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What to Pack in a Bug-Out Bag (or Go Bag) so you survive your emergency

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When an emergency is imminent you need to be ready. Pack your bug-out bag now.

What to pack in a bug-out bag

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We are living in an apocalypse. Everyone should be ready to evacuate. Do this when you are calm, not as the disaster looms. I moved from earthquake country to hurricane country. I’ve been through this. Let me help you figure out what to pack in a bug-out bag.

Some disasters call for staying home. But sometimes — if you are in a hot fire zone, volcanic eruption, earthquake, or the path of a hurricane — getting out fast is your best course of action. Are you ready to flee if necessary?

When disaster is looming is not the time to prep. Assemble your go bag — or bug-out bag — when things are calm. You’ll pack a smarter bag and save money.

You know you need a change of clothes, toiletries, your cell phone, and other basics. But here is a list of things to add to your go bag that will get you through the not-normal situations you might encounter while you are living out of that bag.

The Bag

For many people, the go bag is in their car. This is a reasonable strategy as long as you can drive away from the disaster. Even if you can’t, grabbing your emergency kit from the car is something you can do quickly. You might want a collection of small bags you can squirrel away in the car to keep your emergency supplies in order and easy to find — and to keep your car neat.

If you are packing an actual bag, though, you want something big, durable, and inexpensive like this big duffel from AmazonBasics ($20.55) Keep it in your car, if that’s your strategy so you don’t have to hunt the closet for it if you need to leave by boat or foot.

A power supply for all your gear

If Zombies are in pursuit, the world is in an apocalyptic state, or even if it’s late at night, you do not want to wait around for AAA. This HALO Bolt power bank ($120) will charge everything from your laptop to your car. If you can connect to the grid occasionally, it will keep all your gear going.

A way to turn the sun into power

Add a battery to your kit that can charged with sunlight in case you are without power for a long time. This power bank ($19) can be charged by leaving it in the sun or plugging it in. It’s also a flashlight. You can’t have enough of those.

Pack some snacks

You don’t know what’s going to happen when you evacuate. Pack some snacks. If you always keep a bag of protein bars or trail mix ($21) in your car or go bag, you won’t be the hangry human who can’t rise to whatever emergency happens.

You also won’t be the one faced with a hangry child or partner in the middle of an emergency. No one is their best during a sugar crash.

Don’t forget hydration

Dehydration is a serious hazard, too, in an emergency. Make sure you bring water. Coconut water, though, will recover a human from dehydration faster than anything. So pack some shelf-stable boxes of coconut water ($15.)

Bring some toiletries

If you end up in a shelter or campsite, you will want to get clean at some point. Pack your go bag with essential toiletries.

If you don’t want to commit the space and money to a backup of your everyday products, throw in a bar of this hair and body soap ($12) so you can take a shower when the opportunity presents itself. It won’t spill and you can jump on a flight, if that’s your exit, without worrying about liquids.

Some Basic Tools

Sometimes a screwdriver, zip tie, or tape can be the thing that saves you. You never know which it’s going to be. So a go bag should have some basics in it: Zip ties and good tape are must-haves. But keeping a basic toolbox $23) in your car and/or go bag is also smart.

Food Storage

Who knows what the restaurant and grocery situation will be like out there? If you find something open and serving, you might want to stock up. Or you might have leftovers in the fridge you want to take along.

Keep a good food thermos on hand. This Stanley Insulated Food Jar ($38) is perfect for this. It comes in four colors and it even has an integrated spork.

A good double-wall insulated cup is also a great idea, allowing you to grab a hot or cold drink you can sip from all day whenever you find a source.

This Yeti Rambler 26-ounce insulated tumbler ($27) is perfect for this.

It is easy to wash, easy to see what you are sipping, and it holds plenty. It comes in lots of colors but a bright color you can spot during chaos is never a bad idea.

A First Aid Kit

Don’t let a small cut or other injury derail your survival. Keep a good first aid kit ($42) in your car at all times — and especially during an emergency. Add some liquid bandage and backups of everyone’s medications.

