investment

INVESTMENT


I’m sure that for the last two days you’ve found my articles to be mediocre. I know I have, so there is no need to whisper quietly and try not to upset me by not blurting out “You Suck!”. I’m not too sure about today’s. Tomorrow I think will be much better. I will be writing on female body fat, lactation and birth control. I imagine you don’t share my enthusiasm on the subject, but if you think about it for a few seconds you realize it fits right in there with post-collapse living and survival. I read up on it last night but I need to take notes. Back to my less than stellar articles ( which have always happened in droves, and will always happen on occasion ), I’m coming down with another damn cold and am feeling like I’ve been rode hard and put up wet. I’m just going on auto-pilot, churning out drivel. I usually only get sick once a season, at least to the point I feel this bad, largely thanks to mega-dosing vitamin C and my being pure of heart. But now I’m sick twice in a month. My newest theory is that one of the homeless guys here hangs out at the hospital at night to stay warm and he has taken to licking the walls. After he mixes and matches several toxic man-made barnyard flu cultures he comes back here to share.

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I’ve covered why you need to prep before. Previously I’ve explained it as a fixed cost, insurance wise. Just one of life’s expenses. But today The Ranger Man ran an article defending the practice as a therapeutic hobby, and I felt the need to chime in. I also read over at http://cryptogon.com/ how the newest and greatest, once a week miracle to confuse the masses cure for Peak Oil is now going to be turning sunlight into fuel artificially, as plants do. This is of course just hogwash, pie in the sky, unicorns and glitter thinking, but it did allow me for a second to wish and hope we weren’t all going to die. I only give civilizations ( or, at least the American Empire descending into anarchy ) chances of survival a single digit, say 2%. As long as you don’t gamble on it happening it is alright to wish for it. So, just in case that 2% happens, on the off chance we don’t all end up in the stew pot, what if your survival plans and preps come to naught?

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Some prepping items are pure expense and can only be justified as “help you sleep at night insurance”. But a large part can be investment. The most obvious is of course junk land. For the mere expense of a few thousand bucks you have the potential to save hundreds every month thereafter once you move on to it. If it all goes to hell you have a place the bankers can’t repo. If nothing bad happens you have a very frugal homestead that will allow you to prep more, or earn less or both. If your number one expense all your life is rent or a mortgage, it just makes sense to eliminate that. Yes, at first it will be primitive camping, but soon after that as you invest in the land and its structures it becomes more livable and comfortable. You will be the envy of all your friends as they need to suck on the bosses ass to keep their good paying job just a little longer before it goes to India so they can pay more interest to the bankers before they are homeless. Another way prepping is investing is it forces you to live more frugal to afford that expense. Afterwards, if you ever reach that illusive “enough supplies” point, you have learned how to live cheap and can thereafter enjoy life rather than laboring mightily for others benefit. At first it will be hard to give up your double decaf latte, cell phone glued to your ear, eating out three times a week. But after a bit you will shudder at the prospect of ever wasting money like that again.

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If you really get into prepping you start eating the same food as you have stockpiled, such as whole wheat. This saves you tons of money and gets you in far better health. A great investment, in other words. Than of course there is the buying in bulk. At first you are just trying to save 25 or 50% but soon you won’t buy any item at less than pallet sizes. The incredible savings are simple irresistible. It takes a bit of doing to save up for monthly shopping rather than daily or weekly, but it returns your investment very quickly. I know few of you share my hatred of motor vehicles. But if you never bought a new vehicle again, convinced the oil won’t outlive it, you’ve saved a ton of money. When you go from florescent to LED’s the cost is pretty high. Going from 26 to 6 watts a fixture will never pay back your cost ( although factoring in bulb replacement of fluorescents might make it look better ) but once the cost goes from 15 cents a kilowatt to a buck ( almost guaranteed to happen prior to brown outs and then the permanent black out ) you will once again have made a huge, smart, envied investment. Even if the lights always stay on, increased inflation will jack up the price. The same with insulation. It might not pay for itself now, but once heat becomes more expensive it will. And NOT investing in these items will be foolish since it replaces the need for energy. It is a one time expense. As opposed to a monthly forever after expense of extra heat and electricity.

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So, don’t look at it as spending money on storage food, look at it as saving grocery money by buying in bulk. Don’t look at it as eating weird food but being on a health regimen. You aren’t throwing away four grand buying land a thousand miles away, you are buying a cheap homestead you will move out to shortly. You aren’t prepping the house to keep you alive after grid down, but saving money as you save the earth. You aren’t wasting four hundred bucks buying more rimfire ammo than you’ll ever need, simply buying at a discount, while affordable, ammunition for the rest of your life going to the shooting range. None of this HAS to be for the apocalypse, it can simply be fighting inflation before one of you in the marriage gets laid off. That is, if my paranoid screaming haven’t convinced you of the need to prep ( honestly, I don’t give myself that much credit- anyone with half open eyes can see the threats ).

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My e-mail is jimd303@netzero.com
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