219 Easter 2: Salting the Prepper Shake Down
219 Easter 2: Salting the Prepper Shake Down
“Let them praise the name of the Lord, for His name alone is exalted; His glory is above the earth and heaven.” ~ Psalm 148
Salting the Prepper Shake Down
Whether getting scammed by doomers, utopians, or the cult of denying the obvious, worshiping fear is a mistake. You do not have to play the victim in their pyramid-building schemes. You do not have follow the wind.
Key decisions can be targeted and enacted now. Take a note, share it at the table, and push forward toward the simple goals that align with natural life as created beings. We were made for this. Nothing else in all history has ever stopped us from surviving before. There is no reason not to plan to now.
What matters the most is Water, Food, Shelter, Sanitation and Personnel, usually in that order. Having enough clean water on hand for three days of Catastrophe X is the most obvious and powerful thing you can do out of the gate. Storing dried goods (beans+rice=protein mix) or canned items (sardines in oil are a superfood) is also a simple enough step. Two weeks of food per person is the standard goal for an event like a hurricane or earthquake. Sanitation is where it gets tricky: re-potable non-drinking 5.5L bottles are a necessity for flushing, but you don’t want to ever flush your drinking water!
Shelter is in where another important decision should be made now: in the event of a world-shaking event, do you stay, or do you go? What’s in your Go-Bag, do you have one, what’s your route, and for what reasons would you leave? If you’ve never asked these questions, it’s much easier now than later.
I’m focused on the Stay-Bag approach, but that doesn’t mean I am not scouting. Another easy early pick up is a simple First Aid kit built for backpacking.
Personnel is the most important matter to decide on now. Who is on your side, and who is not? If Grandma lives in nowheresville, do we go there first, or hunker down and hope she can make it to us? Who’s in charge? Who gets to ask questions, and when?
In a crisis, personnel matters come down to clearly defined and embraced roles.
What’s yours?
You are the salt of the earth.
Christ is King. He is risen. All hail the power of Jesus’ Name!
Next week: Personnel Matters
Till angel cry and trumpet sound,
The Mad Christian
God’s Green Earth
A Moon Shadow
Niagara Falls has declared a state of emergency after being touted as a go-to destination for this afternoon’s solar eclipse. Indiana which is also in the eclipse path has followed suit, battening down for an influx of visitors. (ZeroHedge, Indystar)
The solar eclipse could mess with your pet’s head, particularly if you own a Komodo dragon. (Scientific American)
NASA pilots will be flying along the path of totality. (BBC)
The path of totality mapped out, if you missed it. (CBS)
Krispy Kreme made a solar eclipse donut. (10TV)
And to other earthy news..
Underwater imaging has revealed the sheer magnitude of salvaging the Francis Scott Key bridge from the Patapsco River. (ZeroHedge)
Part of California’s Highway 1 has given way after heavy rain. (The Hill)
Rural populations grew for the second consecutive year. (Daily Yonder)
Vincent Van Gecko: newly discovered reptile looks like a starry, starry night. (This Is Colossal)
Harper Collins says small tweaks to its printing choices have saved thousands of trees by using different layout and the (apparently) eco-friendly Garamond Pro font. Zondervan, the company’s Christian division came up with the idea to save pages in Bibles which can have more than 2500 pages. (Fast Company)
The Digital Age
Gmail is 20 years old. People assumed it was an April Fool’s joke when it was released in 2004. Email with 1 gigabyte of storage? “We were trying to shift the way people had been thinking because people were working in this model of storage scarcity for so long that deleting became a default action.” Navigating thousands of emails was a snap as Google added its whiz bang search capability to email, enabling a whole new laundry basket way of finding things. Innovation for sure, but to anyone aiming for Inbox Zero, maybe the joke’s on us! (AP, The Verge)
OpenAI’s new tech can clone someone’s voice from 15 seconds of recording. Exciting for some, terrifying for others! OpenAI say they are sitting on the release for now in the interest of public safety. But it’s also likely that the looming US presidential election is influencing that decision, with panic that artificially-generated content may influence voters. (Fortune, The Guardian)
Not so secret: Google has agreed to delete millions of records of user browser data as part of the settlement in a class action lawsuit. The data was collected when Google tracked people while they were using Chrome’s incognito mode. (Time)
