Glen Tate - 299 Days - The Preparation

The lower bond rating had another devastating effect on the economy. The U.S. would need to raise the interest it paid on its bonds much, much higher to entice investors. Interest on the bonds had always been a percent or two. Now it might be 5%, 10%, or higher.

This meant the U.S. had to pay more (in inflated, made-up dollars) to borrow money. This added fuel to the inflation fire. It also meant the amount of interest people in the U.S. paid would go way up. Many private loans for houses and other things were based on the U.S. bond interest rate; when it went up, so did interest on mortgages, credit cards, and everything else. This alone would grind the economy to a halt.

The stock market crashed about five minutes after the announcement of the second bond downgrade. The downgrade, coupled with the fact that the U.S. Government had basically lost control of its Southern border, led to a massive sell off. The stock market went down 900 points before trading was suspended. Gold went up 50% in about ten minutes. People were in a full panic.

Grant had long ago written off his 401(k). He knew those investments would be worthless; he just wished that Lisa had realized it. Right then, in those few moments after Grant heard the news on the radio, a good chunk of the Matsons’ life savings had just been wiped out. Exactly like he knew it would. It was weird. His reaction was a big, fat “I told you so” instead of the horror of losing his life savings. He had known this was coming with such certainty that he had long ago gotten over the anger at potentially losing his savings.

Grant kept telling himself not to gloat. Telling Lisa “I told you so” would only make her more angry. He needed her to view him as resource, not an enemy. He would be asking her to do things she didn’t want to do in the next few hours, days, and months. He needed her on his team. Besides, being a dick and saying, “I told you so” wouldn’t get their money back.

There was that warm joy again. He had food, a secure place out in the country, guns, and a network of trusted people with skills. They would probably be fine. At least, compared to others. The rest of the country wouldn’t be, but a few people like him would be.

Besides — here came that rush of the warm joy — this had to happen. Things couldn’t keep going on like they had been. Grant didn’t want all the bad things to happen to the mostly innocent people out there, but he knew that it was the only way things would change. Those people had their chance over and over again to stop living like they were. To stop taking the easy way out. To stop looking the other way as other people’s rights were taken away. To stop spending money they didn’t have.

Grant thought about the people who sat back and let all this happen. Grant tried to explain to them what would happen, but they wouldn’t listen. They thought he and others warning of a collapse were crazy.

“People get what they deserve,” Grant finally said out loud in the car. He felt guilty for thinking it, but he couldn’t deny his sentiment.

It was time to activate the preparation plans. He had already developed two basic plans: one for an immediate crisis like an earthquake, and another for things that would take a few days, or even weeks, to fully unfold. This was a slowly developing crisis.

Given that there was some time to get the final touches put together, there was no need to freak out and start loading guns. That would only scare Lisa and might get him a visit from the Olympia police. No need for that. Stick to the plan, he told himself.

Since he had plenty of supplies out at the cabin, his plan centered on convincing Lisa that they needed to go out there. She wouldn’t see any need to go right away. She’d think it was just some dip in the stock market. That happens all the time. Why run off to the countryside over that?

Grant thought about how Lisa would be reacting to this so he could tailor the best approach to fit her concerns. She would not want Grant to overreact; that would be her primary concern. This was no big deal, she would think. The stock market was just having a “correction.” It sucked to lose the money, of course, but the stock market would come back. OK, play the hand you’ve been dealt, Grant thought. Be supportive of her.

Grant thought about Lisa’s level of awareness of the situation to decide how to convince her based on that. She did not know how bad things really were. That was probably better for her, given how angrily she reacted to his “doom and gloom.” He needed to break it to her slowly; there was no sense overwhelming her.

He called her on her cell phone at work. She answered right away, which wasn’t always the case because she worked in the ER.

“Have you heard about the stock market?” he asked.

“No,” she said, wondering why he was calling her at work.

“Did it go up?”

He told her what had happened. Not the part about the bond rating being lowered. Not yet, at least. He was in supportive husband mode right now.

“I’m calling to see if there is anything you think we should do right away,” he said. “I’m not suggesting we sell all our stocks, which we couldn’t do anyway, given that the market has shut down, but just wanted to see how you wanted to approach this together. I’m at work, but can do things like move money around if you need me to.”

He was sure that Lisa was relieved that Mr. Gloom and Doom, who had said a few years ago that this would happen, wasn’t saying “I told you so” or freaking out about buying gold now when the price was so high. He knew that she appreciated that he wanted to work together to determine whether to move money around various funds instead of preaching at her.

“No,” Lisa said, “I can’t think of anything we need to do. It will work out.”

“See you tonight at home, dear,” Grant said, being the supportive and non-overreacting husband that he was.

Grant got into his car and proceeded to “overreact.” He went out to invest in something as valuable as gold; actually, something more valuable than gold. He headed to Cash n’ Carry.

He wasn’t the only one who had the idea to go to Cash n’ Carry. The parking lot was full, but it wasn’t a mob scene. It was just a busy shopping day. Most of the world was still oblivious, unaware of what was likely to happen. They were going about their day wondering who would win whatever stupid reality show they watched that night. Grant hated to have such elitist thoughts — he had always thought of himself as a regular guy, a country boy — but he couldn’t help but think how much of the population was utterly stupid about all of this. He hated thinking it, but the evidence supported that conclusion. For example, the Cash n’ Carry parking lot was not full after all of this news.

It was an interesting cross section of humanity at Cash n’ Carry. Some people, like Grant, were well dressed professionals. There were older, middle-aged, and younger people. Lots of kids in tow. Lots of immigrants. It seemed that many immigrants owned restaurants and got their supplies at Cash n’ Carry. There were also what appeared to be members of religious sects. Some of the women there, who had about a zillion kids, donned bonnets and wore dresses straight out of the old West. They looked like the people rescued from a polygamist compound or Amish sect that had permission to drive cars to Cash n’ Carry. Grant didn’t know what religion they were, but they definitely were not the average suburbanites.

All the preppers in the store assumed they were the only ones in a panic stocking up on food. They didn’t want to tip off the others about what they were up to. They were trying to leave the impression that it was just another shopping errand, but they weren’t acting like it. They had big carts and were throwing fifty pound bags of rice and beans in them without thinking. They didn’t have shopping lists.