Normalcy Bias - an example

Recently there was a fire on the 5 Freeway here in sunny California. Someone called me and I watched the event unfold on live TV. I found myself yelling at the people on TV as I watched people make some really odd decisions.

NORMAL – “usual or ordinary: not strange”

These folks were driving along on the freeway just cruising down the road, no different than other trips along this route some of them had done before. First smoke appeared blowing across the road and was followed by the sight of flames along the road. Someone decided to stop. Maybe they could not see? Maybe they thought the flames would burn their car? The reason they stopped really does not matter at this point. What does matter is the flow of traffic stopped. People now started making decisions which would affect their lives or the lives of others!

CHANGE – “to make someone or something different”

Some people milled around watching the flames come toward them. Of course cell phones were brought out and video was taken. ‘Selfies’ made their way on to the internet. People did not seem to understand their “normal” had changed…………

Mass panic – “An uncontrolled mass response to a triggering event (e.g., fire, explosion) in which a crowd of people—e.g., on a religious pilgrimage or at a professional sporting or music event—move at once towards a presumed direction of egress, which, if blocked, may result in a mass disaster of human crush injuries and death due to compressive asphyxiation.”

Mass hysteria – “A socially contagious frenzy of irrational behavior in a group of people as a reaction to an event.”

One of the people involved gave this interview;

"Police had come by, calling over their loudspeakers for people to stay in their cars.” Sclafani and her teammates ditched their van, left everything and started running up the mountain in the 95 degree heat of the California afternoon. What seemed like 1,000 people were doing the same, she said. “Including a pregnant woman we helped out,” she said. They stayed up on the hill for about three hours.“There were lots of people crying. Some were vomiting. People were really frightened,” she said."

When we talk about normalcy bias we have to first work on our own. Then we have to take into account everyone else’s bias. Most people do not think about what could happen to change their day. They take no steps to prepare themselves or to give themselves items which could help them when the situation takes a turn for the worst. Instead we see here an example of people’s bias turning into panic and I would add a "out for themselves" mentality.

With the exception of a few of the large semi-trailers on the road, every single one of the passenger vehicles on the road could have put their engine into reverse and driven backwards on the freeway! They could, with a limited amount of cooperation, turned their vehicles around and carefully driven back the way they had come. Instead people thought only of their own situation and reacted in what they thought was the best way to save their own hides.

Luckily, no one was killed in this incident. The Fire Fighters did an outstanding job of dropping water on the burning vehicles right there on the freeway, never seen that trick before! What was unlucky is some people did not have vehicles to return to. They were now stranded on the freeway with what they had with them! Most of them had basically nothing with them………………

There was no group hug and a sharing of resources at the end of the danger. If people returned and their vehicle worked, they left the area. Not sure if the first person to run had a vehicle to return to. Absolutely positive the people just outside of the affected area enjoyed having video, photos and a story to tell but did not stay to help the people now stranded along the freeway. At the end of the day this is a reminder we are responsible for our loved ones and ourselves..... Do not count on others to make the right decision for you or to help you in any way!

The desert around the cities of Southern California is a real desert and most people tend to forget this as they fly by in the vehicles. If these people had been trapped by the flames for much longer than three hours or had been forced to run a greater distance to save their lives how many would have made it? How many people, on a regular day, would say they would stop to help the pregnant lady? How many of these people ran passed her in “real life”?

Remember the actions of others are out of your control yet can greatly affect your life! Have the forethought to pack a Bail Out Bag! Have a Get Home Bag! Make decisions even if the decision is not what the herd is doing! Help those people you can!

As Always,

Stay Safe!!!

Shelter - Clothes on your back

Every day we get up, throw some clothes on and go about our day. Most of us never really think about what we are doing when we get dressed, we put on an outfit and do not think of this layer of clothing as our first line of shelter if a bad day comes. Sure we take into account the weather, if it is hot we wear less, if it is cold we wear more. “Simple, nothing to think about! I know how to get dressed!”

Sure we all get dressed every day, have you ever thought about it? Are you wearing clothes which assist with keeping you warm or cool? Do you know how to use your clothing to assist with keeping yourself comfortable? Are you giving yourself advantages or disadvantages if something interrupts your normal routine?

Our skin is the first layer between us and the outside world. Yes our skin also keeps all of our insides ‘in’ but our skin does more than this. Our skin helps regulate our body temperature by sweating and other mechanisms. When we get dressed we can assist our skin or hamper our bodies’ ability to regulate by what items or materials we place on top of our skin.

