From the Trenches World Report
Enforce our Bill of Rights
Sometimes people think that a sumer power outage is easier to deal with than a winter one. After all, in the summer, you don’t have to worry about freezing to death, which is a very real threat during a long-lasting winter outage.
However, a summer power outage carries its own set of problems. Foremost are heat-related illnesses and the higher potential of spoilage for your food. Continue reading “How to Prep for a Summer Power Outage”
It’s that time of year again. The mercury is climbing…and staying there, way up at the top of the thermometer. But running an air conditioner at full blast to combat the heat can be very expensive, and for those of us on a budget, the resulting bill can be crippling. Continue reading “The Cheapskate’s Guide to Suriviving without Air Conditioning”
In the prepper world, everyone always talks about “strategic relocation
We’re preparing for what I hope is my final move ever. We have a nice little farm awaiting us, with a deep well, a greenhouse, and a barn: everything we need for self-reliance heaven. Continue reading “Strategically Relocating? Here’s How to Move All That Prepper Stuff”
With all of the ridiculous new regulations, coddling, and societal mores that seem to be the norm these days, it’s a miracle those of us over 30 survived our childhoods.
Here’s the problem with all of this babying: it creates a society of weenies.
There won’t be more more rebels because this generation has been frightened into submission and apathy through a deliberately orchestrated culture of fear. No one will have faced adventure and lived to greatly embroider the story
If you’re one of the people who was excited when the “natural” sweetener that was allegedly made from the stevia plant
All of that hype about the “new” zero-calorie Truvia? All the talk about how natural it is? That’s just not true.
Incidentally, while the FDA has approved this bastardization of stevia, the actual leaf, where the active chemicals are found, is banned from sale as a food additive or sweetener and my only be sold as an “herbal supplement.” Continue reading “Truvia’s Sweet Scam: Highly Processed, GMO, and Contains Hardly Any Stevia”
There comes a day when we learn that we have gotten so far away from nature and simplicity that it’s laughable.
That day was yesterday for me, when a friend of mine laughingly shared an article on Facebook called, “If you haven’t tried wild swimming, here’s what you’re missing.”
Wild swimming
One of the most common questions I’m asked in interviews is how I got started prepping. That crucial moment when you decide that you need to change the way you live is paramount to understanding the motivation to live a prepared lifestyle
Recently, I asked many of you how you started out, too, for an article I was working on. You answered via email and social media, and I so thoroughly enjoyed hearing your stories that I decided to publish some of them in this collection, as opposed to merely quoting bits and pieces in the original article I had planned. Continue reading “Looking for Motivation? 21 Preppers Share the Stories of How They Got Started”
A red flag sign of an emotionally abusive relationship
For the second time in as many months, Utah is facing a municipal water crisis. Back in April, the community of Nibley was unable to use the water from the taps due to a chemical spill. This time, the city of Syracuse, Utah has issued a boil order due to E. Coli and Coliform contamination in the water supply.
It seems that across the country, more and more water crises are occurring, underlining the need for all households to possess an emergency water supply. Continue reading “There’s Something in the Water in Utah: E Coli”
Did you ever read a blog post on a prepper site and sigh, because the person writing the post seemed to have been born a survivalist?
In your mind’s eye, you could envision them at the tender age of six, weaving a snare from some vines that they wisely assessed not to be poison ivy, catching a rabbit, skinning and gutting it with a pocketknife, and cooking it over a fire they started with two sticks that they rubbed together, while wearing their little elementary-school-sized camo outfit. Continue reading “How to Prep When You’re NOT an Epic Wilderness Survival Guru”
Nothing warms my prepper’s heart more than a good disaster movie that supports my hypotheses about a specific event, and the recent movie San Andreas 
Okay, sure, there was some pretty unrealistic stuff like when The Rock was driving a boat through post-tsunami San Francisco and just happened to find his daughter that he was looking for. The last time I went to San Francisco, my daughter and I had trouble finding each other on the first floor of Forever 21, for crying out loud. Continue reading “San Andreas for Preppers: 12 Earthquake Survival Lessons from the Movie”
Are you truly prepared for a water emergency?
How long could your family survive if the water stopped flowing from the municipal supply and none was available at the store? If the answer is not “indefinitely” then you need to check out my new book, The Prepper’s Water Survival Guide: Harvest, Treat, and Store Your Most Vital Resource
Did you ever stop to put some thought into the flushing power of your toilet?
It’s one of those things we in modern society take for granted. We use the restroom, then we flush, wash our hands, and forget it.
But during extreme scenarios, this isn’t always so easy. When researching my book, The Prepper’s Water Survival Guide, I spent a lot of time reading about water, sanitation, and waterborne illness. These issues are all closely linked, and it’s vital to find solutions. Continue reading “Sanitation in the City: What To Do When the Toilet Won’t Flush”
If you aren’t eating yogurt on a daily basis, you might be shortchanging your health. There’s no easier way to get some healthy bacteria in your system than to enjoy some rich, delicious, full-fat yogurt loaded of active cultures.
If your gut is damaged, a daily dose of yogurt can actually repair the damage
Have you ever heard anyone utter some variation of one of these comments?
“I’m going to start prepping as soon as I can move.”
“I can’t prepare because I live in a tiny apartment.”
“Well, once we are able to get moved to our farm in two years I’ll start prepping hardcore.” Continue reading “Bloom Where You’re Planted: Prepping to Survive Where You Are Right Now”
Did you ever wish that you could relocate to a fortress
There’s no denying that for many of us, times are tight. Many homes have a basket by the door full of unopened bills. Bank accounts are in overdraft. Every week the charges at the grocery store are a little bit higher than the week before, and for less food. Kids want new clothes and that latest video game, the car needs to be fixed, and people’s jobs are draining the very life from them. Continue reading “The Cheapskate’s Guide to Productive Hobbies”
Excerpt from The Pantry Primer: A Prepper’s Guide to Whole Food on a Half-Price Budget
Another important consideration when building your pantry is the restrictions of family members with food-related issues.
There are many people who must eliminate certain foods or suffer the consequence. Allergies and intolerances are a primary issue for the families of sufferers. Continue reading “How to Prep for Those with Dietary Restrictions”
Yogurt is full of good bacteria, and it’s delicious too! But those little six-packs touting “active cultures” are also filled with other ingredients that you probably don’t want to add to your diet if the purpose of eating yogurt is good health.
Here are the ingredients in Yoplait’s plain yogurt:
Cultured Pasteurized Grade A Nonfat Milk. Contains Less Than 2% of: Corn Starch, Kosher Gelatin, Pectin. Made With Active Yogurt Cultures Including L. Acidophilus.
Continue reading “Two Ridiculously Easy Ways to Make Homemade Yogurt”
Looking for a good series to read this summer? I’m here to hook you up!
I really love a good prepping/survival story and sometimes a good one can be tough to come by. There are those excellent classic survival books like One Second After and Alas Babylon that pretty much spoil you for lesser prepper fiction. Continue reading “Book Review: A. American’s Survivalist Series”
