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My conversion to become a “born again&rdqu o; prepper started in the summer of 2011, when I was settling down to bed and surfing the net with my iPad. Performing some calculations on the national debt, as a Certified Public Accountant, I understood one thing– all the money in the world from every country wouldn’t or couldn’t be enough to even make a dent in its reduction, let alone a complete pay off. At that time, I had even calculated that approximately 18% of the Gross National Product (GDP) was used to pay just the interest on the national debt… just the interest! Then I did another calculation and came to terms that the Federal Reserve Rate, at that time, was just about 1%, which essentially means that the interest on money that our government borrowed is at that interest rate to pay back. Finally, the whopper came in performing the above calculation, but instead of the 1%, I substituted it for the normal Federal Reserve Rate, in normal economic times, which is leveled off at approximately 6%. That calculation, with a 6% federal reserve interest rate, concluded that it would require 77% of GDP be consumed to pay the interest on the national debt; that, again, is merely the interest. I knew at that juncture that “We The People” were enslaved beyond turning back of indebtedness of a benevolent government that the world economies couldn’t even afford, let alone the American people. This, without some safeguards on a governmental embodiment gone wild, will cause severe cataclysmic economic hardship, such as printing money to cause super inflation overnight.

So as a citizen of the glorious, wonderful State of Californication, I did some research on obtaining a gun. (An economic hardship of that magnitude will most likely bring down the walls of the Castle, ushering in evil to create chaos in the streets of America in some form of looting. Then, it will likely usher in the largest bandwidth of Martial Law– one that would make Adolph Hitler look like a Cub Scout in comparison– to quell freedoms of her citizens with more governmental decision making.) Well, to my dismay, you can’t own a firearm in the State of California, as almost every firearm sold in other states are illegal in the State of California. Other states are even barred from shipping firearms into this U.S. Constitution-abiding state. Yeah, right; I am being religiously facetious here. About that time, I started probing around the Internet to do research on good “gun states”– states that do not tread on the 2nd Amendment. (As a sidebar, whoola, James Wesley, Rawles book How to Survive the End of the World As We Know It graced my hands, through mail order.) After a fervent reading and re-reading (as I, of course, like to immerse myself into the study of topic threads), I purchased my first firearm. Psych! It was utterly stupid to hold a driver’s license from the State of California.

No more. I purchased a home just a four hour drive east of Orange County, California, where I was currently residing and driving my convertible Jaguar up and down the 405 freeway working for the “man”– ME! I immediately obtained a Nevada’s driver’s license, claimed my home state as Nevada, and purchased two AR-15 assault rifles manufactured by Colt. Now for you military veterans, you must understand that I only ever owned a B.B. gun as a child and didn’t have a clue on gun ownership. However, I purchased two five-hundred round batches of ammunition as any good prepper would do, and I obtained tactical training in targets, moving targets, positional shooting, obstacle course shooting, and night shooting. I learned a very important lesson in the art of gun cleaning– your guns need oil, just as your Orange County blonde girlfriend needs money. (It’s just a joke, if anyone is offended.)

This leads me into my next topic– more due diligence in the understanding of the need to prepare for this catastrophe. The fancy sports car was the first to go and then the condo on the beach. (I exchanged it for a five bedroom home in Nevada, and I had some change left over for prepping.) Lastly, the financial drain of a “Blonde Bimbo” (as some females have called her) went. Actually, I didn’t even have to break up with her. Once the sports car and condo left my possession, she automatically drifted off into a new relationship with a new found financier, who provides that fancy, dancy lifestyle. It’s not me! At this point, I am a full-time, “born again” prepper. As in the story of Animal Farm, or from the Old Testament of Belshazzar, “I saw the writing on the wall.”

Back in Nevada, I purchased a year’s worth of freeze-dried foods in #10 cans from The Ready Store. I got over 75 cans in all, containing everything from freeze-dried fruits and vegetables, powdered milk, and nuts and oats to grains and full meals, such as beef stroganoff and spaghetti dinners. I also got butter, white and brown sugars, and MRE’s, which are all stored in a newly hollowed out portion of my stairwell. Then, months went by. After more research, the gadgets started to arrive through mail order from gun shows and discrete purchases; these included things like flashlights for my AR-15, night vision scopes, thermal/night vision binoculars, the inferred light bulbs James speaks of in his book (in which you can turn your outside lights on and no one can see any difference, but your night vision can see your yard lit up like daylight), an assortment of all types of batteries galore with rechargeable kits, bulbs, solar panels to charge a DC car battery, stock of car batteries, electronic components such as resistors, capacitors, inductors, coils, soldering irons, circuit boards, and more.

