How long could you survive?

[Malacandra]

[QUOTE=Angel of the Lord]
Um, I think we have a few weeks worth of ramen, another few weeks of canned goods, and some diet soda. I know ramen is usually cooked, but if there isn’t another option, I’ll eat it. Guess we’d be screwed on water, though. Thing is, any disaster that would affect us where we live would also evict us from our home. The only thing that <i>wouldn’t</i> would be avian flu, and I don’t think that particular disaster would shut down society. I’d be fine going out in a mask and washing my hands.

Honestly, what I’m working on is building up the portable reserves. You can’t take it if it’s already inside my body! ;).
[/QUOTE]

With fava beans and a nice chianti, this can be addressed…

[BiblioCat]

[QUOTE=Cluricaun]
If it really comes down to it, I have all the supplies that I’ll need, courtesy of non firearm owning hoarders and my own will to survive. We do have enough canned food and beer on hand to last easily a week or maybe 10 days. After that, it’s reappropration time.
[/QUOTE]
I don’t have any cigarettes, and we do have guns, but they’re hunting rifles.
I doubt I could hit the broad side of a barn, but you know, even a blind squirrel finds a nut every now and then. Stay away from my stash of coffee and chocolate.

[Cluricaun]

[QUOTE=Excalibre]
Hey, Cluricaun! Just do it quick and clean, dude, and we’re cool. You can have the canned soup, but you probably won’t find much else in the way of useful supplies.
[/QUOTE]

No worries, Dopers are exempt from being cherry picked. Just put a sign in your window that says “SDMB-NO CIGS” and I’ll pass on by.

PS- If you see me, say hi. I’ll be the one dressed like Mad Max.

[Contrapuntal]

[QUOTE=SkipMagic]
I’m not nice, but eh, what the hell. Moved. (Not being nice means I’ll survive forever. That’s just the way of the world. And the Grump.)
[/QUOTE]
Whatever you say, Butch. Those are some great survival chops ya got workin’ there.

Definitions of Twee on the Web:

* affectedly or excessively dainty, delicate, cute or quaint.
  missbunbun.tripod.com/id7.html

* dainty: affectedly dainty or refined
  wordnet.princeton.edu/perl/webwn

[vetbridge]

[QUOTE=Queen Tonya]
Well then, since Pennsylvania’s much closer for me than Alabama…how you doin’?
[/QUOTE]

Just knock on the door; two taps, pause, then three more.

[August_West]

We’d be OK for a while at home.

We are raising 2 pigs, 8 turkeys, 7 ducks and a dozen chickens. We have an 1400 sq ft garden and are able to can veggies and meat for long storage. There is a lot of wild game in the area, deer, turkeys, and pheasants are common sights in our yard.

Our water comes from our own well, there is also a hand pump well that works when it isn’t winter.

We have an absolutely enormous chest freezer in the garage, it’s got a lot of food in it. The entire floor of it is covered with gallon jugs of frozen water, both as an emergency water supply and to keep things cold in case of power loss.

We have a generator for backup power for the well, furnace, and freezer. 2 wood burning stoves and a woodshed with close to 3 cords of hardwood.

I work at a brewery, I think our best bet would be to secure our building and barter beer for food!

[DrDeth]

Well, MRE’s are fine. But cheaper and better for HOME survival is cheap canned goods- those that can be eaten without adding a lot of water or being cooked. Here’s how you do it- whenever you go to the store, you grab 2 cans of “survival food” (this can also include stuff like certain crackers) and one of those one gallon bottles of water. Next, whenever you finish off a 2liter bottle of soda or a one liter bottle of water, add a couple drops of bleach and re-fill with water (this water will be your cooking or washing water more likely). Keep all this stuff stored somewhere. Perhaps to start off, make a trip to some super discount "outlet’ store and buy a cart full.

Other things to add- a decent 1st aid kit, candles, matches, a couple of non-electric can openers, a LED lamp and/or flashlight, and extra batteries.

Make sure you have two months of whatever drugs you need.

If you have pets, make sure you have extra water & food for them.

Canned fruit in natural juice is one of the best survival foods, along with anything you can see yourself eating straight out of a can.

A 5 gallon bucket makes a fair emergency toilet.

[DrDeth]

A few good long term emergency foods; P-Nut butter (protien, fats), canned fruit (carbs, water), vienna sausages (protein, fats), tuna (protien, fats if in oil or water if not), those hard rye crackers (fiber, carbs), honey (carbs), powered drinks- iced tea and citrus with vit C (adds flavor to your stored water, and a few vitamins). To those without any such- go to the discount store, buy a milkcrate sized plastic tote box, and fill it with the above, plus anything else you can eat right from the can without cooking. Throw in a 1st aid kit, a box of candles, a box of matches then top the box with the crackers. Store this with plenty of water.

