Hand Guns

Well I promised a blog post on firearms. So here it is. I’ll do my best. I am not a firearms expert. I have a certain passion for firearms and love to tinker and shoot and reload. I have repaired a few pistols and revolvers as well as long guns.

I suppose the question is where do I start this? I figure it best to start from the point of view that these firearms will be used for defensive use only. Everyone seems to have their own idea of what they need or want. If you are coming at this with some practical experience under your belt then make your decision based on that and call it good. If not listen to people you KNOW to have good experience and whose opinion you value.

Having a gun is an awesome responsibility. Keeping your gun loaded is even more so. There is one main purpose to a firearm. That is to kill. Sure we can have fun target, trap, skeet, or various other games or contest designed for a particular weapon but all these are designed to sharpen your skills with your firearm.

So let us go over a few general types of guns and what they are used for and what they shoot.

Handguns: In this category I will include semi-automatics as well as revolvers and then separate the 2. What a handgun is basically designed for is close up personal protection. Its primary function is to get you out of trouble and back to your long gun or safety as soon as possible. Semi autos have come a long way in the last 50 years as well as ammunition design. It used to be that feeding a semi auto with wide flat or hollow point bullets was a jam waiting to happen and all too often happened sooner than later. But today between gun designs and ammo manufactures feeding problems are less of a concern. Miss feeds still happen and it is best to function test your weapon with at least 200 rounds of the ammo you plan to carry/shoot before you consider it good for everyday carry.

Revolvers are less prone to feeding problems. That doesn’t mean that they are trouble free. When a semi-auto miss feeds or you have a failure to fire, (it happens for various reasons) you need to slam the magazine home and rework the slide hard and fast. That will often take care of the problem. In a fight forget about why just get it done now. At the range everything can be inspected to figure out why. With a revolver a dud round is not as big and issue. With a double action just pull the trigger again. The cylinder rotates to the next round and BANG. The worst thing I can think of for a revolver is the cylinder goes out of time. Meaning when the cylinder rotates it doesn’t line up with either the barrel or the firing pin. You cannot fix this in a fight. It is hard to fix at home. Often its best left for a professional gunsmith to handle.

Size does matter. You should carry the largest caliber you can comfortably handle. Personally I like the 45acp it has recoil sure but it seems to be more of a push than the sharp whack of say a 357 which is also a great carry/personal defense round. There are lots of choices in caliber. I would even go so far as to say if all you can handle is a 22 than practice with it and carry it. It is better than throwing rocks. The only caliber I would shy away from is the .25acp it has a lousy reputation. But in hand gun calibers usually 380, 38 special 9mm 357mag 40s&w 45acp are the primary defense calibers. Dirty Harry Callahan with his 44mag is over kill. It’s a great hunting round and I dare say it may work as a defensive round outdoors where over penetration MAY be less of an issue. But also consider any round has the capability of over penetration. Meaning they can go through the bad guy and into and through the wall behind the bad guy and possible into the innocent on the other side of the wall. This is even more likely if you miss your target.

Find the pistol and caliber that suites you. Rent a few at the range. See which ones fit your hand the best and point naturally. Then consider is this a night stand gun or a carry gun? Then size really does matter. Keep in mind the larger the gun the harder to conceal, also usually the more uncomfortable, which will keep you from carrying all the time. On the next post I’ll talk more about Shot guns and rifles. There are volumes written about all this stuff. There is no way for me to cover it all without writing a book.

Till next time God Bless.

For those that need I should take the time to provide links that will teach and maybe inspire you to do more on your preps. These are not in any particular order except I will put provident living first. Its from the LDS church and has a lot of good information. You must know (full disclaimer here) I’m a Husband and a father and a grandfather and a prepper and I’m a Mormon.

