There is a rumor that may be more true than not that some political interests may have your interests at heart, or not. One of them is if you are a hoarder of food you may be considered an enemy of the state, whatever that may be.

Therefore it might be worth while to know if a body is a "prepper" or a "hoarder".

At first glance a body may consider both of them of similar meaning and automatically "assume" (you do know what assume means, no?) that if you are storing food and every other "needful thing" for any potential catastrophe is a hoarder.

But first, why would a body want to store food and other needful things for a potential catastrophe? Does it not make sense to be as the scouts motto says, "Be Prepared"? And does it not say elsewhere that, "If you are prepared you shall not fear/worry"?

It seems to only make sense to prepare yourself for any unplanned eventualities. What could some of those be in this day and age? Perhaps earthquakes, tornadoes, hurricanes, power outages, heavy snow falls, flooding and others that a body could designate as being of Divine origin.

And then there could be a thing called man made disaster like terrorist actions.

Do you know most folks have to go shopping almost every day and sometime several times a day to get goods for a meal. Can you imagine the hardship and bind these folks would be in if they could not access the grocery store for a week?

They may not starve, but they may get a wee bit gaunt by the time the highway is cleared or the power back on or the flood water recedes enough to get there.

It is in the middle of the winter and an ice storm hits and all the power lines go down for miles around or a huge transformer bites the dust and all the power is down not for a day or three but for weeks or months.

What would become of all those folks who depend on electricity to heat their homes, heat their water, cook their food? A sad place to be for sure.

Any one of these events by themselves or coupled together could be devastating.

Now back to prepper vs hoarder. By definition a hoarder is a compulsive maniac who cannot help themselves.

They will hoard anything from strings to empty cardboard boxes to barbie dolls or anything else the mind can conceive of that someone thinks of in a sick way they cannot live without.

You see them on TV all the time. You cannot even walk through their house for want of even a trail.

The news had a story the other day of one couple who were in a back room when a pile of boxes fell on them and they could not get out. It was several days before they were found and rescued.

That is sick and destructive and compulsive behavior and they could be considered an enemy of the state.

However, a prepper is not a hoarder but one who is organized and knows what they have and it is used on a regular basis. If food it is rotated to keep the fresh stock at the back and older stock being used up.

They are storing in a logical and orderly manner supplies for a time of need, like when the lights go out.

If this should happen in the middle of the night a good dependable flashlight might be a good thing to be able to lay your hands on. Or a thing called a radio dynamo so you can find out how long you just might be without power so you can get that generator fired up you bought for just such a situation.

Speaking of flashlights, there has been some massive improvements made in their design in the past few years. Flashlights use to burn through batters and bulbs about as fast you could replace them.

God forbid you be in the belly of a whale and drop your light and have the bulb blink out on you.

Now days there is a new LED Flashlights with LED bulbs that last and last and will not burn out like the incandescent bulbs will and they will not run the batteries down withing a few minutes of turning them on.

This might be considered a needful and necessary thing for any family to have several on hand in case of an emergency power outage.

It is doubtful a hoarder would have several generators on hand but a prepper might have one in case of an extended power outage. He might also have converted his home to passive solar energy or equipped it with a windmill or both and turned the switch off to the grid all together.

A prepper may have a seventy-two hour bug-out kit in his car and truck and at the office or place of work and have one for each member of his family. You know, just in case they need to leave for a few days or are on the road and get lost in a snow storm or the vehicle becomes disabled in some remote area.

To have something on hand that will help to sustain life and limb until help can find them.

So, in conclusion, which are you? A "prepper" or a "hoarder"? If you are neither one perhaps it is time, with current events being what they are, to start becoming a "prepper". Start making a list and checking it twice for every needful thing you may need in any given circumstance you can think of.

Get several flashlights on hand to start with and have them around the house where you can lay your hands on them at a moments and keep fresh batteries in them as needed. And a few more batteries on hand close to them.

And while you are at it, it may be a good idea to have one of those fancy dynamo radios. You know the kind that has a flashlight built in and generates it own power with a hand crank and will pick up weather channels.

You just might want to know what is going on in the outside world when all of those fancy electric stereos don't work any longer.