That’s part of the point of my column. How can we ever have enough? How can we be fully prepared? We can’t. We can only prepare as much as we’re able, and depending on our living situations, it’s different for each of us.
We can play “what if” all day long. What if you have ten years’ worth of supplies, but you’re forced to flee your home? Your bug-out bag is all you have then.
But this argument can be used to have zero preparations at all. And will be. And is, in fact.
It’s defeatist. I can’t do 100% so let me justify not doing anything at all.
Why 4 weeks then, why not 2? or just 10 days?
Nobody is ever fully prepared. Even those with 10 years of freeze dried food.
In the case of my kin it was an excuse to spend money at Disney rather than stocking an extra 4 or 5 weeks of food in their pantry. And IMHO he cut down all the food plants because he was tired of mowing around them. In a sense (or maybe in reality) his ‘preps’ came out of everyone elses pocket when he received those MRE’s and bottle water cases. And he got tired of maintaining the well and water pump, on muni water it’s all someone elses problem. Ditto chimney maintenance. So they bricked up all the fireplaces.
You needn’t spend any extra at all. Next time your grocery store has something 50% off, get 2 and put one back. Coupon for that. And buy in bulk. Any perceived ‘preps’ we have are simply because I have to buy in bulk. Its easily 1/3 the cost to buy a giant 50lb bag of rice flour than it is to buy piddling 24oz bags at the grocery store.
Store what you use and use what you store. Rotate. The people with 10 years of freeze dried food aren’t going to be really happy about it when that’s all they have to eat if they’ve not been using and eating that beforehand.
And even in an apartment, especially on the coast, if you have any sun exposure on a balcony at all you can grow fresh food there 12m out of the year. I grew 3 or 4 bushels of tomatoes on a southeast facing balcony in NYC one summer. My neighbors were floored such a thing was even possible. If you have a yard, you’re good to go. Read up on a subject called ‘edible landscaping’.
The very best preps are self sufficient skillsets and the tools you need to carry those out. You needn’t have 10 years of stored food if you have a plan to obtain food after yours runs out that does NOT include a gun and your neighbor’s pantry under duress.
This mentality is why I save seeds for half the county (ok, that’s an exaggeration), just in case. I have the freezer space (tiny in comparison to the food I’d have to store for even a week for just the neighbors on my road) and recycle those though the compost pile every year or two when I get fresh ones.
If you have any yard at all on the coast your preps should be more in the line of growing fresh food in as great a quantity as you can to feed yourself and learning how to save the seeds for what you eat. You live in a zone with literally a 12m growing season. There’s no reason, other than perhaps physical incapacity, you can’t grow nearly everything you eat. And I’m including backyard chickens here as well. I’m not talking toiling over endless red clay hilled up rows of my grandmother’s canning garden either. 2 raised beds would be all you needed for one person other than a few staples easily obtained in bulk (25lbs or so, efficiently stored (flour, sugar, salt, beans) and cheaply gotten) and could provide for you for months and months.
The best way to prep is to be self sufficient for your physical needs in as much as you possibly can. ‘Our’ ancestors just 100 years ago would have considered the whole ‘prep or be faithful’ dichotomy to be insanity of the finest order.
My kin actually have about 10 days now. When they first started the whole ‘non prepping’ thing they had less than 1 day’s worth of food in the house. They went through the drive thru or food delivery or the ‘fresh made’ pickup stuff you get at the grocery store. Every. Single. Day. When he lost his job some years ago and went for a while w/o one she had to start cooking simply because they couldn’t afford the drive thru anymore.