http://www.providentliving.org/

http://24.179.28.6/

http://www.codeready.org/index.cfm

http://www.sorbentsystems.com/mylar.html

http://mormonfoodstorage.blogspot.com/2008/09/pantry-paragon-or-how-to-make-your-own.html

http://safelygatheredin2.blogspot.com/2008/11/alphabetical-recipe-list.html

http://www.codenameinsight.com/

http://www.ferfal.blogspot.com/

http://nchfp.uga.edu/publications/publications_home.html

http://everydayfoodstorage.net/

http://beready.utah.gov/beready/index.html

http://dehydrate2store.com/

http://72hours.org/make_plan.html

http://readynutrition.com/resources/category/preparedness/

http://readynutrition.com/

These links should provide plenty of reading and prepping ideas for a while. Next time I’ll post on one of my favorite subjects. Firearms. And I will provide some links that will inform and possibly entertain

Your health

Taking care of my health is always an issue with me. I always seem to like what is not good for me. But in these uncertain times it is far better to correct an issue before it becomes a problem than wait until it becomes a problem and shell out big money to maybe have your problem fixed if it can be.

Case in point, My doctor told me for a few years I was pre-diabetic. I just blew her off and continued to live and eat the same way I had. When I became diabetic it escalated quickly.  First to blood testing and pills then to multiple injections. No matter what I did it seemed I could not get good control over my blood sugar. I had to live with this for a number of years until I learned about bareatric  by pass surgery. Now this seems to have cured my diabetes but it comes with its own set of issues to deal with on a life time basis. Some foods I cant tolerate anymore. My eyes are always to big for my stomach now. Over eating can be a real problem. And I will be on supplements for the rest of my life.

All this could have been avoided if I would have listened to my doctors advice when she first discussed my imminent problem. Diet and exerciser would have taken care of the issue.

I have always been one to exerciser, but it would go in spurts, and I always figured I worked hard so why couldn't I enjoy a few more cookies or that bowl of ice cream. 

Do what you can to take care of your health now. It is way easier than correcting a problem after it becomes a problem.  

Thanksgiving

Today is the day we as a nation feast and give thanks to God for seeing us through another year. I have to say as one who tries to be prepared in as many things as possible with out the blessings of the Lord I could do nothing. With out the Lord it would all mean nothing. So today I hope my family and friends remember the Lord and his bounty and give thanks indeed.

Wasted Food Storage

My youngest son is moving home. Yea....Boo.... I have had to completely remove the shelves from our spare room and move them into our bedroom. Along with this I had to move some of our food storage. We had a variety of things put up in Mylar bags. Things like beans, hot cocoa, dried carrots and dried onions, and a few more items. I noticed the seal on the side of a few bags were split. These are not the seals we did these were factory seals. Not knowing how long the items were exposed to the air I had to throw out 6-7 bags. No more Mylar bags for us. We will use what we have and from now on it all gets put into cans.

I think cans stack and rotate easier anyway.

Saving money

Recently I posted about my ordering RX eyeglasses through a company called Zenni Optical.   http://www.zennioptical.com/ this isn’t really an endorsement of them except to say I have been very happy with their service and pricing. They have enough styles of frames to keep me happy and I have been using them for about 4 years.

But like I said this isn’t really an endorsement. I am sure when it comes to Rx eye wear there are other sites that do just as well.

What I am hoping to do is to get your wheels turning with the idea that sometimes (not always) you can save money by shopping online.  Almost every store has sales now and again even online stores.   

I have no loyalty to any brand or store If I can save money.  What used to cost me 450.00 or more because of my astigmatism I can get away with less than 80.00. For my spouse her glasses, that look real nice, cost less than 60.00.

The biggest problem is getting sizing right, but if you can use a ruler and measure in metric your good to go. All you need is a current Rx and pupil eye distance. Maybe you can talk you DR into measuring that. Good Luck mine never would. But it is easy enough to measure yourself.

Today I had to figure with the change of seasons coming and the cooler weather It has to be time to revamp our GO Bags. We do planning on sheltering in place for most things but I can see a few reasons to have to move,These bug outs will require some thought as Cheryl cant carry a back pack. Im thinking maybe two large rubbermaids on wheels, or even two large basic airline type suitcases.  Mayby a smaller pack already set up and in the van in case something happens on the road and I need to walk home.

