Thursday, January 16, 2014

West Virginia Resilience


Recently a chemical spill in a local river took out the water supply for over 300,000 people. I have learned several things during this event, which has so far lasted a week (and counting). First and foremost, West Virginia is a great state to live in. Neighbors are still neighbors and the amount of support given to each other before outside help arrived was amazing. I was also impressed with the creativity of folks in the no water zone. This picture shows the area effected by the tainted water. In this picture, the zones in blue had been ok'd to start flushing their lines. As you can see, I was (not so) patiently waiting.


I have one of these and highly recommend keeping one on hand as I am sure they sold out quick! It typically is used for camping and sits in the sun until it warms up. Water can be heated on the stove and put in the shower bag. They run about $10 bucks and can be bought at Walmart.
A guy I work with told me that he went and bought one of these for an emergency shower. It cost him about $9 bucks.


My favorite has been a home made shower I saw that was made by Boone County resident Alan Wilson. This is just great!


Like I said, West Virginians have shown some real ingenuity. But the main purpose of this story is this... the water crisis has opened my eyes to a very important fact. WE ARE UNPREPARED. I am definitely not a doomsday prepper, but there is a wide range between prepper and totally unprepared for anything. I want to fall somewhere in the middle.




I was talking to my buddy Lucy about all of this. Lucy and I share coupons, deals, recipes, crafts, camping ideas, crazy stories among a plethora of thoughts that come into the minds of Appalachian women. During the discussion, the idea of this blog was born. Lucy and I agree that we are always learning. Sometimes the hard way, but the journey is all the fun! Please join us while we share what we have learned (or wish we had learned) along the way.      







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