The greatest compliment I have ever received was from my wife answering her sister's question just prior to the expected arrival of a hurricane, The question: " Why aren't you running around all the stores trying to get batteries, food, water, etc?" The answer: "Because I have a husband who has taken care of all those things!"
There are times when readiness should be increased across the board and there are times to reduce readiness in order to use funds elsewhere.
I have a 55gal plastic drum which formerly held glycerine (Listerine) and it stores water well. I also store water in empty, cleaned 2 liter soda and juice bottles. I have a group of 5gal water jugs that are kept filled for operating the porta-potty and flushing of the toilets.
Everytime we make a store run, we pick up a little something. In food stores, my wife picks up 1 or 2 canned goods while I specialize in dry goods.
My wife keeps extra paper towels, toilet paper, diapers, wet ones, etc in stock at all times.
There are certain medicines that we keep 1 or 2 prescriptions filled, ahead of our needs to insure they are available.
Going out to the stores and dealing with the "Herd" mentality is not only being too late, it can get you hurt or killed. Being prepared means that you can sit back and watch the "herd frenzy" from a distance and smile.
To figure out my needs, I looked @ various checklists, but I also paid attention to what I did, for a couple of weeks. This is how I figured out what items I needed that weren't included on the checklists or that applied to my personal situation more so than other's situations. I don't try to be stocked up all at once. That is prohibitively expensive and I would be facing "block obsolescence" as well. I get a few things, steadily and I rotate my supplies, steadily.
My readines is always about an 8 on a 1 - 10 scale! Like Leah Ratcliffe says, "I don't do dumb and helpless"