What If It All Goes Smash? --The Short Answer

You're going to die.

Joe addresses it in more detail but the 30-second read is, if technological civilization went belly-up tomorrow, unless you're Amish or a very serious survivalist, you're going to die (and they're going to be on short rations and will face lifestyle changes; note all the "low-tech" factory-made goods!). If you're a Prepper or a good LDS member (etc.) and relatively lucky, it might not be for a long time -- a year, maybe two. Most of us less-ready types will be toast within six months and the remainder will go like mayflies in the first Winter.

Thoreau in his cabin was dependent on technological civilization -- his axe, his clothing, the means to make fire. Even assuming you are as clever and resourceful (not to mention fictional) as the boy in My Side Of The Mountain, he wasn't competing with several thousand other hungry survivors. (Short-term advantage goes to the meanest.)

Most of the human race lives in climates that will kill us if we lack adequate protection from them and we do so at population densities that are insanely unsustainable for hunter-gatherers. And the really low-level skills that will keep you housed and clothed, fed a sufficiently-balanced diet to prevent malnutrition are not widespread. Depending on how things go -- how bad the die-off is -- there's a fair chance the second year will start with a better availability of salvaged goods; but I wouldn't count on it, as there are a lot of ways for a few fools to destroy a city, starting by being foolish with fire.

--Of course, that's not especially realistic, barring EMP from natural or man-made sources or something similarly unforseen; most of the really big TEOTWAWKI events result in widespread death along with the destruction, which takes us back to "See first paragraph" land.

So what's realistic to plan for?

-Economic Collapse. Something like what happened in Russia, only without the localized booms. Or we're all in Cuba, only the "classic car" you're gonna have to keep running forever is a Prius. Good luck! This calls for Depression-era coping skills and starting with a very full larder will help (in fact, it's never not a help, unless persons inclined to take it from you find out about it). Personally, I rate this the most likely and figure I'm likely to spend my retirement in a third-world country without having to move to one. Slow collapse is probably better than sudden and, horribly enough, may actually be what the market-regulators are really aiming for. (I'm lookin' at you, Ben Bernanke).

-Terrorist Activity. From "dirty" bombs to chemical or biological agents or just exploding bus stations, this would be horrible but also tends -- mostly! -- to draw people together. Coping skills would be more like the Home Front skill set for the U.S. or Canada in WW II. OTOH, regional/political violence would be differently polarizing and, Tom Leherer being too good a prophet, what do you do if the Crips or Bloods have The Bomb -- or weaponized smallpox? I guess we might as well lump "civil unrest" at the low end of this category; a good-sized riot can have very much the same effect, only on a smaller scale; and that's the most probable one you'll encounter.

-Natural Disaster. New Madrid Earthquake, anyone? Aw, why stop there -- Yellowstone? Okay, those get close to the "high probability of death" level but they're outliers; smaller quakes and eruptions, flood, hurricane, tornado, big fires and so on are a lot more common.

Dean Ing talks about the need to consider all the higher-probability events and map out what you'd do -- including literal maps, marked for the likelier scenarios. If things get bad enough you need them, don't count on your ISP or smartphone to be able to dig 'em out -- and you may want to be discreet about that GPS.

The big, flashy possibilities are the "sexiest" to plan for (sheesh, lookit even my "smaller" examples) but they're outliers; the littler ones are more likely to be the ones you'll face. And by a happy coincidence, they're also the ones with the best return on investment, too. If it goes Mad Max, you may be better off with a colander than canned goods; but if it goes LA riots or blizzard of the century and you need to hole up for a week or three, that stack of MREs will come in handy.

Morning

Did not sleep well this weekend, though waking up Saturday with both cats snoozing on my bed was noteworthy even though they were at diagonally opposite corners. I have the occasional anxiety-driven "white night," with both fretfulness and sleepiness growing as the night wears on; I don't recommend them.

