I’m sort of a “prepper lite”.
I keep a small survival kit in my work bag: black plastic garbage bag, water treatment filters, distress whistle, couple of freezer bags, pen and paper, tweezers, duct tape, a bandanna, compass, small multitool, nail clippers, a couple blocks of Wetfire and a tealight candle, couple more odds and ends like that but you get the idea.
I keep a small backpack at my desk. It’s mostly safety equipment (headlamp, goggles, dust mask, another bandanna, gloves) and some rescue tools in case something happens to the building. I used to have a reflective vest in there too, not sure if that’s still in or not. It’s got a few general purpose things in it like you might take camping but it’s got more urban disaster oriented tools in it, like wrenches to open and close sillcock valves or a fire hydrant (though I have some serious doubts you’d actually open a hydrant with that particular tool, but it’s a glassbreaker so why not).
I keep a handful of things like spare socks and shoes in my desk and in my vehicle (which also has rain gear in it). First aid kits in the desk backpack and in the vehicle. Vehicle of course has my tool box.
I’m still working on my bag at home, it’s intended for temporarily abandoning my domicile in case the authorities make us leave. I don’t want some massive kit that looks like I’m going to fight a war either, I want something I can lug 30 miles and not notice it so much, I might have to hop the fence around the property if the gate doesn’t work because the power is out. It’s a tricky one because I want to take my personal electronics if that happens, but I use those every day so it’s hard to put them in a bag. I’m going for half of it being a minimalist “10 Cs” based kit with a couple of “urban comfort” items (flashlight and a pair of gloves namely) and the other half being a comfortable change of clothes and basically a tiny overnight bag and really I need some cash for it, not a ton, just enough for maybe a taxi ride, a one night hotel stay and a couple of meals.
I keep rice, beans and lentils, and some staple foods like flour, etc. around and a few canned goods too. Without any power or ability to cook at all I could eat for a week, longer than that if I have electricity or fire. Twelve gallons or so fresh water too.
Hand crank radios, spare batteries, some unscented undyed bleach, 5 gallon buckets with lids, candles, plastic sheeting, stuff like that. I don’t have tons and tons of it but I have it. One reason I haven’t tried to rid myself of all my paper books is I might have to sit in my dark apartment for a week listening to the radio, eating room temperature wet mushy legumes and reading to not go out of my mind.
I don’t have large stores, it’s just the shelves in my utility room and pantry.
Disruption of food supply is one I worry about in an urban area and it just depends on the reason how well prepared I actually am. If I have power but not food, I am in much better shape. I can still eat something for about a week without power but for morale if nothing else I do have a small propane stove.
The thing is, the last time I moved, I stopped grocery shopping except for some produce and meat, and I ate the food in my cabinets for 3.5 weeks. I run a little leaner now, probably could only do 2 weeks now, but still. It’s not THAT hard to have a reserve of food even if you don’t have a pallet of freeze dried pellets around.
If the situation permits I can load up a trailer and be gone with a lot of my stuff pretty fast, but if anything serious happens here the highways clog up super fast and no one in the city proper is going anywhere. When the hurricanes hit and the traffic comes this way, it’s perfect gridlock.
I’m not trying to survive the extinction event or anything like that, I’m thinking more like fires, riots (this is patently realistic for me, I work in a very politically sensitive area where large protests and demonstrations go on), blackouts, grocery trucks not coming in for a week, etc. I figure most realistic problems will go away in 72 hours, so I strive to make it for a week. I figure after a week, something is bound to change for better or worse.
Of course a few self-defense items here and there, I keep a variety of options around for the legal climate I’m operating in. My best weapon is the one between my ears of course but you never know, I’m pretty good at avoiding trouble in public but I’ve had some real sketchy characters bother me in not so legal ways before.
I’d love to have a proper setup, like geothermal or solar energy, a workshop, maybe gardening etc. some day but that’s a pipe dream for now. I don’t know how hardcore I’d really be though, permaculture looks like a lot of damn work. A proper emergency escape vehicle would be nice too but again pipe dream territory for me.
Sometimes when I’ m having a really bad day I pray for the zombies to rise and start eating brains.
As far as keeping it on a budget, the whole point of prepping is that you lazily acquire these things on the cheap or even free while the world is still spinning. I think if you go out and spend a ton of cash you’re doing it wrong. It’s little things, a box of garbage bags here, a second hand radio there, and so on. The danger of having this giant pile of crap you’ll never use is too high otherwise.
Of course you have to be careful, like I’ve never used my distress whistle for its intended purpose. If I’m ever caught in a building trying to let the fire department know where I am though, that $0.75 will have been worth it. But the whistle is very small, unbreakable, constantly within reach, etc.
Plus I can justify this item anyway. It’s a nice loud whistle, I use it at the company picnic. I just have to remember to put it back!