Sales of consoles and PCs are up, but gaming hours are down, according to a new survey. Gamers are still spending the majority of their gaming time on games 6 years old or older. (Venture Beat)
A Microsoft developer noticed a 600ms delay in one process and this led to the discovery of malicious code with potential to make it vulnerable to hacking. (TechSpot)
Science
A 62 year-old man has left hospital two weeks after receiving a genetically-edited pig’s kidney. Transplants of modified pig hearts have so far failed, but this is the first use of pig kidneys. The patient, Richard Slayman, who was in end-stage kidney disease no longer needs dialysis, according to reports. (BBC)
Physicists say they are a step closer to making a nuclear clock, after firing a laser at thorium to “bump [its] atomic nucleus into a higher energy state.” Nuclear clocks will be even more accurate than atomic clocks and give insights in various atomic processes. (Science News)
NASA wants to create standard time on the moon. (The Guardian)
Births, Deaths and Marriages
President Biden has denied that he declared a day for transgender people on Easter Sunday. Posts on the official presidential X account contradict the President’s testimony. The celebration of mental delusion that is Transgender Day of Visibility has been marked for March 31 since 2009, so White House spox said it was an unfortunate coincidence that Easter fell on the same day this year. The LGBTQ crowd are now some of the most celebrated minorities in the USA accumulating over 50 days/weeks or months dedicated to their depravity. The fact that the Catholic President chose to highlight it says a lot. (The Federalist, Washington Stand)
Florida’s Supreme Court has ruled that a 6 week abortion ban can take effect, finding that a “right to privacy” does not extend to life in the womb. However, the ruling has triggered a ballot measure due to be put to Floridians in November which would undo all of that and see abortion enshrined into its constitution. The measure would need 60% to pass, but given how pro-life laws have gone down in other states, we should get praying and speaking out! (Daily Wire)
Can there be any more heartbreaking story of how horrifically the spirit of the age has twisted the notion of “healthcare”? A baby has been wrongly aborted in a patient mix-up in a Czech hospital. (Not the Bee)
Left-wing media are worried about the “explosion” of women quitting hormonal birth control due to “misinformation” proliferating on the internet. “What if women have unplanned pregnancies and are in a state where they can’t abort the baby?” they lament. (The Blaze, Daily Beast)
The myth of hypermasculinity. (Christian Combatives)
Crime and Punishment
An Oklahoma woman claims that FBI agents have questioned her about pro-Palestine/anti-Israel social media posts after Facebook flagged them. (Washington Times)
Frisby’s write-up on Scotland’s new speech laws:
A hapless car thief probably regrets stealing a Tesla which ran out of battery mid-pursuit. The vehicle’s owner had informed the police when the battery was down to 1%, so police chased until it was spent. (Yahoo)
Hearts and Minds
One journalist wrote about her experiences trying a “negativity fast”. The fast invites participants to put the best construction on negative interactions but also encourages taking stock of the negative inputs in your life. Author of the concept, Anthony Lannarino, says most of our dominant emotions – anger, contempt, fear, disgust, happiness, sadness, and surprise – are negative, so avoiding adverse feelings must be a deliberate process. For example, “Humans complain a lot and often don’t recognize they’re doing it,” he says. “It makes you more anxious and stressed.” (Fast Company)
The pursuit of happiness can be exhausting. Slowing down, contemplating and finding things that make you wonder might bring more satisfaction. (BigThink via YouTube)
Politics
The FBI has been criticized for trying to “rehabilitate the public image” of section 702 of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (known as FISA), which is due to be reauthorized by Congress this month. Although the Act is supposed to allow the Bureau to spy on foreigners outside the US, citizens get swept up in the surveillance if they communicate with the target via phone, email etc. Heads of intelligence agencies have argued that is unfortunate but necessary. However, reporting last year showed that the Bureau had targeted American citizens under the guise of trying to surveil foreigners as it was investigating January 6th and the riots of 2020. Lawmakers critical of the Act want Congress to stipulate that the FBI show probable cause and obtain a warrant. (The Blaze, The Hill)
