Distractions

[rat31465]

Back in 2007 many across the midwest suffered power outages for days and even weeks. Myself I was without power for 17 days and while I was somewhat prepared with food, water, Kerosene, Battery Operated Radio/B&W Television combo etc...what I found to be the most problematic was the down time. My wife and I kept ourselves busy as best we could throughout the day, but once the sun set it became quite monotinous.
Not wanting to burn through the deep cycle batteries I used for power...we watched Television sparingly so the boredom was great.

I decided that some sort of distractions were needed for a long term survival situation. I am currently looking for a book on games which utilize just dice...and one with rules for Card games as well.
We have added a travel sized yahtzee game and a back gammon board to our survival gear...

Curious as to what others may have considered?

[Outlander Systems]

Playing cards. I've thought about board games as well. The problem I have is that the Mrs. isn't terribly fond of board games, whereas I love them.

The thing to consider is whether or not we're dealing with long-term, or short-term shutdown of the grid.

One of my favourite games of all-time, that I played very frequently as a kid with my family, is the Dictionary Game.

It's almost like a play on poker. The way it works is that one person is the "dealer" on a given round. Each time a new word is chosen, there's a new dealer.

So, say you are the dealer this round. You choose a word from the dictionary, and write the definition down on a sticky note. Everyone else has sticky notes as well. You read the word aloud, and then everyone has to write a definition for the word. Then you read the definitions back, and people vote on which one is the correct one. For every vote, that person gets a point. The dealer does NOT get points on the correct definition.

It's pretty simple, but it works.

I would much rather play the Dictionary Game, than the latest titillating, mind-numbing videogame, any day of the week. That's just me...

[MIKE G]

I picked up a few board games on sale at one of the big box stores. Also keep cards and some puzzles to occupy down time during such an event. As well, I keep a pretty solid library of both leisure reading and reference that could easily occupy me and the wife. That is for a short term event. On a longer term event those reference materials would be used to develop programs of instruction of various topics from offense and defense, self aid/buddy aid, comms, signaling, shooting, tactics, medicine, farming, preserving, etc, etc. It does me no good to be the only one who has any knowledge on a topic so it would be time to share knowledge around the proverbial or literal campfire.

[Jerm]

No reason to go totally primitive.

I'm about to pick up a Surge NT02 solar charger for my Ipod Touch.It should keep me running for years after the lights go out.

Between the games,music,videos,and my Kindle books it could provide endless entertainment(until it burns out completely anyway).I'd like to get a few more for the kids and wife...Maybe an extra solar charger or two as well.

It also has alot of practical tools.Many in the SAS Survival app alone(there's alot of other apps that could have varying degrees of usefullness)...I've saved all of my schematics,ballistic charts,and diagrams to it.NTM the little tools like calculator,unit conversion,etc.

I wish I could transfer all of my PDF files...For now I've been doing screen grabs and saving them as pics.

Now if I can just find a relatively cheap/easy way to keep my laptop up indefinitely.

[chavez_e_chavez]

Uno and Yahtzee is a personal favorite of my wife and daughter..they have travel versions so its little and compact..

[tampam4]

No reason to go totally primitive.

I'm about to pick up a Surge NT02 solar charger for my Ipod Touch.It should keep me running for years after the lights go out.

Between the games,music,videos,and my Kindle books it could provide endless entertainment(until it burns out completely anyway).I'd like to get a few more for the kids and wife...Maybe an extra solar charger or two as well.

It also has alot of practical tools.Many in the SAS Survival app alone(there's alot of other apps that could have varying udegrees of usefullness)...I've saved all of my schematics,ballistic charts,and diagrams to it.NTM the little tools like calculator,unit conversion,etc.

I wish I could transfer all of my PDF files...For now I've been doing screen grabs and saving them as pics.

Now if I can just find a relatively cheap/easy way to keep my laptop up indefinitely.

Only bad thing I have to say about using electronic storage devices for such purposes, is that if something happens to it, you are SOL and just lost tons of valuable info.

[Jerm]

Only bad thing I have to say about using electronic storage devices for such purposes, is that if something happens to it, you are SOL and just lost tons of valuable info.

Yeah,I'm working on as much redundancy as possible...Even printing out alot of what I consider the most important info(that I don't already have in book form).

...I'm currently working some small scale EMP protection.

[Biz Kizzle]

of course cards are a great option due to the relatively small size and variety of games. cribbage is a great game to play also. but i think a great use of down time would be reloading ammo ;)

[tampam4]

while reloading ammo may be a good thing to do short term, it will obviously not be the long term solution, and if you have to leave your area, forget about it. I think cards are just about the most versatile past time you can get. Very compact in size, hundreds, if not thousands of game varieties to keep things interesting, memory games, math games, quick thinking etc etc.

[Mac5.56]

I paint military style miniatures, (30mm), and I have enough to last through two generations of people. Eventually of course I will run out of paint. But for the short term it is an awesome hobby to pass large amounts of time.