Layering is important when you pick your clothing for the day. Being able to add or subtract articles of clothing gives you the ability to regulate better how hot or cold you are. Proper clothing can be the difference between suffering and dealing with a situation. Just having the ability to access additional clothing or the ability to change clothing can be a god send in certain situations. Nobody wants to be cold and wet if they do not need to be.

Mothers understand this quicker than most fellas, especially when little ones are involved. When the bag gets packed for the little one Mom always makes sure there is jackets or a change of clothes packed away “just in case”. As we plan our day we should take a moment to also plan for “just in case”. Take a moment and check the weather. Is there a chance of rain? Maybe we should plan for the chance of getting wet later in the day? Maybe we alter what we wear to what the weather report says could happen?

You can still be fashionable and wear proper clothing to assist you with dealing with the elements. Now days there are plenty of materials both natural and manmade which can keep you cool, warm and dry. Except for in warm climates cotton is something we should stay away from. Cotton likes to hold water and this will just make you colder and miserable if you are caught in a rain shower or snow. You want a base layer of material which whisks perspiration away from your skin. In a hot environment this helps your body cool down, in a cold environment this helps to keep your body warm. Your clothing has to help your skin do what the skin is supposed to do. If your bas layer holds your sweet against your skin you are hindering what your body is trying to do.

Think of clothing as building a shelter around your skin. In cold weather you want more between you and the elements. In hot weather you want to help your body cool down and keep the sun from burning your skin. The same as you try to regulate the temperature in your home. Just like your house your clothing layering needs a tough outer shell or a roof and walls. Your outer layer of clothing needs to work like a portable house. This layer needs to be water, snow or sun proof. This layer needs to be something you can put on or off easily and in most cases is a jacket you have handy. Umbrellas also count in this outer layer group. Remember this is your tough outer shell.

Between your outer shell and your base layer are all the other clothes and options you have. Long sleeve shirts, gloves, maybe a scarf? This is the layer most of us throw on in the morning but do not think much about. Yet this is the main layer which predicts how well we can deal with the elements. Sure you can pack a big heavy jacket and toss this on when the rain starts. But those dress shoes you are wearing as you walk through the rain do not keep the water out. Your cotton socks are never going to dry. The dress slacks you have on soak up water like a sponge. Your jacket does a good job covering you from the neck down but the water coming down is hitting you on the head, dripping down your neck and soaking into the shirt you have on. Then the power goes out and the heating in the office stops working. Of course the power does not come back on and now you have to think about walking home…….. Hope you are not wearing those flats and dress…..

A suggestion is to have clothing available to you if the situation changes and you need to adapt to the weather. Having a spare pair of shoes or ‘real’ boots, not fashionable ones, to put on along with a few other items could make all the difference. We all can stuff a rain coat in the trunk or find a spot in the office to stash one. Pair of wool socks and a good hat also does not take up much space.

Should you ever find yourself in a situation take a moment and figure out if your clothing is helping our hurting your ability to deal with the situation. Finding dry and warm clothes can instantly make a bad situation better. Hypothermia and hyperthermia, getting to cold or too hot, can quickly make you a casualty during an emergency and your clothing choices can go a long way in making sure neither happens.

As Always,

Stay Safe!!!

Greece Crisis - On $66.00 a day

This morning the news was filled with stories of the Greece Financial crisis, of course every talking head had a different idea of what the situation meant. For this post I will stay away from the politics (for the most part) of the situation, instead let us talk about what we should do to help ourselves and our family if we are caught up in a situation like this.

The news stories pointed out banks in Greece were only letting people withdraw the equivalent of $66.00 USD. Not real sure what the prices of food, gas and other items are there but take a minute and see if you could live on $66.00 a day…….. Quick math….. $462.00 a week?...... $1,848.00 a month?..... $22,176 a year?!?!?! Reports are already stating the banks cannot guarantee how long the paper money can be found to keep “letting” everyone withdraw $66.00 a day. If the banks can keep paper money flowing into and out of the ATM machines? This means even if you have a hundred thousand in the bank you only get $66.00 a day, welcome to the other side of life!

Yes for some of us this is a bizarre thought; you go to the ATM and the only amount you are “allowed” to withdraw of your own money is $66.00. To all of us living in the USA, yes this can happen here also! YES IT CAN!!! That means you have to work with $66.00 a day or you have to work with what you have on hand and the $66.00. No your credit cards will not get you through this one as Greeks are finding out.

When we are discussing planning for emergencies we are not focused only on the end of the world zombie attack or an asteroid showing us how it felt to be T-Rex seeing the big fire ball coming down from the sky. We plan for everything we can by having a solid foundation. If we have some money put away the money could really help out if the car breaks down, one of the kids gets thrown in jail or the financial system you live under collapses! Having extra in the fridge and pantry would really make a difference for people in Greece right now. I watched and read reports of hoarding already taking place this morning.