Wisconsin voters have approved a measure which bans private funding of elections. During the pandemic election of 2020, huge charitable donations from Mark Zuckerberg were used by voter outreach organizations to fund Democrat ballot harvesting efforts. Georgia has also passed some measures which will plug up vulnerabilities revealed in recent elections, including more transparency in ballot counting, authentication of ballots and rules around money from foreign sources. (National Review, Impris, The Federalist)
New York Governor Kathy Hochul is seeking to hire a Muslim affairs director. Muslim community leaders have not been happy with the Governor’s condemnation of Hamas nor her support for Israel. (Religion News)
Money, Markets and Jobs
California’s minimum fast food wage law, which came into effect on April 1st has resulted in higher prices, layoffs and businesses closing down, according to reports. (Red State)
Also in California, a bill has been introduced that would ensure employees are not required to respond to work-related communications after hours. (Engadget)
Chinese fast fashion giant, Shein, has doubled its profits since news of a planned public listing. The company is waiting for Beijing’s approval to list on London or New York exchanges. (Irish Times)
Why do thieves steal razors? If it’s worth buying then it’s also worth stealing. (The Hustle)
The last time the US was free from debt? 1835. President Jackson sold government land and vetoed infrastructure spending, thought to have triggered financial woes for years after. (History)
From the Mad☧Tank
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Arts, History and Sport
The Mona Lisa was copied by one of Da Vinci’s apprentices and it’s not too shabby. (Modern Met)
Salvador Dalí tried his hand at designing cutlery: an elephant fork, snail knife, leaf knife, two artichoke spoons, and a fish fork. We’re not sure if you can actually use them to eat but that’s probably the point… (Modern Met)
The climate hysteria edition? The new Catan set pits fossil fuel companies against green energy moguls. (Fast Company)
This week in history:
1513 Explorer Juan Ponce de Leon claimed Florida for the Spanish crown. (Politico)
1970 President Nixon signed legislation to ban cigarette ads on radio and television. (History)
1973 First ever cellphone call made. (NPR)
1979 Iran officially became an Islamic republic after the Shah is overthrown. (Brookings)
1996 Ted Kaczynski, who became known as the Unabomber, was apprehended by police. Kaczynski was convicted for bombing campaigns, mostly against universities. Also check out A Brief History’s discussion on FBI entrapment and how there may be more to Kaczynski’s story. (Britannica)
Health, Medicine and Food
Pfizer UK has been found guilty of “bringing discredit” to the pharmaceutical industry by the UK’s medical watchdog. The charge was brought after a complaint about misleading posts from the company on social media. Pfizer was fined £34K and said it was sorry. Ben Kingsley, who was part of the group bringing the complaint, said that although this is the most serious code violation that could be dished out, “The consequences for Pfizer and the individuals concerned continue to be derisory. This hopeless system of regulation for a multi-billion dollar life and death industry has become a sham, in dire need of reform.” (Telegraph)
Two new studies reveal that Pfizer’s covid treatment drug, Paxlovid, does not prevent “rebound” symptoms, nor did it ever. (The Dossier)
The difference between FDA Cleared and FDA Approved. (IFL Science)
Investigations into menstrual products including period underwear as well as disposable products have found many contain any number of the group of carcinogenic chemicals known as PFAS. Although PFAS (also known as per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances) have begun to be replaced in cookware products, they are still found in cosmetics and activewear. (The Hill)
The US largest producer of eggs has slaughtered almost 2 million chickens after some tested positive for avian flu. (USA Today)
How does loneliness affect your health? (Nature)
Religion and the Church
The paganization of America. (Issues Etc)
War and Rumors of War
A new joint investigation by several prominent media outlets claims there is fresh evident to link Russia to “Havana syndrome”. Staff at US embassies experienced various symptoms, theorized to be the result of a directed energy weapon. Russia denied the accusations and US intelligence remains skeptical. (The Week)
Anti-government protests have broken out in Israel, with Prime Minister Netanyahu’s main opponent Benny Gantz calling for fresh elections. The father of a slain soldier has called upon fellow Israelis not to “burn the country down”. (The Guardian, Jerusalem News Service)
