Update and Welcome

First, an update on last week's post about shovels. I was asked a few questions about specific types of shovels, and rather than belabor a point I'll just post a link to an excellent website that I found while looking for references. The Shovel Zone should be able to answer all of your questions; the only thing I wish they had were more pictures for the various designs. Forestry Suppliers has a good catalog of shovels and other outdoor equipment; I'm not affiliated with them in any way, but have browsed their wares for many years.

With all of the uncertainty and turmoil in the world today, there are a lot of people waking up to the idea of prepping. If you're new here, welcome to BCP: we're a non-political, mostly sane group of folks that try to get realistic information out to the people who need and want it. You won't see articles about bunkers and vehicles that cost more than most people make in a year, we don't have flashy ads on our site, and we're all volunteers. Most of our writing comes from personal experience rather than repeating what we've read on other sources, our product reviews are based on things we've purchased with our own money, and we're not afraid to tell you if something isn't worth buying. 

We've been around since 2014, so most of us are starting our ninth year of writing for this blog, and there's a search box in the upper left-hand corner that can take you to our older posts. One of the nice things about being simple is that the information rarely gets old; some things are so basic that they will always be there.

The reasons people prepare are varied, so their preps will vary. Here are a few of the more common ones:

Food prices are going up and availability is going down, so it makes sense to buy and store what you can as a hedge against inflation and shortages. Growing your own food in whatever quantity you can is starting to look pretty darn good to a lot of people; even something as simple as a window garden that produces a few tomatoes or peppers will help stretch the food budget with very little input. We're not at the stage of eating the animals in zoos yet, but it has happened elsewhere and we're not immune to the causes of shortages.

Wars and rumors of wars are spreading. War is never good for anyone other than those selling arms; it disrupts so many aspects of life that the impact spreads to other places and makes life harder for everyone, and the larger the participant in a war, the larger the impact. We live in an interconnected world so what happens thousands of miles away will cause changes in our lives, and there's not much we can do other than prepare for it.

Crime is becoming increasingly more violent. Humans are not nice animals in general; rather, we are greedy, prone to violence, and very tribal. Various religions and philosophers have tried to blunt these traits over the millennia, but each new generation has to learn these lessons or they will revert to the basic animal that resides in all of us. I'm old, so I've seen the changes in what is taught and allowed in American society over the last half century or so, and it hasn't always been for the better.

I mentioned inflation up above, and the USA is currently seeing rates of inflation higher than any in the last 40 years. When your income is going to lose value fairly quickly, it's a good thing to buy and store essentials as soon as you can because they'll cost more in the future. If the inflation is temporary, you might be able to store enough to be more comfortable; if it sticks around for more than a year or reaches the level of hyper-inflation, life becomes a day-to-day struggle.

Feel free to reach out to us with questions through our social media links on the right side of the page. I'm not on Facebook, but we do have a group over there. MeWe is less censorious and doesn't have all of the ads, so we have a group there as well. If you use Discord, I've put up a server there and can provide an invite upon request.

Please remember that we're volunteers and have lives of our own with jobs and families, so we may not be able to respond immediately. Thanks for joining us, and welcome to prepping. 

Summer Vacation

 Hi everyone. This is Erin. 

I'm dealing with a lot of drama right now and I just can't give this blog the attention it deserves right now, so because of that, and because the other bloggers have been working very hard, I'm giving them time off as a summer vacation. 

I'll see you all in (hopefully) a week. 

-- Erin Palette, emotionally exhausted editrix

Happy Holidays to You and Yours

The Blue Collar Prepping staff are on vacation until January 4th. 

Be safe, have a merry holiday season, and hopefully Santa will leave some preps in your stockings!

BCP Unwelcome on Facebook

Not actually Erin.

Picture by KJ Photography

& is used with permission.

Yesterday, Facebook decided that this blog "violates community standards" and removed all links to it from both personal pages and our dedicated FB group.

