kin·dle/ˈkindl/
Verb:

1.     Light or set on fire.
2.     Arouse or inspire (an emotion or feeling).
3.    To give birth to young. Used especially of rabbits.

 

Fire is something I’ve written about several times, and is one of the major skills in survival circles. Since this blog is for expanding my circles of knowledge, I consider this an inspiration, of sorts, too. And considering what I am raising, I find the third one rather ironic…However, “Kindle” is also my preferred electronic reader, after having done some extensive testing and research.

Why is this on  a self-sufficiency/homesteading blog? I consider it an essential part of my preps, for both entertainment as well as electronic storage of important documents. Let me elaborate….

Since the moment I first browsed a website from a small-format screen, in my case, a cell phone, I knew that the days of owning extensive stacks of books would soon join the dinosaurs, horse and buggies, and VCR tapes. As technology advances, we improve our lives, sometimes making what was once a great achievement into an obsolete thing of the past.

For example, when was the last time you went to Blockbuster to rent a video on a VCR tape? At one time, the ability to record TV was novel, but given time, is now so common as to make one of the original methods completely obsolete….

So I wanted an “eReader”, an electronic book, something able to store an entire book, and allow me to read it anywhere….so the hunt was on…

Being a huge fan of Android, I started looking at Android-based options early on. Tablets could be had for around $100 out of China (where else?), so I ordered one, played with it for a week or so, found it lacking in performance for what I had in mind, so I moved on.

Pandigital made an eReader that I tried out on display at BestBuy, but I found it to be slow as well. However, it was my first exposure to a gray scale “eInk” type display and found it VERY readable…so added that feature to my search criteria.

I waded though option after option, buying some used, testing out most at retail stores, and finally settled on the Kindle line of products for fit, feel, and useability. The screen really looks like it is on paper, a lovely thing for reading. No glare, no shine, just an easy-on-the-eyes experience. I had two issues with it though, no GOOD way to read at night, since it was not back-lit like most tablets, laptops, and cell phones; and data entry was a slow, tedious process via virtual keyboard on most models. The latter was resolved with the Kindle 3, but unless you used some klunky ready light add-on, it just did not work well for reading in the dark.

Because of the light issue, I ended up dragging my feet on purchasing a Kindle 3 until I saw Amazon release an integrated case/light combo that utilized the Kindles battery to power the light, and stowed the light away out of sight unless needed. I was sold! The painful part was the Kindle was $150 or so (Since I planned to pre-load my reading material, I opted to get the WI-FI only model, saving about $50), and the cover was another $50! A $200 ereader was more than I wanted to spend…so off to eBay and Craigslist I went, finding a local seller of the Kindle 3 for $100, and the cover off of eBay for $20. I saved $80 just by shopping a bit, gotta love that!

It wasn’t long after getting mine, setting it up, and using it, that my wife, Liz, decided she wanted to use it. Eventually, I purchased another used one for her, along with the proper lighted case, as well as one for the girls to share. Since the Kindle 3 is an older model and now can be had used of eBay for around $100 WITH the cover I want, there is a good probability I’ll be buying a fourth one so the girls won’t have to share, as well as one for emergencies.

Yes, I said one for emergencies. You see, the Kindle makes for a mighty fine storage facility for documents just like a thumb drive, only with the added bonus of being able to view those documents. Drivers licenses, birth certificates, banking documents, and other important papers can be stored safely, along with survival manuals, gardening books, and how-to’s on just about anything. And with the ability to store around 3500 books, yo should be able to prove who you are in the event that your house gets wiped off the map by a hurricane, or stock up on enough “how-to” material to kick start a 12 person tribe back into civilization in a generation or so. Like Billy Idol said, “Information is power and currency”.

Prepare for the simple things first, then expand your preparedness for larger, less likely misfortunes. A house fire without a copy of the documents listed above makes for some very difficult times that could be avoided with a little planning. Having had a house burn down, I know how tough this can be. Even if you do do NOT buy one of these for storing docs, do yourself a favor, buy some peace of mind my getting all of your important papers and docs scanned and then email them to yourself, preferably to a free email service you can access anywhere there is internet access. Work servers can go down, but Google probably won’t, so use gmail to store your info (I do). I won’t go into security here, but DO keep that in mind as well….

So I now have the “ereader of my dreams”, currently loaded with around 1,000 books, documents, forum threads, how-to guides, and magazines. I actually have a couple monthly subscriptions that are delivered to my Kindle without having a paper copy mailed to me, saving trees, and a little money over the cover price. My next post will be sources for reading material. There are literally millions of things you can get on your Kindle for free, and I’ll be going over some of them that I use.

Time for my G,B,&E:

This is a great product, and in my opinion, fits me FAR better than a Kindle Fire which is more of a tablet than an ereader.