untonuggan: Lily and Chance squished in a cat pile-up on top of a cat tree (buff tabby, black cat with red collar) (Default)
[personal profile] untonuggan
Due to all the snow (or here it's more like snow furor, because it is nothing to write home about unless you are a journalist trying to get web hits I guess), there has been some media talk about emergency preparedness kits and stuff. My brother in law and brother are both big into those disaster kits. My brother in law has a legit reason, because he's trained for emergency response. I think my brother is just into buying survival stuff and without my sister-in-law to keep him in check might end up with some sort of bunker or root cellar full of parachute cord and gods knows what.

Anyway, it got me thinking about other kinds of emergency kits that one could put together that are not all about natural disasters.

I have a box for Brain Weasel Emergencies that has things like pictures of people I love, nice things people have said about me, some really low-key craft projects (think coloring and crayons), lists of people to call and coping mechanisms, etc.

Given the current bought of cold/plague my grandmother has brought upon my house, am thinking when I move I might have a "someone's got a cold" sort of emergency box. It's one thing to know that you have things like cough drops somewhere in a medicine box. But what if you had a box that had a couple cans of a favorite soup flavor, gatorade (or powder that can be made into gatorade), common over the counter medications (cough drops, decongestants, Tylenol, whatever you usually take), your doctor's name/phone and hours, hours and phone for some local urgent care places and a pharmacy, maybe a menu for a local take-out place,  a box of really nice Kleenex that won't make your nose burn after using it…that kind of thing. Not to be opened or raided unless you do actually need it. And then if you are living alone or you and your housemate(s) get hit a the same time, no one is having to go to the store for cough drops when you feel like a literal zombie.

Other possible boxes: chronic pain box (which I would use frequently, honestly). My chronic pain stuff is kind of scattered through the house, but I have things like special bath salts (magic, I tell you); icy hot; topical prescription meds; ibuprofen; hot packs that are the one-time-use kind you stick on yourself. This could also be especially useful if, say, you were going somewhere for a night or just for a longish drive: grab the chronic pain box or travel version, and even if the trip proves a bit much you have things to help you deal. (Whereas usually I have some of my meds in my bag, my knitting which I may or may not have hands for at that time, and have to stop by a pharmacy or gas station which might or might not have what I need).

Lot of government sites also recommend some sort of pet emergency box, which I have though about but am still trying to figure out how to make one my cats can't get into and steal the extra food we have stored. (Seriously, they're good about that.)

Just a thought. Seems like way more useful to me personally than a bag of rations and rope, because if there is some sort of horrible emergency I'm betting the pain stuff I use is going to be super hard to find. IDK, what kind of self-care or "oops I've got to run but I should bring these things with me" kits would you want to bring? What if you had some sort of D&D type bag that could somehow hold a horse and still be carry-able? What if space was more limited?

<---things I find bizarrely interesting. But seriously, gonna make a pain kit. So I don't have to hunt for that shit.

Date: 2015-01-27 05:40 pm (UTC)
ironed_orchid: watercolour and pen style sketch of a brown tabby cat curl up with her head looking up at the viewer and her front paw stretched out on the left (Default)
From: [personal profile] ironed_orchid
That is a really good idea.

I'm trying to figure out what might go in an insomnia box. Maybe some essential oils, and probably a Terry Pratchett novel.

Date: 2015-01-27 08:06 pm (UTC)
phlox: Bright pink phlox-shaped flower (Default)
From: [personal profile] phlox
I found de Tocqueville's Democracy in America to be amazingly soporific when I was reading it a number of years ago. It's not that it's not interesting, just--very, very calm. And long-winded. :)

Date: 2015-01-28 04:06 am (UTC)
ironed_orchid: watercolour and pen style sketch of a brown tabby cat curl up with her head looking up at the viewer and her front paw stretched out on the left (Default)
From: [personal profile] ironed_orchid
I have a rule about not reading new to me books when I ought to be going to bed, which means I end up re-reading books by my favourite authors instead.

Date: 2015-01-27 06:29 pm (UTC)
altamira16: A sailboat on the water at dawn or dusk (Default)
From: [personal profile] altamira16
I don't remember if you have a car or not, but having a car emergency kit is a good one. This involves bottles of water, jumper cables, a blanket, emergency flares.

Date: 2015-01-27 07:11 pm (UTC)
jelazakazone: black squid on a variegated red background (Default)
From: [personal profile] jelazakazone
I feel like my house is basically one big care kit. If I have to leave the house in a hurry, things I want with me would be, hubby, kids, Advil, and mouth guard. And my phone. Vaseline would be handy. I always have chocolate on me. Everything else I think I could get somewhere else.

Date: 2015-01-27 07:26 pm (UTC)
angelikitten: Yami Yugi looking lost in thought (Thoughts - Thoughtful!Yami)
From: [personal profile] angelikitten
I have something that I call my mini-bag, which is for all intents and purposes my general emergency kit. I think I'll make a post about it rather than describe it here, if only because I think it's gonna need photos.

