Key developments for Thursday, December 3, 2020

US Embassy staff are being pulled from Baghdad: Climate change fears are impacting some US-Americans’ plans to have children. Some participants in the peer-reviewed study divulged regretting having children knowing those children could be forced to struggle to survive through potentially tough conditions in the future. Speaking of the impacts of climate change, the Great

Key developments for Friday, November 27, 2020

The head of Iran’s military nuclear weapons program has been assassinated–tensions with Iran continue to grow: Authorities in Iran suspect Israel is responsible for the assassination: And, incidentally, the US is moving warships back into the Middle East (the decision to do this was reportedly made before tensions grew today): The world has nearly 62

Save 50% preordering the new Water Essentials video course

Today we’re launching the preview video and 50%-off preorders for the upcoming course on water preparedness and survival — get it for $24 instead of $49 when released in a few weeks (with money-back guarantee if you don’t like it!) Similar in-person lessons cost hundreds of dollars, require travel and field time, and still won’t

Key developments for Tuesday, November 24, 2020

Here are some free resources for neighborhood crime statistics—but don’t let the notifications get you rattled. Crime-information overload could be an anxiety-inducing time sink. It’s best to put the data in perspective. Shipping container bottlenecks are causing irregularities in supply and logistical headaches. In general, the shipping industry has been more robust throughout the pandemic

Key developments for Thursday, November 12, 2020

Prepping was recently considered an eccentric pastime. The folks at NatGeo link modern day prepping back to the Cold War. I’ve always considered it simple self-sufficiency, myself, and saw these commonsense practices as a legacy of the American expansion west from the first big cities. In any case, it’s increasingly mainstream. Bloomberg has a rosy

How to make char cloth

Char cloth is a source of tinder that has been around for over 500 years. This dark, carbonized material can easily catch a spark or small flame, and lets you grow that into a big enough flame to light the larger pieces that make up the foundation of our fire (i.e. the kindling). You create

Drinking your own pee for survival: does the science bear it out?

If you’ve been on the internet for a minute, you’ve no doubt seen the famous Bear Grylls meme. But long before the British Army SAS veteran guzzled his way to meme glory in a now-infamous episode of his “reality” TV survival show, drinking your own pee was a classic metonym for desperation in prepper/survivalist folklore.

Here’s why you’re not excited enough about Pfizer’s COVID vaccine

Monday morning brought the sweet, sweet news that Pfizer’s RNA-based COVID-19 vaccine has turned out to be extremely effective in its Phase 3 trial. While the news itself has been all over social media and has resulted in an instant 5% jump in the stock market, much of the press coverage has actually been not

Turtleback Expedition review

Overland camping trailers for bug outs? Review of the Turtleback Expedition

I’ve spent the last few months testing the Turtleback Expedition trailer after buying it new in the summer of 2020. Besides reviewing just this specific Turtleback trailer for our daily-life offroading and camping adventures, we also used it as a general proxy to test whether this category of RV makes sense for prepping. We’ve logged