lot about hate and hate speech. We now have hate crimes and people think that they can tell what someone was thinking when they committed a crime. Orwell's book 1984 is coming true right before our eyes. This new definition of hate is what the fasciunists are using to bring down the good patriotic people in this country. If you disagree with any policy of B. Hussein O. it is racist and considered hate speech. If you point out that Muslims cause most of the terrorist attacks in the world, it is hate speech. There are so many things that are now considered hate speech that many people are afraid to give an opinion about almost anything.

When you take a real close look at it, it is not what is said, it who said it. Why is it that when people take issue with B. Hussein O. they are racists but when people attack Herman Cain, that is free speech and not racist? Both of those men are black, but one of them gets special protections against people not liking him. Why is it that when Maxine Waters says "The Tea Party can go straight to hell" is that not hate speech? Why is it when James Hoffa says "Let's take the son-of-b-----s out", meaning to kill the members of the tea party, is that not hate speech? I could go on with many more examples, but I think you get the picture. There is a definite double standard taking over in this country.

We are constantly being asked to be politically correct. However, it only goes one way. I wrote last time about the difference between the Tea Party and the Occupy Wall Street (OWS) demonstrators. With the Tea Party it was if one little letter was out of place of if some liberal infiltrated the group with a sign, the Tea Party was a bunch of racist, hate mongers and were pilloried in the press for days at a time for one incident. The OWS demonstrators have hate signs and show their hatred in many other ways and the MSM (Malfeasant-Smug-Press) does not even cover the story. Just a bit of one sidedness I would say.

I remember well when there were signs carried with pictures of George W. Shrub with a Hitler mustache and there were no comments about it. There were also no comments by the MSM here in Wisconsin when there were signs with Governor Walker with a Hitler mustache during the demonstrations against his balancing the Wisconsin budget. In fact, it appeared that most of the press agreed with the demonstrators. There were many threats to the governor and to many of the state legislators, including death threats. However, reading or listening to the MSM, one would never know it. All of these things were swept under the rug as free speech.

Now, I am neither a demlican or a republicrat because most in both parties are nothing but shills for bigger government. However, when I see how democrats, liberals, progressives, socialists, communists, fascists and fasciunists (what a bunch of redundancy) doing things one way and not having to answer for it, it ticks me off. I was no fan of G. W. Shrub, but if drawing a Hitler mustache on him was okay according to the MSM, why is it hateful to draw one on B. Hussein O.?

Orwells 1984 was right on target when it came to the changing of the meaning of words. There are words that cannot be used today without being looked at as a bigot or a hater. Yet Joe Biden can get away with saying anything as can Nancy Pelosi and all the rest of the Demlicans. However, conservative and patriotic people are not allowed to voice their opinions without being accused of hate speech. Now the Muslims are trying to make it illegal to say anything that they believe is derogatory about Muslims. All they have to do is to claim it is derogatory, even if in reality it is not and you would be arrested. With a pretendsident that is either a Muslim or a Muslim sympathizer I have no doubt that it could happen. If he cannot get it through congress he will just sign another presidential order making it illegal to say these thing or you will be accused of a hate crime. That hate crime would be denigrating the Muslim religion. Even though we all know that most terrorist plots around the entire globe are perpetrated by Muslims.

This country is going amok. The MSM and the progressives are taking us into a world that we do not want. They are stripping us of our liberties and constitutional guarantees. Schools, especially colleges have strict speech codes that are undoubtedly unconstitutional and now the illegal government and the MSM are trying their best to make this kind of a speech code the law of the land.

If you want to know where the hate is, it is in the government especially the liberals and progressives and the press. They are the ones that truly hate. If they did not hate, why would they want to shut everyone that disagrees with them down? You can see the hatred emanating from every one of them from our pretendsident to the progressives in congeress, to the unions to the MSM. The unions are some of the worst haters in this country. They have always hated anyone that was not on their side. Now they own the person in the Whitehouse and can get away with going public with their hatred. It is time to stop them. How? I am not really sure but it is my hope that it can be done non-violently. However, if it is not done soon in a non-violent fashion, I do not like to think of what it would take later.

