Thanks for your suggestions and for the conversation.
Here's where I generally stand:
1) We've witnessed numerous catastrophes around the globe in recent years, i.e., tsunamis, earthquakes, hurricanes, tornadoes, riots, floods, and general chaos. Knowing that these things can and do happen elsewhere awakens me to the possibility that they could happen here where I live.
It makes a lot of sense to be prepared for things, even if "prepared" only means taking a more pragmatic viewpoint than "it will never happen here" or the kind of naive concept that somehow the government "would never let" something happen.
2) Past experience has taught me that being prepared for any number of possible situations is better than being unprepared for them. E.g., I'd rather have spare tools in my truck if it breaks down than to be stranded without tools.
I'd agree with you on this one as well, obviously up to a point. Preparedness is a good thing although "spare tools" could conceivably get to a point of being silly. It's one thing to carry a few wrenches, some motor oil etc with you, it's another thing entirely to carry a hoist and a spare engine, just in case of catastrophic failure. Silly examples I know, they just highlight the whole "how extreme do you want to go" concept.
3) I don't know precisely what tomorrow will bring. Anything could happen or nothing could happen. I don't spend my time worrying or biting my nails. What will be will be. I place my faith and trust in Christ. I simply hope for the best but prepare for the worst.
It makes a lot of sense. Where I live is a very urban area so there are dozens of places to buy stuff within a very short distance, although the flipside of that is that if things turn south we can be sure the shelves will be stripped bare very quickly, and that there are more people around who might relieve me of purchases on my way home.
To me in an urban area the very base level of being prepared is to keep a few days' worth of spending money on hand in case there's an outage in the banking system. Much more than that and I feel vulnerable having too much cash in the house, but it's good to know if payment systems fail I've got pieces of paper with pictures of Her Majesty on them that will buy the things I need for a short time.
4) Although I do generally prepare for myself and family I can also picture a situation where my stash of food could save the lives of others. In other words, if a major catastrophe occurred near my abode but I wasn't affected I would be willing to supply the victims of that event with food if it meant the difference between life and death. May God's will be done in all things. Christ left us with two Great Commandments. Love God and love thy neighbor.
It could be, even if the best you can do is help someone get back on their feet if their house burns down or some such. It is actually quite a refreshing change to talk to someone about preparation for disaster that doesn't involve an overbearing attitude of "I'm alright Jack, (expletive) the rest of them"
5) I have two hobbies that keep my mind occupied during my rare times of leisure. One of my hobbies is knife collecting and the other is prepping. I don't necessarily collect knives with the expectation that I will get in a knife fight with a crazed man or an angry grizzly bear. I simply collect them because I enjoy it. It's a hobby and an investment. Prepping may have a more practical purpose but I don't necessarily expect that hoards of starving, criminally-minded lunatics are going to surround my home and ravage my family, me, and my food supply. In my opinion, the chances of that happening is slim. There is a greater chance that we (Americans) could suffer a major economic collapse which will certainly have far reaching implications. As a kid, I heard my mom and dad speak of the Great Depression and the struggle to survive during that troublesome period. It happened then and it could happen again in the future. If I have a reason for storing more than a few months' supply of food that would be the reason.
I'm expecting a financial meltdown on the scale of the Great Depression and maybe worse still. When people can't just go to the ATM and get money, when they can't spend what they don't have with a small piece of plastic, when they don't get their government handouts because the government doesn't have the money any more, things will get ugly.
That's where I get to thinking about the threats posed by a disaster on that level. If the power goes out for two days all you need is some fuel to keep warm, some clean water and some food. At a push you can go two days without food if it comes to that. If you're boiling a kettle over your wood fire you might as well throw in some water for the people next door so they can have a hot drink as well.
If the power stays out for a week you'll start to have more social issues. More people cold, more people wanting shelter, more people wanting food and so on. Maybe not desperate enough to just loot and steal whatever they can find but getting that way.
Turn off the government for a month and things get a whole lot uglier. No more welfare payments, no social security, no pensions, no salary for the emergency services, shelves stripped bare in the stores, and people holding up the delivery trucks so they can eat. Now you'll have serious social unrest, and if you've got supplies you'll draw all sorts of unwanted attention. Part of the plan would then have to include how to conceal or protect your supplies, otherwise it becomes akin to fortifying your home security but then leaving the side door wide open.
As for storing water in glass? I personally believe it's more practical to store it in plastic. Plastic is more durable, lighter, and less expensive and I'm not too concerned about the chemicals that may be leached from the plastic. The city's tap water is probably full of more dangerous chemicals. That's why we have three Berkey Water Filters which remove 99.999% of all impurities.
Filtering makes sense. I tend to be wary of long term storage of water in plastic bottles because I've found that once a container is opened the water can have a very noticeable plastic taste to it after only a day or so. In theory if it's sealed it should be OK but if there is any problem with the seal you could end up with unusable water.
I'm an imperfect man. My preps are probably just as imperfect and/or inadequate. I'm probably more prepared than most of the world's population but far under-prepared when compared to folks who live deep in the woods with underground bunkers and 5000 gallon water storage containers and emergency helicopters. I can only afford what I can afford. Rich, I'm not!
Indeed, you can only do what is within your capability. I'd like a fortified underground bunker with enough space to store food for a year or more but in an urban area you need way more money than I've got to buy such a thing.
