Doomsday Preppers...

[Jill]

Are any of you watching Doomsday Preppers on National Geographic? Harvey and I love it!!! But, I think it's making me a potential subject for a bad sitcom!!! When you combine my addiction to that show, my love of FOX News, and the fact that if they made enough episodes, I'd watch The Walking Dead for many hours each and every day, I'm right there! Preparing for the (surely unlikely) end of the world.

Some of the people featured on Doomsday Preppers seem nuts to me, but others I find very inspirational. As a woman, I think I have a natural desire to gather food, and.... yeah! It's influenced me. Harvey and I were up until after midnight last night organizing our stash of food. We got a shelf system at Lowes and organized that and our existing cupboard of food. Should an Apocalypse -- be it eenvironmental terroristic, or (my preference) zombie -- H and I could live for quite some time from what I've been gathering and hoarding like a hamster.

What about you all? If nothing else, that Doomsday Preppers show is pretty entertaining

 

[KanoasDestiny]

I'm right there with you Jill. My husband and I watch Doomsday Preppers every week, and I'm OBSESSED with The Walking Dead (can't wait for tonight's but then it will be over till October. BOO!) I love/hate zombies with a passion! Lol.

I think that some of the people on DP are nuts! And I find it sad that they are so focused on the 'end' that the fail to live and enjoy life in the present. That said, I do think that being self sufficient and having a storage of extra food/water is a must for any potential occassion. We have an emergency shed where we're storing extra nonparishable goods and bottled water. We also have an emerency kit out there and are working on getting other things we might need should a big earthquake hit us (So Cal). My husband bought some seeds yesterday, so it looks like we might be growing a garden this year too.

 

[Sonya]

There is also a new show called 'Doomsday Bunkers'...it is on Discovery Channel. It's along the same lines as Preppers. Have you heard the Peppers theme song promoting the show, it is to the beat/music of the old Dr. Pepper commercials.....wouldn't you like to be a prepper too...lol

 

[Jill]

We're going to be watching The Walking Dead tonight, too. We had missed one episode, Triggerfinger, but they repeat that today so we can watch it and the ones that come after. That show is outstanding!!!

I didn't know about the Doomsday Bunkers show. I'm going to give my DVR a new assigment

And, yes, I heard the Doomsday Preppers song on the commerical -- I LOVE IT!!! Poor Harvey... It's probably going to make my top 10 of songs to sing to him and the dogs. Dogs love it when I sing, but Harvey... not so much! There will be the traditional Sunday night concert at my house this evening as I sing the theme songs to the Fox cartoon lineup weekly. Who could resist?

 

[bcody]

I watch the dooms day shows. Can not convince my husband that though I am not extreme, I would like to be prepared. Some of those bunkers are amazing. I told hubby we could get one to double as our storm shelter! We do have a tornado shelter (hopefully will not need it today) but it is small.

 

[Riverrose28]

Since we are on a strick budget, recession and all, we no longer get that channel, but my son-in law does. I watched it once with him, I couldn't believe that guy feed his family road kill, and a ground hog at that. We've been self sufficient for yrs. only use two wood stoves for heat, grow and can all of our vegtables, have a cool room for potatoes, onions, etc. and a storm area. I'm already stocked on ammo, and my gun is loaded at all times. We're building a pen now for a couple of hogs, and rebuilding the hen house for chickens. We also have plenty of deer in our area. We have a new neighbor across the road, and I told him he could come get some seasoned manure if he wanted for a garden, since the soil around here is mostly clay, and he said it was too much work! Sorry for his luck as I have a family to care for and he is going to be left out. We have had trucks, trailers, and tractors pulling in here for two weeks getting manure for the smart ones! We give it away, but on the other hand they give us eggs, or whatever they grow that doesn't come up for us, we all work together, those of us that are not afraid of a little hard work that is. We are the ants, and the guy across the road is the grass hopper, feel bad for him.

 

[Nathan Luszcz]

They're plain nuts.... Prepared is one thing, hoarders are a phycological issue.

