Ain't it great that the worst of worst case Y2K midnight disasters -- power outages and nuclear meltdowns, worldwide, time-zone by time-zone -- didn't happen? Isn't it nice that nothing even approaching a major Y2K problem has yet been reported midway through the first day of 2000?

So the way some of the polly scumbags that infest this forum tell it, anyone who prepared for possible Y2K problems must have been DEAD CERTAIN that these things were going to happen. And now, having pronounced Y2K to be a dead duck issue, those who prepared might as well have taken the money that they spent on Y2K and instead gone to Las Vegas for New Year's weekend on a wild drinking and gambling spree, and totally blown it at the bars and game tables.

Well, in the first place, I think it is safe to say that most people who prepared for Y2K did it not because they were SURE any of these things would happen, but because they felt it to be prudent for their families to have extra water, food, clothing, etc., just in case. (You know, like the way the U.S. government "blew" $50M on that Y2K bunker in Dee Cee?) Of course, pollies never could understand odds-versus-stakes type arguments, so naturally the fact that the world is here and the lights are on causes them to conclude that doomers were complete fools.

Secondly, the money spent on Y2K preparations did not go down a beer bottle or get lost on a spin of the roulette wheel. Whatever it was spent on -- whether it be for extra food, a wood stove, garden seeds, a year's supply of dog yummies -- it is still there. It can (and surely will) be used. It has value. It offers protection, a hedge against uncertainties that can happen anytime, anywhere, regardless of Y2K.

Finally, and most important: Anyone who thinks that Y2K can be dismissed because the first few hours of Jan 1, 2000 are uneventful is really delusional. We need WEEKS NOT HOURS to see how this plays out.

So, doomers, keep your preps handy. Pollies, good luck at the casinos.

-- King of Spain (madrid@aol.cum), January 01, 2000

Answers

I'm still preparing for the coming depression.

-- dinosaur (dinosaur@williams-net.com), January 01, 2000.

King of Spain, do you like to mudwrestle?

-- Pearlie Sweetcake (storestuff@home.now), January 01, 2000.

KoS, I agree. I must also say I have learned a lot on this forum. Further, what if money was "wasted"? Is that a crime? I am normally a totally prudent shopper. For Y2K I did buy things I would not ordinarily have bought. So what!!! I did things to preserve my life and the lives of others--just in case. I followed my gut and intellect to the ultimate conclusions without being lazy or a coward. I think I did rather well. (It ain't over yet, either--just starting. But I'm glad to have running water today!!)

Best to you all.

-- Mara (MaraWayne@aol.com), January 01, 2000.

Thanks, King of Spain, Good words. I just logged on, and yours was the first thread I saw. Rather amazed the computer is working, my air cleaner is still working - but I sure don't take them for granted any more.

-- DB (tomG@h.com), January 01, 2000.

Thanks, couldn't agree more.

But can I drain my bathtubs?

-- Duke1983 (Duke1983@aol.com), January 01, 2000.

KoS-

The reason most of us prepared is exactly because we DIDN'T KNOW what would happen. We lacked the ARROGANCE to possibly gamble our lives and the lives of our loved ones if it all went south. We lacked the ARROGANCE to think we could predict the future.

-- (cavscout@fix.net), January 01, 2000.

The new revisionist position. Oh no! WE never expected a meltdown! WE were just being prudent, taking out insurance! When people recommended preparations against a low-probability event, WE didn't claim it was a sure thing! We called them pollies, and morons, and idiots and fools for doubting the certainty of meltdown, but we didn't mean it! Oh no!

Nobody is saying preparations aren't wise. But when you attack people for a year for accurately predicting what we've seen, and THEN turn around and claim that was your position all along, that's too much.

-- Flint (flintc@mindspring.com), January 01, 2000.

Listen here, Miss Pearlie Sweetcake....get in line! This old hen is feeling so elated today that she is ready, willing, and able to step up to the mud hole and take KOS on. So git otta my way Sweetie... and wait yer tern!!

Taz

-- Taz (Tassi123@aol.com), January 01, 2000.

King, I love you! But don't empty your bathtubs folks if you live in Chicago. My water main just blew and I'm counting the drops as they trickle from the faucet.

Sheila

-- Sheila (Sheilamars@aol.com), January 01, 2000.

Flint, listen up: crow pie never tasted sooooooo good!