As the time passed on, I started reading more and purchasing all under a new budget just for prepping. For instance, it took me four months of budget to purchase the full army surgical bag complete with an Operating Room capability for up to four surgeries, medical supplies, dental supplies, hand sanitizer, gloves, masks, tyvek suites, et cetera, et cetera. The most important was the training. Learning C.P.R. for the first time was a humbling experience, and I realized how unprepared I was in life not even to come to the aid of another in a crisis. How selfish was that? I now have four community college classes completed in microbiology, general biology, human anatomy, and physiology, which the later course was taught with a real “human cadaver” to dissect and understand how it all works. It’s great knowledge to now have for an emergency situation.

As an electrical engineering undergrad, I set up an entire electrical/electronics shop to repair and upgrade any electronics, even the Apple things, which need special tools to unlock their potential and of course voiding any warranty at that moment. I am now the amateur Radio calls sign KB2—. The three dashes are left off my complete call-sign, for concerns of anonymity. I have purchased a Kenwood “rig” of TS590SG and setup myriad configuration of antenna around the home. In which I can reach the far reaches of the world talking to other Hams in Siberia, Russia, or in the next county over. James Rawles once illustrated to have a parcel map of your neighborhood and write the names of the neighbors on them. However, I did that for frequencies, in all States and counties as a compilation of all military, police and rescue, maritime, air traffic control, Ham Radio, Racing, and weather stations are printed off and stored in a safe, fireproof location. (Your guns needs a safe of their own, but an additional Fat boy gun safe will store your family documents, non-paper money, neighborhood parcels, frequency listings, and much more.) I did not mention it, but receiving and transmitting Morse code in five-words a minute speeds is extremely fun. No more do I go out for $200 dinners with girls that I didn’t even want to spend time with anyhow, and no more am I purchasing “bling” to impress people that are not going where I am going in life and really don’t care about me anyway. So much for the corporate status; an outfit of camos and a discussion on prepping at the shooting range suits me just fine.

With more years and more due diligence in knowledge accumulation, I added a well stocked library in the home with all the essentials of medical surgery (Emergency War Surgery is an excellent read), gardening, seed planting (I found out the difference between heirloom seed and generic hybrid seed; wow, start experimenting with heirloom seed now), tactical training (such as the Navy SEAL handbook and SAS from the British Special Forces, a well stocked Christian genre of books on marriage, God, faith, finances, and of course James Rawles’ fictional books which really demonstrated how to use all your prepping stocks in a grid down, or world crisis, approach. I must add, a great read is In Pursuit of the Free Pass by John Howard, which illustrates the ideologies of the Liberal agenda as a battle plan to overtake America’s Christian foundation and turn it into a rewritten liberal existence. (Church and State is a big part of the book. Please read it.) Furthermore, as a man of God now, and of three college degrees, I really understand the value of learning and having good knowledge. Not only do I have the U.S. Constitution in hardback book form but also an authentic copy of the Declaration of Independence, along with the Bill of Rights, Emancipation Proclamation (written by Abraham Lincoln), and the Federalist Papers, laminated and plastered on the walls in the library.

The Ten Commandments are the cornerstone of the entire library! I can’t live with moral relativism any longer, where everyone does right in their own eyes! It’s best to keep it simple, with one creed that ALL follow and uphold, which equates to “One Nation Under God, Indivisible, with Liberty and Justice For All”. We are a divided nation, today, and it’s only going to get worse with this liberal leftist agenda being forced into mainstream and freedoms eroding minute by minute. God’s word has never changed, not even in Heaven (when we get there), so why do we need a “new doctrine” from a heathen populous who are going to Hell anyway?

