What to PREPARE for.

You or someone close to you might think what do we need to prepare for? We have stores, we have insurance, everything will be taken care of, no problems, right? WRONG!

In case of a natural disaster (Texas Tornado 4-3-2012 to name a recent one) what things might you need if there was no power or access to food for a week or more? If you live in an area where tornadoes are common it's best to have an underground area to store food, blankets, water, radios, camping supplies and of course, family and friends. Someplaces are not suited for underground structures, flooding is an issue, but there are tornado proof buildings that can be built. This might be a community project, someplace that everyone knows to go to in case of an emergency. Would not reccomend staying in a home or building that would be squished like a bug in a strong wind.

This past year has shown us the aftermath of disasters of immense power. There is the shock of climbing out of your safety hole and finding everything you own is swept away. Friends and neighbors dead because they didn't heed warnings or weren't even aware that there was something dangerous in the area.
What will you do now?
Do you have a place to go, will you have to depend on people who's resources are already stretched to the max.
Or would you have taken precautions for just such an event.

Oh, Walmart would be open, so why worry? Unless your local Walmart had it's roof ripped off and contents spread out over the county.
 During the aftermath of the April 27th tornado we had no power for about 5 days. No power means no way to have lights to shop by, no way to run the registers. The KMart, for about one day, would let about 3 people in at a time, after they'd waited in line for about 2 hours. You were escorted around by an employee with a flashlight and believe me, you were encouraged to be as quick about it as you could. Then you were checked out at the front where they used calculators. It worked, but wasn't something they wanted to repeat the next day.
Walmart was in danger of being looted. The Piggly Wiggly had to have all their meat thrown out, a Health Dept. employee threw bleach on it to make sure that no one scavenged it.
Unless you had a grill, or knew someone nearby who did, then you had to rely on other sources for food. The churches were pretty good about that, if you knew to go there. Anouncements were made over the radio, but what if you didn't have a radio? Or the batteries decided to die.

So does a little prepping not seem like a prudent idea?
FEMA advices to have about three days of supplies per person but what if you have another situation on your hands? What if you've lost your job or mode of transportation? Wouldn't canning food from your garden take a bit of stress off the bottom line you have to pay out every month?

We are a society of "I want, I want." I could live without all the little extras we end of buying every month.  Seriously, I could live without cable. But my husband would have cow without his entertainment. Hmmm....cow = fresh milk. Nah, that's another thing he wouldn't go for at this moment in time. He grew up on a farm in India, it was his job to milk the water buffalo every day. Not something he fondly remembers, but then he was a kid who wanted to get out and see the world. He does speak fondly of how unbelievably good that milk tasted compared to what we get from the stores. But that's another issue, lol.

It's never a bad idea to plan ahead for whatever might be around the corner. What's so crazy about that?