Saul Goodman - Get Off the Grid! - Saul Goodman's Guide to Staying Off the Radar

The bug-out bag, for example: what harm is it to order one today then pop it under the bed, or in the back of the closet? Sure, you might be in the middle of a move years from now, find it, and laugh at your paranoia, but an asteroid might drop on the closest major city tomorrow. If that happens, everyone squiring shih tzus and toddlers through the suburbs in their compact SUVs will be screwed, but you’ll be the smart one with a few days’ supply of food, water purifying tablets, and a cozy mylar blanket tucked into a pack on your back.

Most folks aren’t worried about an actual dinosaur destroyer of an asteroid, though—they’re worried about whatever figurative asteroid of trouble might be shooting their way. Whatever sinks your boat, I hope you’re ready with a life vest and some dried apricots.

There’s always a roadblock somewhere.Let’s say you’ve done just about everything right, so far. You carefully picked out a dead guy or gal and copped their birth certificate. You quietly acquired a state-issued identification card. Then let’s say you locked down lodging—perhaps a weekly hotel to start, paid for in cash or with a pre-paid debit card. You are on your way. Maybe you’re at a point where you’re focused on laying down a firmer foundation in your new home. The kind of thing that takes a little time and attention.

Here’s where I hit you with a little bit of cold water: Roadblocks. Actual real ones and a few mental speed bumps as well.

Here’s a scenario, a very simple one. Say you’ve settled into innocuous, out-of-the-way neighborhood X on the outskirts of middle-of-nowhere town B. Very good place to disappear. Maybe you’ve been living under your new name for several months and have grown… comfortable. Anyone would. No, you’re not letting your guard down. Digitally, you’ve completely left your old online persona behind. You have a landline phone under your new name and you’ve made sure that number’s unlisted. If you were an author, you’d fall somewhere between “Salinger” and “Pynchon” on the publicity scale.

One morning, you wake up feeling pretty good and want to celebrate with a half-dozen donuts. Just because you’ve taken on a new name and identity doesn’t mean you have to lay low and hide in your darkened split-level ranch all the time, right?

You head into town to get your Homer Simpson on—and when you come back, you’re met by a blockade at the only road leading into your neighborhood. There you are, carrying a driver’s license that the first friendly officer who stops your ride might examine carefully for signs of fraudulence.

If the roadblock is for a certain criminal element known to reside near you (drug dealer, wanted felon who happened to live one street over, etc.) it may be no big deal! Quick glance, the appropriate hologram burned into the ID’s plastic coating, and you’re good to go. You’re not what’s on the menu today.

But then again, what if you’re not waved right along? No matter what you’ve heard about duty-sworn officers of the law, most of them are not easily nor readily swayed by a half-dozen donuts. Hell, not even a full dozen. You may well be boned after you’ve only just begun, my friend. The most innocuous irritation—a routine checkpoint meant to roust one lone weed dealer—can potentially trip you up.

And here we come to that cold, hard catch-22 about life off the grid: just because you’re paranoid doesn’t mean they’re not out to get you.

So: the house you found to rent from a landlord who didn’t care about background-checking you because you had the cash to offer up front? The one in a neighborhood with a one-road entrance? Who the hell normally plans around that kind of thing? No one but criminals and volcanologists. Folks with all their proper papers have no need to worry about how many roads lead away from their pleasantly beige home base at the end of a cul-de-sac. But you? You have to brace yourself for the unexpected catastrophic eruption.

The closed-lipped suburbs where no one expects a lone wolf to attend the bi-monthly HOA meetings seem like a great place to hide out, but it might be more wise to invest in the anonymous week-by-week extended-stay motels that sit right off a major interstate and usually offer a free continental breakfast between six and nine AM. If that’s too much excitement for you (and you can’t convince yourself that the highway sounds like a soothing river lulling you to sleep every night), at least make it a habit to study the maps of whichever neighbor-bland ’hood you’ve decided to retire to. A few different routes in and out, only the most tasteful graffiti—why plop down in a heavily monitored neighborhood if the main thing you’re trying to do is avoid attention? Keep in mind that cops will run background checks on witnesses to crimes, too.

I’m being discouraging, I know. But—and this is a big old but—it doesn’t have to be this way. Just make sure to align yourself with the philosophical styling of “K.I.S.S.”

We all want to rock and roll all night and party every day, but I’m not referring to the pyrotechnic-loving, blood-spitting brothers Paul, Gene, Peter, and Ace. I’m talking about that old military tenet of “Keep it simple, stupid.” It’s always a good idea to examine your options and take the cleanest, most simple one. When launching a second life under a new name, you need to take Occam’s razor and whittle everything down to the basics.

We’re talking money, shelter, sustenance. Go someplace out of the way, distant, unsung—but unlike the cabin-plundering hermits I told you about, don’t drill that down to a permanent tent in the woods. Most people can’t handle that life.

Gather All the Intelligence About You.Spy stuff again. The moment you lock in on a new destination to reboot your existence, the first thing you should do is doctorate-level research on that locale. If you’ve never been the best student, fix that! And here’s the great thing: the Internet is a huge help in such an endeavor. Become a historian, cartographer, and an avid fan of the soap opera starring your new neighbors. Fact is, pretty much anyone can utilize a search engine and gather enough data about even the smallest town to fill an entire home library.

Unless you take the very chancy chance of hiring someone to map out the whole deal in advance, then you will have to be the hunter-gatherer of your own intelligence. Put together aerial views, stats about demographics, income, and crime. Read letters to the editor in the local paper. Target the part of town where you want to live. Remember: you don’t want flashy; you want bland. Avoid mansions; avoid broken windows. Don’t take it personally—this choice won’t make you bland at all! Doing the whole “new identity” thing automatically puts you in the category of “Very Interesting Person” for life. Which brings me to my next point…

Don’t Be So Damn Interesting.Whoops, sorry. Are you a charismatic character? The kind of gal or guy who warms up the room the moment you arrive at the party? Take it from Saul, friend: put that light under a bushel, ASAP. Don’t be colorful. Look back on the folks I’ve already told you about who remain total mysteries to this very day—what ties them together? I’ll tell you: they were boring as hell. Remember Joey Newts? From 1978 till 2003, he could have won his workplace’s award for Most Vanilla Employee. Dial down that inner party monster, and channel your inner introvert.

On one level this seems easy: just don’t talk to people. Restrict daily communication to the necessities related to whatever practical business you’re up to, and only that. Say you grab a job as the lowly attendant at the morgue, one of those guys who helps haul the dead bodies around. Whatever you do, don’t start making observations about the transitory nature of existence. Avoid deep thoughts. Embrace the shallow. If someone says the local single-A baseball team is interesting, do not debate this. Try not to have polarizing opinions about things. This is not the time to reach deep into the recesses of your mathematics degree and go all Moneyball on your coworkers. Your only reply should be, “Yeah, baseball’s cool, man.” Your safety and anonymity is at stake. It’s shocking how easily that can turn on its head when you become a person of interest to the interested persons around you.