 

[Jill]

The road kill eating guy was the craziest of the crazy people they've shown. There have been a few others I thought were nuts, but he was REALLY out there, I thought. Squeezing dirty water from moss, eating road kill, just ETC...

Nathan, how do the preppers prepare for a potentially long term disaster without hoarding things like food, water, weapons, ammo?

Some of my favorites so far were the storage unit fortress, the New England couple who have prepared to the nine's, but aren't comfortable having weapons (so, if the worst happens, everyone in their area will know who to take stuff from), and the guy who had a huge supply of booze that he was going to use to barter after doomsday (THAT was a great idea, imo!).

 

[Charley]

Do any of you personally know someone doing this? I know a couple of people.

My dental hygenist (about age 45) and her boyfriend are stocking up on food, growing a garden, and stocking up on ammo and guns. They do have more friends who are preppers and they meet together to exchange ideas.

Another guy that I know (about 50 and single) has been stocking up on food for a few years. His problem is that some of what he stocked up on is now past it's expiration date. He is now looking to see what he can eat and replace with new and has been upset that he has had to throw away and replace some food.

I think I watched an episode or maybe part of an episode. It really didn't catch my interest.

 

[Tab]

I haven't thought about it too much. That show sounds really interesting. We do like our Sam's club, though!

 

[horsefeather]

Actually, my family (daughter, grandson and us) are sort of preppers. No, we don't eat road kill...yuck...yet. LOL However, we have 60 acres and have a large garden, cows, goats, horses (large and mini) chickens, geese and many dogs. My granddaughter-in law is supposed to learn how to can this year. Her neighbor is going to teach her. I hope she learns well, as I tried it once and sure didn't like it!!! Talk about LOTS of work...whew. We are also putting items in freezers, but don't count on it too much, because if power goes, there goes our freezers. To those who aren't paying attention to what's going on in the world, I would suggest you start. I have no idea what may, or may not happen, but my 'gut' tells me something is going to really challenge us humans. Now, I don't think the world is going to end on December 21st, but there is something in the air. I know probably a dozen physics and they are ALL saying close to the same thing and that is to prepare, prepare!!

We are in the process of trying to get something we can bury to double as a tornado shelter and a place to store our food and WATER. Water is SO important!! Please don't think all of us 'preppers' are like the ones on TV. Some of those folks are wayyyyy out there. Jill, I like your post!

Pam

 

[Nathan Luszcz]

Tornados are likely (where I am). Hurricanes are expected on the east coast. Earthquakes are normal in CA. EM pulses, social collapse, etc are SLIGHTLY less than a remote possibility. I think its a phycological problem tied to extreme pessimism. Teaching kids to steal gas, punture fuel tanks, kill intruders, etc is an issue. Prepared =/= doomsday prepper. OCD, social depression, etc = doomsday prepper, IMHO.

I don't see any issue preparing for a realistic natural disaster, that's just smart. If you can afford to do so (I can't afford food THIS week, never mind food for a potential week a year in the future!)

 

[Jill]

Charley / Lois

--

I don't think H and I can call ourselves preppers -- but we aspire!!! We do have a stock pile of guns and ammo (go figure, as I'm a "right wing nut"), and probably 6mos worth of food for us and our dogs. I'd like to find how we can make our very deep well operate w/o eelectricity And I would like to stock pile more and find a way to make our house less vvulnerableif things do get to the "science fiction movie" level. Honestly, I don't know what American could have felt that was a far fetched ppossibilityimmediately following 9/11...

So, not there yet, but working on it

Jill

 

[sfmini]

We are in a tornado area and are very vulnerable being on top of a hill with our basement exposed to the west. Pete has a huge garden and cans. He keeps thinking I think he is nuts, and I don't, I am glad he does it, I won't, just too much work for me, but I love all the home grown food. We have corn, broccoli, potatoes, beans, then stuff only he will eat like beets and turnips. We also had our first steer, Harry Hamburger and he is tasty, think we will do that again. Plenty of guns and supplies, he shoots competitive trap and Judy works at a shooting center, and he does his own reloads. I have my own 38 somewhere.....