[Edit] Here we go!
Edited Date: 2015-01-27 10:31 pm (UTC)

Date: 2015-01-27 07:31 pm (UTC)
anke: (Default)
From: [personal profile] anke
I have an "emergency" box at work. It has instant noodles and canned soup, for days when I either forget to bring lunch, or can't be bothered, e.g. because I need to cook again to increase variety in my freezer. Also generic aspirin. I should probably add tampons (though there is a jar for those in the restroom I add to occasinally) and a box of tissues, because those are things it's really awkward to not have on hand when you need them. (I have a box of tissues on my desk, but those can run unexpectedly.)

My experience with keeping cough drops in storage is that a tin full of them turns into a tin filled with one huge lump of hard candy... apart from those, I think between my medicine cabinet (decongestant, aspirin, vapo-rub kind of stuff, mint oil) and my freezer (mostly homecooked food frozen in single portions) and storage closet (have a small emergency stash of instant nodles and canned soups here, too, plus a lot of tissues, including one box of lotion-treated tissues for the next big nasty cold) I'm good. Office times of my doctor I'd rather check online, anyway, in case they are changed, or in case someone takes a vacation.

Past-me surprised me last week by having bought an extra pair of rubber gloves, so when I was doing dishes and noticed one seemed to be leaking, I had spares \o/

I guess I'm more for "there are things I always want a spare of in the house so I don't run out" than actually putting together situation-specific kits... Partly because if I put together a kit or three in their own box(es), I'd have to find space for those...

Date: 2015-01-27 08:20 pm (UTC)
tyger: Kid's face in black, white and blue, as a flashbang goes off. (Magic Kaito/Detective Conan) (Kid - blue flashbang)
From: [personal profile] tyger
I think these are good ideas. Yes. :3

Date: 2015-01-27 08:29 pm (UTC)
phlox: Bright pink phlox-shaped flower (Default)
From: [personal profile] phlox
I like this idea! Pet-emergency kit would be a challenge here, too--not because they'd likely break in, but because of space and freshness. I'd worry that I'd forget about the emergency meds until they were past their dates! (Same is true for a me-emergency kit. :) ) I suppose it could work to have two weeks of meds set up, and rotate the containers, so I'd only have to fill one per week, and I'd grab the one from the emergency kit and use that, and put the just-emptied-and-refilled one into the emergency kit each week. :)

The Cold-Care Kit is also an awesome idea! Super-nice tissues that you know you'll get to use when you're feeling awful. I'd probably include a number of medicinal teas--we went through a whole lot of various types of cold-treatment teas this month!

Date: 2015-01-27 11:47 pm (UTC)
lilacsigil: 12 Apostles rocks, text "Rock On" (12 Apostles)
From: [personal profile] lilacsigil
I don't have an emergency kit, but I do have a detailed emergency list, because I live in a bushfire-prone area and it's quite likely that one of these days we're going to have to evacuate in a hurry. The list is kept in the emergency soft cat carrier which expands to be a tent big enough for two cats and a small litter box.

Date: 2015-01-28 05:22 am (UTC)
ironed_orchid: watercolour and pen style sketch of a brown tabby cat curl up with her head looking up at the viewer and her front paw stretched out on the left (Default)
From: [personal profile] ironed_orchid
I just realized that I do have an emergency kit, for when that emergency is late for work*: I keep my toothbrush, toothpaste and floss, and my meds** in a soft cosmetics case near my bathroom sink, which means that they are easy to pick up whenever I need to grab them and go. It also reminds me to take my meds when I brush my teeth in the morning.



*It's also good for sleeping over somewhere, which is not usually construed as an emergency.
** I keep one foil sheet of each medication, in one case that's 10 tablets, in another it's 28.

Date: 2015-01-28 01:42 pm (UTC)
cadenzamuse: Cross-legged girl literally drawing the world around her into being (Default)
From: [personal profile] cadenzamuse
I am in the process of creating small "emergency sleeping over" kits, because there are often times when I am tired or enjoying myself and don't want to head home, but I can't sleep over without pre-planning because ALL THE MEDICATIONS.

This is complicated by the gov'ment not wanting me to have extras of certain medications *coughbenzoscough*, and by having some of these things be inhalers. But especially since I'm now commuting 1.5 hours to school, I have managed to get one kit (minus inhaler) together in my car, just in case snow leaves me stuck in Columbus at my in-laws house.

Future goals include getting new inhalers early enough that I can leave 3 days worth of puffs on one and stick it with the kit; completing two more kits, one for T's car and one for in-laws' house.

And then maybe I'll work on snow emergency car kit, which I have been procrastinating about, even though I now drive 1.5 hours each way on the interstate through rural Ohio once a week.

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untonuggan: Lily and Chance squished in a cat pile-up on top of a cat tree (buff tabby, black cat with red collar) (Default)
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