Note from JWR:

Today we present another entry for Round 25 of the SurvivalBlog non-fiction writing contest.

First Prize: A.) A course certificate from onPoint Tactical. This certificate will be for the prize winner’s choice of three-day civilian courses. (Excluding those restricted for military or government teams.) Three day onPoint courses normally cost between $500 and $600, and B.) Two cases of Mountain House freeze dried assorted entrees, in #10 cans, courtesy of Ready Made Resources. (A $392 value.) and C.) A HAZARiD Decontamination Kit from Safecastle.com. (A $350 value.)

Second Prize: A “grab bag” of preparedness gear and books from Jim’s Amazing Secret Bunker of Redundant Redundancy (JASBORR) with a retail value of at least $350.

Third Prize: A copy of my “Rawles Gets You Ready” preparedness course, from Arbogast Publishing.

Round 25 ends on November 30th, so get busy writing and e-mail us your entry. Remember that articles that relate practical “how to” skills for survival have an advantage in the judging.

Where You Live Matters: How to Assess Your Location and Develop Scenarios, by Brendan S.

A little foreknowledge will prevent you from becoming a victim. Most people don’t think about what they will actually do in the case of an emergency. One just has to see what happened after Hurricane Katrina to see how ill-informed the masses are. They simply expect the government to take care of everything. They meander like zombies to some location and wait to be fed and cleaned up after. Not me! I know what I’m going to do when any disaster strikes.

In this article I want to share with you my thoughts on how to:

•Assess the situation and your location.

•Assess your job location and commute.

•Assess any variables to your survival plans.

When disaster strikes where will you be? How well do you know the place where you live, work, or the space in between? Chances are that when a disaster occurs you will be either at home or at work or commuting in between. You may be ready to deal with things at home on a sunny afternoon, but what if you’re on the road in a downpour?

The main occupation of think tanks is to devise scenarios of whatever their specialty is; oil, food, military or political events. The same tactics can be done on an individual scale to find out what your reactions might be to disasters or events. You can plan out your reactions to events by knowing what your assets are at the time and how to be ready for any variables. Planning is simply about not being surprised. “When I am in situation 1, I will do X. When I am in situation 2 I will do Y.” Simple yet effective.

ASSESS THE SITUATION

A scenario doesn’t need to be the end of the world as we know it (TEOTWAWKI). Natural disasters are just as important and deadly. Not just in the initial disaster but also in the aftermath. Actually more people usually die after a disaster.

Living here in Northern California, earthquakes are an ever present fear and so ill prepared by people and neglected by the elected officials, city planners and developers. People’s houses might be able to take a moderate earthquake with little damage, but what about the roads, highways and overpasses? Chances are fire will spread unabated killing more people than the initial damage. Or, with the cops busy, looters will think it’s open season on home shopping.

So where does your house stand in the general theme of threats?

TASK #1: List the dangers that might affect your area.

Living where you do, you should already have some experience with some disaster inducing events. The United States has a very large variation in weather and its effects can be devastating. Floods near rivers, hurricanes near the coasts, blizzards up north, heat waves almost anywhere, earthquakes out west… the list goes on. You have probably dealt with something already.

Growing up in the Midwest we were always in danger of tornados cutting a swath through our neighborhood. Then in winter we had to worry about blizzards. But the situation doesn’t have to be devastating. What if a thunderstorm simply cut the power for several days? What if the basement floods? What if there’s an escape from a prison?

Could the effects be temporary or long lasting? Is it just power lines down or a blackout covering several states? Do striking rail workers mean food shortages? Is the riot from a basketball game or did Oakland finally collapse into chaos?

ASSESS YOUR LOCATION

TASK#2: Know your city.

As a pilot I know a lot about terrain. All day long I see the land rolling underneath me. Here in Northern California, from the air, I can easily see how land is managed and how cities and towns are developed. I see how many roads go in and out of town centers, suburbs, business parks and so on.

The place I live in is a small town in a valley with only a few roads leading in and out. If there was an earthquake along the Hayward fault line like the “big one” that is due to happen here any time now, and most of Oakland, Berkeley, San Francisco were apocalyptic hellscapes, the bridges might be knocked out and it would hopefully prevent refugees from setting up camp in our open land. We have a route to safety toward Sacramento if needed. And we have arable land that can be turned into farms quickly.

How dense is the population where you live?