 

Each Kit will contian a basics of change of clothes appropriate for the season, hygene items, three days non perishable food, preferably that you can eat cold, 2 two liter bottles of water, rain gear, Rx medicine, first aid items, cash and change, (yup we have a lot of that floating around) Scriptures. batteries for the radio and flashlights. (dont keep the batteries in these items incase of leakage) and important family documents. Some of them could be on a disk or usb flash drive. Don't forget plastic garbage bags. Maybe a family walkie talkie for each set or person set on a predetermined channel. More items as I think of it. Our kits are always evolving.  

 

Make a plan. Plan how to evacute. Plan where to meet up. Plan who is to do what and go over it until every one knows there duties. Plan who takes care of who. Ultimatly as adults were responsible for the children but even older children can and should help where appropriate.. 

Recently I posted about my ordering RX eyeglasses through a company called Zenni Optical.   http://www.zennioptical.com/ this isn’t really an endorsement of them except to say I have been very happy with their service and pricing. They have enough styles of frames to keep me happy and I have been using them for about 4 years.

But like I said this isn’t really an endorsement. I am sure when it comes to Rx eye wear there are other sites that do just as well.

What I am hoping to do is to get your wheels turning with the idea that sometimes (not always) you can save money by shopping online.  Almost every store has sales now and again even online stores.   

Let’s jump into a totally different subject. Apples….. It’s the time of year when the apples are coming in. Orchards are full. Bring the kids out to hike around the orchard then stop and bring home apples. How much is up to you but certainly you want enough for eating and doing any fresh baking. But have you considered putting up your own dried apples. It’s easy enough. Especially if you have an old fashioned hand crank peeler, slicer, coring machine.  Spray the apples down with lemon juice. Right out of a squirt bottle or spray bottle. This keeps them from turning brown. Spread them out in your dehydrator and away you go. 

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Time to save some money. Needing a new pair of glasses I ordered a new set from Zinni optical, there an online store. My eyeglasses because of my prescription are usually very expensive even if i go with cheapo frames. At Zinni i can expect to pay 2/3rds less. Walmart will do the adjusting for free.

New or updated links

I had started this blog with idea that my family and friends would take the opportunity to read about preparedness and food storage. There by helping me to magnify my callings as the ward preparedness specialist and the wards home storage specialist.

I may write about things that you may not think have anything to do with being prepared but if it will save you money by showing or explaining how to do something on your own then you will not be dependent on someone else in a crisis.

There are so many good sources for information out there on so many topics. I would recommend a few of them to you. First is http://providentliving.org  this one is provident living. It is full of good basic information and the source can be unquestionable.  The next I would recommend is a Boy Scout manual. I learned so much good basic information from an old scout manual that was given to me as a boy. You can pick these up in any scout store. Sometimes you run across these manuals in 2^nd hand stores or even garage sales. Another source is You Tube. I won’t vouch for its accuracy unless something is posted by a source you trust. But even a source your uncertain about may give good information. Just be careful of the internet commandos out there whose man purpose seems to be to just get a following.  Also another great source is http://71.14.99.192/ This is the public side of the Rubicon whose Motto is "Facta Non Verba" 

As you can see I have changed the name of the blog to "Living Prepared"

As you may have noticed I have changed the name of the blog to "Living Prepared". I think this is a better name because preparations are not a one time deal and your done. Its a way of life. Learning about every aspect of daily living and finding ways to do it that will or wont impact your long term survival in a positive manner. There are many other names I could have given this blog. What I am concerned with is the manner I prepare and what I can do to help others do the same. I am also interested in world events, what that will mean for living a prepared life style and what I will need to do to cope with those events.

Name Change

As you may have notices I have changed the name of the blog to "Living Prepared". I think this is a better name because preparations are not a one time deal and your done. Its a way of life. Learning about every aspect of daily living and finding ways to do it that will or wont impact your long term survival in a positive manner.

Time to plan the garden

OK its cold out side. Actually we've warmed up slightly today but still its under 30 and there is snow yet on the ground. But its time. Its time to pull out the seed catalogs or start viewing your bookmarked web pages for seeds.