Some good flashlights

Good flashlights are essential in any emergency. These LED tactical lights ($23) are small, bright, versatile, durable, and affordable. This is a pack of two.

A headlamp beanie

You could include a headlamp but this beanie with a built-in LED light ($15) is a better idea. It is easier to pack and will keep you warm while providing hands-free lighting.

It comes in lots of colors. Pick one — preferably bright — for your clan so you can put them on and spot each other in a crowd.

A small & packable lantern

Since you don’t know what your emergency will look like, a lantern you can set down in a campsite or use to illuminate your home — even a temporary one — is a good call.

This KIZEN solar lantern ($16) is packable — it compacts to the size of your palm — and charges with sunlight.

Dry Bags

At least one of the bags you have in your car should be able to keep some essentials dry, especially if your emergency is potentially wet — like a hurricane.

A good dry bag ($10) can hold a change of clothes, your phone, a battery, a light, and your wallet, keeping these essentials safe even if a flood is your disaster.

If you fill it with air, it will float, too. And that could save you.

Also, pack enough phone dry bags ($9 for two) for everyone’s phone. Your phone will become an essential lifeline out there. This is not the time to kill it with water.

Did I forget anything? Good luck out there!

When you purchase anything through links on this site, GeekGirlfriends.com sometimes earns a little money. It doesn’t cost you any extra, but you are making this content possible. We only recommend products that we own, have tried through the company’s review program, or covet. Thanks for your support.

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The Best Squirt Gun for Training Kittens

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When kitty jumps on the table, this is the best cat squirt gun for stopping that

The best squirt gun for training kittens

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Being a cat person, I have discovered a great upside to living with a family that includes a teenage girl: She brings home kittens.

Get the best squirt gun for training kittens

Not all the time, thankfully. Once is enough. But the new family kitten is fun. Unfortunately, he learned how to jump onto the table and kitchen counter, which means it’s time to train him. I have had many cats so I know how to stop a cat from jumping on counters. It requires an excellent, leak-proof, squirt gun that’s dedicated to training the kitten.

Even the best cat squirt gun won’t fix this on its own. Teaching the cat to stop jumping on things requires a squirt gun and a training strategy. But this little Nerf pistol is a great place to start. I will also share a reliable training trick, to go with it, that will make a cat behave without causing stress.

Associate the unpleasant squirt with a sound

What noise do you make to discourage a naughty kitten?

“PSSSSHHHHHTTT!”

Something like a hiss, right? (It is a cat’s warning noise so they pay attention to it.) Unfortunately, it’s not super effective on its own because they know you don’t have claws. In fact, it’s useless until the cat associates that sound with consequences. For example, a quick squirt of water, which is harmless but cats hate it. For that, you need a reliable tool. And a water bottle is not it. Those are inaccurate. A sidearm. That’s what you need.

The Nerf Super Soaker Zipfire Blaster is deadly accurate and never leaks.

Look out, naughty kitten, because Nerf is stocking the playground armory with an amazing line of Super Soaker pistols. Super Soakers made a name for themselves in the 90’s with their giant water cannons that changed summertime yard battles forever.

Today’s lineup includes fantastic handheld pistols.

photo of grey tabby kitten lying down

The Nerf Super Soaker Zipfire Blaster fits in the palm of your hand, is durable, doesn’t drip or leak, delivers a deadly accurate burst to about 20 feet, and has a trigger response so fast you can shoot multiple squirts as fast as you can squeeze your finger.

This makes them fun for yard games and the best squirt gun for training kittens ever.

These pistols are so affordable that you can order multiples and locate them all over the house so there is always a training squirt gun handy when kitty misbehaves. 

If Nerf invents a Super Soaker that gets the teenager to do her homework, we’ll order that, too. In the meantime, the Nerf Super Soaker Zipfire Blaster is outstanding for training kittens.

