On Tue 22 Apr 2008 02:37:27p, Nancy Young told us...


"Pete C." wrote

Nancy Young wrote:

"Wayne Boatwright" wrote

On Tue 22 Apr 2008 02:02:48p, Nancy Young told us...

"Pete C." wrote

First off, the Y2K panic had reasonable underpinnings. I was
responsible for some of that Y2K remediation testing and I can
assure
you that there was a lot of work done and if it had not been done
successfully some of those doom and gloom scenarios would have
indeed been reality at least for a few months.

And that's why I don't think it was reasonable. It was taken care
of.

Yes, for the most part, and primarily within large organizations.
However,
there was quite a scramble by small companies who realized in the
11th
hour that they might need to do something. It was almost too late
for
some of them.

Of course. But their lack of planning had nothing to do with people
arming themselves because there was going to be widespread food
shortages after Y2K. That's the fear I'm talking about. People
thought
their water was going to be turned off and other nonsense.

It wasn't nonsense, but you need to have a good understanding of how our
infrastructure operates and how things are interconnected to understand
the short duration domino effect that is possible from a seemingly small
failure that might only take a few days to resolve.

It was nonsense because the people who needed to know what had
to be done, did it. Nothing happened on Y2K, as expected, except
for people who like being scared or prepared to kill their neighbors who
were surely going to steal their food.

nancy

May have been total nonsense to you, but there was always that nagging
thought that something important might be overlooked and cause some real
problems. If you weren't involved, you simply don't know.

Have you seen that commercial (I don't know what it was for) where there's
a guy pedalling something that looks a bit like a bike, that makes the
earth rotate? His shift is over and the new guy has arrived to take over.
For a second, the earth stops rotating.

--
Wayne Boatwright
-------------------------------------------
Tuesday, 04(IV)/22(XXII)/08(MMVIII)
-------------------------------------------
Today is: Earth Day
Countdown till Memorial Day
4wks 5dys 9hrs 10mins
-------------------------------------------
The man who makes no mistakes does not
usually make anything.
-------------------------------------------

Wayne Boatwright wrote:
On Tue 22 Apr 2008 02:36:48p, Blinky the Shark told us...

Pete C. wrote:

Nancy Young wrote:
wrote

Nancy Young wrote:

"Gregory Morrow" wrote
Yep, kids...it's TRUE...the "END TIMES" are near...so go out and
STOCK UP...!!!
(sigh) Wasn't the ridiculous panic about Y2K enough, now we need
this fearmongering? People don't need much of a reason.
You know, I heard some sort of "public service" annoucement on the
radio a few days ago. The Department of Homeland Security was asking
if everyone had enough food and water and supplies for 3 days in case
of some unspecified emergency. They seemed to imply no power,
because
refrigerated and frozen stuff was being disparaged in the spot.

So the government seems to be beating the Chicken Little drum, too.
People probably should have 3 days of food and water. Long power
outtages have occurred now and then. Never mind hurricanes. I don't
think that's unreasonable.

nancy
Hurricanes, tornadoes, ice storms, floods, earthquakes, fires,
epidemics,
terrorist attacks, etc. Lots of possible events that can cause a need to
be self sufficient for a few days.
Locusts. Nobody ever thinks of locusts any more. They need better
lobbyists.



I guess you could eat those after they'd eaten everything else. Good
source of protein?

Yeah, used to be a major source of dry season food for Africans in
certain areas. US gubmint discovered they bred, hatched and flew in
Saudi Arabia and started putting pesticides on them to "help the poor
people". Seems they did such a good job that a lot of people went hungry
for awhile.

We used to get the odd one in our garden when we lived in western Saudi
Arabia. Imagine a grasshopper four inches long that flies in large
groups and you can see how scary they would be to Westerners. We were
only 80 miles across the Red Sea from Africa so it was no big jaunt.
Particularly as the wind blew to Saudi in the morning and back to Africa
in the afternoon.

Nancy Young wrote:
"George Shirley" wrote

Wayne Boatwright wrote:
On Tue 22 Apr 2008 02:02:48p, Nancy Young told us...

And that's why I don't think it was reasonable. It was taken care of.

Yes, for the most part, and primarily within large organizations.
However, there was quite a scramble by small companies who realized in
the 11th hour that they might need to do something. It was almost too
late for some of them.

I had a big laugh at what one of my older sisters did prior to Y2K. Got
$20K in cash, bought a pistol (never fired one in her life), filled two
spare bedrooms with canned goods and bottled water. I think she's still
eating and drinking stuff she bought then. She was in a total panic that
she was going to starve to death.