I believe a garden this year will be very important, as the economy gets worse prices will rise. There will be more lay offs and less money to spend on needed items never mind fun items. I don't buy the government lies, er uh, I mean line, that the economy is now improving and we are starting to see the benefits of all that stimulus money. In fact I do believe we will see a crash of major proportions by the end of the year.

This post isn't so much about the economic down turns we all are facing except that it is a good reason to start gardening if you never laid a spade to the soil before. So where do you begin? For you first timers there will be a lot to consider and I cant cover it all in this little post. But lets make a short list of what your going to need.

1.) Land. You will need to determine the plot size and location. Will you want raised beds or a more traditional plot? Will you want one plot or several? How large depends on the amount you plan to harvest. This should be determined from the size of your family or how many you plan to feed from this garden. Also the type of vegetables planted would need to be considered in the size of the garden. Things like squash take up lots of space. Lettuce not as much, and some plants you could get multiple harvest from in the same growing season.

2.) Location. Again lots involved here. What are you intending to grow? Will it need full sun? Will it do OK on partial sun? What is your soil like? What are the critters like?

3.) What are you planning on growing. Will it be things that preserve well, or items you'll need to consume quickly? Almost everything can be canned, most items can be dried. Then of course there is freezing. We have done all three, but I usually can or dehydrate most of our produce as it doesn't use our valuable freezer space. Now along with what you are planing to grow have you decided on seed type? When ever possible I try and use heirloom seeds. There are a lot of reasons to consider heirloom varieties over modern hybrids. Hybrids are generally bred for a specific purpose and often as not it has little to do with taste. Most are bred to conform to shipping, or how well they will ripen when picked early, or even looks. Now heirlooms are from stock that are generations old. They would have been the type of tomato, eggplant, squash, your great grand parents grew up with. Taste is usually great but they may not lend them selves to well to shipping or picking 2-3 weeks early. The other great factor in heirlooms seeds is you have a known commodity. If you plan on saving seeds from your garden this year to plant in next years garden using heirlooms is the only way to go. The reason being is the seed you saved from this years German tomato will be what you get next year. But with a hybred the seeds you save this year may revert back to one of the parent plants (an unknown) or it may be sterile and not produce fruit.

There are a lot of books and websites that cover gardening. I suggest the local extension service for the best advice for the area you live in. http://www.extension.umn.edu/ I've included the university of MN link. There are plenty of other sites out there and you can make gardening as simple or complex as you want. There is plenty I didn't discuss, so I suggest doing a bit of research. I hope this helps someone and I would enjoy feed back.

God Bless
Mark

So is all this intentional?

Looks like the world is going through uncertainties still. What with the lies about our economy and how well were doing?! Heck just tell that to the guy who has been out of work for over a year, or the family that cant make the mortgage because they are under employed. Tell that to the food shelves that are seeing record number of people getting groceries, the economy dosn't appear to be getting better by an understandable measurement. It rather appears this whole situation is by design. Why would in the worst of our economy our government bail out the banks? Why do we JUST HAVE TO PASS HEALTH CARE reform now. Our government is broke. It has to run the presses to devalue the dollar. We owe our collective souls to the federal reserve central bank.

The middle east is still a hot box and getting hotter everyday. Especially with Iran successfully testing and firing missiles that can carry payloads. Why have we not targeted them? Were already over there wasting lives and money? Heck whats another couple billion?! Or why have we not allowed Isreal to do the same. Its as if we want Iran to launch. With a missile that can travel 1200 miles carrying a nuclear pay load it would be easy to launch one over the US from a disguised fishing boat or fleet. 1200 miles would put it over the central U.S., burst way up it would cause an EMP effect.

There are a lot of misconceptions about EMP and what will be effected and what won't. I certainly don't know the answers to that. But the answers are out there.

Regardless of whether we are in a financial crisis or war or pandemic. Now is the time to get your homes in order if possible. The Prophets have told us repeatedly to prepare, to get our food storage together, to put together as much savings as we can. This next months Ensign (January) has a section on provident living and being self reliant.