“Some of us are barely making it check to check and cannot put any money away?” Yes you can, we all can. Fixing your financial situation at home should be a priority, before you spend any money ask yourself “Is this a WANT or a NEED?” but that concept is for another day. For right now think about all the change you have around the house, collect the change, the money you find in a pair of jeans after they are washed. Toss all of it into a jar. Then put the jar somewhere you cannot see it, if you can see it you will spend it. In most cases the money you collect is already been budgeted in and ‘spent’ so you should not miss this money.

If your budget allows $6.00 a day for a pack of cigarettes, they cost $5.50, you now have $0.50 to put in the jar. The next day you toss in the $0.50 for that day and now you have $1.00! You get the idea. We add the $1.00 to the $66.00, when the crisis hits, for $67.00 and just maybe this is enough for your family to make it through the day? Over time you will be surprised by how much money you can collect this way. SIDE NOTE: no judging here, some of us still smoke and you are not allowed to judge!

We all know at some point the crisis will lead to violence if the powers that be cannot come to some sort of agreement. With hoarding already taking place, people will not be able to find what they need; this will also lead to violence. If you have planned ahead your ‘NEED’ to go out and expose yourself to the situation will be decreased.

Having planned ahead will give you more to work with. You will have more options when the options start to be limited. $66.00 a day will go further if you do not ‘need’ to go to the store every day for the days meals. Prior Planning Prevents Poor Performance.

As Always,

Stay Safe!!!

Got To Go Box

This will be one of those “GO DO IT NOW!” postings. As soon as you read this go do it, do not wait, get up from where you are at and do it!
Find a box, shoebox, hatbox or just any small box you might have around the house. Inside of this box put all of the important information you have around the house. Extra identification, mortgage paperwork, insurance paperwork, medical information, shot records, address book and anything else you can think of you would need if you had to walk away from your home right now. Remember you cannot take everything so just the important stuff. GO DO IT NOW!

I’ll wait…………………………..

Ok so hopefully you took the time to gather the stuff up and toss it into some sort of container. Of course we can upgrade the container to a fire resistant box, old ammo can or hopefully some other container which is portable and you can lock. You might of also accidently organized some of the clutter and have all of the important stuff in one place now!!

Should you need to leave in a hurry you only have to grab this one container and you know you have the most important paperwork with you. Just that quickly! No running around trying finding and organizing stuff while the water is rising, the fire is approaching or the Zombies are stumbling toward your home. The twenty minutes to an hour you spent doing this now could really pay off when and if you find yourself in an emergency!!!

Please take a few moments, be pro-active and tackle this task!!!!

As Always,

Stay Safe!!!

Fire Season

Fire season has started. With the start of the season it is time for those of us not already affected by one of the first fires to crank up our planning to respond to what nature has in store for us this year. Forest fires can affect all of us, even if we live in the “city” fires we would think of as “forest fires” can quickly find their way into the city and the fire does not care where you live or how far away from the wilderness you live.

First thing we have to do, buy insurance!!! Home owner’s and renter’s policies can be bought to cover your house if the fire decides your house needs to burn. This helps with after the fire for the most part yet can also give you comfort during the fire. Having insurance lets you think “Well at least we got insurance!” Being able to say this pushes the grief and worry back a bit and allows you to function better.

Having to evacuate from a fire or finding you cannot return home from a fire is not the time to think about the prior planning you “should” have done. Prior Planning Prevents Poor Performance! We all need to take a few minutes and check over or begin planning for having to evacuating from a fire. Of course leaving the house for any reason is hard to do and in this case can be one of the shortest warnings you might receive. Following some of the plans we have covered in other post let’s check and see what we can have Pre-Planned to help us if we suddenly need to evacuate.

No matter if the fire is minutes or hours away one of the first things we check is our Every Day Carry. If we have our wallet, phone and other items on us or positioned for easy pick up in the middle of the night we are even with the game so far. We can run, literally run from the house in our pajamas if we had to! With our EDC we should be able to buy some clothes, food and shelter. Of course some of us might want to rethink what we wear to bed in case we suddenly end up in the street for all to see!!!!!

If you keep your Bail Out Bag in the car or by the door having one means you have more with you when the time to run comes. Hopefully the bag includes a jacket, more money, phone charger and other items which can help you in the immediate aftermath of the running!! Once in the car or on the way out the house hopefully you picked up or have your get home bag! This will also give you additional items, food, clothes and other items to help you. All of these items and the prior planning which goes with them could be a God send if you have to run. Especially if you have little ones you have to care for. Having already planned to evacuate if you need to will also help with our furry friends. Having carriers on hand to pack them into or plans for moving larger animals already worked out will make ensuring they are safe much easier.

