Waiting

Ladies and gentlemen I am here today to speak to you all about something very near and dear to my heart right now: impatience. As I sit here in the prayer room after one hour and 45 minutes exactly, I am waiting for these last 15 minutes to come to a close so that I can mark down my time and leave. Now normally it's not this bad, but in this particular situation I also happen to be waiting to go and watch The Hunger Games, and have been ever since I finished the first book about eight months ago. Yes sir, nothing quite like finishing time in the prayer room while waiting to go to a movie, nothing quite like it at all. Anyways: impatience. This monster will usually start out little. A nagging voice in the back of your mind, or anything that causes any amount of minor discomfort. Over time, however, it will grow. Two hours is a ripe old breeding ground for impatience, and I can  attest first hand that it can become quite powerful in such an amount of time. Eventually it will also give rise to other things such as annoyance and lack of focus. Pretty soon you will be reduced to the human form of a chihuahua, not able to keep focus on anything for more than five seconds and snapping at anything that comes close enough. Thankfully I have not yet reached this point, but if I had one more hour I have no doubt that I would.

(Let it be noted that I love the Prayer Room and am glad for its existence.)

A Crossroads

And so here we are, yet again faced with a choice. To continue to waste time, or to do homework? To waste time would be the easiest and most immediately rewarding path to choose. Further on down the road, however, it would become bumpy and miserable. Life would become nothing more than a world of regret and remorse. The cry of my soul would become, "Why foolish heart? Oh why have you done this too me? Something that could have been done in relative ease earlier was put off until now because of a whim, a fancy. Now I am paying the price and there is no consolation because I have no one to blame but myself." On the other hand, if I was to do even one subject of my homework now I would be miserable and cranky. I know beyond a shadow of a doubt that I would not regret it later, but is it worth the price that I would have to pay now? And so the crossroads faces me, both options wide open and tempting in their own way. Procrastination beckons me with her deceptive charm. Promising relaxation and peace now, and hiding the pain and agony that I know from experience are further down her road. Diligence does not try to hide the fact that her way is more immediately trying, but she promises a better reward at the end. A reward that I would hazard is much more preferable to the immediate pleasure of procrastination. She promises that if I take the lesser pain now, I will have a greater joy later. I also know from experience that this is true. There is nothing quite as rewarding as reaching late afternoon with the realization that you have just completed your last subject of the day. And so it is with a heavy heart and soon to be aching brain that I finally make my decision. I shall face the road of diligence and push through her lesser pain now so that I will not have to face the greater pain of procrastination later. I bid all of you adieu my good friends, and hope that you will remember me and this crossroads that I have faced and ultimately overcome. As the Psalmist would have advised us if he had been here to witness this event: choose the path of wisdom, and shun the path of folly.

How to Survive the Apocalypse: Mark IV

M1 Abrams Battle Tank - Yes, you did read the description correctly, this little addition to the survival list is a tank, and not just any tank. The M1 Abrams is one of the most well known tanks in the world today. It is used by six different nations, and its not hard to see why. First of all, the thing is a beast. Weighing in a grand total of 68 tons it's one of the largest tanks in the world today. It comes equipped with not only your standard anti-tank gun (the big one on the front) but also three different mounted machine guns for cleaning up the survivors. Its armor is a mix of ceramic, steel, plastic, and kevlar so you can be dang sure that nothing is going to get through it easily. It's engine is powered by jet fuel and the tank can reach speeds of 45 to 60 miles per hour. At this point you are probably thinking: yeah, that's great and all, but isn't a tank just a little bit overkill? The answer to that question is simple, when dealing with an apocalyptic situation, nothing is overkill. Besides, this is the perfect way to defend your rebel encampment or storm the totalitarian regime's strongholds. These don't go cheap, however, so unless you are just planning to storm a military base after the U.S. goes to pot, I would recommend you start saving up now.

How to Survive the Apocalypse: Mark III

(let it be noted that at this point I have decided to stop using numbers before the post as it is already included in the title, if this throws you off I apologize, if you have no idea what I'm talking about then you have about five minutes to figure it out before your computer explodes)

AK-47 (aka. automatic Kalashnikov pattern year 1947) - This is THE gun. Actually that is not quite true, but it is probably as close as we will get this side of glory. It could admittedly use some upgrading in the accuracy and range department, but the pros make the cons virtually vanish. First off, the AK-47 is cheap. In some countries they have become so plentiful that you could probably pick one up for around ten American dollars. Your first reaction to this is probably: wow that must be a piece of crap if it goes for that cheap. Wrong! The AK-47 is one of the most reliable guns on the market today. It needs virtually no cleaning other than occasionally checking to make sure the barrel isn't clogged. The design of the gun is so ingenious that it actually cleans itself while firing. That is you could leave it buried in the beach by the ocean for six months, come and dig it up, and it would fire perfectly. That is not made up or an exaggeration as it has been recorded during the Vietnam war that American soldiers would find Vietnamese AK-47s that had been sunken in rice paddies for months that would still fire. Another key factor of the AK-47 is that it is very intuitive to use. If you can pick up and comfortably hold the gun then you can fire it. This is the ultimate survival tool. Get yours today!

Apocalypse Countdown

In light of my recent posts, I thought it prudent to provide the reader with a countdown to the 2012 apocalypse, just so you can have an idea of when you need to start getting all of the things listed.

http://countdowntoapocalypse.com/

How to Survive the Apocalypse: Mark II

2. Cheese (aka CHEEZE) - if you need to ask why cheese is on the list, you shouldn't be reading this blog. But seriously, when can you not use cheese? It is a viable food source, useful for bribing bounty hunters who are trying to kill you, functions quite well as an adhesive if first melted and then left to dry, you can kill someone with it (not really sure how but I'll think of something and put it in the next post), if it smells strong enough you can use it to confound dogs trying to track you, if you eat enough you can fly, it can be used in conjunction with duct tape to patch up holes in your car, and last but not least, when the value of paper money goes down the toilet, cheese will become the new standard.

VIVA LA CHEEZE!

How to Survive the Apocalypse: Mark I

Being as it has once again become vogue to focus on the end of the world, for these next few posts I have decided to provide you, dear reader, with a list of apocalypse survival materials and under what circumstances they should be used.

1. Flashbang grenades (aka stun grenades) - these defensive weapons are most commonly used in crowd control. They produce a blinding flash of light and a concussive "bang" designed to impair the target's vision and hearing for about ten seconds. This may not sound like a very long time, but it can make all the difference in a tight situation, enabling you to either gain the advantage in a fight, or remove yourself from the situation entirely. The only physically harmful thing about these tools besides a lingering ringing in the ears is that the flash can burn if you get too close. Under extreme situations this can be used in your benefit to create an explosion by tossing a grenade onto or by flammable or explosive material (ie. a drum of gasoline). These grenades are a must have and I would advise you to get your hands on as many as possible should you find yourself in an apocalyptic setting.