The Urban Survivalist

My new years resolution is to buy a few acres in the boonies. I'll either buy a trailer and park it out there or just put up a small cabin. If things get really bad then I'll have a place to go. Even if things don't get bad I'll have a kickass place to hang out on the weekends when I just want to get away from it all. I already know where I'm going to buy my land. Growing a decent sized garden will be feasible. There's plenty of wood and water in the area. It's far enough out of the way that everyone and their mother won't show up if things get ugly. It's close enough that I could walk there in a few days if I had to. I don't exactly see myself longing for a disconnect from consumerism but when the lights stop turning on when I flip the switch, the heater stops coming on when it drops below a certain temperature and walking down the street makes me a little nervous whether I'm carrying a gun or not then I'll probably be willing t...

Several months ago I bought a couple of vacuum sealed bags of corned beef at the local supermarket. They were only a couple bucks a bag so I jumped on them. They sat and sat in the meat drawer of my refrigerator until the other day when I finally decided to cook one of them. The "expiration date" on them was July 4th. I cut the bag open half expecting a rancid, stomach turning odor that would surely force everything from my stomach that's been digesting for the last couple of days. Surprisingly enough I was greeted with the wonderful scent of "fresh" corned beef. It was a bit more ripe than usual but that only added to the appeal. I decided to cook it to see how it would turn out. I tossed it in a stock pot, dumped in the contents of the spice package that it came with, filled the pot with water until the beef was just covered and began cooking. After letting it boil for about 10 minutes I lowered the heat to a simmer and left it alone for a few hours. ...

The economy is going nuts right now. The stock market is extremely volatile. The precious metals market is defying all reason. Gas prices are in the gutter. Property values just keep getting lower. Firearm and ammo sales are through the roof which is resulting in higher and higher prices. Then again, prices have only been going up and they never seem to go back down in the firearms market. So what do you do if you want to preserve some of your wealth? If you've got money in the stock market then you need to start thinking about getting out of it. It's down a LOT right now but this is not a buying opportunity. It'll probably go much lower. For the most part I got out of the stock market at the beginning of the year. What I have left won't start taking a serious hit until Obama gets into office and starts trying to bankrupt the energy industry so I might as well wait until the beginning of the year so that it gets applied to '10s taxes. Gas is a pretty goo...

I went out and bought a puppy a few days ago. He cost me a few hundred bucks which probably could have been used for other preps. I'm pretty well set in most areas, though. The only spot where I'm sorely lacking is the off grid retreat with fully functional bomb shelter so he didn't set me back too much from that goal. Pets are something that I feel like everyone should have. I'm a dog person myself. Even if all you can get is a little one he'll be enough to at least warn you of trouble before it's on top of you. Some of them are even better at taking care of pests than cats are. They're cheap to take care of and, for the most part, can take care of themselves. They say that just petting a dog lowers most people's blood pressure a few points. They're definitely a good stress reliever for me. After a long day at work spending time with the dogs is probably my biggest stress reliever. A lot of times I even prefer their company to people. Pi...