I appealed this decision and was informed -- well, when I say "informed" I mean "I checked the support center because certainly no one from Facebook contacted me about this" -- that the matter was closed. Furthermore, I discovered that for reasons which Facebook has not disclosed, we have somehow been labeled as a spam site.

Our readers know this, but I should like to point out for the sake of completeness that Blue Collar Prepping does not sell anything. Therefore, even if we did engage in spam tactics -- which we do not -- they would be completely useless to us in any event.

Furthermore, whenever anyone tries to post a new link, they receive the following message:



I have appealed this decision with Facebook via an email to a support liaison, which should result in this matter being reviewed by a team rather than an algorithm. While I hope that this resolves the issue quickly, we have taken actions to move ourselves, and not incidentally our followers and their profitable-to-social-media-for-advertising-purposes attention and clicks, over to MeWe. Please go to https://mewe.com/join/bcp1 to join our new MeWe BCP group!

Summer Vacation

Not actually Erin.

Picture by KJ Photography

& is used with permission.

Hi everyone! I've given all the authors here at Blue Collar Prepping  a week off to relax and enjoy their summer.

All except for David Blackard, of course:

Regular posts will resume Monday, June 15.

Welcome, New Preppers!

Ah, spring, the time of year when anything can happen and usually does, including rain, snow, earthquakes, tornadoes, floods, and fires all over the place... and that's just Monday. The world is going through a rough patch right now and lots of people are starting to look at prepping in a different way. Some are admitting that maybe, just maybe, having some things set aside for emergencies isn't such a bad idea. Others are demanding that all of those “hoarders” be punished and their supplies redistributed to those who couldn't be bothered to plan ahead. The truly evil are looking at ways to take what they want and are looking for opportunities, while ordinary people are stepping up and providing supplies and services to their neighbors. Everyone is getting an education on prepping, whether they wanted it or not.

If you're new to the idea of prepping, welcome to the family. We're not all a bunch of greedy psychopaths looking to take your money in exchange for some piece of gear with dubious utility or longevity, and here at Blue Collar Prepping, we deal in information and teaching instead of sales and marketing. You may have noticed the shortage of ads: no flashing banners or pop-ups, no email harvesting, no books or classes for sale. For the last six years we've been cranking out new articles almost every Monday through Friday to try to enlighten and entertain our readers. None of us have gotten rich off of this; in fact, several of us have lost money. We do it because we think you, the reader, should have good information about a topic that we think is important.

We also welcome questions and guest articles if you need or have specific information pertaining to prepping. There is a search box in the upper left-hand corner of the blog page that will let you check out our archive of articles. After six years we have over 1700 of them, so you may find some of what you're looking for in a previous post.

The writers do have a few rules that have served us well.

• We Have No Politics. I stretch this one some days, but most of the time we avoid taking sides in political issues. There are few things in today's world more divisive than politics, and we're not here to drive anyone away. Everybody deserves the information they need to survive an emergency, regardless of their political party or other “difference”. There are plenty of other blogs and webpages out there that cover the political sphere, and this is not one of them.
• We Promote No Specific Religion. This is close to the rule above, and is important because the writing pool is such a mixture of differing beliefs that we'd all quit if anyone tried to push their specific religion. As I have explained to a few, I'm a Chaplain, but I am not likely your Chaplain. I'm not here to push my beliefs; I'm here to pass on information on other matters.
• We Do Not Give Sales Pitches. Several of our writers have personal businesses, but you won't see them pushing their wares here. Our product reviews are done mainly on items that we have purchased with out own money (and on the rare occasions when an item was donated for testing & evaluation will state so), and we are not afraid to be honest in our reviews. If something is worthless, we'll let you know so you don't waste your money.
• We Keep It Personal. Most of our writing is based on personal experience, not a regurgitation of something we read in a book but have never tried ourselves. If we don't know something, we're not going to lie to you and say we do. The writers are scattered across geological, educational, ideological, age, and lifestyle divides, so we can probably find someone with personal experience on most matters.
• We Are Reasonable in Scope. The blog's name is Blue Collar Prepping, so you're not going to find descriptions of 10,000 sq ft “Doomsday Bunkers” or maps of where to fly your plane to escape a hurricane. We're working-class folks and we try to keep in mind that most people have to live within a budget.
• We Are Civil. We don't deride or ridicule anyone other than a few really obnoxious snake oil salesmen out there. We'll call out a charlatan, but we welcome questions and differing opinions. Conspiracy theories and racist commentary are a good way to get blocked and ignored around here, as they serve no constructive purpose and hinder the flow of information.