Do you live in a dense populated city? A suburb? In the center or on the edge, close to farmland? If there was a disaster, where would most of those people head? You don’t need to fly over your area to assess it, Google Earth will do just fine. Take a good look at the main avenues of traffic and housing. Where is the most dense? Where do you not want to be? Where does the suburbs taper off finally into farmland? If Hurricane Katrina is any indication, people will congregate in a large open space like a stadium, park, school or the like. If you were a FEMA organizer, where would you tell people to go?

Where are the nearest hospitals?

When something happens these are most likely going to be the first place that people head for. There is medical attention, food, warmth and light. If you are uninjured, do you really need to go there? Would it be more dangerous? When the hospital gets overloaded after a disaster and turns into a triage; giving attention to the worst cases first, do you think that panicked people are going to simply wait calmly in the waiting room? Or will they start fights, demand attention maybe at gunpoint? Better to avoid it at all costs. (Or be the very first to show up through the emergency room doors!)

Is your home prepared?

Most time spent by people like us is in preparing our home for disaster, so this is well covered elsewhere and too vast to talk about here. But don’t just look at the stuff you have in your house. The wall of freeze-dried food will get you through the initial catastrophe, but then what? How adaptable is your house? Do you have a yard that can be turned into a garden with a little work? Where can you get more water? Are you near a stream or lake?

Is your neighborhood safe and secure?

You don’t have to live in a gated community to be safe, but how far off the main roads is your house or apartment? Would big city gang-bangers find it accessible and tempting? This fear goes up as the powered lights go out at night and all you can see is darkness out of your front door. Even temporary power outages cause hoodlums to go outside and behave like jackasses.

How well do you know your neighbors?

What would your kids do if you were stuck at work and they were home from school? Do they know your plan of action? Which neighbors could they trust? Which neighbors might want to come together but really are there to deplete your stockpile at twice the rate?

ASSESS YOUR WORK AND COMMUTE

TASK #3: Know your place of work.

If you are stuck at work how long could you last there? You could always sleep at your desk overnight but what about food? Do you think your boss would be ready or willing to provide for you and the other employees? Probably not. It would probably turn into surviving out of your car, especially if your place of work is damaged.

What would you do if stuck on the highway?

The cars are stopped because of an earthquake, flood, jack-knifed chemical truck, etc. Could you pull off and hike on foot? Which way?

When I lived in Tokyo we had to have a plan ready for commuting by train and an earthquake happened. I carried a small street map book so I could walk back to my home when the roads and train lines were disrupted. (Even harder for a foreigner.) The Japanese are far better equipped for disasters from typhoons to earthquakes because of simple occurrence. They know it is just inevitable that something is going to happen. There they can trust their government and employers to help though.

Where are your loved ones and do they know what to do?

Does your spouse know what you might do? Don’t expect your cell phones to be working. I have an agreement with my wife not to come looking for me. I will either go to work or home and she will do the same.

ASSESS THE VARIABLES

TASK #4: Game out some variables.

Once you have a plan of action and know what you want to do, you have to be ready for any changes. The emergency situation probably won’t stay static, but either gets better with quick action from authorities or more likely get worse through inaction and incompetence from them.

If rising flood waters block the road that lies between you and your loved ones, do you know the alternate routes? Where is the higher terrain versus lower? Once you know what you want to do, head straight home for example, what variable might change that course of action? Snow too deep. Flooded bridge. Tremors sending rocks to the road below. Pinhead cop telling you the road is closed.

Are you ready for the extremes?

Are you ready to spend the night in your car? Or several nights? You can find lists of things to have to make your car into a temporary shelter, but the main thing is not to be surprised and get taken by panic. Simply be ready to tough it out for a while until the situation is to your advantage. If you plan to stay at work, how long until you want to head home?

In conclusion, being prepared for emergencies is not just about sitting on top of your stockpile of food with an AR-15 and waiting. You have to know the game plan and how to implement it and expect it to change. As a pilot, I am always ready for an emergency situation by being mentally prepared for it and never panicking when it doesn’t go the way I’ve practiced. You can do the same for any situation.

Letter Re: How to Make Your Own “Black Out” OPSEC Window Panels

Sir,
In the film industry we use a very cheap and very opaque product to block out windows. We often need to shoot [indoor] night time scenes during the day and can’t have any stray light.

