Mental resilience

All good points !

I dunno , the way our world is changing I'm becoming more and more into the survivalist mindset . And giving thought to who I want around me if/when a collapse occurs . And I've come to realize just how much we depend on the utility infrastructure . Cut off the gas and 'lectrons , and lots of people ain't gonna know what to do .

Snag, look into history. These kinds of disruptions happened many times, and nothing major happened. No massive die offs, people recovered and life moved on. I am still into survivalist mindset, but mostly because I like guns, tools and generators.I did realize, though, that survivalist fears are overdone.

Just this week a physician told Mary he'd never had a patient with issues like she has that was quite as upbeat as she is. Unlike recon missions which eventually end, there's no safe return from an incurable disease. It's a less urgent form of stress, but perhaps more telling because it is relentlessly ever-present -- and it does get urgent now and then as when BP drops to levels that should not support consciousness but she flat refuses to give in and faint.

I have great respect for our spec ops warriors, force recon marines and LRRP soldiers having known a few, but they ain't the only exemplars of courage.

We did a down-and-back-same-day run to Mayo today for a triple chemo session. Mar was cheering up the others around her with her plucky attitude.

The road we see ahead is a low crawl up a hill of sharp rocks, but eventual improvement and abatement is possible and an objective. Her team of professionals at Mayo are committed to maximizing her quality of life. We are far from done enjoying life and each other.

Mayo is not treating her this way because we're rich or elite. We're seniors on medicare with good supplementary insurance, responsible but ordinary people. Mayo is far from elitist. The folks next to Mary today were from Fort Dodge, Iowa, nice folks and clean-cut. A discussion about wigs revealed value-consciousness. Her wig was very becoming (faked us out), we got a good tip there.

We're going to Mayo because they are world-class in understanding how to manage Mary's very rare (8 per million) incurable disease. Doctors learn how to treat disease by treating disease. We all eventually die, mercifully so I think, but it's worthwhile to make whatever contributions we can to prolong good lives for our collective progeny.

I'd rather ally myself with those who aren't addicted to war, making "recon missions" moot.

Thanks, Rich

Have you ever heard of cognitive dissonance? That is where there is a huge threat, and the minds of the general public simply cannot handle it, so they just go off and play Nintendo or go get laid or high or get their nails done or whatever. We're coming up to some pretty drastic things in the way of fuel prices, shortage of good water, failure of money and the financial system, moral decay, camel jockeys getting nukes, and several other areas.

It's good to be a Boy Scout.

Steve

The Democrap party wants YOU!

I'd much rather know sharp-end people.

-- If you're looking for the key to the Universe, I've got some good news and some bad news.

The bad news: There is no key to the Universe.

The good news: It was never locked. --Swami Beyondananda

Steve, think about New Orleans. It was rather bad in many ways, flood, bad evacuation, looting, racial issues, etc, but only 1,500 people died out of 336,000 people.

Yes, and contrary to rumors, there was little long term harm.

Right?

Steve

There isn't much doubt that the damage was long term and considerable. It took quite a while for shipping to recover. The coffee industry just got creamed. Bluewater Horizon was skipping maintenance is another example. One of the drivers was the hiatus in drilling Katrina lead to as well as the loss of existing rigs a the time. Also, contrary to Bobby Jihndal's "small government" prattle, his State has seen a tremendous influx of Katrina related federal dollars. Those dollars are all part of the public debt today. The consequences were, in fact, rather high and long term.

Only 1,500 people died out of 336,000 people, however this was due to the very localized nature of the incident and the fact that the other

I don't think any real collapse of civilization is likely in any of our lifetimes, however I do think that the Great Global Tidy Bowl Swirl (tm) is going to continue and overall conditions will continue to deteriorate. I'm not so much into the "survivalist" thing, but I do think it is a reasonable goal to become as self reliant and self sufficient as practical so as to minimize the impact of the continued decline on yourself and your family.

Keep thinking those comfortable thoughts and learn to say YESSIR!

Oh, were _created_ equal. What you do with that from that point on is up to you.

Hope This Helps! Rich

No, just stop electing them; maybe get the country into rehab.

Say, where's that computer you were going to donate? I've lost your phone #, but you can email me at snipped-for-privacy@yahoo.com, but without the "ard." (i.e., just concatenate "rich" and "grise".) Is it safe to post a phone # here?

Thanks, Rich

There was a lot of harm, as far as I could tell.

What amazes me is that the insurance company and gov't both allowed them to rebuild in the same sinkhole after it dried out. Amazing. Head-up-their-asses Dumb, too.

-- You and I have a rendezvous with destiny. We will preserve for our children this, the last best hope of man on Earth, or we will sentence them to take the last step into a thousand years of darkness.? -- Ronald Reagan

There is a long history of those that hunt excelling in the military. Everything from guys walking point, sniping, or being gunners on bombers back in WWII.

Wes

-- "Additionally as a security officer, I carry a gun to protect government officials but my life isn't worth protecting at home in their eyes." Dick Anthony Heller

Two points to remember:

1. Insurance companies exist to make a profit, not to make anything safer. The insurance premiums the people rebuilding are paying are supposed to be proportional to the risk of claims. The insurance companies will make a profit from those premiums if they have calculated the risks of future claims properly.

1. The government might be able to buy out and eliminate people living in some Super Fund spot where the people don't want to live anyway, but there is/was no way they could get away with eliminating a place like New Orleans. They would have ended up stuck re-enginering the entire city for trillions of dollars if they pushed too hard. As it is they didn't want to pay just to rebuild the levies properly.

All they had to do was scream 'RACISTS!!!'

Yea, the Nobel laureat and the poor slob living in the group home were created equal... Sorry, that "created equal" ideal is simply not true.