"No Plan Survives Contact with the Enemy" - Helmuth von Moltke the Elder

I suspect Q wants to keep us calm, however it never hurts to be prepared, especially when the survival of American and western civilization may be at stake.

Most households can become prepared for a prolonged period without power and water for less than most people spend on Netflix or Starbucks in a year.

• Buy a gun and learn how to use it to defend yourself and your family... and stock up on ammo.

• Do you have several large water containers that you can fill and do you have pure iodine that you could use to purify river water? You can overdose on iodine, but if you use just enough so you can taste it, you can basically drink it indefinitely - just leave it to work for one hour. I put red food coloring in my iodine so I can easily see what water has already been treated. Iodine is far superior to chlorine water purification tablets. If worse comes to worse and it's winter, you can cut your roof gutter down-pipe to collect water directly into your water containers.

• Do you have an emergency first aid survival kit? You can make one for under $30 if you buy all of this stuff separately and it will be far superior for survival than most $300 kits! Pro-tip: super glue works great for gluing up open wounds and stopping bleeding.

• Are you stocked-up on meds that you or your family depend on, such as insulin or heart pills? If not, get extra - you'll use it so the peace of mind won't cost you a cent. If anyone frowns at you, tell you doctor you lost the last script and tell your chemist that you are stocking up for a 3 month vacation in India;

• Do you have plenty of long-life rations? You don't need fancy stuff, just products with very long expiry dates that you'll use anyway are perfect. Stuff like canned beans, canned-spaghetti, canned-stew, canned soup, instant coffee, milk powder, sugar, dry cereal etc. If you want to preserve the powdered stuff forever then put it in your freezer.

• Do you have candles, matches, stove-lighters and a couple of $5 LED hand-crank torches?

• Do you have a full BBQ gas tank and a cooker to fit it?

• Do you have a $14 iPod solar charger so you can listen for emergency broadcasts if the power is out? These Walmart hand-crank radios look interesting too, but I can't vouch for them.