RANT: Self-reliance?

Thursday, January 7, 2010

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1240629/At-mercy-deep-freeze-Schools-shut-firms-hit–6-inches-snow.html

Army rescues 1,000 drivers stranded in cars for 12 HOURS as UK is paralysed by heavy snow (with more on its way)
By Sophie Freeman
Last updated at 2:09 PM on 06th January 2010

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The 23-year-old said: ‘We went through hell. I am eight months pregnant, I couldn’t go to the toilet all night, I couldn’t warm the bottle up for my baby daughter. It was very frightening.

‘There were loads of cars parked up, just on the motorway. No-one knew what was going on – there was no-one to help.

‘We didn’t see any police, we’ve heard that the Army is out but we didn’t see anyone – it’s not very good really.”

She had set off for Heathrow Airport in West Sussex at 5.30pm yesterday and didn’t arrive until 8am today.

Ms Holt’s father, Mark, attempted to reach his daughter but was prevented from driving up the A3 beause it had been closed because of the weather.

He said: ‘It took my daughter 15 hours to get home and no-one came to help her, they didn’t see anyone.’

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Totally unprepared Brits, throughout article, whine: “they” didn’t do this for me; “they” didn’t do this for me; wha, wha, WHA! No one takes responsibility for themselves. Maybe it is the welfare state culture?

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MONEY: Time to get “small”

Thursday, January 7, 2010

http://www.newsweek.com/id/228428/output/print

Survivalism Lite
They call themselves ‘preppers.’ They are regular people with homes and families. But like the survivalists that came before them, they’re preparing for the worst.
By Jessica Bennett | Newsweek Web Exclusive
Dec 28, 2009

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In the end, what it all boils down to, at least for the preppers, is self-reliance—a concept as old as the human race itself. As survival blogger Joe Solomon pointed out in a recent column, during the Victory Gardens of WWII, Americans managed to grow 40 percent of all the vegetables they needed to survive. “My mother’s parents had a 10-acre garden, and my grandfather worked at the dairy farm next door,” says Hill, the former jet mechanic. “They worked by raising their own food, they had their own chickens, they canned vegetables, and my grandfather fed a family of 12 like that.” But in the modern world, he says, many of those skills are easily forgotten. Today, our food comes from dozens of different sources. Most of us aren’t quite sure how electricity gets from the wires to our stoves. We use debit cards to buy a can of tuna and we wouldn’t have the slightest idea how to filter contaminated water. We are residents of the new millennium; we simply haven’t needed to prepare.

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Hard times are coming. While it may not be TEOTWAWKI (The End Of The World As We Know It), there’s no doubt that it will represent a lesser standard of living for everyone.

Get “prepared”!

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