When to go? As soon as someone tells you it is time to go! If the police come through your neighborhood or the reverse 911 systems tells you to go! GO! DO NOT WAIT, GO! At the end of the day whatever it is you could jam into the car or put in to a bag is not worth your life!!!! Fire does not care who you are, it will burn you and move on, never thinking of the hurt your death will bring to others. You must remember this; you dying will affect others for the rest of their lives!!! The loss of photos, toys or electronics can be dealt with mush easier…………… If the fire is getting close, leave. Just leave! You do not get extra “tough guy/girl” points awarded for staying until you can feel the fire on your face. What you do get is to use up some of your luck and some of us are not lucky to begin with!!!

Do not be the idiot on the news trying to hold back a wild fire with a garden hose! Your dumbass just becomes something the fire fighters have to deal with when they could be focusing on the firefighting!! Because when the fire gets close enough your little hose can reach the fire your little hose is no match for the fire!!

Being able to secure your home, because you have taken steps to increase the security of your home, should give you more piece of mind knowing no one can just break in if you leave. Having cleared away brush to give the fire fighters room to work should give you another piece of mind to add in. Not having to plan while in the middle of something should also help.

Now if we have the time we need to prioritize what we take. Start with paperwork, insurance paperwork, mortgage or rental agreements, passports, shot records and all the other paperwork which will help you after the fire. All of these things need to be in one spot, preferable in one container. Cheap, locking, fire resistant boxes can be picked up at Target or hardware stores for cheap. These boxes easily give you somewhere to keep all this stuff and allow you to just throw the box in the car and go.

Medications or other special need items should be the next priority. Making your way to safe area is good, getting there and needing the heart medicine you left in the house is bad. Clothes for at least three days might be next. This way you can have a set on, one in the wash and one set for the next day. Fill a cooler with food for a picnic, the kid’s favorite food or other items you do not need to cook. Maybe you just need to pull back to a nearby park for a few hours? Having something to eat could make watching the fire go by your house make easier to deal with! After all these things, then think about heirlooms or the big TV. Just remember you can live without the PlayStation or the picture Grandma painted in 1918!!!

From experience I can attest having to pack to run from a fire is not fun! Having plans in place really does help. The last fire we had to pack up for was chaos for a few minutes followed by hanging out watching to see if the fire was going to come close enough to run. Personally seeing, implementing and having the little piece of mind from prior planning were great not just for me but also the wife and kids. Which is the point of taking the time to plan ahead……………..

As Always,

Stay Safe!!!

Priority - WATER

Water is an item you have to put a priority on when planning for emergencies due to water being one of the first issues you have to deal with. Maybe you were in a car wreck and are now stuck on the side of the road, maybe you found shelter from a tornado or maybe the city has put out a warning about not using the tap water because it has become contaminated? You will be surprised how thirsty you get after the adrenaline goes away from the car wreck and hopefully you do not have any thirsty little ones with you while you wait for a tow!! Surviving a tornado only to find your home and neighborhood destroyed would be bad enough! Having family and friends needing water would with now way of getting any would make a bad situation far worst!

Depending on how hydrated you are when the emergency starts, amount of moving around you are doing and a host of other factors determine how soon water will move up the priority scale. For just about any situation a day to three days is about how long you can go before water becomes the top priority in your life. Literally, your body will stop working without water. We need to have the ability to find, clean and store water to put off any issues until the situation goes back to “normal”.

You have to remember one drop of unclean water can give you a host of water borne illnesses. The simplest one to think of is diarrhea, something anyone who has traveled to Mexico has worried about. Other bugs you can pick up from water are real bugs, little creepy crawlers living in your gut and tearing you up!! Think of this, you have survived the immediate danger of an emergency only to become a casualty to the event from drinking bad water. Now think about your whole family getting sick because you do not know how to clean water!!!! You can put all the water you want into one end but if it coming out the other just as fast you are doing yourself no good!

Easiest answer to the need for water during most emergencies is bottled water. Wait, did you find that bottle floating in the flood water? Did you clean off the bottle before you put it to your lips? Did you forget because you were glad to find “safe water” and now you put flood water into your system without realizing it? Remember untreated water for anywhere, even the outside of container, can make you sick! Safely stored bottled water can help greatly during an emergency. Even a few bottles of warm water in the car can help if you are stranded and need to make a bottle or give a youngster a drink.