Product is called Duvetyne, it’s a very, very heavy black cloth. We even use it for flags and cutters, which are light-blocking pieces that we put in front of lights as big as 20K (20,000 watts) to deflect and control stray light. This stuff works great.

Here is a supplier of Duvetyne.

Has it for $8.25 per yard (60″ wide), so it really is cheap as dirt. You can buy a 50 yard roll for a little over $400, which has got to be enough to do the windows on two or three average houses. At that price I wouldn’t want to be using old rags and what have you. I hope that this helps. – Adam

Economics and Investing:

Reader CP suggested a column piece by Malcolm Berko: Taking Stock. CP’s comment: “While Berko runs an investment advice column, he’s generally not a cheerleader for irrational exuberance. This response to a reader’s question is an general indictment of the markets and those who might as well be donning grass skirts dancing on a beach to appease the financial gods.”

Commentary from Dan Denninger: Consumer Credit: Disaster, Down $12 billion

Items from The Economatrix:

US Consumers Cut Borrowing by $12 Billion in August

Mortgage Rates Below 5% Fuel Re-Fi Boom

Gold Price Hit Record High on Report to Ditch Dollar

Gold Breakout Alert

Dead Man Walking

Dow at 6,300 By Year End

China Calls End to Dollar Hegemony

Dollar Tumbles on Report of its Demise

Sugar the New Oil as Prices Soar. JWR’s comment: Although most SurvivalBlog readers wisely store mostly honey, it might be prudent to buy some refined sugar to store for holiday baking and for barter, before the retail price of sugar jumps.

Jim’s Quote of the Day:

"If you become involved in a crisis situation, you will not rise to the occasion but, rather, default to your level of training." – A phrase first coined by firefighters, but now commonly used by shooting instructors

Notes from JWR:

Wow! We recently set two new records: 31,898 unique visits in one day, and a whopping 46.2 Gigabytes of traffic. My sincere thanks for spreading the word about SurvivalBlog. Please continue to do so, by adding a link to your web site, blog, or e-mail footer. Thanks!

—

Today we present another entry for Round 25 of the SurvivalBlog non-fiction writing contest.

First Prize: A.) A course certificate from onPoint Tactical. This certificate will be for the prize winner’s choice of three-day civilian courses. (Excluding those restricted for military or government teams.) Three day onPoint courses normally cost between $500 and $600, and B.) Two cases of Mountain House freeze dried assorted entrees, in #10 cans, courtesy of Ready Made Resources. (A $392 value.) and C.) A HAZARiD Decontamination Kit from Safecastle.com. (A $350 value.)

Second Prize: A “grab bag” of preparedness gear and books from Jim’s Amazing Secret Bunker of Redundant Redundancy (JASBORR) with a retail value of at least $350.

Third Prize: A copy of my “Rawles Gets You Ready” preparedness course, from Arbogast Publishing.

Round 25 ends on November 30th, so get busy writing and e-mail us your entry. Remember that articles that relate practical “how to” skills for survival have an advantage in the judging.

Hard Love Preparedness Upbringing, by FBP

As a child, I was orphaned by age 10. I went from living in wealthy lifestyle with maids and yard handyman, with ponies and pet monkeys in Miami, Florida, to living in rural mid-West with my Grandparents. This was truly a culture shock. It has been with prepping that I have truly appreciated the time spent with my Grandparents. From them learned about gardening, canning, freezing, sewing, and mind expanding experiences from visiting relatives on the farm (acres and acres of corn, and livestock!)

I remember Grandma’s bootstrapping on everything. She’d lived through the depression and WWII with its rationing. She saved everything useful. She explained to me that sewing needles were hard to come by, and butter had been rationed. In today’s perspective, it reminds me to stock up on those little things, like needles. Butter making is a skill and relatively easy to do if you have the animals to do it, but without them, I stocked up on powdered butter, just in case! Old clothes were always saved, and were sometimes remade into new ones (hand-me-downs) for another. I even remember an old rag rug made from scraps of old materials braided and then sewn together in an oval shape. Nothing went to waste.

My other Grandmother told me of her experiences during the Depression. They didn’t have electricity to ‘do without’ because they didn’t have electricity back then! They managed and just didn’t seem to be aware of how hard they had it; just because that was the way it was then. However, she did mention that there were problems in the area with hobos and less fortunates stealing and killing livestock. Grandpa had been more fortunate and not had as much trouble with them due to his reputation for being fair. He paid anyone dropping by, ‘a meal for a day’s work’, such as splitting wood, or other farm chore. The word got around that one could get a meal for work and some would come, help, and eat. Grandpa’s farm wasn’t bothered by losses like some of the neighbors.