I'd laugh except that is what a lot of people did. A kind of hysteria.

nancy


And people like that don't listen to the voice of reason. My other
sister and I just went on as normal with the one in the middle
proclaiming that we couldn't come to her house when all the
transportation systems collapsed and the ravening horde was devouring
everything in sight. Of course we don't have a lot to do with her before
or since but she is blood kin.

Wayne Boatwright wrote:
On Tue 22 Apr 2008 02:37:27p, Nancy Young told us...

"Pete C." wrote

Nancy Young wrote:
"Wayne Boatwright" wrote

On Tue 22 Apr 2008 02:02:48p, Nancy Young told us...
"Pete C." wrote
First off, the Y2K panic had reasonable underpinnings. I was
responsible for some of that Y2K remediation testing and I can
assure
you that there was a lot of work done and if it had not been done
successfully some of those doom and gloom scenarios would have
indeed been reality at least for a few months.
And that's why I don't think it was reasonable. It was taken care
of.
Yes, for the most part, and primarily within large organizations.
However,
there was quite a scramble by small companies who realized in the
11th
hour that they might need to do something. It was almost too late
for
some of them.
Of course. But their lack of planning had nothing to do with people
arming themselves because there was going to be widespread food
shortages after Y2K. That's the fear I'm talking about. People
thought
their water was going to be turned off and other nonsense.
It wasn't nonsense, but you need to have a good understanding of how our
infrastructure operates and how things are interconnected to understand
the short duration domino effect that is possible from a seemingly small
failure that might only take a few days to resolve.
It was nonsense because the people who needed to know what had
to be done, did it. Nothing happened on Y2K, as expected, except
for people who like being scared or prepared to kill their neighbors who
were surely going to steal their food.

nancy

May have been total nonsense to you, but there was always that nagging
thought that something important might be overlooked and cause some real
problems. If you weren't involved, you simply don't know.

Have you seen that commercial (I don't know what it was for) where there's
a guy pedalling something that looks a bit like a bike, that makes the
earth rotate? His shift is over and the new guy has arrived to take over.
For a second, the earth stops rotating.

Yeah, did you notice the thighs and legs on those guys?

I was hired as a consultant by a couple of large hydrocarbon processing
plants in the area just for Y2K. My job was to coordinate operations
when all the computer went belly up and they had to run them manually.
Wasn't because I was a good industrial safety professional, was because
I used to run plants by hand back in the day, 1961 to 1976.

I laughed all the way to the bank. Their own computer professionals were
telling them it wasn't necessary that the changes had been made to the
programming. A great many chemical and petroleum engineers then were
computer illiterates.

"Wayne Boatwright" wrote

On Tue 22 Apr 2008 02:37:27p, Nancy Young told us...

It was nonsense because the people who needed to know what had
to be done, did it. Nothing happened on Y2K, as expected, except
for people who like being scared or prepared to kill their neighbors who
were surely going to steal their food.

May have been total nonsense to you, but there was always that nagging
thought that something important might be overlooked and cause some real
problems. If you weren't involved, you simply don't know.

You're right, I didn't think the water was going to stop flowing and that
the food supply would stop dead. I knew utilities were overseen and
weren't going to be turned off suddenly in the new year. If it did, it
would
be fixed. But it wouldn't. And I woke up that morning and there you go,
no catastrophes. Like, what exactly would stop the water flowing and the
electricity to go off permanently? Nothing wrong with having extra
supplies,
of course. Prepared is different from that fear people had.

Have you seen that commercial (I don't know what it was for) where there's
a guy pedalling something that looks a bit like a bike, that makes the
earth rotate? His shift is over and the new guy has arrived to take over.
For a second, the earth stops rotating.

No, I haven't seen that one. Cute.

nancy

Adam Funk wrote:

On 2008-04-22, Blinky the Shark wrote:

Come to think of it, I haven't run this PSA in quite a while. Thanks
for reminding me. It's something of which we should not lose sight.

http://blinkynet.net/humor/psa01ct.html

*All* of them?

http://www.newsfroup.net/procurable/

Heh!

Okay......not your mom.


