Remember all that Y2K hype that computers would crash and kill us all? Well it never happened, but many people prepared for it anyway. Given world events, some of us are ready again.
Kawhidoyoucare asked Y2K survivors: What was the most radical action someone you know did to prepare for the "apocalypse?"
Submissions have been edited for clarity, context, and profanity.
10. When you need barrels of food.
I worked for Sam's Club during that time. Y2K was really, really good for business there.
I know a guy who stockpiled a few hundred pounds of rice and beans.
Four months after Y2K
"So what are we having for dinner tonight, Dad?"
"You know exactly what we're having."
"...god damn it."
9. Back to the old fashioned way.
I worked for a newspaper. We basically did everything twice the day before, and we were prepared to essentially typeset and prep the newspaper manually if the sh*t hit the fan so we could get info out. It sounds simple, but it was a ridiculous amount of work to prepare for.
We basically did everything twice the day before,
Please tell me you made two different front pages:
Y2K A Y2ZERO: EVERYTHING NORMAL
and
CIVILIZATION COLLAPSES: CITY PLUNGED INTO DARK AGES
8. Might as well go out happy.
Girlfriend was working at a grocery store. Apparently one old guy came in and bought like ridiculous amounts of molasses, and, iirc, peanut butter. Definitely sure about the molasses, though. It would keep you alive, I guess!
Blackstrap molasses prevents scuuurrvvyyyy
It doesn't, really, but it is Rich in b vitamins and they used to give it in sailor's rations when they were trying to figure out how to prevent scurvy.
7. Legit though.
My aunt stocked up on Hot Pockets. Apparently that's all you need.
Haha! I know a lady who filled a deep freeze with a year's worth of frozen food. She didn't even have a generator.
6. Setting up a barter system.
My aunt and uncle bought an entire ton of shredded wheat. Their church assigned each family something to get so that they could all share and support each other during the fallout, and that's what they had. They ate shredded wheat for breakfast for many, many years after that
Edit: apparently I remembered wrong! I told my parents about this this morning and they said my aunt and uncle actually bought wheat berries that they had to grind themselves. They still have the grinder too.
Why didn't the church just get everyone to divide up what they'd stockpiled anyway? Or get people to donate some of it to the food pantry? Or organise a delivery to other food banks/homeless shelters? Or literally one million other things that would have actually been useful.
They probably had some nice regular bowel movements though
Those are important during the collapse of civilization.
5. Free is always good.
We lived in the mountains, and in the last couple of years before Y2K several pepper families moved in to our neighborhood. We're talking ammunition bunkers, panic rooms and cellars full of food.
After nothing happened lots of them ended up giving away barrels of food because it turns out they didn't want to eat rice and beans for every meal if there wasn't actually going to be an apocalypse. We ate for free for years!
Tobias and Moriah Capsaicin and their children, Adam, Ruger, Winchester, Smith, Wesson, Mary, Matthew, Mark, Luke, John, Timothy, Revelations, and Hygrh (short for "How'd-you-get-red-hair").
I love how after they exhausted their favorite gun brands THEN they went to the Gospels.
4. Overtime at a crisis hotline.
My dad worked in customer service for a telecommunication company. He got paid double time and a half for working overtime on a holiday to reassure customers that their systems will still be working on January 1st.
Double time and a half is the best! Well at least the pay check afterwards is.
3. Not everyone bought into the hype.
I grew up in England and all I remember from my late teens on this issue is that most people seemed to laugh about it and not take it seriously at all, which is quite reflective of my general recollection of growing up in England. I went to a sleepover at a friend's house and we just sat outside and waited for it while eating toast. When nothing happened we went to bed.
The most interesting nugget I do remember about some crackpot millennium panic was the former Argentina and Real Mallorca goalkeeper Carlos Roa who abruptly quit his career because he was convinced the world was going to end. As far as I remember he just dropped off the map and went to live in the mountains somewhere in South America. When it didn't end in Armageddon, he scuttled back out to his team but his career didn't quite hit the same heights. His story is interesting and you can look it up.
I was 13 in Finland and the general attitude was pretty much the same.
Worst case scenario, some people might get their next salaries a little late due to minor computer problems, but that's it.
Except this one a bit nutty guy in our village who boasted how he filled his sauna with sugar bags. Nothing but sugar.
He was certain that when all goes to sh!t he'll become super rich selling the sugar, which would become a rare luxury.
2. Whoops.
I was college aged back then, a friend of mine dropped out of school his parents were paying for b/c..."whats the point? y2k is happening".
The day came and went. He was out of school. Parents were pissed and no longer wanted to pay his way. Haven't been back to that area is years, but last time I went, he was the manager of a roller skating rink.
1. What more could you do? Oh..
We installed a patch on our home pc so the clock wouldn't roll back to 1900!
I manually reset my roommates computer to 1900 because he ate my leftovers.
