The Urban Survivalist

I don't post many rants but every once in a while I get annoyed enough with what's going on that I just can't help myself. I can't believe how lazy people are. This country is so well off and so successful that we can't imagine what we'd do if we actually had to TRY to get by. The poorest people in the country live better than the "well off" people living in third world countries. There's enough money floating around to support millions of workers who do nothing but sit on their ass all day and push buttons. Then they have the gall to bitch about how much their job sucks. They're also shocked when their job is shipped overseas or they're fired because of "budget cuts". This entitlement mentality is what's destroying this country. The politicians are certainly helping but you can't put all of the blame on them. There are most definitely some legitimate, hard workers that are swept up in all of this mess and are hurting bec...

Sorry I haven't posted in a while. I've been busy with the garden, work, etc. It took a sprained foot to get me to sit down long enough to make a post. I was walking barefoot to the car last night, stepped on a rock and my foot slipped off of the sidewalk and rolled into the grass. It's not bad. I didn't even bother going to the doctor. Why bother when I had the same stuff to treat it that the doctor would have given me (minus the expensive x-rays of course)? It's just swollen and I can't put much weight on it. If it's still bad in a few days then I'll go get it checked out but it feels a lot better even since this morning. As far as real preps go I bought a canner a few days ago and have been experimenting with that. I canned some pickles the other day and I made some cucumber relish today. I'm probably going to can some green tomatoes pretty soon since it's going to freeze before all of my tomatoes get ripe enough to pick. I wish t...

Several months ago I did an article about saving your change. You remember the one. Don't spend your pennies or nickels. Keep a lookout for silver dimes and quarters. Yeah, that one. One thing that I neglected to mention was how to easily identify silver coins. Once you've got all of your coins separated there's a quick and easy way to find the silver coins without checking each individual date. Newer coins have brown edges because the middle is made up of copper. Silver coins are all silver on the edges. Just take a bunch of them and look at the edges like so. The silver ones will stand out like a sore thumb. Sorry for the crappy pic but it's pretty obvious which coins are silver and it's very easy to see how dramatic the brown is on the newer coins. Every once in a while you'll get a dirty silver coin that looks like it's brown or a brand new one that looks silver. Just check the dates on the coins that seem suspect. Ever since silver went thr...

Recreation is an important part of your preps that everyone should think about. It's easy to get caught up in the serious stuff like food storage and arsenal maintenance. At some point you're going to get a chance for a break and you'll want to take that opportunity to relieve some stress. These days a break from reality is right at our fingertips. We can turn on a TV and get away from everything for a few hours. We can turn on our playstations, Xboxes, Nintendos or whatever and fire up a game that can easily occupy us for hours. The internet is an infinite source of entertainment and information. One of the most obvious indicators that you are in a real SHTF scenario will be when the lights go out and you don't have constant, easy access to all of those anymore. So what do you do when the easy entertainment sources aren't always available? There are plenty of options out there. Books are a great start. If the lights go out and nothing else is going on the...

Sunshine: This isn't so much a SHTF movie but a "how Earth reacts to a global SHTF scenario". It's years in the future and the sun is dying. Somehow the human race lasted up to that point and they have a plan to kickstart it. A few years earlier they had sent a mega nuke to try to make it happen but the mission failed. The second mission was their last chance since they used the last of their resources this time around. The entire movie takes place on a space ship headed for the sun and they have to deal with several problems along the way. I thought it was good and you might like it. Diary of the Dead: It wasn't as good as some of his other movies but it was still good nonetheless. I'd recommend this to anyone who's into the zombie genre. Once you realize the point that George A Romero is trying to get across then it becomes much easier to appreciate his movies. He's a guy that understands the human nature aspect and does his best to make th...

I quit about 5 years ago. I was doing pretty good. There was always that nagging itch in the back of my mind, though. I never really stopped wanting one. A few weeks ago I just said fuck it and bummed one off of a buddy. A few days later I bummed a couple more at a party. The next day I bought a pack. I've been rehooked again ever since. So what does this have to do with survival? Smokers want cigarettes. If you're a smoker then you'll want to be able to smoke if the supply lines get cut. If you're not a smoker then you might have to deal with those edgy assholes that haven't had a smoke in a few days. Let's face it. Tobacco will be one hell of a trade item during a crisis. If you're the guy with the fix then people will rely on you for something. One cool thing about tobacco is that it's one of those things that people won't necessarily kill for. If you trade off a few boxes of ammo to some guy then there's the possibility that he...

Spot silver is down to $12.70 an ounce this weekend and gold is sitting at $786. If you've got a reputable dealer nearby and you've got some extra cash sitting in the SHTF fund then now is as good a time as any to go snatch some up. It aint gonna get much cheaper. While the government keeps reassuring us and telling us how things keep looking up we continue to see home values slide even more, the unemployment rate rise every month and foreclosures and huge bank losses continue. Once something else happens that sends the price of oil skyrocketing again we'll see the price of precious metals skyrocket right along with it. Get it while it's cheap.