--
Blinky
Killing all posts from Google Groups
The Usenet Improvement Project: http://improve-usenet.org
Blinky: http://blinkynet.net

Wayne Boatwright wrote:
On Tue 22 Apr 2008 02:36:48p, Blinky the Shark told us...
Pete C. wrote:

Hurricanes, tornadoes, ice storms, floods, earthquakes, fires,
epidemics,
terrorist attacks, etc. Lots of possible events that can cause a need
to be self sufficient for a few days.

Locusts. Nobody ever thinks of locusts any more. They need better
lobbyists.

I guess you could eat those after they'd eaten everything else. Good
source of protein?

Mmmmmmmm...locusts! No, wait. I misspelled "blech!"


--
Blinky
Killing all posts from Google Groups
The Usenet Improvement Project: http://improve-usenet.org
Blinky: http://blinkynet.net

George Shirley wrote:

Wayne Boatwright wrote:
On Tue 22 Apr 2008 02:36:48p, Blinky the Shark told us...

Pete C. wrote:

Nancy Young wrote:
wrote

Nancy Young wrote:

"Gregory Morrow" wrote
Yep, kids...it's TRUE...the "END TIMES" are near...so go out and
STOCK UP...!!!
(sigh) Wasn't the ridiculous panic about Y2K enough, now we need
this fearmongering? People don't need much of a reason.
You know, I heard some sort of "public service" annoucement on the
radio a few days ago. The Department of Homeland Security was
asking if everyone had enough food and water and supplies for 3 days
in case of some unspecified emergency. They seemed to imply no
power,
because
refrigerated and frozen stuff was being disparaged in the spot.

So the government seems to be beating the Chicken Little drum, too.
People probably should have 3 days of food and water. Long power
outtages have occurred now and then. Never mind hurricanes. I don't
think that's unreasonable.

nancy
Hurricanes, tornadoes, ice storms, floods, earthquakes, fires,
epidemics,
terrorist attacks, etc. Lots of possible events that can cause a need
to be self sufficient for a few days.
Locusts. Nobody ever thinks of locusts any more. They need better
lobbyists.



I guess you could eat those after they'd eaten everything else. Good
source of protein?

Yeah, used to be a major source of dry season food for Africans in certain
areas. US gubmint discovered they bred, hatched and flew in Saudi Arabia
and started putting pesticides on them to "help the poor people". Seems
they did such a good job that a lot of people went hungry for awhile.

We used to get the odd one in our garden when we lived in western Saudi
Arabia. Imagine a grasshopper four inches long that flies in large groups
and you can see how scary they would be to Westerners. We were only 80
miles across the Red Sea from Africa so it was no big jaunt. Particularly
as the wind blew to Saudi in the morning and back to Africa in the
afternoon.

Now you've got me thinking about those damned cockroaches that are the
size of a sofa. skin crawls


--
Blinky
Killing all posts from Google Groups
The Usenet Improvement Project: http://improve-usenet.org
Blinky: http://blinkynet.net

"Nancy Young" wrote in
:


"Pete C." wrote

Nancy Young wrote:

"Wayne Boatwright" wrote

On Tue 22 Apr 2008 02:02:48p, Nancy Young told us...

"Pete C." wrote

First off, the Y2K panic had reasonable underpinnings. I was
responsible
for some of that Y2K remediation testing and I can assure you
that there
was a lot of work done and if it had not been done successfully
some of
those doom and gloom scenarios would have indeed been reality at
least
for a few months.

And that's why I don't think it was reasonable. It was taken
care of.

Yes, for the most part, and primarily within large organizations.
However,
there was quite a scramble by small companies who realized in the
11th hour
that they might need to do something. It was almost too late for
some of
them.

Of course. But their lack of planning had nothing to do with people
arming themselves because there was going to be widespread food
shortages after Y2K. That's the fear I'm talking about. People
thought their water was going to be turned off and other nonsense.

It wasn't nonsense, but you need to have a good understanding of how
our infrastructure operates and how things are interconnected to
understand the short duration domino effect that is possible from a
seemingly small failure that might only take a few days to resolve.

It was nonsense because the people who needed to know what had
to be done, did it. Nothing happened on Y2K, as expected, except
for people who like being scared or prepared to kill their neighbors
who were surely going to steal their food.

nancy




Remember the flame war here...especially the one on if it would happen...
Some insisted 2000 and others said 2001. The thread lasted months.

--

The house of the burning beet-Alan

A man in line at the bank kept falling over...when he got to a teller he
asked for his balance.

I'm just wondering how we should cook Chicken Little...???


I'd suggest a nice roasted ostrich as a second entre. You can find them
easily enough, they have their heads in the ground and their butts
confidently exposed.

