Couple of weeks ago I felt the intuitive need to collect all the home flashlights and put them where I could find them in the dark. Some short time later all the power in the house and outside of the house went out in the night, try and I could hobble to where I had made the pile of flashlights in the blind dark. I thought of where my gun is, sickness which I can also find in the dark. I missed my shotgun. I heard later that someone had shot up important town transformers putting out town power. This story is not confirmed to me.
Nancy Alex said the power outage was the fault of some 20 year old who turned his air conditioner up so far as to blow the circuit. Some girl at a mini mart bodaga type store told her some guy had shot up the power pole on a dare. The girl said she was afraid to talk about it.
Anyway I was upset that I had anticipated a power outage for I anticipate now overall general disaster and wish I had a better collection of batteries and other survival tools.
Yesterday MSN listed survival equipment in a 7 list from Kiplinger's newsletter. It was okay. They listed a modular rechargeable lantern flashlight thing, buy generator, water purifier rechargeable TV and radio, but left off guns and knives and stuff like that.
For food security potatoes in your yard are recommended. Stockpile of MREs are recommended. Bug food recipes are recommended.
The other day I heard that some computer geek in the Obama administration was in conflict with DOD, Department of Defense over actions to take concerning Cyberwar threats. Much as I like Obama he, and his administration seem oddly half brained far as the realities I perceive. It has been known for years that a cyberattack could disable our electric grid. We are all very dependent of computer security. The way things are now there is a whole industry dependent on individuals being forced to spend money to protect their computers whenever they network, or go on line. It's like the US government won't take up protecting our computers because there is a moneymaking industry dependent on allowing extortionists to flourish. I have imagined that it would be good for the US Postal Service to take up the job of protecting email and computer security, but it is not really part of their clear and simple mission of delivering mail and packages.
I don't mind if DOD does the job. Obviously somebody there knows what their job is supposed to be. It's a little bit of good news.
Because of my Flashlight story I am in a disaster preparedness mode of thinking. Since I'm real broke it will be dependent on low tech solutions and collections of things like matches. When I get a Kindle I shall load up on How To books first. I want a complete library of Boy Scout Merit Badge books.