Today, when reflecting on my childhood and the things I learned, and in contrast looking at today’s young people, gave me pause. Our group of prepper families consists of older parents with young adult children who are continuing their lives as usual. We had viewed it as giving them a chance to enjoy life and have some good memories before the hard times. It occurred to me today, that for our kids, it is comparable to the Roaring Twenties just before the Great Depression.

But, isn’t the prepping for the continuation of our offspring? I realized today that they are not gaining as much of the skill sets for survival, like I had gained from my Grandparents, by working at their side pulling weeds out of the garden, picking green beans, snapping green beans, shucking corn, blanching and freezing corn, canning green beans, cooking (from scratch!), sewing, automotive repairs, and on and on… Or rather, the extensive lessons gained from this year’s prepping.

This summer’s garden has been unusual for us. We have had a large garden for nearly 15 years, but this year’s garden was planted as a training garden. It was laid out on paper first, companion planting in mind. We innovated and experimented with several new crops, including hops. We planted some both in the garden and in containers for comparison. There are berries, tomatoes, peppers, grapes, lemon bushes, pole-green beans, tire-stack potatoes, yams, and landscaped with herbs and cucumbers and pumpkins. Before planting the garden, we assembled a PVC water distribution line with on/off valves for each row and for the garden as a whole. After rototilling the compost into the garden and covering it with black plastic for two weeks to kill weed seeds, we made furrows and laid out the soaker hoses on the rows, and connected to the water distribution line (PVC) at one end of the garden. The seeds were planted according to the preplanned paper charted layout; each soaker hose was planted on both sides of the hose, essentially doubling the garden’s capacity. (We did have to fertilize a month ago because of the doubling of the crops.) Marigold seeds were planted around the outside perimeter of the garden, unfortunately not on a soaker hose, which required manual watering. This turned out to be a blessing because it provided a bi-daily requirement to water and an opportunity to review progress and address weeds and needs of the garden. It has blossomed like a jungle forest in Hawaii despite being in the middle of a drought and 100 degree summer weather! I have maintained my first ever garden journal and noted all progress and failures. Our hops are now over 9 feet tall, and covered with hops. Our potato tire stacks looked like they worked well, but we discovered potatoes only liked the first tire which held dirt; the tires above were filled with tree mulch and grew no potatoes. This was a good lesson before TEOTWAWKI. The green beans have produced 49 quarts to date and are ready for their 4th picking and are still blooming! The bell peppers are nearly the size of a baseball. These were grown from seeds we saved from Costco’s bell peppers eaten earlier in the year! We have a patch along the side of the garden which holds the perennials which don’t get rototilled. There grows the asparagus, which gave us spears for two months early in the year and then goes to frond, tall and wispy, to support the root structure. We also grew new asparagus from seed saved from last year! We have tomatoes planted next to the asparagus. They repel each other’s pests! In between are basil and parsley and garlic. We have had no problems with pests this year! Yeah!

We learned not to plant winter crops in spring, but rather in July. We learned that spinach and lettuce like shade, and that spinach bolts (goes to seed) when the days are too long. Our pole beans have grown up 6 foot rabbit/deer fencing staked down along the soaker hoses. Pole beans are vining plants and have grown into arches making getting down the rows difficult. Next year we will alternate pole bean rows with spinach or lettuce I think. Our cowpeas/black-eyed peas are doing fine and require no work! They will also make a great cover crop for the winter and to rototill into the garden. They add nitrogen to the soil!

The entire garden survived a devastating hail storm which tattered much of the garden, and bruised some of the produce, but most survived and recovered. I discovered that thinning can be done with scissors to remove the extra plants without disturbing the roots of the “keeper” plants.

The garden has always been canned, but this year, we have discovered that much of it can be put up through dehydration. The Excalibur dehydrators web site has excellent videos of how to dehydrate food for TEOTWAWKI, which saves space and weight! We are still canning meats. We also smoked our first freshly caught river salmon and vacu-sealing it before freezing it, to keep it around for awhile. (Of course, that is after we ate lots of fresh salmon.)