Get this excellent roller for keeping your pants free of kitten fur, too

If you just got a kitten, I also recommend adding the Chom Chom roller to your pet-tool arsenal. I once spent a crazy amount of time vacuuming pet hair off the furniture and carpets. But now I can get away with the occasional quick swipe to their favorite spots.

This thing is amazing. And it requires no refills like those tape rollers. (It’s more effective, too.) Seriously, just get it.

And this litter box robot that does all the work

When your cat gets a little older — and you are tired of cleaning the litter box — you will also want the Litter Robot. That thing has saved my sanity.

It’s expensive. And I’m cheap. But I have never been happier about spending money.

I’ll write a complete review of it soon. But the TLDR is:

It does all the work and the box is always clean and never smells. (It alerts your phone when you have to empty the bag. But that’s your only chore.)

The Litter-Robot 4 is the one to get. But you can get the slightly cheaper Litter-Robot 3 on Amazon.

When you purchase anything through links on this site, GeekGirlfriends.com sometimes earns a little money. It doesn’t cost you any extra, but you are making this content possible. We only recommend products that we own, have tried through the company’s review program, or covet. Thanks for your support.

The post The Best Squirt Gun for Training Kittens appeared first on Geek Girlfriends.

How to Capture Ideas So You Never Lose Them

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If you make a living — or your art — from ideas, you need an effective way to capture & store them

how to capture ideas

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I’m a working writer. A lot of people think this is some kind of dream job, impossible and exciting. That may be true for Stephen King. But the truth, from my point of view, is that I run a small business. I sell ideas. After I sell an idea, I either have a customer who buys more of them or I don’t. Ideas are my product. And they are slippery. Here is how to capture ideas.

I’m still here a couple of decades later. So my ideas sell and turn into customers often enough that I own a home, an investment property, and a car. I earn as much as most people with a day job, though nothing like Stephen King.

I’m not here to give writing advice, not today. But I am here to say that if ideas are your bread and butter, as they are mine, you need to treat them with respect. If ideas are your product – and this is true for most creatives – you need an effective way to capture, store, and inventory them. You need a system for keeping them fresh.

You might think, “I’ll never forget this great idea!” But everyone says that. When I was starting out, I said that. But you will forget. You have already forgotten some good ideas. It’s crucial to have a system that helps you store and remember every idea because one of the inescapable truths about ideas is that they always happen at an inopportune time.

I’ve developed a method to capture ideas effectively and revisit them on a cadence that keeps them fresh. It’s not hard.

Here’s how:

Step 1: Choose Your Tool

First, select a work management tool that suits your needs. There are many options available, such as Trello, Asana, OneNote, or Evernote. Or you could go analog and use a Bullet Journal or plain notebook. The tool you choose depends on your workload, level of comfort with technology, and the volume of ideas you plan to generate. You can change your mind and move up to a more robust tool at any time.

My tool of choice is ClickUp

I use ClickUp. If you are a freelance writer, here because you keep losing track of ideas and landed here looking for how to capture ideas, that’s the one you want. If your work is fast-paced and you want a tool you will always have in your pocket, this is the one to get. All of these tools are good. But many don’t understand how necessary the calendar is to my work.

Whether your work requires you to visualize it in time – because of deadlines – or space — because you schedule things based on where they are on a map, it is the best — the only — tool that does these things well.

It also offers a free version that allows you to do most things and, when you are ready to level up, purchase a single seat.

Most of the other tools – except Evernote, which is too chaotic for me — see themselves as serving software developers. They put lots of emphasis on working with a team. They don’t sell a single seat at a price that’s reasonable for a solo worker. I work alone, sometimes collaborating with clients. After using almost every other tool, I now use Clickup. It is perfect for me because it is simple to use but can get very complex and granular. Not only does it have beautiful internal calendar tools — my work is all tied to deadlines — but it also integrates seamlessly with my Google calendar.