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One of Huck the cat's behaviors really amuses me; he has a stuffed toy, a little cow, that is scaled to him about as a largish goat would be to a medium-sized tiger. If I throw or slide it, he happily pounces, picks it up by the throat, and waddles off with it to his scratching post, where he sets it down, grabs with front paws and "disembowels" it with his back paws, quite often by reaching around the post. I'm starting to think he believes himself to be a miniature tiger

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Tamara's cat Random Numbers -- "Rannie Wu" -- dislikes sharing a water bowl with Huck; she'd rather lick water from a sink or bathtub spout and I'd rather she did not. I poured her a bowl of water in the kitchen this morning and Huck was so very interested in pestering her as she drank that I ended up as the cat-lady version of an old cliche, cooking while holding a cat (instead of a child) at my hip. Huck put up with it, too. For a wonder -- it could have been a real mess.

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And that had better be it for this morning. Some kind of visual migraine is trying to lay hold of me and I need to head it off before it makes any more progress.

Later: Ibuprofen didn't work. Great.

Who Makes The Coal Roll?

...SJRPP does, is who. (Catch the reference? Clues follow.)

Wiki-wandering, I was struck by the extensive water access in and around Jacksonville, Florida and points South; the First Coast has all manner of coast to it. My attention was drawn to a big freight-type terminal on an island and I idly followed the roads and rails and -- hey, what's that thing? Light rail? Not exactly.

It runs from NW to SE in the linked view, paralleling roads and rails; zoom out and have a look. I even had a Street View look where it crossed a road and wasn't entirely sure. (Bear with, I don't know if that'll work.)

Followed to the end, it was pretty obvious what it was carrying and further searching brought up a nice flyer about the installation it serves, and how: it's a 3.2-mile, fully-enclosed (what do the neighborhoods say?) conveyor belt for coal. Reading it is a reminder that we are still, on a fundamental level, living in the Age of Steam, the Age of Coal.

Who makes the coal roll? Techs and engineers, boilermen and steamfitters. Not the Technocrats, outside of fiction.

Gotta keep the lights on; gotta keep those air conditioners spinning! --Oh, and your electric (coal and steam powered) car charged up, too.

"We Interrupt This Broadcast--"

Update: As predicted in comments, it's still infected. Ordered an external optical drive and I guess I will have to mindwipe the poor thing and start over. (Salvaged a bunch of IWOAS text files but that thumb drive needs looked at now, just in case. Malwarebytes claims it is clean).

Or this blog; last night, I started my "Top Shot" post on my little Eee but had to finish it on my desktop, and that after running spyware/malware scans: the Eee had a trojan, an especially annoying and nasty one, and I am not sure how I got it.

Initially, it wouldn't boot up at all and I supposed the hard drive had died; but the hidden reset button got it to boot up, my browser launched okay but then opened another tab and once I'd closed that -- chaos! Screen after screen of nearly-plausible warnings; the giveaway was their persistence and the long list of supposed risks, threats and "stealth intrusions" reported.

Removing the trojan took some time and effort and I am giving serious thought to keeping the wireless LAN off; my main use for the Eee netbook is to write fiction and I darned near lost tens of thousands of words I hadn't backed up. Had to change a bunch of passwords, too.

...And today will be "install more protection day." Oh, the fun.

Top Shot: Fail

Watching the first two episodes of the new season of Top Shot and hey, it's supercool -- a shooting game/reality show, what's not to like?

This: They run a nice disclaimer, "Expert marksmen on a closed course. Do not try this at home."

On that, I'm callin' BS on two counts:

1. Other than the rare Hollywood moving chair/falling shooter/ hugely reactive target setup, it's just various forms of competition-type shooting in fancy dress; not all that unusual or dangerous.

2. If they're so all-fired safe, why do I keep seeing hand-held camera work from the "hot" side of the firing line while competitors or the host are handling live weapons? Why does the camera keep getting muzzled?

Srsly, you knock that stuff off -- or stop telling Me The Home Viewer, "Don't try this at home." Bilge. If I had a home range, I'd be trying a lot of the more-fun setups; and when I am at the range -- any range! -- I don't handle firearms while folks are on the wrong side of the line. I don't care what kind of hot-shot Joe Dangerous Cameraman you are, stay back of the line! If you've just gotta have that looking-at-'em shot, you go place a mirror when the range is clear, or you set up the camera and leave it.

