How to Set Up a Space for Emergency Water #5　非常用備蓄水置き場の作り方

How to Set Up a Space for Emergency Water in My Home?

どうやってスペースを確保するの？

First, you need to make space in your kitchen. So you need to tidy up!!　

In this blog post, we’ll explore how to make space in your kitchen by tidying up.

The kitchen is usually the most heavily trafficked room in your home… maybe the bathroom too.  Some people, to help them find their motivation for tidying up, need a quick, easy win, and the kitchen is the place with the most “low hanging fruit.”  Many supplies in the kitchen turnover quickly.  Food and other items in the kitchen are constantly being used up and replaced.

I recommend you tidy up your kitchen first.　

Remember in post #4, I explained that you should:

“Expect the unexpected.  You should keep an emergency water supply in at least two separate locations.”

(Maybe you already have enough space in your kitchen.  If so, wow.  Excellent.  You’re ahead of the curve, and you can skip this tidy up step described in this post, but you might find some useful tidbits nonetheless.  Also, if you don’t choose the kitchen as an emergency storage location, you could skip this post too, but I still recommend reading on.)

Let’s walk through setting up the stockpile, and I’ll assume your first location is your kitchen.  You’ll need a second location too, and the steps to set up your second location will be the same.

Before we get started, please throw away your ideal image of an emergency stockpile.  It’s for an emergency; it doesn’t need to be perfect.  It doesn’t need to look like a picture in a magazine.

How to do it ?

Let get started!

★ This is step A

1. Get 2 empty boxes (or any kind of big containers).

2. Check the expiration date for all of your food.

3. Already expired, you think you will not eat it:  Throw it away.

4. Already expired but you think it’s still ok! Put it into BOX No 1.

5. Close to the expiry date, but not quite expired yet:  Put it into BOX No 2.

6. Still not expired and has time:  You can put it back where it came from.

7. Put BOX No 1, and BOX No 2 in the kitchen where you can see them clearly.

You just took the first step, and you checked your entire kitchen.  You can find a space for your emergency water supply now, can’t you?  Usually, yes!!  But if not, you’ll need to finish eating some of the food in your kitchen and refrain from buying more of the same items until you can make the space you need.

A quick note on food from your fridge:  If you found expired food in your fridge, I recommend you throw it away; don’t put it in BOX No 1 (that’s the box for expired but still OK items).  Don’t be wishy-washy, just chuck it.  If you found expired food in the freezer, it depends on the food.  I will almost always throw away frozen food if it expired more than 1 year ago.

★ Step B.

1. Now you can acquire your emergency water. Go get as much as will fit in your new space.

2. Your emergency water for the kitchen doesn’t need to be anything special.  It’s ok for it to be your favorite bottled water, but it’s good if the water bottles are light. You want to be able to carry it easily.

⚠️

Please throw away your ideal image of an emergency stockpile.  It’s for an emergency; it doesn’t need to be perfect.  It doesn’t need to look like a picture in a magazine.

雑誌などの完璧で綺麗な備蓄棚など考えないで。とにかく緊急時のために備えることだけを考えて

This is still just the beginning of setting up your emergency stockpile.  I’m explaining how to manage your stockpile in the kitchen now, but once your whole home is set up, you’ll need to manage all of your stockpile spaces.  Each place has its own key considerations when buying water. When I explain each place, I will cover how to manage overall water consumption without waste.
 

★ Step C.

1. First priority, plan to use the food in BOX No 1, as soon as possible. When you finish eating all of it, keep the box for the next space (actually you can start checking expiration dates in another place, like your garage, car, etc.).

2. Plan to use food from BOX No 2, but if you tidy up other locations in your house, you might have other, fully expired, BOX No 1 items to deal with first. (i.e., you might have a lot of expired food.)

If you are like me, and are not a super-sensitive person, you can wait 6 months after the expiration date.  It depends on the type of food, of course, and it needs to remain unopened.  You’ll have to use your best judgement.  I try to use expired food within 6 months of expiry.  Surprisingly, we can eat expired foods even 6 months later, but it’s important to draw a clear distinction between keeping and throwing away.  I will talk more about expiration dates in a future post.

Let’s start! and go to the kitchen!!

See you soon.