Thank you Ed Yourdon for having the courage to share with us your assessments about the potential impact of Y2K. I believe your veracity, and that you are not trying to mislead anyone or profit from this situation. You and your daughter are intelligent enough to make a living in many ways; I know that theres no need by you to exploit people by creating an artificial doomsday scenario.

You are an optimist!

If on the day of birth someone had forecast the events that were to impact my body and soul, only the most dedicated doomers would have believed them to be possible.

The following is a very short account of what I have personally experienced during my first quarter century on this lovely planet:

As a baby a Nazi doctor refused to send me to the hospital until I was almost dead. I spent more than two months there.

Then I was firebombed. While I was again in the hospital, this time with diphtheria, our apartment went up in flames.

After WWII, as a seven-year old, my mother made me collect pigs guts from a farmers manure pile. It was an ingredient for dinner.

Rich ol Pa abandoned us. Ma, my brother and I squatted in an attic for one year. Slept one mattress on the floor. We had no running water, toilet, heat, power and still very little to eat.

At the ages of 15 and 17 our mother sent my brother and me to America. To freedom. Into slavery in the United States. Again, and still, I lived in a shack without heat, water, sewer or toilet. My only companions: friendly field mice, ducks and geese.

Worked my ass off.

Seven days a week.

Without pay.

Since I trust my governments advice, I am preparing for Y2K.

For a 3 day snowstorm.

ROFLMAO.

Ive learned that: Man has nothing to fear but man himself.

Or hisself

Or whatever the proper English expression is nowadays.

Again, thanks Ed, for your excellent book, etc. May God bless you and your family.

He has blessed me.

-- Not Again! (Seenit@ww2.com), July 23, 1999

Answers

I feel this tidbit needs to be brought back up to the top, and this thread is the perfect spot.

Last Weds, I attended the St. Paul MN Community Conversation meeting with Koskin'em, and other state and local officials. The meeting went pretty much as planned, with bland platitudes and vague reassurances.

But AFTER the meeting, I hung around and got to ask Kosky a few questions (on nukes, actually. He didn't much like them.)

Right before Koskin'em left, I said to him, "But all the folks who've done nothing to prepare are going to panic at the last minute. There's gonna be bank runs, and runs on stores..."

His response: "Yeah, I know....."

Made the whole evening worth while...

Got your preps done yet? 161 days.

-- Dennis (djolson@pressenter.com), July 23, 1999.

Not Again -- a looonnngg time ago, you posted some of your memoirs about the difficult experiences you had (which, unfortunately, got you trolled mercilessly). For those of us who have never really known want, or toil, or hunger -- is there some guidance or advice you would like to offer?

Anita Evangelista

-- Anita Evangelista (ale@townsqr.com), July 23, 1999.

When your hungry look for pig guts.

-- roadkill (roadkill@roadkill.com), July 23, 1999.

Dennis,

WTF?!?!?

Tell me you are not serious.

Father

-- Thomas G. Hale (hale.tg@att.net), July 23, 1999.

Not Again!:

Thanks for sticking around. I, as do many here, share your feeling regarding Ed, Jennifer and their book. We do not 'idolize' him as some of the more misguided here have suggested. It is true that I have respected his professional work for a long time (before Y2K ever became an issue). This is because I've earned my living for the past 20 years by programming computers. Ed's texts were a major part of my education and my professors had a respect for his work as well.

I also respect what he and Jennifer have attempted to accomplish by focusing on this issue. If he turns out to have been mostly correct in his assessment of the situation, I think it took a lot of guts. If he turns out to be mostly wrong, it still took a lot of guts. Either way, I don't hold him responsible for my actions. They are mine and mine alone. Ed's book merely prompted me to do additional research.

The conclusion that I reached, based both on my research and my professional knowledge of software/information systems, is that precise predictions are impossible but that at least some preparation is prudent. We will be delighted should those preparations not be needed.

Your story, played out in bits and pieces here over the past year is about as scary as it gets. I'd like to tell myself "it can't happen here...it can't happen to me" but it happened to you didn't it?

I've lived my entire life in relative comfort and luxury. No, I'm not rich and I don't eat from a silver spoon, but I've never really been hungry or severely mistreated, nor have I suffered the darker side of human ignorance. I've always had fresh water, a toilet and people who cared about me. I've had incredible opportunities for education. I'd like to think that everyone should have the same opportunities.

Sometimes though, we don't understand and appreciate what is truly important in our lives until we are faced with loosing it.

You presence here shatters the illusion that history exists only in the text books and that it has no real meaning for our lives today. Sometimes though, a cold bucket of water is the best thing to wake the sleeping. Thank you for your contribution.

-- Arnie Rimmer (Arnie_Rimmer@usa.net), July 23, 1999.