US Secretary of State, Antony Blinken has said that America’s support of Israel will be determined by how well it protects citizens in Gaza conflict. The pronouncement comes after seven aid workers were killed by an Israeli drone strike. Israel has investigated the incident dismissing several soldiers involved, saying they did not follow protocol but critics have accused Israel of deliberately targeting the convoy. (AP, Politico, BBC)
Israel struck an Iranian consulate in Damascus, Syria killing senior members of Iran's Islamic Revolutionary Guard. (CBS)
Ukraine has lowered its conscription age from 27 years to 25. (AP)
Stories from Far Away
🇹🇼 A strong earthquake off Taiwan’s east coast has claimed the lives of 12 with hundreds stranded as rock slides cut off access to emergency crews. (The Guardian, Time)
🇹🇷 Turkey’s President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan may be in trouble after opposition candidates claimed victory in local elections across several major cities. While Erdoğan was not on the ballot, economic downturn in the country is galvanizing support for other parties. (CNN)
🇫🇮 A 12 year-old boy has been detained in Finland after opening fire in a school, killing one student and injuring others. (BBC)
🇧🇼 Living with elephants is no joke, as folks in Botswana know very well. Elephant numbers have swelled with conservation efforts in recent years, and Botswana has donated thousands of the pachyderms to neighboring countries in a bid to keep the populations manageable. After Germany’s environmental ministry suggested that trophy hunting should restricted, Botswana’s wildlife minister threatened to send a ship of elephants over, so that Germans could see what it’s like to live with them. (BBC)
🇭🇹 Law enforcement in Haiti have repelled another attempt by gangs to take over the National Palace, the main government building in Port-au-Prince. (Merco Press)
🇨🇭 Swiss government ministers have given up their entitlement to complimentary access to the country’s ski slopes in a display of economic austerity. (Snow Industry News)
🇷🇺 SovStation? SputBox? Russian president Vladimir Putin wants Russia to create its own gaming console. (PC Mag)
🐹 A messy, messy bath
🏝️ The world’s loneliest house
🌎 This map shows the global antipode of any location. Most of our coordinates ended up in the ocean!
🦌What’s a reindeer cyclone? Well, now you know!
🚐 Replicas of vehicles from movies including the Flintstone’s car and the A-Team van
📆 A man spent 40 weekends 3-D printing every component to recreate a 1986 Mac
🥚 Ostriches are pretty formidable and no, they don’t bury their heads
✈️ An old collection of paper airplanes
🌶️ Spiceflation: jalapeños are less spicy than they once were
♭ Man foils his neighbor’s loud music with an AI-trained box of tricks
🐸 Not a dog whistle, a FROG whistle
🗽 Lady Liberty gets electric
⚭ “What God has Joined Together - A Lutheran Conference on Marriage” May 3-5, 2024, Ontario, Canada. Featuring keynote speaker, Dr Adam Koontz. Details here.
✝️ Join us on Memorial Day in Rockford IL to learn how you can start your local men's group and nurture Christian brotherhood. Come check out the Hebron Collegium, share your experience with praying the scriptures, and participate in the mutual consolation of the brothers. Bring a tent or bedroll if you'd like to camp out, or else reach out for more info on lodging opportunities. Wives and children are welcome to attend, but lodging options are more limited. To RSVP or for more info, send an email to sos.113.487@gmail.com or reach out via the SoS contact page.
You need more critters in your life! On Stop the White Noise, (YouTube or Rumble) Jonathan and Meridith talked about the highs and lows of hamsters ownership and the new Fisk addition: chinchillas. But there was also some serious subjects: confirmation traditions and the dangers of reasoning out the mysteries of God. Some helpful links below:
Without Flesh by Jonathan Fisk
Thomas Nelson Chronological Bible NKJV
Formerly known as Paul’s Leather Co, the new Scriptura website is where Pastor Fisk got the leather bound NKJV Bible he loves with his confirmation verse inscribed in Greek.
Our disclaimer: These are some resources the Fisks have found edifying, but when dealing with human-authored texts, apply discernment liberally!
If you missed it, Meridith put out a call for anyone who would like to make a quilt for men who stay at the Hebron Collegium. If that is something you would be interested in helping out with, please reply to this email or send a message through madpxm.com/contact.
This Week Preached:
Podcast Release:
Let us pray. Almighty God, grant that we who have celebrated the Lord’s resurrection may by Your grace confess in our life and conversation that Jesus is Lord and God; through the same Jesus Christ, Your Son, who lives and reigns with You and the Holy Spirit, one God, now and forever. Amen.
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