Other than the blog, there are several ways to reach us:

• Our Facebook group (moderators are on duty)
• Our Discord server (this one is new, but I monitor it all day)
• Email (this one doesn't get checked very often)

There are no stupid questions, and we were all new to prepping at one time, so feel free to ask us anything. 

Hiatus

Due to a variety of factors -- Scott is dealing with a death in the family, David is packing and moving to a new place, Chaplain Tim is sick and I'm going to Utah for a week -- I have given our authors the week off.

Have a great week and a happy Valentine's Day, and we'll see you all on Monday the 18th.

-- Erin

Disconnecting from Social Media

After many years of being active on various social media, I've come to the conclusion that most of it is garbage. Myspace, LiveJournal, Facebook, and a few other, more obscure social media portals have all fallen from their goals of connecting people, and if they're still around they have “evolved” into being mostly mindless echo chambers.

Division

The widening political divide is a large part of the problem; most people aren't willing to communicate with someone who supports “the other side”. This lack of tolerance for the “other” has led to what I call “intellectual incest”, a state where new thoughts are not allowed and the old thoughts are repeated and reinforced so strongly that the participants start to show signs of hemophilia (lack of blood clotting so wounds don't heal), microcephaly (diminished skull capacity), and mental retardation, all commonly found in populations where inbreeding is practiced.

We have a strict “No Politics” rule on our blog and Facebook page because we don't want to become an echo chamber. We want to hear new thoughts and ideas. None of us are “experts”; we're here to learn as well as teach, and that requires the ability to listen to what others have to say. We don't always agree on everything -- I've had readers bring up conflicting evidence several times -- but we keep it civil and polite. Trolls and liars are acceptable targets for ridicule, but honest disagreement is allowed and opinions are (for the most part) respected. I fear we are becoming a rarity on the Internet.

Dehumanization

There is a theory that has been repeatedly tested on how to get people to do things to other people, generally applied to soldiers who have been taught since birth that it is wrong to kill other people. Not killing people is a good thing to teach children, but creates a problem when there are people who need to be killed. 

1. The first step to overcoming this childhood training is “othering”: creating or highlighting a distinct difference between the “good guys” and the “bad guys”. In the past, most of the “othering” was based on race or religion, and sometimes language and cultural differences were used to point out the “inferior” or “sub-human” qualities that made it permissible to kill another person.
• A slight alternative is to completely dehumanize the “other”, making them not-human and therefor not protected by our childhood training. We see this in the various zombie and alien gore-fests in popular video games and movies. 
2.  Once you have created the “other”, it is easier to make it acceptable to do things to them. 
3. The last step is teaching the soldier how to actually end a human life, which is the easiest part of the training.

Schoolyard bullies use the same techniques when they ostracize the “weird” kid, making him fair game for abuse. Cliches and gangs also use these tactics to strengthen their internal bonds and exclude outsiders from the “benefits” of membership. Using phrases that refer to a person as an animal (pig, dog, rat, etc.) is a milder form of dehumanizing, but it can be used as a stepping stone for future propaganda.

