The Best Laid Plans...

by Allison Pang

Probably the first issue with all of this is that I don't generally plan much of anything. Certainly not my writing, at any rate - but that also goes for basic things like...dinner. Or cleaning. Or paying bills. Or making travel arrangements.

(Which sometimes leads to some awkward situations - usually in the "hmmm, crap, I've missed my window for X")

*ahem*

So where does the contingency part come in?

I'm not entirely sure. Every once in a while the DH will be flipping the TV channels (in between SyFy classics such as "Mansquito") and runs across one of those Prepper shows.

For those not aware, Preppers are those people who are convinced that the world will end. Soon. Like those family members of Cold War yore who might have built bomb shelters many years ago, the new generation of doomsday survivors are much the same, planning for the ultimate contingency, as it were.

Now here's the thing - contingency plans are necessary for a lot of things. We train our children what to do in the case of a fire, for example. (Get out of the house through your window and everyone meets by the big tree in the front yard.)

And I totally get wanting to unplug or be more self-sufficient. I know plenty of people who grow their own food, raise chickens, don't use the internet.

There are plenty of survival skills out there that are worth learning for a number of reasons. (Like...how to survive in a snow storm or a bear attack or escape a car you just drove into a lake.)

That doesn't mean I think the world is going to go all Walking Dead any time soon, either.  I'm sure not every prepper is quite as nutbally as the ones on the show (reality TV, FTW), but it's a hard sell for me, to be honest.

I wish I could find the Terminator clip on YouTube - but should the zombie apocalypse come, I'm pretty sure my reaction would be along the sames lines as Sarah Connor: "Do I look like the mother of the future? I mean, am I tough, organized? I can't even balance my checkbook."

Or maybe I'd just sit on my roof with my AR-15 and plink away. Guess we'll find out.