3 Solid reasons that you need to start your food plan.

Pick your reason to get prepared for a food/water crisis.

(CNN) -- Connecticut's largest utility pushed back a self-declared deadline to restore power to 99% of its customers by midnight Sunday, more than a week after a crippling early blizzard.

(CNN) -- Central Oklahoma continued to experience dozens of aftershocks Sunday, nearly 24 hours since the state's strongest earthquake since 1952 was felt throughout the region.

Athens, Greece (CNN) -- Greek Prime Minister George Papandreou will step down as his government's leader, the country's president announced Sunday night -- agreeing to do so on the condition that the controversial 130 billion euro bailout deal is approved.

What do these three items have to do with me and my family?  Well, if you live in Connecticut tonight you have been without power for more than a week.  What do you think people are doing for food?  Most of the wealthy and middle class are staying with friends, or family.  They have people to help.  What about the poor, or those people who don't have friends or family living nearby?  A public shelter?  That's where you want to spend the night with your family right?  A converted gymnasium with zero privacy, crowded living quarters, surrounded by people you don't know? 

If you live in Central Oklahoma tonight.  Your house may be damaged to the point that you can't stay there.  Is this the last after shock?  Or is the big one coming?  If the authorities came around and said, evacuate this area, you have 15 minutes.  What would you grab first.

What does Athens Greece have to do with this?  I live in the USA!  If the Greece government fails completely it will drag the Euro down with it.  Should the European nations fail financially, we are so intertwined with them, it will be our financial downfall as well.  If you think 9.1% unemployment is bad, think about 50% or worse when company after company fails.

Let's play a quick game.  Pretend you are given 10 minutes to gather the things you can from your house before you are to be evacuated to a shelter.  What do you grab first?  Make a quick list mentally or even write it down.  Then go back and judge your choices.  Did you include snack foods?  Medicine?  How about your important papers?  What are you going to do with your pets? 

There really isn't a 100% correct answer to this question.  However, with some common sense, and doing your planning now, instead of as the storm is bearing down on you and your family, you have a 80 to 90% chance of having most everything you will need.

My list, if I had to leave quickly with my family would be as follows.

4 survival food buckets.  (Details to come soon on the creation of these).
Most survival food buckets that you would buy pre-prepared can cost quite a bit of money.  You wind up with food your family doesn't like, and doesn't want to eat.  In addition, the hit to your check account in today's turbulent times makes this approach almost impossible without serious sacrifice.  I can show you how to create this item for the cost of carrying your lunch to work for a week instead of eating fast food everyday.  You'll be better prepared, and slightly healthier from not eating fast food for a week! 

I would carry my families survival backpacks that I discussed in a previous blog.  These provide the basic daily necessities that will be in extremely short supply after any type of disaster with injuries.  I also will have all of the basic car emergency items in my vehicle as well. 

Most importantly,  I have a place to go.  I have a couple of different places I can take my family for safety and protection.  Can you name yours?  If you can't  you should add that to your list of priority items to be prepared. 

Hopefully this week I'll have my camera that I need to take pictures and show you what i'm talking about with some of these items.  Please stay tuned and forward my blog to your friends and family wherever they may live.  http://cheapsurvival.blogspot.com/.

Also, if you're reading this and you forgot.  Set your clock back.  =)  Stay safe.