Hello, Winklebury here

[Winklebury]

Hello Everyone,

I am new to the website, but have been interested in prepping for a long time.

I am afraid I do enjoy the Nut'n'Fancy / Alex Jones / James W Rawles circus, but also have a more serious approach to this.

At present, the UK enjoys access to commodities that are more varied, and available in larger quantities than most of humanity enjoys today, let alone throughout history. For example, Arabs used to store pepper corn in their treasuries, as prized as highly as gold and silver.

As a result, we can now all personally have our own 'grain silos'.

Food: rice, canned goods, preserved goods - we can have a few hundred pounds worth in a garage or spare room. If nothing occurs, then its a few hundred pounds of extra food you have.

But, if the balloon goes up, for whatever reason, you have the ability to barter, or protect loved ones, months of food, to offer to others- in the short - medium term. It gives you freedom from want, and enables you to have options.

The potential causes are written about, argued about, but in affect it doesn't matter what is the cause of a crisis. Its the impact, and your ability to mitigate it - ride it out - that is the factor which is of concern.

I find it exciting that I, even with a relatively modest budget, can build contingencies for months and years, which although are smaller in scale, can rival modern countries, aid agencies, and historically, entire civilisations in their effectiveness, variety and modern brilliance.

A short list:

Food - P for Plenty
Water - Storage AND Treatment
Medical - First Aid, personal meds, minor trauma (most of this can be bought at ASDA for goodness sake)
Entertainment - Kindles, I am convinced, may contain magic!
Mapping - GPS is amazing, but even OS maps and Silva compasses would make pre-20ieth century armies salivate
Clothing - Gore-Tex does not contain magic!
Tools - When the gas runs out, you'll be happy you bought that Gransfors Bruk axe


Having worked in the City, I am familiar with Risk management. Risk is calculatd in the following way:

Risk = Probability X Impact

It may transpire that there is a sustain grid-down scenario, but its pretty remote. However, as mentioned above, with a modest budget, even a long term impact can be mitigated. Working backwards from there, if one has a years food on hand, the ability to store and treat water, cookware and fuel to continue eating, and clothes and equipment to continue functioning, a whole raft of smaller impacts but with higher probabilities are also taken care of. Short term unemployment is somewhat mitigated by having food, toiletries, etc on hand. A power cut is mitigated by having camping stoves and candles on hand. Having a bound paper copy of info, preps, maps, contact etc mitigates a power cut, or internet failure.

So one can flirt with the crazies (personal favourites are Burt and Heather from Tremors), but enjoy real life satisfaction that you are stocked up, prepared, with fuel, water, meds, and food for any blip that comes along.

I live and work in London, and would love to talk with people in the area, and perhaps meet one day. It is certainly a niche interest this, but nothing to be ashamed of!

Bye for now.

Oh, and Happy New Year!

[hobo]

Good intro! Thanks W

[mallie99]

So one can flirt with the crazies (personal favourites are Burt and Heather from Tremors), but enjoy real life satisfaction that you are stocked up, prepared, with fuel, water, meds, and food for any blip that comes along.

"What have you people got against being prepared?!"
"Just a few household chemicals in the proper proportions."

Gotta LOVE Burt!

Mallie

[vassili]

Yep, I like the cut of your jib! Lol. I think your only obvious priority now is to get as far away as possible from Londononistan.
Look forwards to reading more of your posts.
V

[Winklebury]

Hello all,

I am not sure where I would run or evacuate to tbh. Home is Hampshire, so would need to cross London, and heading down the A3 would be an obvious route, but there will be a burning Portsmouth waiting, if you ever get there. Traffic would be a disaster, and there would be people fleeing north ans south, so I'd rather save the trek.

I am afraid for now (next few years) the plan is to stay in London, and bear any trouble out.

Which is reason enough to make allies, and make plans. Ultimately I'd like a network of friends and associates, Preppers Club if you will, with rented garages, caches etc. I love stocked food, air rifles, tools, maps, plans, radios et al, so I am sure there are lots of people to network with.

And enough of the Londononistan nonsense. I am a quarter Scandinavian (which explains my cutting edginess... ) and would be offended if my relatives from across the seas were to be made to feel uncomfortable, so lets all be nice, shall we?

[tigs]

welcome to the forum