One of the biggest misconceptions people tend to have is that they will be taken care of in an emergency situation. During large scale events, this is likely not going to be the case. This is the reason why we prepare. We try to be self reliant so that we don’t have to rely on someone else to get us through.
Think about it. You’re in a small city, say 40,000, you’re probably served by less than 100 emergency personnel. What happens when half of your city needs help? What if you’re in a much larger city? Hundreds of thousands of people. Millions. While there may be more emergency personnel available to help, they are helping many more people. The likelihood that you’re going to be the first helped is directly proportionate to the scale of the disaster, the ratio of help to those needing help, your location in relation to those providing the help, and their ability to get to you.
As you can see, it’s just common sense to have some preparations allowing you to rely upon yourself. Not only will this give you the ability to take care of emergencies while waiting on help, it will also give you the ability to reduce the burden on emergency services. If you can be self sufficient, you are one less person the emergency services need to attend to. For every self reliant person out there, the strain on the system will be reduced.
Without being self reliant you are dependent upon a system that may take longer than you have to reach you. That’s assuming that they can reach you at all. The longer the duration of the event, the longer that you go waiting on help, the more difficult it can be.
Now think about it. If you’re prepared to handle situations that may arise, won’t you feel more secure? To us, the piece of mind is priceless.
“Worry often gives a small thing a big shadow.”
~Swedish proverb
Let’s start with the physical aspect. It’s easy to imagine a scenario in which you’d have to use your emergency preparations. In these scenarios you might find yourself hunkering down at home, but what we’d like to look at here is if you had to go on the move. Can you get your preps from where they are now to where you need to be? More importantly, can you get yourself where you need to be? What if you have to walk a mile, 2 miles, 10 miles to get to aid? Can you carry yourself and your pack without quickly reaching exhaustion?
Mental preparedness, when it comes to dealing with an at hand emergency, is a little more difficult to attain. No one can really say how they will react under the pressure of an unexpected event. What we can do is increase our ability to handle the things that are thrown at us. The knowledge we gain from research, practicing with out gear, and pondering different scenarios all bolster our ability to handle emergencies. With those in mind, one of the best ways to get prepared is through repetition. If you instinctively know how to do something, when to do it and when not to do it, your mind will endure less stress as it handles the task at hand.
One of our favorite past times is hiking, and we believe that the biggest impact on our hikes are the shoes on our feet. They can easily mean the difference between an enjoyable hike and one fraught with discomfort and pain.
As mentioned before, the sole of this boot is made by Vibram, and while still being stiff, is lighter than other similar boots. The designed with the arc tempo last, which is more athletic in design. The midsole is molded with a full foot plate. The full foot plate provides for the stiffer feel. All of this weighs in at a scant 2lbs 9oz.
The second of the three points we at 
As you begin outfitting yourself for preparedness begin to weigh these pros and cons when selecting each piece of gear, and you’ll quickly figure out what is essential and what can be sacrificed. You’ll see where you will want the highest quality gear you can find, and you’ll also start to understand what can be considered a throw away item. Things like matches, toilet paper, bandaids, and other consumables fit in this category, and compromising quality to cut costs may not be an issue. Non-consumable items like your pack or shoes would be places that you would want to focus on quality over cost. The same goes for items that you may need to stake your life on, such as a pistol.
I’ve found that when I start talking to some people about being prepared their eyes begin to gloss over. They begin thinking about global doomsday scenarios. Images begin to flash through their mind. Things like stumbling zombies wandering around or volcanoes erupting and covering the planet in ash take root, causing any preparations to seem fruitless. Let’s face it, we’re just talking about doom and gloom, right?
This couldn’t be more true when it comes to looking for shoes to weather an emergency. The last thing you’d want to do is walk 5 miles in a pair of 2″ high heals because you ran out of gas, or trudge through mud and snow in those fancy wingtips because you got stranded in a snow drift on the way home.
One of the biggest issues we have with our feet are blisters. Once you have them they can be detrimental. Along with proper fitting shoes, you need to keep them dry. This can be accomplished by wearing some type of sweat wicking material, and changing them routinely. Cotton socks are a terrible choice, but better than nothing. If you are stuck with wearing cotton, ensure you change them frequently.
This leads into the sole of the shoe. It should provide traction as well as protection. Let’s face it, when we walk down a sidewalk or the road, we can come across some pretty nasty stuff like rocks, nails, and glass. A good sole can and should protect against the vast majority of these things.
One option you will come across is waterproofing. As with everything, there are pros and cons to buying waterproof footwear. The obvious pro is that your feet will remain dry while walking through wet grass, shallow streams, and puddles. A con would be that waterproof shoes are slightly hotter than their non-waterproof counterpart. The socks you wear can exacerbate or alleviate this to a point. It’s our opinion that the pros outweigh the cons here, and for very little sacrifice, having the waterproof shoe is the way to go. With that said, if you live in the desert, you may opt out as there is very little chance you feet might get wet.
Many of us are pet owners. While the type of pet may be different, most of us love them as they are part of the family. With this in mind, why is it that they are often left out of our preparations? Considering that they are as dependent, if not more so, than the rest of our family, this shouldn’t be the case.
While having their own pack may not work for some animals, studies show that saddling a dog with their can give them the perception that they are doing a job, and even cause them to act in a more calm manner.
It was December 8th 2007. The news reported that Oklahoma was in for snow, freezing rain, and heavy icing. As the snow and rain continued to fall throughout the day, many people decided that it would be safer to stay home than to brave the roads, which was probably a pretty smart idea. At approximately 7PM the power went out across a large portion of the state. More than 600,000 homes and businesses (about 40% of the state) were affected. This power outage would last for upward of 10 days in certain areas.
If you’re anything like us most of your transactions involve some form of plastic, whether it be a credit card, check card, or debit card. It’s just convenient. This has become so common place that it’s not unlikely for someone to not touch cash for days, weeks, months, or more.
In today’s society where we place significant value in high fashion, we often ignore the need for utility and durability when shopping for our daily attire. This is compounded when you look for attire for special events, and even more so when you try to have a different look every day.
The first is try to tailor your wardrobe to have a level of class or fashion while keeping the durability and utility intact. This doesn’t mean that you have to go out and buy a set of BDU’s and go camouflaged every day. We all know there are companies out there who make clothing that’s less likely to have you stick out in a negative manner. Whether it be denim, cotton, polyester, or some other fabric, there are alternatives. That doesn’t mean that camouflage doesn’t have it’s place.
No matter how hard we might try, we’re going to end up in a situation where our clothing options are significantly limited. Weddings, funerals, high profile meetings, etc. are all examples. Its in these cases that we have to think outside of the box, or rather, inside the bag.
While on the subject, we think it’s important to stress the necessity of breaking in shoes and frequently changing your socks when you’re walking a lot or hiking. Your feet are susceptible to a number of ailments, one of the biggest being blisters from ill fitting or new footwear. This can be exacerbated by damp socks. If there’s a possibility that you may end up having to do quite a bit of walking, it’s best not to have a brand new pair of shoes for the trek.
Most of us have vehicles, and use them significantly. This use has increased over the past 50 years, and with that increase the chances that we’ll encounter an emergency while out and about also increases. Being prepared to handle such an emergency is just good planning.