MikeLigalig.com

By Robert MacPherson | AFP News – 15 hours ago





Jay Blevins walks to his backyard with a bug-out bag, containing about 40 pounds of survival gear on, December 5, 2012 in Berryville, Virginia. The Mayan end of the world is the last thing on Blevins' mind, but if it happens, he and his family are more than ready for it.

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Blevins is a "prepper," one of a growing number of Americans making big plans for bad times, be it economic chaos, climate change, terrorism, natural disasters like the recent Hurricane Sandy or just a very long power outage.

In contrast to go-it-alone survivalists, preppers have embraced social media, blogging and self-publishing in a big way to share knowledge and build networks in the event of TEOTWAWKI, or The End Of The World As We Know It.

Some of the more outgoing members of the movement, like Blevins, feature in season two of "Doomsday Preppers," a National Geographic Channel reality TV series, now airing worldwide.

"It's kind of this natural homegrown American thing that's just catching on with more suburbanites," said Mike Porenta of the American Preppers Network, an online forum for local prepper meet-up groups all over the United States.

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Prepping enjoys a degree of tacit government endorsement: the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA), on its ready.gov website, tells citizens to put together a basic disaster kit with food and water for three days.
But why stop there? Preppers can shop online for everything from a year's supply of food for one person ($1,152 from Walmart) to pre-fabricated underground bunkers to sit out a nuclear, biological or chemical attack.

In California, the Vivos Group markets luxury bunkers for anyone from a family of four ("discreetly installed just about anywhere in one week") to a community of 1,000 people outfitted for a year of survival.

"Members need to only arrive before their facility is locked down and secured from the chaos above,"
it says.

On a more modest and practical scale, 1-800-Prepare.com peddles a range of made-in-USA survival kits for individuals, families, offices, even dogs and cats -- and in the aftermath of Sandy, it's seen its sales explode ten-fold.

"My typical client is the everyday American, the mainstream consumer," said its owner, New York area volunteer firefighter Paul Faust, who turns over a slice of his post-Sandy profits to a disaster relief charity.

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James Stevens, 73, alias Dr Prepper, who lives on a secluded hilltop outside San Antonio, Texas with five years' supply of food and his own water supply, has been prepping since 1974.

That was the year of the Arab oil embargo, which put paid forever to many Americans' belief in a bottomless supply of cheap energy as they lined up for hours to fill up their cars.

"You prepare for the lifestyle you'd like to maintain when things over which you have no control take control," said Stevens, who's sold 800,000 copies of his "Family Preparedness Handbook," now in its 12th edition.

The Mayan end of the world? "It's the last thing I'm worried about," Stevens told AFP by telephone. "I'm more concerned about the economic, political and moral situation."

Despite its guy-thing image, mother-of-two Lisa Bedford, whose blog TheSurvivalMom.com gives useful tips on how to weather a disaster with a brood of boisterous kids, considers prepping "a very natural fit" for women.

"We start preparing for a baby even before we start getting pregnant," said Bedford, who keeps a three-month supply of Spam, chili and peanut butter in the house, plus a survival kit in the car to hold out for 72 hours with kids.

"I want my family to be less vulnerable, no matter what happens," she added. "There is power in being proactive."

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Back in Berryville, Blevins -- whose own mother knows a thing or two about survival, having lived through war in her native Vietnam before coming to the United States -- acknowledges "a fine line between preparation and paranoia."

But he puts his passion for prepping into context.

"Since 2000, in this state (Virginia), we've had 17 major disaster declarations, everything from the September 11 terrorist attacks to earthquakes to hurricanes to blizzards," he said.

"As a husband and a father, I want to make sure that my family is prepared, really, for anything that will come."



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Mayan says....

that the world will end on 12/21/12 - i don't care



No one knows about that day or hour, not even the angels in heaven, nor the son, but only the FATHER

Mathew 24:36

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naa ko amiga sa u.s. nga motuo ani.  mas kuyaw siyag supply ug emergency food kay sa ani nilang blevins kay ang iyang preparation packets of astronaut food, high-powered nga gamay ray kinahanglanon pero makalahutay ka.

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I don't think the world will end in 2012. Other civilizations, just as advanced as that of the Mayas, also made predictions regarding the end of the world. Those predictions did not come to pass, and life went on as normal. While the Mayas were good at observing the seasons and could predict eclipses based on what had regularly happened in the past, they really had no way of predicting the future.

whos millioner here? lets bet 1 is to 1? that we will still be here in 2012 and beyond.


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