[Madd_Maxx]

[QUOTE=Cluricaun]
No worries, Dopers are exempt from being cherry picked. Just put a sign in your window that says “SDMB-NO CIGS” and I’ll pass on by.

PS- If you see me, say hi. I’ll be the one dressed like Mad Max.
[/QUOTE]

You better not be!!! And give me my pants back.

I’d probably be OK. I’m armed to the teeth, I hunt & fish and I have my own garden. We probably have 100 lbs of rice at home right now, and a case of Ramen noodles. Storing water might be tricky but a couple of Brita filters, the Susquehanna river and lots of empty bottles ought to take care of that. I would barter my game and veggies for other items and consumables. With the extra time on my hands I would expand my garden to 2-3 times it’s current size, and do a lot more fishing and hunting. Hell, it would be like retiring without waiting an extra 2-3 decades. And no pension.

[Tristan]

Yeah, I have to admit that I’m a cold hearted bastard. If the S hits the F permanently (Red Dawn, Zombie Apocalypse, etc.) I’m pretty much going to be one of those roaming guys who shoots those like our Irish Pixee friend.

And others, of course, as needed.

Hopefully I can just get hooked up with one of you with land and food who also happens to need a killer.

[Cluricaun]

[QUOTE=Madd Maxx]
You better not be!!! And give me my pants back.
[/QUOTE]

Didn’t see that one coming. I’ll put the pants back where I found them.

[DrDeth]

[QUOTE=Madd Maxx]
. We probably have 100 lbs of rice at home right now, and a case of Ramen noodles. Storing water might be tricky but a couple of Brita filters, the Susquehanna river and lots of empty bottles ought to take care of that. .
[/QUOTE]

A couple of notes- for those city dudes, rice & ramen aren’t so good as you generally have to cook them, and your gas & electrity will not be there. Brita filters are nice, but they don’t make biologically unsafe water safe- for that you need special filters or chorline, etc. However, a few drops of bleach, let sit- *then * run through the Brita filers and you’re likely safe.

[Queen_Tonya]

[QUOTE=vetbridge]
Just knock on the door; two taps, pause, then three more.
[/QUOTE]

Say, I heard Alabama’s nice, in a post-apocalyptic way, wanna come with? A Vet, a woman and John Carter’s cattle and fish and bees (oh my!) what could go wrong?

[OpalCat]

[QUOTE=DrDeth]
A couple of notes- for those city dudes, rice & ramen aren’t so good as you generally have to cook them, and your gas & electrity will not be there. .
[/QUOTE]

Ramen is fine, because you just have to heat water. I have eaten it camping where there is just a fire pit. I could make ramen over three candles if I have to. Beans aren’t too much worse if you soak them for a day or two first. Not ideal, of course, but would still get you by if you had no other source of food.

[levdrakon]

This is kind of a neat question. At first I thought “I’m doomed.” But after thinking about it a bit, I’m probably not so doomed. I think it mostly depends on whether I have to defend against gangs of roving marauders.

If not, I’m good to go. We keep a case of bottled water in the back of the car. I collect rain water during the winter rainy season for use on some of my houseplants, but I could boil it. I’ve got plenty of rice & pasta & beans. If I took all the meat out of my freezer right now made it into jerky, I’d have meat for at least a month or so, maybe longer.

There’s a fresh water pond within walking distance. First thing would be to use the remaining gas in the car to go fill as many containers with pond water as possible. Later, I’d have to walk, but if it were life or death, I could do that.

I garden, and I’ve got seeds for various things, so I’d have to dig a much larger garden. But in the summer we get no rain so I’m kinda screwed vegetable-wise. Over the winter, I could grow corn, beans, peas, lettuce, tomatoes, onions, garlic, various herbs, etc. I have a lemon tree which doesn’t require watering, and it produces year-round. Yah! No scurvy!

I live by the ocean. I don’t own a gun, but I could probably figure out how to fish, or kill some of those sea lions. We’ve also got lots of deer in the area. I’ve got a bunch of pigeons which are fairly tame around me. I could probably catch some. Long term, I could probably grow enough corn & peas to feed pigeons and raise them as squabs.

There are plenty of trees around I can chop down and dry for firewood.

I think I’m going to be ok for awhile. In fact, this almost sounds kinda fun.