I’m still continuing the prepping as a few more quarters tick by. (As an accountant, I tend to keep track of time in quarters of years.) Then I am continuing on through this journey of divorcing the “worldly statuses”, right up to the past few years, when I purchased many, many more firearms– a 12 gauge shotgun, 45 ACP handgun, .22 handgun, 9 mm handgun, .50 cal BMG sniper rifle, and 308 long range rifle with sniper scope. I still have the two AR-15 assault rifles and almost 20,000 rounds of ammunition stored in an undisclosed location. I have a compound bow and cross bows for silence. I even obtained those tax stamps for a full automatic conversion of the AR-15 and stamps for suppressors. (Yes, I used to call them silencers, but they do make some noise.) I acquired these all within an eight month waiting time period, as the BATF illustrates they are backed-up (though I am not sure if that government agency is being entirely truthful or not). It’s better to have those items in the hands of law-abiding, Constitution-believing contrivance, than with the militarized police force located in a city near you that will eventually have the Final Solution for you to adhere to for their financial collapse.

I then went through the study and purchased equipment, such as camouflage, ghilly suites, boots, gloves, backpacks, tents, and tarps. My bug out bag is packed and ready to go at a moments notice. I even keep ten magazines stocked with 30 rounds each of 5.56mm ammunition for the assault riffles. I have all this because I stay out of the first non-Constitutional-abiding state– California. I also purchased body armor to wear everyday, even to work as an accountant, and the more resilient ceramic plates, which I use on weekends when I go out and train with other professionals in tactics and maneuvers. I even have essentials, such as Tyvec, chemical/biological, and radiation-resistant military suits with gas masks. Even still, to train in all of that heavy equipment in order to become comfortable is the key to withstanding a governmental mishap (whether foreign or domestic).

Within the past year, I have been married to the love of my life. It just so happens she is a foreigner from a communist country– the Peoples Republic of China. Being a mixed race family is all the more better with the understanding of each other and the difference in the cultures. She is all into being a wife and a mother, which is something I have not EVER found in this feminized American culture. (A special note to you, women: my mother and grandmothers never needed women’s rights. A person taught to sue the establishment to be equal to something they never can be [another man] is destroying the home of the brave. Let’s face it; I am not even equal to other men and I am a man, so how are women supposed to be?) I thank God for my China Doll. We are into target shooting, learning, praying, and stockpiling. I must admit, I would have never found my soul-mate if it hadn’t been for this prepper movement. I might still be out with the bimbos! Luckily, we both are in love with each other and with prepping and living in a well-stocked home of beans, bullets, and band-aids, with looking to brighter days ahead knowing we have the peace of mind to not become part of the problem in a crisis but become part of the solution through preparing. We hope to see you all in the American Redoubt, as our next move will be to an undisclosed location west of the Rockies. God Bless!

“In the year of our Lord of 1776, the most famous year in all of world history, in which an entire nation was birthed on the precepts that God alone doles out human rights and that men and women are to safeguard that precept even against tyranny confiscating the right to protect our nation’s freedoms.”

I started prepping back in 2008, when the financial crash hit our family hard. We were going about our business, both my husband and I working ourselves to death enjoying the “American dream”– a mortgage, a couple of car payments, kids in college, and a disposable income that was quickly gobbled up each month by luxuries that included the latest iPhone, every child having his or her own computer, rib eye steaks for dinner, rounds of golf, and things like this. When the financial free fall started, we were not prepared. We lost everything! On top of that, my husband had a debilitating stroke from the stress of it all. We had both worked very, very hard to achieve what we had, but looking back now I see that we were seriously over-leveraged, as many people were. We are Baby Boomers, and our view of what kind of lifestyle we were supposed to maintain was seriously flawed. We were caught unaware. Why had we not learned from our parents and grandparents?