I am seeing this process being used on people more often today than I did in the past, and to much stronger levels. It used to be the tribal/rival sports team and their fans who were joked about, but now it is the dehumanization of anyone who supports a politician or policy that is different. Politicians are openly calling for the harassment of people from the other party; people are being assaulted for wearing the “wrong” hat or T-shirt; destruction of private and public property is happening in broad daylight, and all of this is being celebrated instead of condemned.

The problem I have run into is the incessant seeping of politics into everything on social media. I have friends and acquaintances of just about every stripe you can imagine, but it's getting harder to have a conversation about anything without politics being brought up. Everything is viewed through a filter of politics and political party affiliation, and this is something that I can no longer take part in. I don't really care which driver is behind the wheel when the bus goes over a cliff -- I don't want to be on that bus at all.

Cutting the Cord

I've disconnected from most of my social media accounts, with the exception of the BCP Facebook page. I've decided that it is time to start focusing on things closer to home, and getting rid of distractions is part of that. I'm still going to be here every week, but I won't be following the latest trends on social media unless they pop up in one of my news feeds. 

If TSHTF, I'm not likely to have access to social media, so I consider this preparation for anything that could shut down the Internet. I have a phone and several email accounts, and my friends and family know how to contact me. The various acquaintances I've accumulated over the years will likely not miss me, and if they do they can reach me through mutual friends. 

We're being played with, people. Social media is free because we're not the consumer, we're the product. Every post and note is analyzed and sorted for sale to advertisers or is used to track you. Think of them as a trail of breadcrumbs that lead to your front door; as a prepper, I don't want to be tracked by anyone who is trying to use me.

You may want to at least consider how much personal information you're giving to any group that doesn't have your best interest in mind. If you're like me, you don't like being someone else's pawn and will at least think about leaving social media. This may not be a step you're willing to take yet, but I have reached my limit of negativity and outright manipulation.

Like testing any other prep, stay off all social media for a week and evaluate how it works for you. I think you'll be surprised at how easy it is to do.

Teaching and Learning

A lot of what we write about here is done as a form of education. We're trying to show you what has worked for us (or others) in order to give you a reference point or starting point for your own response to a crisis. We do some product reviews and report our honest feelings about the results of our testing. We recount personal and historical events as a demonstration of what could and/or did go right and/or wrong. We're here to teach, and I assume you're here to learn.

I'll be the first to admit that I don't know everything. I'm a generalist with a good understanding of a wide variety of things, but detailed knowledge of only a few. None of us here are “experts”; we've never claimed to be and likely never will. We're playing the role of “teachers”. I use the term “playing” because none of us are actual educators by trade, nor do we have the baggage that comes with a typical student/teacher relationship. We won't talk down to you and we're open to comments and (polite) criticism. If we're ever wrong about something, show us the error and we'll correct it. We have experience in certain fields, mostly job-related, that we want to share because we realize that no one person can do everything. We've all enjoyed camping, shooting, and other outdoor activities so we all have some common experiences, but we're all a bit different:

• Erin is our editrix, mainly because she started this blog and she has the best grasp of grammar and composition. She also has the dubious pleasure of cleaning up some of the word salads that the other writers can produce.
• Firehand is a good metal-smith and has experience gained through years of practice that most of us don't have the time to duplicate. No reason to re-invent the wheel if you can learn about it from someone who has already done it.
• David is well versed in “starting over” due to his life experiences.  He's also a good generalist with regards to life skills. 
• Lokidude has been prepping in one way or another his entire life, it's just part of him now. He has more "outdoors" skills than most of the rest of us.
• The Discerning Shootist is fairly new here, but his levels of expertise is certain fields will become evident as time goes on. 
• My training is in the sciences and math, with a healthy dose of growing up working on farms (the two are not mutually exclusive - I use more math, biology, chemistry, and physics every day than most people would think). 
• Once in a while we get guest authors  who have specialist knowledge that they would like to pass along, and we're always open to new guest articles (without guaranteeing that they will be used).

