In my opinion "Bump in the Road" and your scale of 1-10 are the same thing. Don't they go hand in hand??

You can't say your an 8,present more solid evidence(facts) that we have very serious problems and in the same post say "if its only a bump in the road"

You can't say people will die cause of Y2K(chain of events)and in the same post say "if its only a bump in the road"

In an earlier post Ed Yourdon made comments about making a decision and sticking with it.

My decision with all the evidence(facts)presented"This will be alot more than a bump in the road"

A bump in the road is an inconvience--my bank statement screwed up,waiting an hour gas expensive gas,the cereal aisle at the store is bare.Those are irratating bumps in the road of life. Those are bumps to me. I'm sure we all have a different definition of this.

I've experenced alot of bumps in the road and this event coming up ain't even close.

-- maji (majiWI@yahoo.com), March 19, 1999

Answers

I can't take credit for this--radio commentator Ken Hamblin said it--but if you go to the gas station and there is no gas, that's TEOTWAWKI. If you go to the grocery store and there is no cereal, that's TEOTWAWKI.

-- Vic (Roadrunner@compliant.com), March 19, 1999.

There is the important issue of the context in which y2k could be a bump. When the K-man and the media and Bennett tell the populace that there will be only a bump, they are saying in the context of current conditions, i.e., a world in which individuals have not prepared. What I can hope will only be a bump for me will in fact be measured against whatever preparations I have made. What the populace *should* be told is that y2k *could* be only a bump if they attempt to protect themselves against it.

And I agree that a "bump" is limited to inconveniences and irritations - once it becomes necessary for people to "pull together" (see recent Terry Block drivel), then y2k has reached the next level. And of course, it is merely a bump if the problem affects you but not me!

-- Brooks (brooksbie@hotmail.com), March 19, 1999.

Do you think that you have experienced more bumps in the road than bumps on the head?

-- aaaaahhhhhhhhh (???@quizzical.com), March 19, 1999.

My definition of 'bump in the road':

3 days or so of problems. Like the senate report tells us to prepare for, and most everyone else 'official.'

Senate report says: Anyone who thinks this is merely a 'bump in the road' is simply misinformed.

Well if three days (or even longer) is MY definition of a bump in the road, and they say it's most certainly not, then...

I'm confused. Seems to me they're saying two different things depending on how you read it.

PJ in TX

-- PJ Gaenir (fire@firedocs.com), March 19, 1999.

I always appreciate the humor in these threads. AAAAAAAAAAAAAAArg, that was good and evoked a giggle.

A "bump in the road", my defination, would be a few days of power outages, a few days without water, some food disruptions, some banking mistakes (quickly taken care of by my banks efficient staff), waiting in line for gas for more than 10 minutes, and no phones for several hours off and on. But, remember, this is my defination.

We should be asking Bennett and the others their defination. Evidently, Bennett's family members think that it is going to be a rough bump because I have read accounts that the daughter has stock piled food in the garage and the nephew dug a hole for a fuel storage tank.

-- Linda A. (adahi@muhlon.com), March 19, 1999.

Sorry, I am really bad with names. It is not aaaarg but aaaaaahhhhh.

-- Linda A. (adahi@muhlon.com), March 19, 1999.

PJ says, "I'm confused. Seems to me they're saying two different things depending on how you read it."

Welcome to the wild and wacky world of politics, where up is down and down is up, depending on what the polls indicate you should be saying today.

-- rick blaine (y2kazoo@hotmail.com), March 19, 1999.

Another thing I was thinking about "Don't we all experience "TEOTWAWKI" in our normal lives.

When you lose a parent,grandparent,child,company layoff,child leaving home for the first time,victem of a crime,serious car accident,and the list gos on.

This issue seems to go way beyond that.

hmmm-I did have a point to make but I lost it--You understand what I'm trying to say.

-- maji (majiWI@yahoo.com), March 19, 1999.

Reminds me of a comparrison of the logic of different professions:

How much is 2 + 2 ?

An Engineer will say: "2.0000 + 2.0000 = 4.0000"

A Mathematician will say "2 + 2 = 4 or -2 + -2 = -4, etc"

A lawyer will say: "...lets's see... 2 + 2....hmmm...How much do you want it to be?"

Different learning and experiences lead people to interpret the question in vastly different ways.

--Greybear, BTW, DeeCee is pretty thick with lawyers.

- Got Calculators?

-- Greybear (greybear@home.com), March 19, 1999.

This Bump In This Road is a red ant hill ready to sting you to death.

-- Watchful (seethesea@msn.com), March 19, 1999.

Go back to sleep. Senator Bennett will make Y2K juuuuust fine. Bureaucrat-speak to mean what we want the situation to look like for you the sheeple. We don't trust you and you don't trust you, so Senator Dodd will BS for you to tranquilize you uninformed boobs, so you don't have to do what you need to do to survive. It might screw up our plans for Amerika.

-- PJC (paulchri@msn.com), March 19, 1999.

If the electricity stays on, it will be a BUMP IN THE ROAD. If the electricity stays off for longer than 3 weeks, TEOTWAWKI.

A bump in the road to me is as follows:

Screwed up electronic accounts (bank, mortgage, credit cards, etc...) Power on times. i.e., your neighborhood or city will have power from X:XX AM to X:XX PM, or rolling brown outs. The grocery store will only take CASH, because all their electronic money systems have crashed. Gasoline is $5.00/ gallon, cash only. You get the picture...

Expect National Guard to be mobile and seen by all of the population. Looters will be shot on sight as an example. Can you say martial law?

That is my definition of a bump in the road.

Now if the electricity goes off, and is off longer than 3 weeks.... Got guns?? Got ammo? Got food? Got water? Got heat?

The Dog

-- Dog (desertdog@sand.com), March 20, 1999.

"Bump in the road" means the DGIs won't notice anything happened. What are the chances for that?

-- (li'ldog@ontheporch.com), March 20, 1999.

Compare this economy to 30 Nascar machines, 700 horsepower each, doing 190 three abreast at Daytona. Ok, now put a bump in the road.

-- Puddintame (dit@dot.com), March 20, 1999.

"30 Nascar machines, 700 horsepower each, doing 190 three abreast at Daytona. Ok, now put a bump in the road."

Or an oil slick. Or a slight contact between two cars at the head of the pack.

-- Tom Carey (tomcarey@mindspring.com), March 21, 1999.