A good idea is to invest in a portable filtration system. LIFE STRAW is a good brand and the simplest to use. You have to remember this filter does not kill viruses and you have to be careful what source of water you choose to use.

There are a lot of hiking filters on the market and having one around the house is a good idea. There are even filter systems built to the needs of families. Do a little research and plan to spend a little bit of money on a system. You will be glad you did if you ever need it!!!

If you need to take water from a questionable source do everything you can to filter the water properly! Start at the collection point. Do not take stagnate, bug growing and debris filled water if you do not have to! Do not collect water from a source animal or humans have been standing in. If you can find a free flowing source or tap into a source, say a water heater, which has a better chance of being clean to start with. Either way using a coffee filters or even a bandanna to cover the container you are filling will stop large pieces of stuff from getting into the water.

If we are boiling the water do not just boil the water for ten minutes. Bring the water to a rolling boiling for several minutes. Have one spot for treated water and one area for untreated and never mix the two!!! When you’re done boiling the water take two containers and transfer the water back and forth. You can even take an empty water bottle, fill it half way with water and shake the water back and forth. This puts air back into the water and makes it taste better.

Speaking of taste, having something to add to the water is a really good idea. Adding something as simple as Kool Aid to the water will get kids to drink more and you can even find other things to add flavor and vitamins to the water. Lemon aid and sports drink mixes are a few other items you can have on hand to add.

Having clean water on hand can be a big task when you’re in an emergency situation. You will want water first for drinking but remember you will also need water for hygiene and cooking. Even the water you use to clean off a cooking space needs to be clean water and having enough water on hand can be a big project. With some prior planning you can have items on hand to speed up this process and assist you with meeting your family’s needs. Anything we can do to make the situation easier adds to our ability to take care of other issues and brings down the stress level.

As Always,

Stay Safe!!!

Suburban garden - mine

Skills and abilities are something you take with you everywhere; no tools are needed to retain knowledge and learning a new skill is fun. This is where my little garden comes into play. My particular skill set, “Skills I have acquired over a very long career. Skills that make me a nightmare for people like you.” extra points if you know what movie the quote is from, does not make me a farmer or even a gardener. Which is one of the reasons I have tried my hand at gardening or as the joke goes around here ‘working the farm’!

I have to admit it is not easy to grow things but is exciting when you see things grow and really exciting when you dig in the ground and find food you have grown!!! If you have never tended a garden or even tried to grow something in the windowsill I would strongly suggest you give it a try!!!
For some of us there is very limited room, we live in the city, in an apartment or our cookie cutter houses seem to close together. Almost all of us can find a window or strip of dirt we can transform into our own private farm!!! Start with just some herbs in the windowsill and work your way up from there. Using whatever space you can find.

I started in the windowsill with herbs, moved on to pots along the side of the house and now have my ‘farm’ along a strip of dirt which had an ornamental bush taking up space. For me starting small got me in the habit of watering something. Trust me the death toll was high when I first tried to grow anything!!! I’ve been trying to turn all of the plants in the backyard into food producers while not interfering with the back yard still being a backyard. Meaning I have not dug up the whole yard and put in rows of crops, the yard still functions as a place the kids can play and we can hang out in.

"The Farm"

As in learning any skill I spent a lot of time researching how to grow things and really just learning what I did wrong the last time. I also had to learn to can what I was growing but that is a post for another day! This week I decided to harvest my bounty off the farm!! Some of the plants were wilting and the bugs had found them. I also couldn’t wait any more to see how I had done!!! Drum roll……..

We managed to grow about five pounds of potatoes, some onions (still not sure how to grow them), a bunch of sage for cooking and even some blackberries!!!

We still have to see how the peppers are going to do and the strawberry plant I thought was dead was just hiding under the potato leaves!!! Tomato plant is growing, the grape vine has several bundles of grapes, we have to wait to see what the apricot tree and apple tree are going to do this year. I'm reading up on how to start another grape vine from scratch, trying to figure out what else to plant and today I will be drying some of the booty from the farm for storage!!! I also have to rework the rain collection system. I put it together in a hurry awhile back and have been using the water to water the plants, we are still in a drought here in California.

As you can probably figure out I have fun learning how to grow food, store food and it is exciting to get out my 'element' to learn new skills!!! If you have skill in the garden step out your comfort zone and learn something new, if you have no skill in the garden step out of your comfort zone and try your hand at something new! As an added bonus get the kids involved as much as they are able to. Nothing beats the look in a child's eye when they dig in the dirt and find a potato!!!

As Always,

Stay Safe!!!