Posted by John
I came across this article on one of my favorite websites, Slate.com, the other day and it instantly struck a chord with me:
If you’re like me and you don’t like reading stuff, especially stuff that’s on links people have sent you, I’ll summarize the article for you here:
The writer lost his job as a journalist for National Geographic Adventure. Instead of wallowing in misery and projecting that misery onto others, he secluded himself in a farmhouse in upstate New York to contemplate the meaning of his life and figure out how long he could live without a job. Apparently it didn’t last very long so he schemed a way to get published on Slate. He and a friend took 6 wilderness survival manuals, Woodcraft and Indian Lore, the US Army Survival Manual, National Geographic Complete Survival Manual, When All Hell Breaks Loose, and The Survival Handbook, into the actual wilderness to see if the contents of the books alone would actually help them survive, thereby determining which survival manual was in fact a manual for survival. Apparently none of the manuals started with a chapter about wearing gloves outside in the cold though because the dude had to abandon his mission at one point to return home and get gloves because he couldn’t feel his hands; but that’s neither here nor there unless at some point between here and there you want to evaluate whether or not the writer is a dumbass, which in this case he is. At any rate, per his analysis all of the books are rubbish except for The Survival Handbook. (Side Note: If you recall from my blog post, I'm Not Really Loving It, the gift I took to this year’s Office Dirty Santa gift exchange was in fact the Army Survival Manual, but we’ll keep that to ourselves lest the body of the receiver of the gift were to turn up somewhere in the wilderness with nothing but the book on his person causing his family to come looking for me for giving him a survival manual full of rubbish).
First of all, I was properly green with envy that the writer of the article thought of doing this before I did because it’s a positively brilliant idea. I spend a tremendous amount of time and energy thinking about survival situations (I told you how to get out of a bathroom if you’re locked inside, didn’t I?). Survival situations can come up at any time and in any form ranging from being trapped in your car, to getting lost in the wilderness, to getting bowled over in an avalanche, to Germans holding your entire office building hostage, to Russians holding your entire town hostage, to Ninja’s appearing out of nowhere while you’re shopping at the Gap, to whatever. It doesn’t matter the situation, you have to be ready at any point.
Now, when talking about survival situations it’s important to note there are three types of people out there:
1. People who don’t think about survival at all and will therefore perish in any such situation. Incidentally if you are not one of these people then you want to keep a few of these people around you at all times, but not too many. You need to have a few of these people in your life because if you ever find yourself in a survival situation with them you need to be able to count on them dying early in case you need to consume their flesh for your own survival. But at the same time, you can’t have too many around you because they’ll be like anchors dragging you to your own death.
2. People who think about survival all the time, are constantly vigilant of any potential survival situation, and will in fact survive any situation they are faced with. These people range in survivalism from the likes of Bear Grylls, the undisputed king god of survivalists, all the way down to your mild-mannered, everyday, average Joe survivor who can turn a pencil into a deadly weapon or a box of Kleenex into a winter coat. If you don’t know anyone in your life who falls into this category it’s because you are in the first category above and all the people in this category are actively avoiding you because you’re an anchor.
3. People who think about survival all the time because they believe the apocalypse will happen in their lifetime, quite possibly as soon as next week, and are therefore stockpiling water, rations, and an arsenal of weapons and ammunition for their own survival. These people are also most likely to have a firearm on their person as we speak, six more in their SUV, and a bunker somewhere on their property. These people are also most likely to “know a guy” who can get “stuff.” If you’re in the first group above you’ll want to be careful about canoodling with the people in this group. Yes, they’ll likely survive when the bad guys infiltrate the country, but they’re also most likely to shoot you first just to make sure the sight on their weapon is properly aligned then feed your flesh to their dog to keep it alive. If you’re in the second group above you also need to be wary of these people because in a survival situation they are most likely to watch you build a shelter then shoot you and take your shelter and cynically call it natural selection – “God selected me to own this gun, heheheh…”
Now that you know who you are, you can prepare for any situation. If you’re in the first group, go ahead and stop reading now because you won’t make it. If you’re in the third group, you’re not reading this blog. So, if you’re in the second group, read on.
Number twos need to identify other number twos. You don’t need to pal around with these people all the time, but it wouldn’t hurt and at the very least you need to know where to find them when the shit hits the fan. Part of being a number two is having the self-awareness to know your limitations. You don’t know all there is to know about survival, but you need to know how to leverage other’s knowledge as a mutual benefit. Do you know the tensile strength of human hair? Probably not, but you need to know who does.
It’s in this spirit that I’m going to start routinely posting survival advice on the blog. Be careful though; this information shall only be used for good and never evil, noting of course that in survival mode martial law is usually the rule of the land so the boundaries on good and evil can be adjusted a little bit.
If you think I’m full of shit about this survival stuff, I present you with this exact scenario that happened to me just moments ago. I have been writing this post throughout the day here at work, and thinking about survival all the while as I often do. Then, round about 3 PM, the power to the entire building went out. No shit. And not only was the power out to the entire building, it was out for half of the entire downtown area. No shit. So you know exactly what was going through my head, “Hells yeah, bitches! It’s time for some surviving!”
So what’s the first thing I do? I look around and immediately evaluate everyone in my vicinity1, “One; one; one; three; one; three; three; two, but you’re old and have a bad heart, so you might as well be a one; one; one; three; three; three; three; three; three; okay that guy is actually loading a pistol right now, so three; three; three… Alright, looks like I’m doing this one on my own.”
Meanwhile, all of the ones are euphoric, "We get to go home early! Get the hell out of my way; I can make it in time for Oprah!" While all of the threes are in a near panic, "It's the terrorists. I know it's the goddamn Muslim terrorists! This is why we took the fight to them!" Then, as everyone is frantically filing to the stairwell, which is going to clog up faster than the arteries of your typical former president or vice president, I casually stroll over to the freight elevator because 1) it’s going to be backed up on emergency power, and 2) it’s going to dump me off in the loading dock where I have the highest probability of escaping the building and/or stealing a delivery truck that still has the keys in the ignition.
Fortunately the power was restored before I had to do anything drastic but you get the picture; this is what it means to survive and if you’re not ready to survive, you’re just weighing me down.
So in the meantime between now and my next post on survival you’re going to need to brush up on your survival tactics. Start by watching a lot of Man vs Wild and Mythbusters2, then start reading The Survival Handbook. This isn't going to be easy, but I'm here to help you through it.
1. 1. Let’s be honest, I already evaluated everyone the day I started working here, but for argument’s sake, let’s pretend I did right after the power went out.
2. 2. Oh, you don’t think Mythbusters is going to help you survive? Well then, tell me what you do when you find yourself inside a car that is sinking in a river. Do you know how to get out? No? Then shut up and watch some Mythbusters.
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