Mr. Hale:

My wife was standing right next to me when Kosky said it. GOD'S TRUTH.

-- Dennis (djolson@pressenter.com), July 23, 1999.

Not Again, Thank you for your input. I have read your posts in the past and have gained from them. We in America take so much for granted and have the arrogance of think we are immune from the horrors of the world.

Our time just has not come yet. We may be looking at it in the next months. I hope to have the strength that has carried you.

-- Linda A. (adahi@muhlon.com), July 23, 1999.

I too heard Mr. K in St. Paul on Wednesday. I got to ask him about availability of pharmaceuticals. He gave a very good answer; they have a 90-day reserve and no calamity in the last 30 years has put people without for more than 36 hours. But we are not talking about one localized situation, so I'm stocking what I can.

What I didn't get to ask him was: what about the world-wide threat of nuclear meltdowns when countries don't have generators to pump cooling water to their plants for the 4-5 months it takes to cool down? Some folks think our plants could melt because some are still waiting for chips ordered over a year ago.

You need lots of running water and a bad nose to clean pig intestines.

-- John Littmann (JTL9700@JUNO.COM), July 23, 1999.

Dear roadkill,

I'm sorry if I, unwittingly, almost ate one of your ancestors. My mother who never cooked, because there was not much to cook or no fuel to cook with, did cook once. Behind a locked door.

When my little brother began to devour her entree, we discovered it was a roadkill. Were you a cat?

Dear father,

I am serious. Ohhhh, that pile was squishy. May your future have few troubles. Who is Dennis?

-- Not Again! (Seenit@ww2.com), July 23, 1999.

I am a computer consultant, and live near MPLS. 25+ years in the computer biz. I asked Kosky about nukes. Got my info from Matt Chalama, Y2K co-ordinater for the NRC. Kosky didn't like my questions.....

-- Dennis (djolson@pressenter.com), July 24, 1999.

This thread is in a death spiral...............lets move on, my freinds.

-- MidWestMike_ (MidWestMike_@hotmail.com), July 24, 1999.

Wow, Dennis, glad I caught your background, I'll probably take you a little more seriously on the Hyatt board now. };-) You spoke with Koskinen? What questions did you ask?

-Draco

-- Draco42 (Somewhere@in.time), July 24, 1999.

Dear Anita,

I bought your book 'How to live without Electricity..' earlier this year. Thank you for your helpful information. Although I was forced to do so for too many years, I wanted to learn how to do in greater comfort should we have to do it again.

Frankly, I do not have a good answer for your question. I have thought for years about why I survived because there never seemed to be any hope. Mainly because there was NOT ONE single person who cared about our predicament.

The best explanation that I can give is that I during my spare time I read incessently. To learn and to take my mind away from it all. This, combined with my unending patience, made me keep my sanity. Now I am healthier and happier than my contempories and in better physical shape than when I was twenty. I am convinced that I can live to be 100+ and still be able to outdo others half my age.

-- Not Again! (Seenit@ww2.com), July 24, 1999.

Hi Anita & Dennis. I too was at the St. Paul Y2K community meeting. Here's how it went.

I got to ask a question on live NPR Radio (second question?). It was (approximately): "My name is Smith. By way of introduction, I run Y2K-Safe Minnesota, a service helping people prepare for Y2K. I also run the Y2K information website, www.y2ksafeminnesota.com. My question is: Social Security started Y2K work 10 years ago. They have the initial code fix* done, but are still doing systems testing, which takes at least a calendar year. They're still not done. Last August, a Minnesota state agency did a survey** of all 330-odd utilities in the state - gas, water, electricity, oil - and found that between half and three-fourths had not yet fixed a line of code. SS has been on this for 10 years, and they're not done... How can you conclude that we're possibly facing anything less than another Great Depression?"

The answer I got was vague and long; basically, Kosky repeated that he was optimistic, and that a lot of work has been done recently. ROTFLMAO! (Between 1/10 & 1/5 of them are still in the assessment and inventory phase, which is 7% of the way thru the project when finished). He and (especially) Norm Coleman (mayor of St.Paul) looked a bit pained when they heard the last half of my question. The most important aspect of their answers IMO was that neither denied the truth of the study. Dennis, Back me up on this one. P.S. My wife said your wife was quite attractive; good to meet you two -- E-mail me sometime.

-- MinnesotaSmith (y2ksafeminnesota@hotmail.com), July 24, 1999.

MinnesotaSmith is indeed correct. No denial was attempted on the facts presented by his question. I found that QUITE interesting. (sorta like Kosky's "off the cuff" comment to ME, eh bud?)

-- Dennis (djolson@pressenter.com), July 24, 1999.