#39 How will you recognize the cataclysm when you see it?

A worried reader recently asked me, Exactly how do you define “cataclysm?” How will I know one when I see one?

Good question. You don’t want to pull out your cataclysm kit and run for the hills if you only have a disaster on your hands, not a full-fledged cataclysm.

It may help to think of a cataclysm as part of a continuum of troubles that runs from everyday trials and tribulations to an outright nobody-but-the cockroaches-survive apocalypse.

In between, you have your misadventure, disaster and your cataclysm.

Think of it in terms of survival. Most people will survive their tribulations (bad hair day) and the ordinary misadventure (US Air Flight 1549). In this day and age most people even survive a disaster. A cataclysm, not so much.

But the best-stocked cataclysm survival kit won’t help you in the case of the apocalypse.

Next time something bad befalls you, or you read about some crisis or other in the news, try to place it on this continuum. As you do it more and more, you’ll start to get the hang of things.

When the cataclysm comes, you’ll recognize it for what it is. You’ll be fit and ready with your skills and stockpiles while everyone else is still twittering on about their very bad day.

#38 Blend in

When the cataclysm hits and marauding bands of your unprepared neighbors tear through the ‘hood looking for a bite to eat and some fresh water, your ability to stand out in a crowd will be definite disadvantage.

Note how this wily crayon cleverly blends into its surroundings

You’ve cultivated your own personal style and developed strategies to draw attention to how you are completely unique in the world. That’s the American way, after all – rugged individualism in the search engine optimized era.

After the global climate change cataclysm, though, you won’t want to show up on your hungry neighbors’ armed analog equivalent of a Google search for “local food.”

To the contrary, you’ll want to blend in and not be noticed. You’ll want people to pass you right by without seeing your well-stocked cataclysm kit.

Get started now. Start taking note of those background people in your life. You know – the invisible ones you don’t usually see. Study their habits of dress, behavior and driving habits.  They have a lot to teach, and you have a lot of bad habits to lose if you’re going to go unnoticed and survive after the cataclysm.

Crayon photo by EJP. Click to see more camoflaged crayons.

#37 Learn to talk to people face-to-face

Apparently, a whole generation of people is growing up unable to carry on a conversation with another human being face-to-face. They’re so used to email and texting with their friends, they’d rather do that than actually see them in real life.

Source: The Onion

Great if we want to reduce the spread of communicable diseases. Not so good for after the global climate change cataclysm, when batteries run dry and the electrical grid collapses.

Imagine, you’re going though life just texting along, when your iPhone suddenly goes dead. You realize the last time you plugged it in, it didn’t actually juice up. You look up from the phone, only to discover the water has already risen up to your knees. What do you do?

You can’t start emailing or texting for help. You’ll have to shout. I know it sounds frightening, but you will have to talk to the people around you. They may be family, friends or even strangers. If you don’t know how to carry on a verbal conversation with the people who planned ahead for the cataclysm, you’ll have a lot of trouble getting them to row you to safety or share their freeze-dried Brunswick stew with you.

Practice now. Put down that phone or PDA and talk to someone. You may find it less efficient than email. It will require more words, and you may have to talk about things that aren’t on the topic you started with. You’ll have to use entire words. Then again, you may be surprised to find out it takes less time to say “by the way” than it does to say the letters “BTW.”

You’ll also need to make facial expressions and hand gestures appropriate to the content of your words. To do this, imagine the kind of emoticon you might use with certain statements, and try to make your face look like that. Many people of the older generation learned this as children, and may be able to help you.

Start talking now, lest you find yourself texting underwater.

#36 Make friends with old people

Many bloggers will find this hard to believe, but there are people alive today who were born before the television was a household item.

Some people alive today remember life before television

They remember life before there were such things as Social Security and the CIA. They remember having to entertain themselves by playing outside, singing aloud and using Go Fish sets that didn’t have little mermaids on them. Many of them, no matter what part of the country they’re from, remember growing their own food. Most remember cooking their own meals, or at least having someone around to cook meals for them.

These people are great resources for preparing for the global climate change cataclysm. They remember the life you’re likely to find yourself living. Limited access to electricity, reduced to depending on the sweat of your brow to get what you need.

So get out there and meet some old people. Learn from them how hard life used to be. They have the tips to help you survive it.