Step 2: Create a Dedicated Space

how to capture ideas

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In whatever tool you have chosen, create a dedicated space for ideas. This could be a specific board in Trello, a project in Asana, a notebook in Evernote, or a section in your bullet journal.

In ClickUp, I created a Space to capture ideas. Or, rather, I have several spaces in ClickUp. Every client or project has an idea space. I also have a general “Ideas” space for ideas that don’t fit into any current projects.

This might seem a chaotic way to go about it. But here’s why I do it this way: When a client asks me for ideas, I can find those that are specific to their needs in a few clicks.

I can’t tell you how many times this has made me look like a genius. I’m on a call with a client, for example, who tends to always have a plan, rarely asking me for ideas. Usually, they ask me to execute an idea that fits an SEO goal, feature set, or a concept the CEO wants to explain. But today, all of a sudden, they say, “We need ideas!” A few clicks later, I’m spewing fully formed ideas that came to me in a moment of creative energy. I might be tired, tapped out from a day of writing, or under-caffeinated. But I can still generate excellent ideas — because I keep them on ice.

Where you put your idea space should reflect you and your work. If you are a novelist and have ideas that suit a variety of genres, maybe create spaces for Romance, Mystery, and Thriller. If you are a feature writer, maybe your spaces are organized around a beat area or publication. If you are an inventor, perhaps your ideas are organized around use case.

Step 3: Make It a Habit

how to capture ideas

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Make it a habit to record your ideas as soon as soon they come to you. This is where a lot of people fail at this. Ideas come at awkward times. Capture them anyway.

If you are at a bar having drinks with some friends and conversation sparks an idea, pull out your phone and write it down. (This is another reason I use a digital system, with an app, instead of a notebook.)

Maybe you are thinking that sounds rude. But there is a way to do this that isn’t. I do it all the time. Someone says something that sparks an idea, I pull out my phone, open the ClickUp app, look my dinner partner right in the eye, and say, “That gave me the best idea!”

Then I write it down – or voice record it so they know what my idea is – and make my idea capture system part of the party. People will think you are rude if you drop them and start looking at your phone but they are usually thrilled to be an inspiration. If you are thinking they will steal your idea if you do this, I assure you they won’t. They will forget it because they didn’t write it down!

Step 4: Regularly Review Your Ideas

a woman working in bed

Photo by Ron Lach on Pexels.com

Capturing ideas is a great start. But if they end up gathering dust in an idea warehouse, it won’t do you much good. So before I put my phone down, in the bar or wherever I jot the idea down, I attach a due date to that idea.

The next time I’m at my desk, my daily plan in ClickUp will show me that idea.

This is the moment when I refine it, file it with the right client or idea space, and – this is very important – put it on a regularly recurring reminder. If the idea is so genius that I want to implement it STAT. I might set it to remind me of its existence every day. More likely, once a month is enough.

In a month (or a day, week, or whatever), when I have completely forgotten that idea, it lands on my daily plan. Some time has passed so I can see it more clearly. Sometimes, I tick it done because I have no time or energy for it. Other times, I refine it, add to it, and see how it might fit into a project or plan I’m working on.

If it is a piece of fiction or a story like this one, I might spend a few minutes building it out by writing a lead or an outline or jotting some ideas. People take coffee breaks, right? I take little breaks like this from whatever I’m working on to add to an idea that feels interesting to me at that moment. Then I tick it done and let it land on my daily plan another day.

I have written articles, novellas, and full works of fiction this way – sandwiched in among my paying work. (I wrote this post using this system.)

When that idea seed shows up in my day, and I tend it, it grows.

Eventually, that seed gets too big for a ClickUp task and I move it to a Word file. But I let those reminders continue, with a note about where the file is now. It is very easy to forget a half-written story. These reminders encourage me to go work on it again, even for a few minutes.

When you purchase anything through links on this site, GeekGirlfriends.com sometimes earns a little money. It doesn’t cost you any extra, but you are making this content possible. We only recommend products that we own, have tried through the company’s review program, or covet. Thanks for your support.

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