Preparedness

Preparedness is a concept that I have been thinking about a lot lately, especially with all of the recent uncontrollable natural disasters.  The most important question is simply, "Are you prepared?"  however the other side of that question is, "What is preparedness?"

I am attempting to separate out the various arenas of preparedness.  I am not talking about being prepared for slight changes in the weather, or being prepared for a job interview.  I am mostly talking about survivalism in the face of sudden catastrophic disaster.  Something along the lines of a nuclear war, I suppose.  In this instance, there are a few key areas that I think I should consider, and maybe try to improve on.

Mental Acuity
Strength
Endurance
Orienteering
General Usable Skills
Hunting/Trapping
Cooking
Water

So let's just start at the top, and try to describe each one.  Then, I will try to come up with a series of questions that should give you an idea of where you fall in the spectrum of preparedness, as observed by myself.  I am not talking about becoming the ultimate warrior, so most of the markers that I am creating are applicable to both men and women.

Mental Acuity
This is your ability to analyze a situation and come to a logical and rational conclusion.  You don't need to be trained in most areas of survivalism if you are just a generally sharp person who can use rules of science and logic to figure out a problem.  Additionally, this also encompasses your ability to keep a calm head during times of extreme distress.  If you lose it, and start acting like a fool, you will certainly die.
Can you use science and rational thinking to examine a situation?

 Strength
Quite frankly, strength will be extremely necessary if you find yourself suddenly thrust into the wilderness.  There may be situations in which you have to be able to pull yourself up off of a cliff.  Or maybe a boulder has rolled on to a companion, and you need to be able to move it.  Now, some lack of strength can be offset by intelligence (lever and pulley systems), but there may still be situations in which you have to act immediately and with great strength.
Can you do 15 chin ups?
Can you lift a two foot diameter boulder off of the ground?
Can you press at least 135 pounds over head? 


Endurance
This would be the other half of the athletic spectrum.  All the strength in the world will prove itself quickly useless if you suddenly need to run far and fast.  I think that this domain is obvious, as many natural predators may be willing to chase you for more than a mile.  Additionally, in the event of something like an erupting volcano, you may just need to flee.  I suppose it is true that if a predator that is wildly faster than you (think cheetah) is coming upon you, you're sort of screwed.  But if you're being chased by a group of roving cannibals or something, you may stand a chance if you can respond affirmatively to the following questions.
Can you run 6 miles without stopping?
Can you run 6 miles without water?
Can you climb a 30 foot rock face?
bonus: Can you run 100 meters in under 15 seconds?

Orienteering
Orienteering is really the ability to use a map and a compass to determine your location and a route to get where you want to go.  In the case of a sudden disaster though, I assume that you won't have a local map and a compass on you, so this is more about the ability to use geographic landmarks and astronomical figures to determine your bearing and present location.
Can you draw a rough topographical map of everything within sight?

General Usable Skills
This encompasses all areas of survivalism that you ought to know beforehand, instead of trying to figure out on the fly with your mental acuity.  Things such as how to use available materials to braid a rope, how to create an arrow head, and how to carve a spear using rocks.  In the event of complete societal collapse, this may expand to include simple things such as how to build a chair, or dig a latrine. 
Can you braid a 15 foot rope using grass and plants?
Can you create a temporary shelter using found wood?

Hunting/Trapping
This one is pretty obvious.  If you find yourself living in wilderness, you'll need to be able to acquire food.  You can get by for a while by foraging berries and edible plants (although, if you don't know how to choose edible plants, you can get yourself in trouble quickly), but eventually you will need to hunt or trap some game.  Some of the other areas come in to play here as well, as you will probably need a spear or boomerang type thing in order to hunt.
Can you track game?
Can you accurately throw a boomerang device?
Can you create a trap for small game?


Cooking
If you manage to capture yourself an animal, do you know how to make it ready to eat?  Some of cooking will depend on the availability of water.  In the greater Phoenix-Tucson area, you can mostly assume that you won't have a great supply of water, so you'll have to cook everything on fire (instead of boiling). 
Can you gut and dress an animal?
Can you build a fire using natural materials?

Water
Without water, you will die.  Relatively quickly, too.  There is a certain art to finding water in the desert, or maybe even in a place like a tropical island.  On an island that gets rain, but does not have any real lakes or rivers, you  will have to look first for plants that are designed to capture rain water in their leaves.  If you can't find that, then you better know how to convert salt water to fresh water without the benefit of fire (assuming you don't know how to make a fire, or don't have a vessel to boil water in).  There is a cool distilling method that involves one large tub with salt water, a small cup standing up in the middle of that water, and then a plastic sheet over the top of all of that with a small rock directly over the cup.  You end up creating a very humid type atmosphere inside, and fresh water will condense on the ceiling plastic.  Then, it will congregate and roll in towards the middle (due to the weight of the rock), and ultimately will drip in to the cup in the middle.  Additionally, if the island gets rain, you can use certain obvious capture methods (mental acuity comes into play again).  In the desert, finding water is significantly more difficult, and requires some basic common sense.  The only hint I'll give you is you find a wash.  After that, you're either going to be hiking forever, or digging forever.  Your choice.  There are also a certain few plants that can save you from immediate lack of water death, but I wouldn't count on them as a major source of water supply.
Can you find or make water?

More later...