I am happy, happy, happy, happy. I bet King of Spain is too. I really enjoyed my hot shower. I luxuriated in the football game on tv. I used my coffeemaker for a cuppa, then my electric mixer to mix up some coffeecake batter, and my gas oven to bake it. My computer works, my modem works, my power works, my water works. My family is alive and healthy and not threatened by desperate looters or inadequate sewage facilities.

God is Good, and has answered my prayers, in the short run anyways.

(still waiting for MY invitation to mudwrestle)

-- mommacarestx (nospam@thanks.net), January 01, 2000.

Taz, YOU step aside. I gotta compliant mudhole all ready.

-- helen (sstaten@fullnet.net), January 01, 2000.

I am new to this discussion--could someone please explain pollies & trolls? I don't mean to ask a dumb Q, but truly the dumb Q is the one not asked. Anyone can send a response to my email: Wolfscout77@hotmail.com Thanks.

-- Loire (Wolfscout77@hotmail.com), January 01, 2000.

Oh, Pooh! And I, an elderly matron, wqanted to be the first to challenge KoS to mud-wrestle. Now I'll have to go to end of the line!

-- Connie Iversen (hive@gte.net), January 01, 2000.

Flint: You are living proof that you can't understand stakes-versus-odds concepts. I give up.

Ladies!: I truly am delighted on that on this wonderful day not only are we not under oppressive martial law, radioactive mushroom clouds, etc., etc., but that we also are expressing a healthy interest in feeling good about ourselves via the exotic art of mudwrestling. I look forward to engaging all of you as time, space and endurance permit. (Gawd! I think maybe 2000 is going to be an OK year after all!!)

-- King of Spain (madrid@aol.cum), January 01, 2000.

Polly scumbags?! Wow, bro you're outta control! Sccot back into your cave and break into your 6 month supply of prozac!

-- el (elmarco@usnvalley.net), January 01, 2000.

you popular, mud-coated fella! Great post. I think a lot of us feel better for having made a positive response to this scarey situation that is not over yet.

Good things follow for people who try to do the right thing. The rassling line with the King forms to the right!

-- Nancy (wellsnl@hotmail.com), January 01, 2000.

Loire, and other newcomers: "polly" is short for pollyanna, one with perhaps unwarranted optimism about Y2k. "Doomers" are those who believe in or prepare for a more serious breakdown of infrastructure or social systems due to Y2k disruptions.

And if you are totally confused about King of Spain and what mudwrestling has to do with Y2k, it seems that to him the life that does not have mudwrestling is no life at all. And you may wonder at the number of customarily sober, sensible citizens who suddenly feel a little friskier with relief now that the lights have stayed on.

But since we are not yet thrown back to the Stone Age, there are better options than mud. While I will not begin to dip into my preps until June has come and gone with no significant problems, there is one prep that I think deserves to be broken out and used with celebration, not to mention the proper mix of reverence and mirth.

The chocolate pudding wrestling.

A few little packets of chocolate pudding each shopping trip adds up. That plastic wading pool brought into the rec room and filled with water in case of the water mains going down did not have to be used yet. How many gallons of chocolate pudding can we make in there?

Some candles lit, a good bottle of wine, a pool full of chocolate pudding and thou. You will remember that mine is the only Y2k prep website bookstore that offers a book on tantra. I take your outstretched hand, and on the soft skin of your forearm that you expose there I gently place the first handful of warm chocolate pudding. Feel the weight of it as it settles to respond to the contours of your arm, the slightly cooler track as a drop runs down to your elbow. My fingers slowly begin to spread the pudding over your arm. The next handful won't go there but will go...

Etc.

There is a long line of fine Y2k-aware ladies waiting patiently for the mudpit. If I must go to the very end of the line and wait my turn patiently, I will. Of course, the infrastructure could still take a turn for the worse, and if you save the best for last you could lose out.

I forget, what was that about odds and stakes? [twinkle]

-- Firemouse (firemouse@fcmail.com), January 01, 2000.

Flint --

Love you, bro. Join in the celebration. It IS a family, and YOU'RE part of it. Today is a holiday -- it is OUR holiday. Enjoy it with us!

(In my view, you've been an honest speaker of your OWN point of view, and not carrying water for TPTB. I know that's suspect to some, but I have generally trusted and appreciated your hard work here.)

-- jor-el (jor-el@krypton.uni), January 01, 2000.

Firemouse, Do you think the King would or could take on two at a time in that pool of chocolate pudding?Sure sounds much more fun than wrestling in mud.I could bring the whipped cream & the cherries !!

-- Chris (griffen@globalnet.co.uk), January 01, 2000.