If your not into that, how about going to a hobby store and picking up some model cars, or planes?

Also of course board games and playing cards.

[Nathan_Bell]

Books. For the price of a practice session worth of ammo you can get a boatload of good ones at the library's book sale. I brought home 42 books last one I went to and spent.....a heartbreaking $23.

Several of them were classics that I want to read, but have never really been able to get through. This way do not have to worry about checking them out from the library and them needing to be returned before I finish them.

Cards.

Darts.

Pool.

[FromMyColdDeadHand]

Load mags.

Sharpen knives.

Dry fire practice.

Just kidding, I was actually hoping this was about smoke or flash bangs.

Had a neighbor that would be so bored she would try to vaccum clean when the power went out- not the brightest bulb, power on or not.

Not being too much of a smartass, but how about stargazing -should be pretty good.

[Biz Kizzle]

yeah. i'll call no homo before i say this, but the sky can be a fascinating thing to look at on a clear night.

[LHS]

I have nearly every Dungeons and Dragons book ever written in the 3rd edition. With a few friends, I can easily burn up 8-10 hours without realizing it. It's good for sharpening math skills, as well as thinking outside the box. It's really a cerebral game.

[Tom Swift]

I have nearly every Dungeons and Dragons book ever written in the 3rd edition. With a few friends, I can easily burn up 8-10 hours without realizing it. It's good for sharpening math skills, as well as thinking outside the box. It's really a cerebral game.

To much win exists in this post.

[LHS]

Just remember, plastic dice + campfire = suck.

[Dale Gribble]

When we had that big ice storm deal several years ago here in Lima, Ohio I pretty much occupied my time with going out and walking around town. I can't even describe how eerie it was seeing a relatively urban area in complete darkness and silence. I walked from the north side of town clear to the south end and saw not a single other living soul. No traffic, no street lights, etc.

[arizonaranchman]

I have a hand-crank emergency radio that won't waste any batteries. Also reading is how I spend the time in such circumstances. One of those little LED clip-on lights for a book. I have a decent library to choose from, including survival and first aid books.

[fixer]

i have Uno and Mille Bornes, plus regular cards.

there are other games, but this is all i have at the moment.

for boardgames, Risk and Stratego were cool. no clue what else is available now. Monopoly seems to take too long for some people, but that might be an advantage in the situation you're describing.

[Von Rheydt]

Back in 2007 many across the midwest suffered power outages for days and even weeks. Myself I was without power for 17 days and while I was somewhat prepared with food, water, Kerosene, Battery Operated Radio/B&W Television combo etc...what I found to be the most problematic was the down time. My wife and I kept ourselves busy as best we could throughout the day, but once the sun set it became quite monotinous.
Not wanting to burn through the deep cycle batteries I used for power...we watched Television sparingly so the boredom was great.

I decided that some sort of distractions were needed for a long term survival situation. I am currently looking for a book on games which utilize just dice...and one with rules for Card games as well.
We have added a travel sized yahtzee game and a back gammon board to our survival gear...

Curious as to what others may have considered?

Never had a 17 day outage, respect to you.

Wind up radios are good kit. The original inventor Trevor Baylis, nice guy met him twice, has put his name to lots of things to do with wind up power. His original concept was that people in remote parts of Africa could not use radios because they could either not get or afford batteries.

There is now a large business utilising the wind up technology mainly run by FREEPLAY ENERGY:

http://www.freeplayenergy.com/

For downtime I like to read and learn so I always have a pile of books awaiting reading on hand.

You should also consider solar water heating, that would reduce your energy dependency by around 35%. You do not need to spend a fortune buying solar collectors for water heating, they are easy enough to make for the average guy with some tools. There are plenty of tree hugger websites out there that show you how to make them. I did a plumbing course in the UK and we put together an array of old heating radiators, painted with black car header paint and fitted a tap on the end. It gave warm water even on cold UK winter days. When I buy my place over here I will be making and fitting solar collection panels for hot water.

[RiggerGod]

I'd say for myself & the Mrs. reading is tops on our list. We have a pretty good library and it is always getting better. I am looking for a nice mix of practical information/how to as well as a nice selection of fiction and hopefully eventually some classic literature. The Commandant’s reading list is well worth checking out. I'd say that even for a non-reader the Harry Potter series and a complete Tom Clancy library would be very entertaining and could be had used for next to nothing. Once long, long, ago on a month long backpacking trip my first copy of Without Remorse was torn to bits by tent mates during a three day snowstorm. Some of them laterally read it page by page. Everyone really seemed to enjoy!
I like the suggestions on astronomy, it is simple enough to start, fun, educational, and has very few limits. A star chart and a simple telescope could be useful too.
As far as games go... chess, checkers, cards, Skip-Bo (always a favorite) ect.
Board games are the best though... we really like Risk and Settlers of Caten good stuff!

[kihnspiracy]

Read
clean guns
dry fire practice
fix things
board games
sex
sleep