Looking back, I am horrified by the way we spent money. It was as if we were doing what we thought we should be doing without understanding the fundamentals of financial management, in a similar manner to what the United States government has done. We were keeping up appearances while standing on quick sand. Our parents owned home(s) and cars, and we all had a college education, yet they made a fraction of what we made. I’m not smart enough to do the calculations for cost of living then versus now, but I think our parents were more frugal. I remember one year, when I was in high school, it was time to go shopping for school clothes. With six children, my parents had to make hard decisions on a regular basis, and this day was no different. My dad looked at us three older girls, all in high school, and said, “I will buy you the material, if you make your clothes.” We were aghast; mind you, this was the 70’s and nobody made his or her own clothes. Surely, he didn’t mean that. Of course we all knew how to sew, but we were expected to sew our school wardrobe!?! Mother was aghast as well, but since Dad managed the finances, she wasn’t always certain how much money there was. Mom got creative and took us girls to the clothing store outlets in San Francisco, and we were able to each buy several items very inexpensively. As she explained it, “He has no idea how much the material costs; it’s cheaper to buy than sew.” However, the day I decided to marry, my mother got busy sewing all the bridesmaids’ dresses as well as her own dress, and we did a backyard wedding. It was beautiful.

After we lost everything, I asked my parents, “How did you do it?” My father frankly relayed that when they were the same age that we were, they were also over-leveraged with several children in college. He said it was by the grace of God, they made it through. He also explained that the housing collapse was not something we could have foreseen, and that they were blessed to have bought and sold houses when they did. We bought at the “wrong time”. Our home’s value had dropped, in a very short period, to nearly half of its purchase price. However, I know my parents’ parents, who went through the Great Depression, influenced them substantially. They were taught frugality and how to work and save for things they wanted. My parents provided such a lovely life for us that it didn’t seem we ever suffered or lacked for anything. We believed that if we worked hard, things would be the same for us. However, we weren’t paying attention to the fundamentals; I’m not going to let us off the hook that easy. As much as I blame the “big money people” (as I call them) and the government, we have to accept blame where blame is due.

I had the chance to discuss the Great Depression with my grandparents before they passed away. My great-great grandfather owned a farm and ran his own construction business. When business got bad, they all moved back to the farm. My grandfather’s view of farming was described to me this way: “Sara, anyone who wants to live on a farm has never lived on one. It’s hard, dirty, and exhausting work.” My grandfather left the farm for the big city as quickly as he could, and he did well. My grandmother on the other hand, was very frugal. She cooked everything from scratch, used basic cleaning supplies, and wore simple clothing from Sears. They were very well off, and yet you couldn’t tell by looking at my grandmother. She still liked to shop at the thrift stores. I had the chance to speak to my husband’s father, who is still living in his mid-80’s. I asked him if he remembered the Great Depression growing up. He became agitated and irritable. He told me that his parents sent him off to live with an aunt who owned a boarding house, since they could not afford to feed all their children. His job was to empty the bedpans for all the boarders and to do what he was told. He never forgave his father for that. He felt abandoned and unloved, and his relationship with his father never repaired, but he stayed alive.

I’ve been trying to learn survival lessons as fast as I can, but it’s all foreign to me. I’ve stocked the pantry and the freezers and started an organic garden. I’ve stocked up on odd supplies, like aluminum foil, paracord, bandages, hospital-grade antibacterial soap, antiviral face masks, and an assortment of “hard to find, might be useful someday” supplies. I’ve educated myself on herbal remedies as opposed to prescription drugs, just in case. I started an herb garden and stocked upon essential oils. We bought guns and ammunition. I have no clue how to shoot a gun, but many in our family do, and some are in law enforcement and/or are veterans. Learning to shoot is on my list of things to do, as so many other things are. I bought a dehydrator and learned a lot about drying food, and then realized I could do better buying dried foods in bulk from Costco. I thought about investing in freeze-drying equipment and stopped myself from going down another rat hole. We stocked up on firewood and purchased cast iron cooking pots and pans, just in case we have to use the fireplaces for cooking. I keep going back to James Rawles’ “list of lists”, and I get so stressed out. We aren’t near ready for a collapse of any length.

Incorporating lessons learned from the Great Depression is one way to be better prepared. There are numerous sources for the Great Depression “lessons learned”, but I’d like to avoid the U.S. government’s fiscal and social policy topics because in the end, it won’t matter. It’s what we do in our daily lives that matters.

Lessons I’ve adopted:

• Don’t borrow money, your house is your home not an ATM machine nor an “asset to leverage”,
• Avoid risk by staying out of the stock market,
• Always look for the best deal,
• Don’t be lazy,
• Hang on to your job with all your might, and
• Don’t forfeit your own retirement to give your kids a better life– they need to work, save, and pay cash.