The discoveries this summer have been wonderful, but the kids have not been around for much of it. They have been too busy enjoying their own lives in our urban community. They have grown gardens before, but they missed out on much of what we learned this year, by not being around. It is hard to tear them away from their friends, girlfriends, jobs, college, parties, movies, and of course electronic games.

I have learned, like the song says, “You’ve got to be Cruel to be Kind”. To do the right thing for our kids will take ‘Hard Love’, like my Grandparents did with me; chores and responsibilities/school homework came first, before play, and before friends! I hated that rule, but it made a better me as a result of it. Wish me luck. – FBP

Letter Re: How to Make Your Own “Black Out” OPSEC Window Panels

Mr. Rawles,
To counter the ridiculous prices of heavy duty lined upholstery fabric and pre-made retail offered curtain panels with “supposed” 99% light blocking out fabric liners, or the use of fabric remnants of odd sizes and black dye, this alternative suggestion beats the cost of other approaches hands down. They can be put up in a hurry with two staples or my preference is to apply them up with screws at both chord ends using para-cord through the holes, which will allow them to be cinched open and closed during daylight hours, if you chose to do so.

I purchased the darkest-colored shower curtain liners from a local dollar store in bulk. I started with tan colored ones. They are heavy duty plastic with weights embedded in the hem bottom to keep them straight and taut. I hung them up on an outdoors clothes line, (yeah, remember those?), so that I could have access to both sides. I spray painted them with non-toxic latex flat black paint, (which I also purchased at the dollar store), and also found para-chord there as well.

Once thoroughly dried, these blocked even the sun which was shining bright that day to dry them in the wind.
I let them hang out in the sun one more day after they were found dry to the touch, to cure the paint and also rid them of the plastic shower curtain new smell. I then rolled them up individually, marked them by number which was assigned to each window on each building and corresponds to a master log sketch picture sheet which also depicts the same numbering system on our OPSEC house “security plan”, and stored them away in the closet of each room. They are now ready for a TEOTWAWKI day that they will be hung up in a flash.

The end cost to do all my windows in the house, barn and outbuildings was 1/4th the price of what it would have cost to hang newly purchased rolled black visqueen material in the widths that I needed.

The second alternative suggestion for economy and successful black out affect, for kitchen windows, or use on those short, small windows, is to go to your local variety store and look for heavy Black bath towel blankets. They are oversized like a beach towel, plush, and very black. They were found on sale now at our local Wal-Mart for $5.00. I used these and made “cut to custom” width and length covers for those odd-sized windows that are used for house perimeter monitoring and are designated “target ports”, and the curtains have no signature sound “rustle” when you pull them open.
Again, this was far less expensive to complete this project, than starting with base materials. It was a fast, efficient use of goods, effective for blocking out light, ( we tested them) and inexpensive project and the materials are available right now. – KAF

JWR Adds: For any new SurvivalBlog readers that are wondering why they might need opaque window coverings, consider this: In a disaster situation where the utility power grid goes down, there will be very few people that will have have electric lights for more than a few days. Most SurvivalBlog readers have either a photovoltaic power system, or a propane-fueled backup generator. But having your house lit up might attract the attention of looters, in search of lucrative targets. So it is wise to be prepared to black out your windows, and perhaps even add a “light lock” foyer (similar to a photographic darkroom entrance), just inside your house’s main entrance. (In a disaster situation, that will most likely be the utility room door.) Once you’ve set up your blackout shutters or drapes, be sure to check for light leaks, preferably with a starlight scope or goggles. Add opaque duct tape to any glaring cracks, as needed.

Letter Re: Getting Self-Sufficient in Wyoming

Dear Mr. Rawles,
I was recently given your novel “Patriots” by a like-minded friend in Wyoming. I read it once for pleasure, then twice with a highlighter, notepad, and Google. It’s a wonderful resource, and I’m looking forward to the new book [“How to Survive the End of the World as We Know It”]. Reading “Patriots” left me proud to be an American, and revitalized something I felt I had been losing in the recent years. This is a wonderful country, and I have faith that there are still a bunch of decent God-fearing people who will stand up for her when needed.

I was 20 when I moved here from Baltimore, to run a cattle ranch that my father had the foresight to buy in the late 1980s. It became the working family “retreat” where I lived full time, and my parents lived half-time. I am forever indebted to Dad for my life. He was my best friend in more ways than can be counted. He passed at age 68 in late 2007, of a digestive cancer. I will always wish I had more time with him on earth.