These things I write of are not meant to scare as much as they are meant to motivate. I pray with all my heart that my friends and family will see wisdom in following the council of the Lord and "prepare every needful thing". I pray that my family and friends will stay close to the Lord.   

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Winter weather is coming so is Christmas

Tomorrow me and my side kick are going to start and Finish our Christmas Shopping. Every year we try to keep the price reasonable but even more important we try to follow a theme. The Theme never changes. Its always preparedness. so this year we will buy Silver Eagles for all we need to buy for, this will do 2 things. Hopefully it will get them thinking about increasing there reserve stock of money. The other thing it will do is allow us to stay within budget and have ALL our shopping done in an hour. Then we can set back and better enjoy the season.

Check your food storage and rotate it

As fall approached we decided to start making our bread again. We usually don't bake to much over the summer as it causes to much heat in our little apartment. Almost exclusively we make our bread from whole wheat flour, sometimes store bought, but usually our own grind.  Cheryl has decided to do some other baking today and opened up the last two Mylar bags of WHITE flour we had stored. This was from 2004. We don't use a lot of white flour so its not unusual that the date is so far out there. Now i know white flour doesn't last long. Even with good oxygen absorbers. I wont say these oxygen absorbers were bad because we were  stretching the limits of the white flours shelf life anyway. One bag smelled old so we tossed it. The other bag seemed OK. Maybe boarder line. We will try using it and see what happens. Even if it is a little rancid i don't expect it would make us sick but it would have an off flavor. That will be enough for Cheryl. She is very picky about food storage items smells and taste. So this was another good reminder for me to not stock more of an item than needed and make sure you rotate through your storage in a TIMELY manner. If things are getting close to expiration try either using them up as quick as you can or give the stuff away to some one or someplace where it will be used quickly. Now in our case I have given items to our children but they are no longer readily assessable, so I have made donations to the food shelves in my area.

Anyway like i said this was a good reminder to me.       

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Recovering from surgery

Being laid up is no fun. I just had surgery on my right foot last Friday. So a week ago today I was released from the hospital. After a week the pain is finally starting to subside. Ibuprofen still isn't cutting it yet but I hope by tomorrow it will be. I'm getting better on the crutches. But I still hate them. Crutches are not made for big men. So do you know how you will handle severe pain? With narcotics I do pretty well, but to be honest I've never had to deal with severe pain so up until now aspirin, ibuprofen, and BC Powder have always been my turn to pain killers of choice. Tylenol has just never worked well for me.

Mostly this post is a test to see how well I did reformatting my laptop and reinstalling a few essentials. Looks like i have scribeFire installed OK

OK More later as I recover and my mind clears.

The Dollar

I don't often make copies of articles written by others, but I will link to them. Today is an exception. I have the deepest respect for Dr Ron Paul as the patriot that he is. So I am linking and copying this article below.

Now you may ask what does this have to do with preparations? I say if we do not see whats coming we can not prepare fully. It can be hard enough to prepare for life's every day problems but when things start sliding down hill in a big way it would be nice if my friends and family had a heads up and were able to get their houses in order.

If the dollar does collapse and that is a very small if, what you have on hand may be what you depend on for your families piece of mind. If barrels of fiat money are worthless then where will the real value be? You decide. It is to critical a question for someone else to decide for you. But I do have opinions. Food storage will be critical. So will skills that can be bartered for things you don't have. Tools and the knowledge to use them will be important. The time to learn how will not be when it is desperately needed. Also products for everyday comfort will be wanted but may be hard to get. So the best time to get may be now when the dollar is still of value.

My next opinion is that hard money like gold and silver will also be an asset. Small denomination coins are best. It may be very hard to make change from a one oz gold piece but if you bought an item with 2 oz of silver you may be OK.

Above I mentioned bartering; That may be the way some folks survive. DON'T barter away things your family uses regularly unless you can produce more. DON'T barter away things that could come back to hurt you. I mean thing like ammunition. If you have a small supply of .22 ammo for small game hunting or pest control don't trade any of it. Ammo traded into the wrong hands could be used against you.

