Monday, January 31, 2011

Neighborhood Survival

As you may know, Egypt is in turmoil and rioting, looting and killing has been occurring for several days.  Those living in the worst areas in Egypt are facing the SHTF and there are no police to be found to protect property and arrest criminals.  Because the police went home some of the people in the neighborhoods in Cairo formed groups to protect themselves and their property. 

That got me thinking about my neighborhood and if we were to cooperate with each other could we survive for an indefinite period of time without police and the luxuries of life like a supermarket.  My small neighborhood, about 100 families, is semi-rural (for New Jersey anyway) and if we were to cooperate in a SHTF situation I believe we could survive.   The neighborhood could easily be isolated and entry by vehicle could be made impossible.  The only issues would be patrolling the surrounding woods and having enough food to make it to the next harvest.  Another issue is, do I really want to cooperate myself which would most likely result in my neighbors knowing that I have more than enough food to survive to the next harvest for me and my family. The most likely conclusion is that I would need to cooperate with my neighbors if a real threat such as gangs of looters were to come into the neighborhood. 

In any case, the neighborhood has several 10+ acre farms, two 18+ acres of forest (mostly pine trees, not the best firewood but good enough) that are partially township owned and privately owned, a small chicken farm and a vineyard.  Some of my neighbors also raise some goats and others have horses. All homes have septic tanks and have both well and public water so sanitation and access to water, even if the power is out, should not be an issue. 

I have met some of my neighbors and most are sheeple and do not have any survival sense.  I've met one of the farmers directly behind my property and they seem to have a survival sense like most farmers do.  So if the SHTF I think we could survive for a while because of the resources in the neighborhood.

Below are aerial photos of my neighborhood.  I recommend that you get to know your neighbors and what resources may be available in your neighborhood in order to be prepared for the SHTF.  A lot of us are individualistic types but in certain situations and areas of the country (like New Jersey), you may need to cooperate with your neighbors to survive.

Live the Motto - Be Prepared!

Overall View of My Neighborhood
Farms located in the neighborhood including vineyard.  






















Two 18+ acre forest for firewood














Small Chicken Farm
















Neighbor with a few horses. 

Sunday, January 30, 2011

New Firearms Website

To Idaho Bob and my other readers.  Thanks for checking on me.  I haven't posted for a month since I am developing a new website that I think would be helpful for new gun owners as well as experienced gun owners.  It's taking me longer than I thought it would to develop the website and the more I develop it, the more ideas I have for the site.  The website will be called Firearms University or F.U. for short :-) It will be sort of an online education website for firearms where you can view gun videos (i.e., Courses) in a more organized fashion.  Hopefully for a new gun owner it will be easier for him/her to find the information and videos they need quickly. I have come to learn that finding good gun videos is sometimes difficult because some people who post videos don't use good keywords or tags and therefore, you have to use different and uncommon keywords to find videos.  Each course will have a set of videos to be viewed, a course manual, and a final exam which when passed you will be given some type of incentive such as product discounts to online/offline retailers.  I still have a lot of work to do and have to develop the exams and manuals for each course.

Just like a university it will be divided into several different colleges and schools.  The main school will be the New Firearms Owner Institute.  The other schools that I plan on "opening" will be Concealed & Open Carry College, Ammunition Reloading College, College of Gunsmithing, School of Competitive Shooting, Tactical College, Long Range Shooting Institute, and of course we will have a Survival & Preparedness College. The goal for each college/school will be to give the viewer/student a basic foundational education on the respective subject through the use of various videos and articles/manuals.

The website is not ready yet but I wanted to get some feedback from my readers to see if this is something that would be helpful and if they would visit on a regular basis.  The work in progress website is http://www.wix.com/livethemotto/firearmsuniversity2  Once the website is semi-completed, the website address will be http://www.FirearmsUniversity.com.

Take a look and click on some of the links.  It's a flash based website so it may load a little slower than normal.  As you will see on the site, there are several tabs at the top.  All the tabs, except the "Athletics" tab, are working.  Make sure you click on the "Courses at F.U." tab to get to the different schools/colleges.  The only working link is the link to the New Firearms Owner Institute.  Once you are at the New Firearms Owner Institute, you will see the different courses offered.  Not all of the courses are completely finished and I am having some issues with some of the video players.  YouTube recently changed their embedding code and the Embedr video player that I wanted to use for the site is not working right.  Nevertheless some of the videos are working so check them out.  FYI, some of the videos do contain profanity.  I will probably remove the videos with profanity since I do want this to be a professional site that anyone, including children, can visit to learn.  Also be sure to check out the Course Manual for the "Introduction of Firearms" course within the Firearms 101 module.  This is the only manual that has been completed.  The course manuals will link all the videos together to give the reader a multimedia learning experience and information resource. 

So let me know what you think, whether good or bad.  FYI, try not to use the Back button on your browser.  For each page I tried to include a link to return to the previous page.  Thanks.

Live the Motto - Be Prepared!