#35 Buy an old cookbook

If your favorite cookbook doesn’t include instructions on how to dress and cook a squirrel, it’s not going to be much use after the global climate change cataclysm.

How much wood would a woodchuck chuck if a woodchuck could chuck wood?

Cooking is cultural, sociological, environmental and historical. What we cook depends on what’s available in our local grocery store or market. As globalization and international trade have grown exponentially in recent years, we’ve grown used to seeing ingredients from around the world on local grocery shelves, like Bulgarian feta, Italian proscuitto and Philippine tilapia.

As ingredients have changed, so have cookbooks, which was nice while the global supply chain still functioned. When it collapses and you have to rely on locally-grown ingredients, your fancy-pants modern cookbook will be next to useless. Well, I suppose you could use it to start a fire.

Luckily, I have the 1975 edition of The Joy of Cooking on my shelf. It includes detailed instructions for how to dress and cook squirrel, opossum, porcupine, raccoon, muskrat, woodchuck, beaver, armadillo, and seven different ways to prepare rabbit. Plus recommended side dishes.

The 2006 edition only offers this advice: “Small game can be cooked following most recipes for chicken.” To survive on local game post-cataclysm, most of us will need more guidance than this.

I mean, the recipe for moo shu tempeh looks tasty – I’ll give it a try it while I can still buy the ingredients. But the odds of finding shiitake mushrooms, wood ear fungus, sesame oil, canned bamboo shoots and tempeh on the grocery shelf after the cataclysm are slim.

I’m keeping my old fashioned cookbook with old fashioned local ingredients in my cataclysm survival kit.

#34 Diversify your immune system

If you thought mononucleosis was bad, check out ebola.

If you haven’t yet, you may get a chance to try.

The Wildlife Conservation Society has identified twelve relatively uncommon diseases that are likely to become much more widespread after the global climate change cataclysm. See, as your local climate changes, pathogens that couldn’t survive there before will suddenly be able to. You’ll have to diversify your immune system if you want to survive.

Thanks to WCS, we know what diseases you should start preparing for now. The “Deadly Dozen” are (in alphabetical order)

• Avian flu
• Babesia
• Cholera
• Ebola
• Intestinal and external parasites
• Plague
• Lyme disease
• Red tides
• Rift Valley fever
• Sleeping sickness
• Tuberculosis
• Yellow fever

I once had a yellow fever vaccination, but I don’t have a clue what “babesia” is.

As we all know, the keys to avoiding illness are 1) keeping yourself fit and healthy, and 2) washing your hands every five minutes. So start with that. The next step is to beef up your immune system and diversify it.

Check the Centers for Disease Control website for reports of the deadly dozen popping up. I found a report of babesia in New Jersey from 2003. That will help you keep track of the geographic infection creep, and might show where you can visit if you want to try to to build up antibodies.

Whatever you do, don’t rely on those antibacterial soaps to save you after the cataclysm. They do more harm than good, and they’ll run out long before the deadly dozen pathogens do.

#33 Pack your barterables

Cash. When the credit markets dry up, it’s what will keep the world going ’round. Right?

Don’t count on it.

As we’ve all been learning since the subprime meltdown began gathering steam earlier this year, a thing has only as much value as people believe it has. After the global climate change cataclysm, cash may become useless. What can you use those small rectangles of printed paper for other than lighting fires? I suppose the coins could make nice paperweights. When everybody around you realizes this and stops using cash, how will you get the things you need from the people who have them?

Useless after the cataclysm?

Bartering. You’ve got something the other guy wants, he’s got something you want. Are they of equal value? Depends how much you both want what the other guy’s got. If all you have on hand in your cataclysm kit is cash, you may find yourself out of luck.

Sure, keep a stash of cash tucked away for an emergency. Just be sure to include some extras in the kit that might be valuable enough to barter for the things you find you need. Maybe it’s an extra can of instant coffee, a spare roll of fishing line, or a second wind-up radio. I’ll leave it to you to sort out the actual value of your barterables, and that will depend on post-cataclysm conditions.

They say cash is king. I say be prepared for the revolution.

#32 Don’t expect backup

Most of us plan for natural disaster-type emergencies with the assumption that we only need food, water and shelter for a few days before life gets back to something like normal. Load up a few cans of tuna and boxes of crackers, a five gallon jug of water and a few changes of underwear. That’ll be enough to ride out the worst until the cavalry arrives. Right?