It sounds simple, eh? It’s not. It’s a lifestyle change. Right now we have a mortgage, but we are working furiously to get the house ready to sell so that we can cash out and downsize now that the housing market has recovered somewhat. We used to buy up, and now we are focused on buying down, so we never have to worry about a mortgage again. We are praying we can beat the next housing crash as we paint and repair and upgrade at a feverish pace. We were tempted to take out a home equity loan to get the house ready faster, but no, no borrowing. HELOCs were a huge problem after the crash, as people had used their homes like ATM machines. We are using every spare dime to get the house ready to sell, which scares us because we are depleting all our reserves. We live in a high-end neighborhood and there is huge upside potential, but we have to do things right without being ridiculous. With that in mind, the upgrades are carefully chosen and have been the source of numerous arguments and agonizing decisions. For instance, have you noticed the price of new kitchen appliances? I about fell down when I realized how expensive they were. We are focusing on quality rather than glitz, and we regularly check the Sears Outlet for returned and undamaged appliances. We haggled like professionals over the price of hardwood and installation. We’ve hired help and paid cash for the manual labor when we couldn’t physically do the work. We stayed with licensed contractors for the important upgrades. We have scraped, painted, and ripped until we can hardly move. We want to get as far away as possible from town and the lines of drift. However, we cannot count on getting out of our home with anything because we have no idea when the housing market will take another nosedive. Right now, it has stalled, so we wait to see what next spring will bring while we work.

Our cars are aging. My SUV is 14 years old. My husband’s SUV is 10 years old. Neither car is worth much, so selling one of them wouldn’t provide any big chunk of cash. Oh, how tempting it is to buy a new car, but no, there will be no car payments. We’ll drive ‘em until they die, and when one dies we will share the other one until it dies. Then how about a practical pre-1985 used GMC truck purchased with cash? What about credit cards? We closed all but one credit card, and it’s for emergencies and travel. We use it, pay it off, use it, pay it off.

I must say that with the Ebola scare, the ISIS threat, and the random acts of violence (especially the recent one in New York where a guy wielded a hatchet at police officers before he was shot to death), I am anxious. His Facebook page had this: “Think of a swarm of bees (negroes) that surround and attack an elephant (America) to death.” It sent chills up and down my spine and I had to calm myself down and realize I lived hours from any large, metropolitan city, but it’s not far enough. The insanity of America’s spending, the fragile economy, the lies about the unemployment rate, the influx of illegal immigrants carrying disease and without jobs and housing, altogether have my heart racing. Furthermore, it’s not just the news, it’s the community of survivalists who are clanging the warning bell, James Rawles included, “Get out now or it will be too late” (my interpretation). The below excerpt from the Woodpile report has been weighing on my heart.

Ol’ Remus: “What you should really fear is scarcity. It’s unAmerican to say this, but what you have is all you’re likely to have and chances are you won’t keep all of that. So, are you planning a mountain retreat with a well and a hand pump, more than a tank of gas from the nearest urban center, away from lines of drift, solar powered hot tub with optional foot massage? If you’re not there now, or nearly so, you’re not going to get there. In other words, time’s up. Get your affairs in order where you are, because where you are is where you’re going to be. And what you have is what you’re going to have.” (http://www.woodpilereport.com/; Woodpile Report 378 – 15 Jul 2014)

What do we do right now? Do we change the plan to hunker down for a year or two? Do we sell the house now, unfinished or with a few cosmetic changes and barely make it out with our finances intact? Do we head for the hills and hope to rent something? I have been spending time every morning reading scripture to calm my fears, knowing that Satan is the father of lies. Then again, I don’t want to be unprepared with my head in the sand. I must focus on the Lord and His Word. I am confident He will make the way straight.

“I will lift up mine eyes unto the hills, from whence cometh my help. My help cometh from the LORD, which made heaven and earth. He will not suffer thy foot to be moved: he that keepeth thee will not slumber. Behold, he that keepeth Israel shall neither slumber nor sleep. The LORD is thy keeper: the LORD is thy shade upon thy right hand. The sun shall not smite thee by day, nor the moon by night. The LORD shall preserve thee from all evil: he shall preserve thy soul. The LORD shall preserve thy going out and thy coming in from this time forth, and even for evermore.” – Psalm 121