You, as a reader, are playing the role of student. You're here to learn something new or maybe a new way to do something. Take notes, interact with the teachers, ask questions, maybe join our Facebook group and meet others like yourself.

• I say "take notes" because most of the emergencies that we are all trying to prepare for are going to involve a lack of internet. Having notes on paper or stored on a local device ensures that you will be able to access the information even if you can't pull up the website.
• Interact with us. We like getting comments because it's one of the few ways we have of knowing that anyone is reading our stuff. The admins have access to some analytical tools, but they're not a convenient way of getting feedback. We're human and like to be acknowledged once in a while.
• If any of us are unclear on something, please ask for clarification. We're not going to belittle anyone who has an honest question (conspiracy theories don't count) and someone will try to answer your question. Different people learn in different ways, so we're flexible in how we present information.
• The FB group has rules, but they're not draconian. The rules are actually a lot like the ones we have imposed upon ourselves here at the blog. No politics, little to no advertising (the few ads we have along the right side of the page don't pay much), no spam, and no promoting other sites are the main rules. We do our best to weed out the 'bots and spammers before allowing them into the group, the few who make it through the vetting process get booted quickly. Having a half-dozen moderators that check the page several times a day means we can stomp on the spammers efficiently. Some of us enjoy that part of the job (a few enjoy it a bit too much).

Basically, our goal at this blog is to give you more than a helping of free ice cream. We want to share knowledge with you, knowing that doing so is often a two-way street. We'll keep doing our best to provide our readers a fresh, non-political, maybe even unique, article every weekday while hoping to learn a few things ourselves.

Editor on Vacation

Picture by KJ Photography

& is used with permission.

This is just a quick post to let you know that the Editor (me) will be leaving tomorrow to attend a MAG40 class and that I won't be back until the weekend.

This is partly a heads-up regarding "Hey, if things are wonky, this is why; I'll fix them when I can" and partly a "I'm doing a cool thing and I'll review it when I'm back."

See you when I get back!

My Candle Burns At Both Ends, It Will Not Last the Night

Not actually Erin.

Picture by KJ Photography

& is used with permission.

For those of you who pay attention to such things, Blue Collar Prepping has been around for over three years now, having written about 915 posts and many, many words about being prepared on a budget.

This is, as you can imagine, a lot of work. I don't know how many hours my co-bloggers spend on writing their articles, but I know I spend several hours on mine. What many people may not realize is that I basically write two prepping articles a week: a written post here and a Blue Collar Prepping segment for the GunBlogVarietyCast. All told, between writing, proofreading, formatting, and fixing links for other articles, I spend between 10 to 12 hours a week working on this blog.

Please note that this is not a complaint, nor a "poor pitiful me" ploy. I'm going somewhere with this, and I feel that I need to show my math here.

In addition to Blue Collar Prepping, I have a personal blog and a freelance writing job, both of which I cannot neglect because they help pay my bills. Furthermore, now that Operation Blazing Sword is a 501c3 charity and gaining in popularity, I am being asked to do interviews and make speaking appearances, which also reduce the amount of time I have to write. In short, something has to give because I can't be everywhere at once.

At this time, I feel I cannot manage writing two prepping articles a week along with all of my other duties and responsibilities. I've felt this was coming for a while now, which explains why I've been trying to get another full-time contributor, but I haven't had any success with that. I tried filling the missing contributor spot with guest posts, but that didn't work well because 1) I wasn't getting enough of them to fill my schedule and 2) it actually takes longer to edit guests than it does regular contributors (because I can teach them my preferred format).

Ultimately, this means that my podcast will have to become my weekly contributor spot, because at this time I feel like I'm burning my candle at both ends. Should we be so fortunate as to acquire another full-time contributor, I will gladly let them have my slot and move the podcast back to Sundays, but until then I'm afraid that this is the only way I can give our readers Monday to Friday content.