Paul

John Kane wrote:

On Apr 22, 4:15*pm, Gregory Morrow
wrote:





Nancy Young wrote:
"Gregory Morrow" wrote

Yep, kids...it's TRUE...the "END TIMES" are near...so go out and STOCK
UP...!!!

(sigh) *Wasn't the ridiculous panic about Y2K enough, now we need this
fearmongering? *People don't need much of a reason.

Yeah, you'd think the world was coming to an end, listening to the
babble on all the nooze outlets...it's getting pretty ridiculous,
hence my "hysterical" subject line, lol...

You don't hear that 97% of all US mortgages are current, you'd think
from the nooze that most everyone is in default...

You don't hear that newly minted college grads are getting multiple
job offers or that some fields have such high demand that there is a
dire shortage of workers, you instead get reports from Rust Belt areas
that those old high - paying industrial jobs are disappearing.
Hello! *That trend started in the late 70's...WHERE have you in the
media BEEN...!!!???

Food "rationing"? *It's no different than stores limiting the number
of sale items, is that "rationing"? *It's NOT WWII...and besides which
many Americans are grossly obese, a little "rationing" just might not
hurt. *Food is still a great bargain...

For all the talk about the "decline" of the US, we are still
considered probably the most stable nation on earth and if we really
opened our borders a BILLION people would pour in to live
here...people die trying to get here every day.

I'm just wondering how we should cook Chicken Little...???

--
Best
Greg

Have a look at the most recent New Scientist. *It has some interesting
articles on the collapse of civilisation as we know it.



Articles like this one...??? :



http://technology.newscientist.com/a...9_head_dn13744


Rescue robots compete to save dolls in distress

17:15 21 April 2008


" Robots are competing in Germany this week to traverse a maze that
simulates the aftermath of a natural disaster (see video, right).

It is part of the largest warm-up event, the German Open, for the
annual RoboCup, held in China this July. The main Robocup event has
been running for 11 years and pits teams of soccer robots against each
other, with the goal of having a robotic team beat the human world
soccer champions at their own game by 2050.

But a sub-competition called RoboCup Rescue may yield useful robots.
Held since 2000, it aims to stimulate development of robots to help
humans in dangerous situations, like collapsed buildings or after a
chemical spill.


Maze mapping

Robots in this year's competition must navigate a complex three-
dimensional maze, using their sensing and mapping abilities to sniff
out toy dolls that either emit CO2, give off heat, make noise, or
move.

"The robots are the mouse and the dolls are the cheese," says Adam
Jacoff of the US Government’s National Institute of Standards and
Technology in Gaithersburg, US, who heads the rescue competition.

Each year Jacoff has slowly ratcheted up the physical complexity of
the 150-square-metre maze. It now includes sharply pitched and sloping
floors, stairs, pipes, and "step fields" – corridors of fixed,
randomly shaped objects that simulate rubble.

He uses the competition to trial new tests, which the US Department of
Homeland Security evaluates urban search and rescue robots with.


Searching alone

Robots must pick their way through the maze to find the dolls
autonomously, as their developers are not allowed inside the arena or
to control their robots remotely.

Teams are scored by how many victims their robots finds, how quickly
they navigate the maze, and how accurately they can generate a 3D map
of the entire course.

This year’s competition will include a “manipulation challenge” that
awards extra points to robots that can deliver handheld radios or
water bottles to victims trapped in tight spaces.


Human helpers

Tom Haus, a captain in the Los Angeles, California Fire Department and
an urban search and rescue specialist at the US Government’s Federal
Emergency Management Agency, says autonomous robots still need a lot
of improvement before they can aid in search and rescue missions.

"They are still a ways away from having something as mobile as a human
that could easily traverse rubble piles," he told New Scientist.

But the laser guidance systems teams have developed for 3D imaging in
the RoboCup Rescue competition could be adapted for use by human
rescuers much sooner, he adds.


Laser maps

"When you go into a dark, smoke-filled structure as a rescuer and then
have to explain the layout to other rescuers, a lot is lost in
translation," Haus says. "3D mapping would be a huge benefit."

Haus was one of the search and rescue experts that helped Jacoff
develop the RoboCup Rescue maze, and says current scanning and map
generation technology is too slow to be of much use for emergency
response teams.

But the current time they take – roughly 5-10 minutes to scan a 900m2
area and another 5-10 minutes to stitch the images together – will
likely decrease rapidly, Haus says..."

