The Survival Weekly Dispatch - Volume 12, Issue 52
Hey folks, thanks for checking out the newsletter. This is obviously the last one of 2025. I truly appreciate each of you for allowing me to take up a little bit of space in your head from time to time. I’ll always try to make it worth your while.
I’ve been trying to wrap up a few more deadlines before the end of the year, as well as make some plans for 2026. For the next few weeks, my primary focus is going to be on a book I need to turn in by mid-February. I’m behind where I wanted to be by now, so I have a little catching up to do.
Looking back over 2025, I’m mostly happy with the work I got done. Lots of writing, some of it even fairly decent. I was able to break into a few new markets, which is great. But the magazine world continues to shrink, which is disappointing. Not much I can do about it, but it’s frustrating.
As you make your own plans for 2026, be sure to include some fun. It’s good for you. Nobody ever hit their death bed upset that they didn’t spend enough time working.
For the last several years, we’ve made it a New Year’s Eve tradition to hang out at home and build LEGO sets while listening to music or having some movies playing. We eat a bunch of snacks along the way, then toast to bring in the new year.
May you all have a fun and safe New Year’s Eve.
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Sheboygan County, Wisconsin, is a couple hours from where I live, so this wasn’t a situation that came anywhere near affecting me personally. But, it’s yet another example why it’s important to have plans in place for emergency evacuation.
Around 11:30PM Christmas night, residents in Beechwood, Wisconsin, were ordered to evacuate due to a gas leak at a natural gas facility in the area. They were told to go to the fire department, which I presume was due to it being a small affected population.
Thankfully, they got the leak under control quickly and the evacuation order was lifted less than an hour later. However, what if things had gone south? Let’s say the leak led to an explosion that at least some homes in the area. If you lived in one of those houses, your evacuation might last a bit longer than an hour.
You need to have three things accounted for in your evacuation plans.
1) Where you’re going to go.
2) How you’re going to get there.
3) What you’re going to grab on the way out the door.
If you cannot confidently answer all three of those questions, get to work.
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A few reasons why Backwoods Survival Guide is awesome:
1) It’s nearly 30% thicker than competing titles on the shelf.
2) Zero ads, all content.
3) Articles written by pros who live this lifestyle and who know how to teach the skills.
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There’s a great article here from Michael Janich on how to use a small knife for self-defense. Janich is a true legend in the defense world and really knows his stuff.
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One of my plans for 2026 is to sort of revamp how I consume and use social media. I’ve come to realize that I spend far more time with it than I should, given the overall signal to noise ratio. With that in mind, on Facebook I’ll be moving virtually all preparedness content to my Real World Prepping page.
I’ll be ramping up my Instagram content, adding videos as well as a lot more posts. If you’re active on IG, feel free to follow me there.
Substack, X, and Bluesky will mostly be links to new articles and other content that is posted online.
This newsletter will continue as it’s been for the last couple of years, prepping tips and info combined with recaps of my work and such.
The overall goal with these changes is to concentrate on doing meaningful work instead of getting caught up in static, noise, and nonsense.
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My latest article for GearJunkie is about the Pack Mule from Kershaw Knives. Here’s the link to the review.
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My good friend Craig Caudill from Nature Reliance School did a video recently on a 14lb survival kit he put together. After seeing it, Wendell Adams at The Prepared Wanderer did his own version. Both videos are excellent and have some great info. Be sure to check them out.
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Our hike over the weekend was a stroll through a few trails at Bigfoot Beach State Park in Lake Geneva, Wisconsin. In the last couple of years, they’ve done quite a bit of work expanding their trail system. Unfortunately, they’ve put zero work into updating their trail maps, so it can be a bit confusing when you’re trying to get from Point A to Point B. During our wandering, we came across this little fort.
Survival Tip — Where to Begin?
One of the most common questions I see posted in the various survival/prepper FB groups is some variation of, “Where do I start?” What follows is not THE answer, it is just MY answer. I’m quite certain there will be people who disagree. That’s cool, to each their own.
Among the first priorities should be:
1) Financial security – Get out of debt and stay there. Build up an emergency fund. Do what you can to bring in extra cash you can put towards your goals.
2) Get in shape – The healthier you are, the easier you’ll be able to withstand extra stress, avoid illness, and just generally have an easier time of it. Work on cardio as well as weight training, within whatever limitations you may have.
3) Figure out water – Nobody has ever come through a disaster or crisis and been upset at having too much potable water available. Store some and have a plan for acquiring more, along with being able to filter/purify it.
Now, don’t take that to mean that you can’t do anything else until you’ve accomplished those steps, that’s not what this is about. But you can’t do everything all at once, you need to have some prioritization. Those three steps are, I feel, the most important and yet most often overlooked. And those first two will be beneficial pretty much no matter what the future brings.
You can work on all three while you’re also exploring your options for food storage, defense capabilities, and the other fun and sexy stuff.
Backwoods Survival Guide Magazine
For those new to my little corner of the Internet, I am the Editor in Chief for Backwoods Survival Guide magazine. Here is the cover for the current issue available in stores right now.
You can find Backwoods Survival Guide just about anywhere magazines are sold, including:
Walmart
Publix
Walgreens
Rite Aid
CVS
Tractor Supply
Fleet Farm
Barnes & Noble
Questions, Comments, Complaints, Concerns?
I am always just an email away - jim@survivalweekly.com.
As always, very useful content. Thanks, Jim.