Now as always my disclaimer. I am not an expert, I don't claim to be. But I do encourage you to PRUDENTLY set a course that will over time help you and your families to become more prepared. Do it prayerfully. Do your own research.

Now for the article below.
Peace


Ron Paul: US Dollar Collapse When China Stops Buying Debt

by Jesse Wojdylo

Subprime Blogger

Tue, Oct 20th, 2009 12:00:00 am

Source: Subprime Blogger

In February of 2009 Ron Paul warned of a US Dollar collapse when China stops buying out debt in this video. There are many good points that Mr. Paul points out in the video but none were more prophetic then calling for the dollar bubble to burst. When the video was recorded the US Dollar index was around 86. Today the US Dollar Index is currently at 75.5.

Another ironic fact about this video is that shortly after this video was recorded President Obama went on 60 Minutes and made the statement that “the dollar is still strong.” Unfortunately the dollar was not strong and we have seen that as a 10% drop has happened since the president’s statement. For those of you wondering why the value of the dollar continues to decline it is truly supply and demand.

The Federal Reserve Bank continues to print money at will. The billions of dollars that have been created out of thin air because of the stimulus package are only decreasing the value of the dollar. Not only is the value of the dollar decreasing, the Federal Reserve Bank is causing people to do things that they normally would not do. With extremely low interest rates people are going to buy homes. There is no problem with people buying homes except that many of these home buyers cannot truly afford homes. For reference to this take a look at the subprime mortgage crisis.

Ron Paul has hope that things will get better though as many Americans are educating themselves to the situation at hand. The book End the Fed by Ron Paul remains on the Amazon.com Top 100 list when is encouraging. If we continue to do the research and better understand what is going on then we are more apt to make the changes necessary to avoid possible disaster.

As we get deeper and deeper into fall.

As we get deeper into fall and move toward winter I would like to remind you all to start changing out your mobile preps. Start moving winter gear into your 72 kits or BOBS. Check medications and food for expiration dates and check children clothing for size changes.

Also now is a good time to restock your automobiles winter kit. Same things apply as mentioned above. Throw a shovel in the trunk, possibly a tow strap, and certainly jumper cables, and blanket, and some warm items for you or passengers. Also it would be good to have a source of heat just in case. There are lots of ideas on the net. But what I carry is a couple of tuna cans with rolled up corrugated cardboard cut to the depth of the can and then filled with melted wax. This could be used by itself or under a #10 can with lots of holes in it for a cook surface. All my stuff is stored in a tote similar to a rubber maid box. It includes extra gloves, blanket, sweatshirts, candles, Bic lighters and wooden matches, TP , nd in our case a large transfer belt that I made to help my wife walk easier in the deep snow if needed. Its your kit put what you need in it.

2012

As we approach the 2012 date that the Mayans predicted would be the end of the world I am afraid there are a lot of people that will jump on that band wagon and stock up on supplies in their mind are needful. Now I as one who is preparedness minded see this in a bad light.
#1.) These people will just buy anything, and buy Willie Nillie.
#2.) This could cause wide spread shortages of food stuff that others may need.
#3.) Shortages could extend to other areas including equipment. Raising the cost of items. Supply and demand will take over.
#4.) Folks less prudent will spend money they don't have, buying items they may not need.

Now myself and lots of people I know believe the preparedness lifestyle is a prudent lifestyle. But every expenditure is bought when its affordable, and bought with clarity of thought and reason. It makes no sense to stock up on gold or silver when you have no beans.

Firearms are cool. I really enjoy shooting all kinds of guns. I would own many hundreds if circumstances allowed. But the cool factor aside, they are a tools. In my mind an important tool but no less so than a good pair of boots or your heavy winter parka, or a good hammer or saw.

My point in this post in the next few years leading up to 2012 there may be a lot of panic buying. Please don't get caught up in the hype and hoopla. But also keep in mind if you have needs there may be reason to get your items sooner rather than later.

Some ancient Mayan may have run out of space on his rock so ended his calendar at 12/21/12. Who knows? All I know is the Lord said no one knows the hour. Not even the angels, but My Father in heaven knoweth. Thats good enough for me.

God bless
Mark