To summarize:

• I am not leaving this blog. 
• I will continue my duties as Editrix-in-Chief.
• I will continue to write the Blue Collar Prepping podcast segment. 
• The podcast will serve as my weekly article instead of a Monday post. 
• If I have time to write other articles, I will of course share them here. 
• If we gain another contributor, I will let them have my slot. 

Hopefully that explains what is going on. If you have questions or concerns, please let me know. 

The Blue Collar Prepping Teespring Store

Hey Erin, why didn't BCP have an article up on time on Monday?

I was busy all afternoon, evening, and a good chunk of the morning uploading designs to our Teespring storefront and getting merchandise ready for sale.

The picture on the right is the color version of our logo and it adorns all of our items. It took me a while to get the face a nice race-neutral complexion to go with the gender-neutral picture, and it took even longer to figure out how to add camouflage to line art. But I think it came out well.

All of our prices are quite fair (lower than what Teespring recommends, in fact) and I think they all came out looking quite nice. For example, here is a hoodie in forest green, for $35.00.

Please visit our store and buy BCP-branded merch. None of us earn a living from blogging, and so all sales will go into a fund that will maintain the operation of this site and, hopefully, allow the authors to attend various prepping-related events.

Thank you!

Reasons For Our Absence Yesterday

Not actually Erin.

Picture by KJ Photography

& is used with permission.

There was no Blue Collar Prepping yesterday for a very good reason: I traveled out of town to be by the side of a dear friend dying of cancer. This was the last time I'd ever get to see her, and so I was there to say my goodbyes and to comfort her husband.

I make no apologies for missing Monday. Some things are more important than blog posts.

If you'd like to contribute funds to help with funeral expenses of my friend Dawn, her GoFundMe page is here. Her husband John has been caring for her and taking her down to Miami for chemo, so he's hardly worked in nearly 2 months. He's definitely going to need help getting back on his feet and figuring out the rest of his life once his wife passes.

Thank you for your understanding. Blogging resumes today, with a post by Firehand as Lokidude has experienced a mild family emergency in the vein of what I had this weekend.

Another Administrative Note

Not actually Erin.

Picture by KJ Photography

& is used with permission.

The comment situation I talked about last week seems to have quietly resolved itself. Even the comments which were submitted but did not initially appear are now present. Thank you, Google, for un-screwing your screwup.

If anyone else has problems with commenting, please shoot me an email at erin DOT palette AT gmail DOT com.

While I'm dealing with administrivia, you may have noticed that Blue Collar Prepping has a new sponsor. Matt Rogers, the owner of Echo Sling, really appreciated the write-up I did about rifle slings and so has kindly bought ad space from us. In the interest of openness (hi there, Federal Trade Commission), I'm going to say what shouldn't need to be said:

1. I've been a fan of Echo Slings for years now, as my 2014 review will attest. 
2. Matt didn't buy my review with ad money. It was an expansion of an article idea I had previously. 
3. Now that Echo Sling is an advertiser, we won't be doing any more reviews of the product because that would constitute a conflict of interest. (Not that it really needs further review.)

Thank you for your continued support by reading BCP, commenting on our articles here and on Facebook, and by supporting us through Patreon. 

An Administrative Note About Comments

Not actually Erin.

Picture by KJ Photography

& is used with permission.

For some reasons, comments made on Feb. 25th or later are not showing up. I do not know why this is.

I get notification of and can read the comments made to my posts (Thank you, Russell Humphress and Eric B, for telling me you value my Apocabox Unboxing vids), but they aren't showing up on the blog.

It isn't anything we at BCP have done. I'm inclined to lay the blame at Google's feet for screwing up the code. Hopefully it will be fixed soon.

Truth be told, though, I am less than impressed with the G+ comment integration with this blog. If I had the change to do it over again, I wouldn't link the two in the first place. So if this issue is not resolved promptly (within a week), I will be uncoupling G+ comments from the blog.