ouch

From time to time I wonder if I am but noah didn't build the ship after the rain.. I go everywhere prepared for all sort of things after I got stranded in the mountains of wyoming when a snowmobile ride turned REAL bad.. now I think ahead of what I could need and bring more. People laugh until I can use some of it then I look smart..

Tenring

Being prepared is not paranoid. Neither is carrying a firearm for personal protection weird (anymore).

The potential for crime nowadays is omnipresent even though one is not personally confronted with it on a daily basis. But, just ask yourself - how many meth labs or gangs were in your area 20 years ago? Then read your local newspaper and check the daily crime report. Answers to those questions alone should inform the aware that our Andy Griffith Days are now past.

Actual crime is still seldom likely to happen to you or your loved ones. But if and when it does you don't want to say, "I wish I was prepared". That may be a statement you will regret for the rest of your days.

Bad things can happen to good people, and sometimes do. But bad things can be especially bad when they happen to good people who aren't prepared to deal with them who just assume they won't happen to them because they figure they are "good people".

__________________
"The constitutions of most of our States assert that all power is inherent in the people; that . . . it is their right and duty to be at all times armed. . . ." Letter from Thomas Jefferson to Justice John Cartwright (June 5, 1824)

dcb188

I was just about to say something like that, Tenring. Paranoia is not the word for the preparedness here. It is just plain being careful to take care of oneself and our loved ones.
Being paranoid is an UNREASONABLE vigilance about something.
In my book, it is reasonable to guard against being victimized by savages, so it cannot be paranoia because it is a real threat. Victimization happens all the time and a few more victims have joined the list since I began typing this one post. So it is hardly paranoid to be aware of criminal types and be armed at all times and places.
So I think it is the wrong word entirely.

__________________
Surrounded and outnumbered, Marine Col Lewis Puller: "Good! We finally got 'em where we want 'em!" (Korea, 1950)
__________________________________
Right is Wrong and Wrong is Right.
__________________________________
Socrates : "Knowledge is knowing that we know nothing".

Hoot

Sixty odd years ago I was a boy scout. As you know the scout motto was/is "Be Prepared." It took a few years for the wisdom embedded in that motto to become entirely clear to me.

Then from my readings as a young man I remember that Teddy Roosevelt said, "There are no emergencies for the prepared."

And the one sentence that I remember from the speaker at my high school graduation in 1951 was to the effect, "There are no rewards or punishments in life. There are only consequences." I don't believe I could fully defend that statement, but there is the kernel of truth that lets us appreciate the knowledge that every decision we make has a consequence for good or ill.

So I tend to see preparation as simply good decision making. As an old veteran told me many years ago, " Son, given the business we're in, "what if" can become "what is" in one heckuva hurry.

dcb188

Exactly right, Hoot.

__________________
Surrounded and outnumbered, Marine Col Lewis Puller: "Good! We finally got 'em where we want 'em!" (Korea, 1950)
__________________________________
Right is Wrong and Wrong is Right.
__________________________________
Socrates : "Knowledge is knowing that we know nothing".

FN1910

Dang Hoot, you are old. I don't know that you can be prepared for all emergencies but you sure can for some/most of them.

MNBurl

I do it all the time. When my wife and I go walking we even talk through some different scenarios.

__________________
MNBurl

Side Guard Holsters

"If everyone is thinking alike, then somebody isn't thinking" - George S. Patton.