Considering what I’ve seen over the past month, I’d call that dangerously optimistic. There are still people in the Gulf Coast region without electricity after Hurricane Ike made landfall in the US two weeks ago. It took three weeks for power to be restored to most people after Hurricane Gustav hit. Surviving that required more than two pairs of socks.

What’s more, if the recently averted (if not still pending) financial crisis could have brought an end to the cash economy as we know it. If that happens, all bets are off. I assure you, if my paycheck wasn’t going to be worth anything, I wouldn’t show up to work, and I bet neither would anyone else.

Whether the global climate change cataclysm arrives more like a lamb (hurricane) or a lion (complete financial global meltdown), there will be no quick resolution. In fact, we can’t count on anyone or anything coming along to save the day. No cavalry to ride in bearing food and water. No FEMA trailers or blue UN tarps. It will be you and yours on your own.

Fill up your cataclysm kit accordingly. Learn the skills you’ll need to survive on your own. Get fit, and prepare yourself for political upheaval. Just don’t call for backup.

Lamb photo: soxophoneplayer

Lion photo: Chris Eason

#31 Learn to count your own change

How many of us skated through elementary school without ever really learning our times tables? I know I’m not alone in this. Especially since the advent of electronic cash registers and hand-held calculators, we haven’t really needed the ability to do even basic math in our heads, have we?

Post-cataclysm calculator

But there I stood at the office supply store yesterday, trying to figure out whether buying paper by the ream was cheaper than buying it by the box. A ream = 500 sheets, and at least I know my five-times tables, but I kept thinking the math in my head must be wrong if it was coming up cheaper to buy five reams, rather than a box full of five reams of the same stuff. So I called up my trusty cell phone calculator, and sure enough, I was right. Those tricksters! Playing on my belief that buying in bulk is always cheaper! Hah! I showed them, and I saved myself five dollars.

But it got me to thinking about what I’ll do after the global climate change cataclysm. You’re standing in the flea market, trying to figure out whether it’s more economical to buy your moldy rice by the scoop or the sack. Your cell phone is long dead. What are you going to do? Just do the rough math as best you can? Or do you make wild guess and hope for the best?

Then how do you know if they’ve given you correct change if there’s no electronic cash register to show what you ought to expect? OMG, how do you subtract $17.49 from the twenty you just handed over? Or subtract seven cowries from the large mollusk shell you just handed over in payment?

You have two choices here.

Option one: get an abacus and learn how to use it. Millions of people all across Asia do just fine with them, and whose economy is doing better these days?

Option two: learn some basic math. Start with addition and subtraction at a bare minimum. Take on those multiplication tables once you’re feeling confident.

After the cataclysm, swindlers and sociopaths will come out of the woodwork. With the right preparation, you can protect yourself from some of the worst. But you’ll need to be able to count your own change.

Abacus photo by Shenghung Lin

#30 Remodel your home for tomorrow’s denizens

The mortgage cataclysm is giving us a sneak preview of what might happen after the global climate change cataclysm. Well, minus the floods, desertification and freak weather. For those, we’ve had plenty of warning. These are new details on what to expect.

Your home, after the climate change cataclysm

Start with West Nile virus. That’s on the uptick as a result of mosquitoes breeding in abandoned swimming pools at foreclosed houses. Now we have bobcats taking over abandoned homes in the ‘burbs. Check out this photo from the Los Angeles Times.

What’s next? It’s impossible to know what will survive the cataclysm. That’s because that all depends on what form the cataclysm will take in your neighborhood. We know that cockroaches can withstand just about anything, from atomic bombs to shoe-wielding housewives. Coyotes are another likely survivor. The more we try to kill them off, the more they expand in numbers and range.

Whoever survives, they’ll take over your home when you’re gone. So why don’t you do them a favor? Prepare your house to be a little more welcoming now to the species you’d prefer to give it to. Start by getting rid of all those deadly pesticides, home cleaners and cosmetics they might accidentally get themselves into. Then cut some pet doors of just the right size and shape.

You won’t turn a profit by welcoming these friends, but your mortgage is probably upside down already anyway, so what’s the loss? And who knows, maybe by giving the cataclysm survivors easy access to so much people stuff, the evolutionary process back to humans will go a little faster next time around.