Lock and Load

I think the time has come to be ready for anything and by that I mean even self-defense from roving mobs. With the anarchists, socialists, communists, fascists and fasciunists occupying Wall Street and many other spots around the country, I believe that it is time to start thinking about having to defend ourselves. Regardless of what our pretendsident says, these hooligans are not anything like the Tea Party. These are mostly people that hate America and anyone that has done better than they have and have more than they do. Everything they have was given to them by their parents and now they want more from the taxpayers. They seem think that the taxpayers owe them a living and a really good living at that. I currently receive Social Security (which I paid for) write for a newspaper and have an on line store and I cannot afford the gadgets that these scum are using. Ipads, Iphones, laptops, and every other electronic gadget that one could want. they have all of this and complain that they are disadvantaged. Just because someone makes a million dollars, as long as they make it legally they must deserve it. The scum want their share of the million without doing a thing to earn it. As you may have noticed there has been more and more violence every day. I am afraid that soon it may erupt into a kind of civil war. As I always say, I hope I am wrong about this but would rather be ready and be wrong than to not be ready and be right.

Here is a list or the armament and the ammo that I feel that every survivalist should have on hand. First of all you need a shotgun. This will be for close range protection. To me what action you choose is unimportant. The important thing is that you are comfortable with it. If for some reason you are only comfortable with a single shot, so be it. Whatever you have is better than not having anything. My personal suggestion would be a slide action (pump) as they are about the fastest cycling shotgun there is. I personally prefer a blot action myself but they are a little hard to come by and unless you already have one you would probably be better off with a slide action or a semi-auto. There is nothing wrong with a double barrel either. A 12 gauge is about the best you can do for a shotgun. However if smaller people are going to use the gun then a 20 gauge may be the best bet. It is all a matter of what you can handle. As for ammo for the shotgun, my recommendation is to have at least 500 rounds. My breakdown of shot sizes would be something like this: 200 00 buckshot, 100 #4 bird shot, 100 # 6 bird shot, 50 # 7 1/2 bird shot and 50 rifled slugs. that should cover just about anything that you need to take care of.

Next I would opt for a .22 caliber rifle. Here a bolt action or semi-auto are my choices. Again, I really do not think that the action is as important as the ability to use what you have and be safe and comfortable with it. Here there is only one type of ammo to have and the is the Long Rifle ammo. 1,000 rounds is the minimum I recommend for .22 ammo, with 2,000 being optimal. However many you decide on make it half hollow points and half solid lead.

Now we get into the high power rifles. Here is where I depart from most survival writers in that I do not recommend any particular weapon. You can have anything from a lever action 30-30, a bolt action 30-06 or .270 or you could have a .243 or .308 semi-auto. To me this does not make any difference. What makes a difference to me is that you are comfortable with your weapon and are able to hit what you aim at. For this weapon I suggest between 500 and 1,000 rounds of ammo. You may want to have a couple of different bullet weights but if you do remember to practice with both so that you are aware of where they are going to hit.

Handguns are another thing that you may or may not want. They serve as an excellent short range weapon and I personally recommend them. If you are a revolver lover, as I am, you will want to get a .357 or .44 magnum. You may also want to have a .22 revolver to use as a practice gun and for hunting small game. If you are a semi-auto handgun lover, my suggestion would be get a 1911 .45. If you have the money you may want to get a Desert Eagle in .44 mag or .50 caliber. I do not believe in .40 caliber and 9mm's as they do not have the knockdown power. If you want one because of the ammo capacity I guess they are all right but I want something with knockdown power. You may want one as a backup but I prefer a .380 or even a .25 caliber. Here again, with the semi-auto you may want to get a .22 to practice with. As far as ammo for your handgun, I feel that you will need at least 500 rounds.

That should take care of your armament and ammo supply for any emergency. I have only three other things to say about firearms, practice, practice, PRACTICE. Always be ready and hope the time never comes that you have to use the knowledge and skill you posses.

Until next time, check out my other blog and my store:

http://www.therealamericanpolitics.blogspot.com

knifeman@webstore.com