Life in Wyoming has been wonderful for me, as I developed good self-sufficiency skills and eventually (starting 1995) built a passive and active solar/wind charged earth-bermed home. I remember back in 1984, when Dad (in the computers/operations research field) bought our first PC – an XT with dual 5.25″ floppies and 128K of RAM. The first thing I did as a teenager was make my lists of things I’d need to go survive in the woods! I have no idea where those thoughts came from – it was absolutely natural. I’m currently forty, and pretty shocked by current events and economics.

What are we doing? Is hyperinflation around the corner? There are two things my dad taught me long ago, that I always use to analyze everything…

1) Nothing is free.
2) If you have to lie to accomplish your goals, maybe you’d rather reevaluate your goals!

Now I’m building marine-grade expedition campers that can operate far from civilization, and restoring old mechanical diesels in my spare time. Next spring and summer my projects will be a good root cellar, a rebuild of my wind charger, and a new small barn for our goats and chickens.

Thank you for the inspiration. I hope one day to shake your hand. God Bless, – Darrin in Wyoming

Economics and Investing:

Thanks to reader GWC for this: U.K. Faced ‘Bank Runs, Riots’ as RBS and HBOS Neared Collapse

GG spotted this key data point: Hours worked plummets to all time low

Thanks to Damon for this news item: Venezuela inflation estimated at 26%, annually. (Prices were up 2.5% in September. But don’t worry. Comrade Hugo has a plan.)

Mark G. found an interesting New York Times blog article: What Happened to Argentina?

Items from The Economatrix:

UN Calls For New Reserve Currency

Australia Rate Hike Good Sign for World Economy

National Retails Groups Forecasts Weak Holiday Season

Weak Dollar, Strong Stock Market Push Oil Higher

How the Dollar is Being Systemically Devalued Since the 1980s

Stiglitz: GDP Blinded Us to the Crisis

Report Questions Claims on Banks’ Health

IG Report Finds Paulson, Bernanke Misled Public on Bank Rescues

Weak Dollar Drives Gold to Record High $1,043.20

Global Aging Population Financial Crisis Brewing

Weiss: Three Government Reports Point to Fiscal Doomsday

Soros Says “Basically Bankrupt Banks” Restrain US

US Rivals Plot to End Oil Trading in Dollars

Banks 1, America 0

The End of the Dollar Spells the Rise of a New Order

US Dollar Sinks After G7 Meeting

Peter Schiff: The “Recovery” That Isn’t

Odds ‘n Sods:

Reader Jim F. mentioned this fascinating Wired article: Missile Silo Fixer-Upper Now Swanky Bachelor Pad

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A reminder that Safecastle’s final Mountain House sale for 2009, ends on October 11th. They are offering 25% off on all Mountain House canned long-term storage foods. Order soon!

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Feds sued to keep out of state’s gun affair; Complaint filed seeking affirmation of Montana Firearms Freedom Act. (Thanks to Clem in Wyoming, for the link.)

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Paint Horses for Sale: SurvivalBlog reader “Tota” wrote me: “Recently I lost my job. I have a herd of Ten (10) Paint/Quarter horses horses that I need to sell because I cannot afford to feed them. I am located in southeastern Idaho. The package includes a young Black/White (Homozygous for color and pattern) stallion, 6 broodmares – 1 mare is also homozygous for color and pattern -1 black QH mare 1- sorrel QH mare, grade paint mare that produces color even bred to solid horses and a paint mare. There are also some 2-year olds yearlings and foals by the above stallion. This package is the best in Paint and QH breeding. The stallion has had four months of professional training, four of the mares are rideable and some even double as pack horses. The whole herd is $15,000.” If you are a serious buyer, please e-mail me, and I will forward it to “Tota”.

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Robert M. mentioned: Serious Green: A Guide to Keeping City Chickens

Jim’s Quote of the Day:

“In addition to some of the obvious reasons why you don’t want to cut yourself when operating a saw, blood on a bare tool steel blade can cause serious and near-immediate rusting, and good tools deserve better treatment than that. “ – H. J. Halterman, Along the Way, August 2009

Note from JWR:

Sorry about the delay, but here are the result’s of last month’s poll. Today, I’m starting a new poll: What are your favorite movies with survival themes? Please e-mail me a list of your top five picks. Thanks! I’ll post the results sometime early in November.