Emergency Preparedness

When a survival situation arises and you go to your cupboard to break out the emergency food you have had stashed away for ages, do you want to be anxiously sniffing it and crossing your fingers that it’s still good and not going to make you very sick? I’m guessing you probably want to be able to trust that the food storage you have spent so much time and effort collecting is going to last as long as it is advertised to. A reliably long shelf life—specifically, 25 years or more—is vital in food storage products for several reasons. Long...

In the snowy, white-washed winter months, sometimes it’s hard to remember what green grass looks like or recall the smell of dirt. This is one of the reasons winter is my least favorite season, and I am always looking for ways to bring a little bit of June into January. One pretty great way to do this and to become more self-reliant in the process is to practice composting through the winter. Why compost? Composting is a responsible and rewarding habit. One third of landfill space is reportedly filled with materials that could be composted. Composting our own waste keeps...

Winter has arrived and with it all the cold, icy trappings. While some of us might love the beauty of the snow and the recreational activities that go along with it, most of us don’t love the driving conditions winter weather creates. If you live in an area of the country that gets a lot of snow, it’s important that you be prepared for hazardous snow conditions. You can do this by storing essential emergency supplies in the trunk of your car and knowing what to do if you find yourself stuck in your car in the snow. What follows...

Every year at the gym I attend, there is a huge surge of people who show up at the gym starting on the first day of January. Go to a fitness class in January and there is no room to stand. Try to get an open treadmill in January and you are going to have to wait a while. Luckily, the crowds don’t last long. Usually by the first or second week of February, things have gotten back to normal. The fact that this cycle is a yearly occurrence highlights a disconcerting truth. It’s almost laughable (if it weren’t so...

Perhaps you’ve heard the good news that the world didn’t end this week. Whether you put your stock with the Mayan prediction or not, you probably agree with me that it’s a good thing life as we know it is still running along, if for no other reason than that it means you’ve still got some time to sharpen your survival skills. (I’m also pretty happy that I’ll get to see my two-year-old open her Christmas presents, but you know.) We talk a lot about the importance of emergency food storage on this blog, and today I want to switch...