Surviving on eBay

My eBay store offers numerous opportunities for obtaining survival equipment. Supplies never dwindle. A never-ending stream of knives, food, clothing, and accoutrement intended to assist with the art of survival can always be ordered.

Shop until the world ends: after that you probably won't have an Internet connection. Stock up on crucial gear before society collapses upon itself and major cities dwindle into chaos. You may find yourself hunkered down in your custom-built bunker refurbished from a 1960's era missile silo or running for your life across a burned-out cityscape as slavering zombies trudge behind. Either scenario obligates copious amounts of gear. Get your gear here.

When you find yourself on the run from zombie hordes or unable to find your car in The Mall of America parking lot, you probably need a survival knife. This tool provides numerous whittling opportunities to while away the tedious hours waiting for rescue. It's a low-tech time killer. You can't play Angry Birds on it but you certainly can make birds angry.

Two general types of knives persist: fixed blade and folding. The latter includes a specially designed hinge allowing the blade to tuck into the handle. The former requires a sheath or similar contrivance in order to avoid an inevitable slicing off of necessary appendages by the possessor.

Look for a serrated blade, also known as a dentated, sawtooth, or toothed blade, when making sawing cuts becomes necessary. A plain blade, on the other hand, offers greater control for making slicing cuts through softer materials. For example, deploy your serrated edge to attack the scabby hand of a rampaging zombie thrust through the kitchen door of your abandoned farmhouse. Apply your plain edged knife for gently peeling an apple during brief periods of respite as the zombies regroup in the back yard.

Inevitably, unless the end of the world wraps up before lunch, you will need to eat. Survival-type food typically arrives in air-tight containers designed to maintain relative freshness into the following millennium. Opening these packages provides much-needed anaerobic exercise. The functionality of a good survival knife becomes even more important.

Survivors parsimoniously parse out servings of dehydrated unrecognizable concoctions. It's not the commissary in the US Congress, but nor is it dumpster diving.

Look for a wide variety of food-based products that will amuse your tired palate until society rebuilds itself and a new McDonald's arises on every corner. Eating the same thing for every meal quickly becomes boring. Variety is the spice of survival.

Don't plan to wait out the apocalypse sans clothing. Invest in a few stylish yet functional outfits that will separate you from the general rabble trying to break into your bunker. Look for tops and bottoms with numerous and voluminous pockets: you can never have too many pockets. Unexpected zombie forays into your compound leave little time to pack up all that you hold dear: keep your pockets fully stocked with survival knives and survival food.

Such clothing is not stylish. Don't expect to win the catwalk battle, just the survival battle. No front-page feature articles in Vogue will be in your future, hopefully no Vogue will be in anyone's future anyway. The annual Soldier of Fortune swimsuit issue does remain a possibility, if you can maintain your figure despite living on dehydrated peas and lard.

When the world ends, electricity won't simply come out of the wall anymore. Creating your own electricity from readily available resources will become a desirable skill. This skill will make you a valuable part of your commune and will set you apart from survivors who no longer have any marketable skills, such as insurance salesmen and politicians.

A generator that generates from wind or water would be a really cool thing to have squirreled away in your survival hut. Sure, it's tempting to stock up on luscious Pringles, but give careful consideration to using that storage space for one or more generators and backup generators. A wind-driven generator will get you through those seemingly interminable days when the zombies have you surrounded and your cable TV is down for what seems like the hundredth time. Wind is free, even if society rebuilds itself into a totalitarian dictatorship.

After food, water, and Oprah, shelter is a necessity for survival. All the dehydrated Pringles in the world are no fun at all if you have to eat them in a driving rainstorm under a radioactive cardboard box. Plan to be prepared.

Hopefully your post-apocalyptic plans include a fully furnished mountain lair with 6-foot thick concrete walls and the complete collection of Seinfeld DVDs. Should unwelcome guests overrun your vacation home, be prepared to subsist in a temporary shelter until you can reclaim what is rightfully yours. Tuck an emergency blanket into a survival pocket of your cargo pants.

Mylar provides a warm and dry personal environment while taking up very little space when folded. The amazing natural properties of Mylar were unknown to the ancient Mayans, or we'd all be speaking Spanish today. Wrap yourself in a shiny silver sheet of Mylar and imagine that you just finished the New York Marathon. We all need a little down time, even at the end of the world.

Even today, people are surviving. You can watch them. The Discovery Channel is replete with folks surviving on camera. Men, men and men, and men and women combine for survival episodes that fit neatly into 30 minute segments. Benefit from their experience by stocking up on survival books that they wrote by the light of campfires started with old copies of TV Guide.

Plan to deploy paper-based books in the event that your Kindle batteries expire. Share your love of books with your closest friends and family members so everyone has a fighting chance to contribute something useful to your mini-society. Insurance salesmen and politicians will obviously need to be retrained.

When all seems hopeless, deploy a strategic can of Pringles to buoy the morale of your clan. Nothing boosts droopy attitudes when facing the end of the world like the world's most perfect snack food. Thankfully, my eBay store stocks a rainbow of Pringles flavors and portion sizes.

Never suffer from salt deprivation again. Simply ingest a few cans of Pringles, any flavor, and enjoy a salt rush only rivaled by a garbage bag-sized serving of popcorn from a movie theater. There will be no movie theaters following the end of the world.

Unlike dehydrated seeds or dehydrated water, Pringles never expire. Lay in a few hundred cases of cartons and rest assured that they will remain crunchily fresh far beyond the expected useful life of your Quonset hut.

Planting and tending a garden will be one of the top 3 activities after society has collapsed upon itself and grocery stores stop offering double coupons. Sentient humans who would otherwise contribute no productive value to civilization, such as sitcom writers and insurance salesmen, will convert to agrarian aficionados.

Sowing survival seeds cannot be accomplished without a steady supply of appropriate seeds: my eBay store offers a cornucopia of such potential produce. Look no further for packets of tiny biological entities that will eventually grow into carrots, peas, olives, tomatoes, and pomegranates. Don't expect the Home Depot to maintain sufficient levels of seedage once the world ends.