Many fall in the face of chaos, but not this one, not today
I don’t think society across the whole planet will collapse, short of a nuclear war in which case gold won’t help one bit
Much more likely that certain areas will experience famine, war, disease, and reduced access to medicine.
Really the best bet is to be able to be mobile if an area has a significant decline you can move to where it’s better
Same, I’ve blocked every single news and politics and it’s bustling
It all started with that smile… that damned smile
I can second these and add
Walking, and add a weighted vest or backpack. Start light, like 5lb/2.5kg for a week or two, then increase by that much a week until you get to 40% of your body weight in a few months.
I find that 30lb/15kg is a great place to stop though, much more feels pretty rough.
Then just walk around. You can listen to music, podcasts, nature, bird sounds.
Do that 45 a day and you’ll be significantly healthier in a few months.
It really is the dream
I live in a tiny NE college town where that happens but for breakfast at a dive coffeeshop. It’s loud, packed, the food and coffee are meh, but every single day I can walk in there and see 5-10 locals eating breakfast and shooting the breeze. There’s cliques who always sit together, and social butterflies who pick a different group every morning. A bottomless mug of coffee is $3, so folks will just come and hang out from like 8-11am. It’s great fun.
There’s a brewery next door that’s often busy at night but generally it’s a quiet town so folks are home chilling after dinner.
We leave them there and if it’s damaged call a tow truck to come pick it up. If it’s not damaged we’ll maybe drive it out of the way or see if a patient’s family member can come pick it up. Sometimes the cops will just have it towed anyway since it can’t just stay on the road.
Keep in mind most firefighters in the USA are volunteers who just drive to the station when there’s a fire - not paid professionals.
My station just hired our first full time paramedics, we have a few part time paid firefighter+EMTs, and some volunteer firefighter+EMTs.
While we’re not getting that many fire calls, the few we get are pretty bad. Like, would burn down a neighborhood bad, because everything is now made from fast burning plastics. Sofas, carpets, house paint, siding, roofs, furniture, and clothes are all pretty much petroleum based. And will burn extremely hot and fast when it catches, spreading to all the surrounding exposure buildings.
My buddy works at Underwriters Laboratories and was saying they just did a burn test that showed the typical house today will catch neighboring houses on fire just from the infrared radiation through their windows. Even if the neighboring houses are soaking wet, the insides can still catch fire through the windows.
So we’re in a jam - we hardly ever have real house fires, but they are extremely dangerous and will burn the whole town down if we don’t get there asap.
Not to mention all the car crashes, hazmat spills, EMS lift assists. I’m sure there’s a way we can improve the situation, but I honestly don’t know what it would look like. The US is a huge place that’s very spread out, I don’t think we’re ever going to fully go away from volunteer firefighters, as much as I think it would be more efficient.
Long story short, if you’re able to lift a 30lb box overhead, the volunteer fire service is desperate in most places. Volunteerism is down like 90% from it’s peak. But most fire stations are entirely volunteer. So there’s a very real need for more folks to pitch in. I’m happy to chat with anyone who is curious and wants to get into it. I highly recommend it, it’s done wonders for my personal life.
Firefox on Android is pretty good and you can still install an ad blocker.
yeah, but like, fuck cars
I’m a fire fighter so I’m used to phone alarms, but this one was a different tone so I was like “holy shit IS THIS THE BIG ONE?” narrator “it was in fact not the big one”
Just look for a job and make sure you’ve got a visa. Third world countries have a lot more “informal economy” that isn’t taxed or handled with paperwork so it’s possible sometimes to just find a job without paperwork or anything, but that won’t help you get a permanent visa.
Ideally, you get a visa that allows work, show you’re working, and then the visa gets upgraded to a permanent resident visa. This varies a lot from country to country. If you’ve got a job, some countries are pretty happy to have you adding to their local economy and will extend you a visa. If you’ve got a remote job that might go even faster.
Alternatively if you’re not skilled in any way, you apply to a super cheap college and apply for a student visa, that’ll buy you a few years while you’re getting skilled in something that country needs. Studying to become a doctor, lawyer, or STEM goes a long way. One of these probably is in demand there, figure out which one and take a crack at it. Hard, for sure, but a pretty solid way to build something long term. Of course if you don’t know the language that will be harder, but colleges generally have language classes too, so that could be the first classes you take.
There’s also teaching English, it’s generally not too hard to find work as a tutor or English teacher, I saw the other day like there’s only one English teacher for every 500 open positions. So that’s a possibility too.
Just generally try to participate in their economy. Try to make local friends and assimilate. Think about what first generation immigrants do: find a steady job or bust ass studying tech or medicine.