/



--
Best
Greg

" I find Greg Morrow lowbrow, witless, and obnoxious. For him to
claim that we are some
kind of comedy team turns my stomach."
- "cybercat" to me on rec.food.cooking

"George Shirley" wrote

I was hired as a consultant by a couple of large hydrocarbon processing
plants in the area just for Y2K. My job was to coordinate operations when
all the computer went belly up and they had to run them manually. Wasn't
because I was a good industrial safety professional, was because I used to
run plants by hand back in the day, 1961 to 1976.

I laughed all the way to the bank. Their own computer professionals were
telling them it wasn't necessary that the changes had been made to the
programming. A great many chemical and petroleum engineers then were
computer illiterates.

I'm happy you made out like a bandit, good for you. Made them feel
more secure and you made a chunk of change. What's not to like?

nancy

ranck wrote

You know, I heard some sort of "public service" annoucement on the
radio a few days ago. The Department of Homeland Security was asking
if everyone had enough food and water and supplies for 3 days in case
of some unspecified emergency. They seemed to imply no power, because
refrigerated and frozen stuff was being disparaged in the spot.

So the government seems to be beating the Chicken Little drum, too.

Well, you live in the same state I do and thats normal every year to remind
folks before hurricane season to have a small stock of things

George Shirley wrote:
Wayne Boatwright wrote:
On Tue 22 Apr 2008 02:02:48p, Nancy Young told us...

"Pete C." wrote

Nancy Young wrote:
(sigh) Wasn't the ridiculous panic about Y2K enough, now we need
this
fearmongering? People don't need much of a reason.
First off, the Y2K panic had reasonable underpinnings. I was
responsible
for some of that Y2K remediation testing and I can assure you that
there
was a lot of work done and if it had not been done successfully some of
those doom and gloom scenarios would have indeed been reality at least
for a few months.
And that's why I don't think it was reasonable. It was taken care of.

nancy

Yes, for the most part, and primarily within large organizations.
However, there was quite a scramble by small companies who realized in
the 11th hour that they might need to do something. It was almost too
late for some of them.

I had a big laugh at what one of my older sisters did prior to Y2K. Got
$20K in cash, bought a pistol (never fired one in her life), filled two
spare bedrooms with canned goods and bottled water. I think she's still
eating and drinking stuff she bought then. She was in a total panic that
she was going to starve to death.


How much toilet paper did she buy? People up here tend to panic-buy
milk, bread, and TP, I guess because they are all white (maybe it's just
a Scandinavian thing)

Bob

George Shirley wrote:

Wayne Boatwright wrote:
On Tue 22 Apr 2008 02:36:48p, Blinky the Shark told us...

Pete C. wrote:

Nancy Young wrote:
wrote

Nancy Young wrote:

"Gregory Morrow" wrote
Yep, kids...it's TRUE...the "END TIMES" are near...so go out and
STOCK UP...!!!
(sigh) Wasn't the ridiculous panic about Y2K enough, now we need
this fearmongering? People don't need much of a reason.
You know, I heard some sort of "public service" annoucement on the
radio a few days ago. The Department of Homeland Security was asking
if everyone had enough food and water and supplies for 3 days in case
of some unspecified emergency. They seemed to imply no power,
because
refrigerated and frozen stuff was being disparaged in the spot.

So the government seems to be beating the Chicken Little drum, too.
People probably should have 3 days of food and water. Long power
outtages have occurred now and then. Never mind hurricanes. I don't
think that's unreasonable.

nancy
Hurricanes, tornadoes, ice storms, floods, earthquakes, fires,
epidemics,
terrorist attacks, etc. Lots of possible events that can cause a need to
be self sufficient for a few days.
Locusts. Nobody ever thinks of locusts any more. They need better
lobbyists.



I guess you could eat those after they'd eaten everything else. Good
source of protein?

Yeah, used to be a major source of dry season food for Africans in
certain areas. US gubmint discovered they bred, hatched and flew in
Saudi Arabia and started putting pesticides on them to "help the poor
people". Seems they did such a good job that a lot of people went hungry
for awhile.

We used to get the odd one in our garden when we lived in western Saudi
Arabia. Imagine a grasshopper four inches long that flies in large
groups and you can see how scary they would be to Westerners. We were
only 80 miles across the Red Sea from Africa so it was no big jaunt.
Particularly as the wind blew to Saudi in the morning and back to Africa
in the afternoon.

Nifty. How is the Red Sea? I'll be diving there in September.