It's a cute show. I just wish they'd figure out that cameramen and focus pullers aren't expendable.

Gah, Clowns

Never trust clowns. At Leeann's

The Magic Number Is "12"

See, 13 states can drop out of earlier associations and form their own country, but if 11 try the same thing, it's a no-no.

(Hideously uncomfortable historical note: somebody's gonna wonder if slavery might be a limiting factor, too. The short, sad answer is no; it was legal in all 13 colonies at the time of Revolution and only Vermont and Massachusetts had put an end to the practice before the 18th Century ended. What's the Oscar Wilde quote about "We're all standing in the gutter but some of us are looking at the stars?" Gotta do more than just watch, sir).

Tasty Goodness

I had eggrolls from the deli at Fresh Market last; it was fast and easy and I was tired. But I didn't have any hot mustard and couldn't find any in the store. Aw, drat!

...Never fear; it turns out that a mixture of 80% good coarse country-style dijon and 20% wasabi (adjust to taste!) makes a hot mustard so good, I slightly burned the roof of my mouth gobbling the eggrolls before they'd cooled down.

Firefly: Almost Back

Anyway, the original episodes of Firefly will be back on basic cable. Claire Wolfe has more.

Which reminds me, I don't remember linking to the fan-spoof, Mosquito. All in good fun.

Go, Belgium!

In addition to having invented "French" fries,* not to mention claims that the country doesn't even exist, Belgium now has a new and perfectly delightful accomplishment: they haven't had a government for over 249 days, beating the previous record-holder (Iran, which has been without a sane government for... Aw, gee. Divide by secret police, add the Ayatollah, carry the Shah: pretty much forever).

Belgium's legislature(s) has got so tied up in knots that there's nobody in charge; it's a remarkably complicated federal system with a (mostly) parliamentary structure; at the Federal level, the representative body is bicameral and that's a simple as it gets -- indeed, Belgians are having trouble working it out, so don't expect me to explain it in a blog post. A hasty read suggests a great deal of decentralization; add in a King as Head Of State and I've got to wonder if Belgians even need the top layer of government they've been doing without for 250 days already?

...That's a question only they can answer and whoever does it had better be convincing in three languages. In the meantime? Here's to you, Belgium, for proving that civilization can work even without high-level meddlers!

(Meanwhile in Brazil, they've elected a clown to Congress. Hey, we've got dozens of 'em in ours here in the States!)
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* So back when people were callin' 'em "freedom fries?" A perfect chance to put things right, had anyone bothered. But noooooo.

Obituary Of A Stranger

Fact, fiction, a very full life? I don't know. But whatever, read it.

Lovely Weather, Empty Head

Haven't a thing to blog about, really. Or at least no one big thing.

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I went to see Mom last night and she looked and acted hugely better, very much her old self. One of her meds seems to have been most of the trouble; recovering from heart surgery is tough enough already without that! Looks like she'll be in hospital for a day or two, then back to rehab and able to really rehabilitate this time!

Tam drove, with her new GPS navagating. Or nagging, with Tam telling it to give proper directions or shut up. (It was occasionally determined to make her drive directly away from our destination and kept calling for a 180 on the freeway.)

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The TV is still milking the Tucson outrage for sobs, concentrating on victims relatives who will parrot the "guns're baaaad" meme. --Yes, so bad that they'd give anything for there to had been a policeman, security guard or other armed, skilled individual on the scene from the get-go; the only problem these ninnies have is that they don't trust their fellow-citizens to go armed unless they are creatures of the State -- or least wearing a spiffy uniform.

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Locally, it appears a fellow out to steal copper tried to steal a live power drop about 3:30 this morning. I guess if I was truly soft-hearted I'd feel bad for him but sheesh: say Hi to Mr. Darwin for me! Bonus: most power drops (at least around here) use aluminum wire.

One of the local FMs went off the air on a hot afternoon last summer and when staffers arrived at the site, all of the air-conditioner plumbing had been hacked out and stolen. Meanwhile, the fat, plastic-jacketed Heliax copper coax, 3" or 4" OD? Intact! Almost a pity, as there are a number of ways to check out trying to steal that stuff, none of them nice.