America. I was going through a training exercise in North Carolina.
The swamps there are unforgiving and filled with black widows, banana spiders, venomous snakes, and gators.
by XenaBoth. I lived between my storage locker, a fully confidential temporary shelter (no ID required) and couches in the student lounge when I was in uni. Finding hot meal programs was difficult enough. Getting into a shower 3-4x/ week was like pulling teeth.
If you spend too much time in one place people start to ask awkward questions about who you are and why you're there.
And there are perverts everywhere. No doubt they intentionally stalk soup kitchens looking for somebody to fuck. ICK.
Also, most of the programs that offer free food and showers are designed for drug addicts. Drama from all sides.
by XenaHowever, my experience has given me full confidence in my ability to survive at least 2 years in the unlikely event that the Chinese stage a hostile takeover, or zombies consume civilization, or any other disaster that might leave my country a dystopian wasteland.
;)
Good god woman, I hope that's your uncomfortably self-deprecating sense of humour at work there and you don't actually think the above experience would help you in a real post-apocalyptic survival situation. When I was a kid we were homeless for a bit, and I can't honestly say it prepared me for anything except for ultimate appreciation of the creature comforts I enjoy now.
Soup kitchens in a dystopian wasteland... it reminds me of that series on the discovery channel with those people preparing for the end of the world, where they store six months' worth of food in a fifth floor apartment and don't give any thought to what they're gonna do when the toilet stops flushing.
by XenaBoth. I lived between my storage locker, a fully confidential temporary shelter (no ID required) and couches in the student lounge when I was in uni. Finding hot meal programs was difficult enough. Getting into a shower 3-4x/ week was like pulling teeth.
If you spend too much time in one place people start to ask awkward questions about who you are and why you're there.
And there are perverts everywhere. No doubt they intentionally stalk soup kitchens looking for somebody to fuck. ICK.
Also, most of the programs that offer free food and showers are designed for drug addicts. Drama from all sides.
Jesus fucking Christ. People have been telling me that I'M an inspiration to society due to the hardships I faced in completing high school and then my undergraduate degree (which, BTW, makes me hate our society even more and I am now determined to milk the shit out of my new status. When people are telling you that you're an INSPIRATION TO SOCIETY, they're implying that they KNOW that there's something wrong with the circumstances in which you were raised even if it hasn't yet occurred to them that those circumstances aren't localized solely within your family but extend to the wider community as well).
The worst thing that really happened to me, though, was having to sleep in a local park at nights when my father wouldn't get off my back. I only ever did that in Summer, though where I lived, Summer nights were pretty damned cold. You didn't really sleep at all. I'd found an enclave amongst the bushes across a creek which was relatively safe because it was difficult to get to. The problem, of course, was that the trees which lined the creek were all weeping willows, and it was impossible to avoid having their branches jam into my back. I'd wake up before dawn, put on some makeup and go to school.
Did you manage to complete your degree in the end? And if you don't mind my asking, why were you living off the grid? Did you do something naughty, or were your parents just cunts?
Don't you be another one ranting about the kids...
It's true though, I find self-deprecation one of the most blood-curdling embarrassing things that can happen in a conversation. Like, what do you honestly want from people when you say shite like that? Sympathy? Awkward laughter? You're certainly not gonna get anyone's respect.
You'll have to get in reeeeeeeeeeeal good with them though, particularly if they happen to be preppers. Preppers tend to be extremely private and sometimes, extremely paranoid about strangers to the group.
I already know that in the event of an apocalypse, I currently have no useful skills to endear myself to a group in a survival situation. With a few years of medical school education under my belt the situation should be different, but currently, I'd be pretty screwed. That's what happens when you spend your entire life studying and training for gymnastics.
:D
I get to see which members of my audience are pampered narcs and which have seen enough of how the world really works to be able to jump out of their ridiculous classification systems. I prefer discussions with the more flexible thinkers.
I don't need the respect of some Mean Girl clique.
Kthx :P
by SystematicSpend one week in the wilderness without having any manufactured supplies.
You'll see how vulnerable humans are. How something as simple as rain can incapacitate you if your not planned.
I was in a remote area when my foot got wet, I had no material or shelter to dry them off. Within 2 days infection set in, my feet are still damaged from that incident.
Well done for surviving that shit. I was going to ask if there were any useful leaves at your disposal until I read your next post and realized that you were in a swamp.
Was there seriously nothing - NOTHING - at your disposal that could've helped with the infection? I know that in the Outback in Australia, the indigenous folks have a use for every single plant the eye can see. Was your trainer just completely ignorant, or now that you have some retrospect to look back on the situation, was there really nothing that could be done for your foot?