A very well respected weather guy here says much wetter and more tornadoes this year, we want to put in a storm shelter for us and also as cool storage root cellar. Tornado is something I have always feared. In our house, the southwest corner of the basement would be right under the reloading supplies. I'll pass. But that does leave me not really sure what to do if a real tornado was to hit us.

 

[Sonya]

Jill....check this out http://www.survivalunlimited.com/deepwellpump.htm this will take care of your water needs.

 

[Jill]

Thank you, Sonya!

 

[weebiscuit]

I've never heard of the Walking Dead, but I've seen the Doomsday Preppers for the first time a few weeks ago. Just stumbled across it, and laughed my butt off, because my husband and I have been "prepping" for two years, but the way the person prepped on the show was just nuts! Honestly, it was too unrealistic! Maybe, though, because we live in the country and have a sizeable amount of land we just do it differently. One of the things I thought was funny was that one of the preppers was buying car loads of toilet paper. TOILET PAPER??? LOL! That would be the LAST thing I'd waste my money and storage space on! You can use a wash cloth and rinse it out in the creek! And a wash cloth costs WAY less and takes up WAY less space than toilet paper!

We prep, but in different ways, and we're not nuts, either! We are just working on "being prepared." We've got enough food to last six people about 18 months. Plus, we raise our own meat, so we won't be at the mercy of empty store shelves. In my opinion, though, one of the most important things to stock up on is ammunition!

 

[brasstackminis]

As a group, my religion is very actively promoting Emergency Preparedness and has been for years. We are encouraged to have a backpack with a 72 hour kit. In it there is everything you think you may need to survive for 72 hours. There is no specific day or event that is being prepared for...no one knows the day. I was so saddened when Hurricane Katrina hit and so many people parished due to dehydration! That is one of the things we all have in our kits! If they had just had water, many would have made it to help. It just made me have more resolve to keep up with all the emergency rediness training availible. We are also encouraged to have food storage, savings for a minimun of 6 months of bills, and to avoid credit cards. It is not enough to have all this stuff. You have to be used to using it! If you never eat whole wheat, what good is it to have 20 large coffee cans of wheat? Also your body would not be used to it and that could cause problems. Knowing how to raise your own food, plant and actually harvest from a garden, raise your own animals for milk, eggs, meat... It is a learning process for sure. I am blessed to have the knowledge to sew, cook, bake, raise animals and plants, and just take care of myself. I still have a long way to go to be able to be ready for any disaster, but I am working on it. The Red Cross has lots of great information on the subject.

Awhile back there was this great series on cable/satellite called "The Colony" on Discovery. You can watch the episodes for free on Hulu.com It was soooo interesting! They dropped 10-15 random people off in an abondoned area of LA and gave them a few rules about how to allow new people into the group and told them to survive. You watch as these people from all walks of life, join together to first just find shelter and food. Then they gather up all sorts of things like car batteries for energy to help them build. But the batteries begin to die so they take apart cars and piece them together with an old tractor and create a generator! Then they run out of diesle fuel, so they find some old rotting pig carcasses and boil them down and make bio-diesle! They build a windmil, they hunt for anything they can get their hands on including cockroaches from an old restraunt, they make a rain gutter system to gather water. It was amazing what they did and how they changed over the 60 days or maybe it was 90? It was facinating...best reality show I have seen in a long time. There was no competition for money...just their lives. It really makes you stop and think about what you really NEED to survive. I hope when a real crisis arises, people will join together to help each other instead of trying to survive as individuals. We all need to be prepared, but I think that survival in really tough times requires communites joining together to help eachother get through it. As seen in the past, you cannot always depend upon the government to be able to save you...sometimes you have to save yourself or at least buy yourself a little time until they can get to you if they are coming!

 

[Leeana]

I've seen it on the guide but never watched it, will check it out. My favorite show that I watched for 10 years (TEN YEARS!) ended last Summer and I've not much had the heart to try and find another "tv obsession"

.

Sounds interesting, will check it out

 

[Jill]

NEW season starts tonight! Two back to back episodes