Add mint.

-- dinosaur (dinosaur@williams-net.com), January 01, 2000.

Chris, we can dilute a little of the chocolate pudding with a few drops of Chalice Well water for its healing qualities, and use it to paint the Tor labyrinth on his back. Then we'll dance the path of the labryinth with our fingernails -- delicately at first, then with increasing pressure.

Devon double cream? [pleading look] And fresh cherries? Pit them right there, and use the firm fresh juicy halves as little suction cups on his skin, like thouse ancient megalithic cup and ring markings?

I'm afraid I consider chocolate and mint a combination only appropriate for fine hotel rooms, with crisp white sheets invitingly turned down. Everything at its proper time and place...

I think one of the reasons I am feeling so giddy about the infrastructure being still up is that our refrigerator died in Thursday. My husband called me at the hospital where I was sitting vigil with my mother, who is critically ill. I snapped at him to just go get a new fridge, just something that will fit in the space available and plug into the stupid wall. Not "let's wait a few weeks and see of we can get something Green like a solar fridge, or look into propane even though I never even got around to getting a bigger propane tank for the stove." Nope, it was go get something now and hop to it, and they delivered it yesterday afternoon. Whew!

But maybe that slight hint of pollyism sounds kinky enough to add some extra excitement to the encounter. If I am polly enough to buy a refrigerator on the Eve of Destruction, who knows what other interesting complexities lie at the core of my Doomerette soul?

-- Firemouse (firemouse@fcmail.com), January 01, 2000.

"Some candles lit, a good bottle of wine, a pool full of chocolate pudding and thou",(What??No patouli incense burning?,I'll bring mine!)

"WHEW",sure is warm near that pudding pool.*SIGH*,I knew I shoulda volunteered for hosingdown duty.Uh,firemouse? When you get finished mudwrestling,let me know,your pudding sounds soooooooo fine.*WEG*, maybe you won't be tired out yet...lol...

-- stunned (wow@blush.com), January 01, 2000.

Huh???? What y'all talking about. Mud...? I lived in Western Washington State. I KNOW MUD!!! But whats with the chocolate and mint stuff and clean white sheets and all that there other kinky stuff? I better not let Pa read this post....might bring his heart rate up and give the old fart ideas!!

Taz

-- Taz (Tassi123@aol.com), January 01, 2000.

Don't forget the spatulas...

-- dinosaur (dinosaur@williams-net.com), January 01, 2000.

Oh, my.

Now I'm embarrassed. I only said that because KoS had asked his notorious question of me, an elderly, happily married (46 years) matron (who didn't he ask it of?) What are the odds of all of us responding on one thread to all of his questions? And how great a stake do we have in the outcome? I think we're all maniacally euphoric that the power is still on!

-- Connie Iversen (hive@gte.net), January 01, 2000.

GAWD!!! I MUST BE DREAMING!!!!

This just cannot be. The first 24 hours of Y2K turn out to be not just a bump in the road, more like a bug on the windshield. Then, all these beautiful women discuss what they want to do to me in a mud/chocolate encounter of the most delightful kind.

Truly the harkening of a new age of wonderment.

-- King of Spain (madrid@aol.cum), January 01, 2000.

Not to worry, Connie. I think that yes, it is partly the euphoria. All the realization of the consequences that Y2k could have had (and still could have) was profoundly depressing. We've had a reprieve, and suddenly we are glorying in the things like hot showers, fresh coffee, and a world where we can sometimes be playful rather than grimly serious like the way we've been so much of the fall.

KoS had not been asking his notorious question as frequently recently, and some of us hadn't been asked yet at all. Still having the power on today gives us more impetus to treat every day as the sacred gift that it is, and to not take it for granted. That includes not taking for granted someone who has been very polite about his mudwrestling invitations, at least from what I've seen on this board. Given some of the social skills exhibited on the board, he tackles a provocative enquiry with refreshing diplomacy. What if after all his Y2k preps he stepped off a curb without looking both ways and got smooshed by a bus, and we never got a chance to discuss chocolate pudding with him? While we live, let us live!

Firemouse (married 28 years, but still interested in expanding her repertoire of creative skills) (And besides, it's been so dry here that we'd have to stockpile freeze-dried mud)

-- Firemouse (firemouse@fcmail.com), January 01, 2000.

Your Highness,

You might have to borrow an idea from Paul Milne. His idea is that if it all turns out to be nothing, he lets folks take their try to drop him into the water in a dunking booth. Three trys for a bucket of rice or such.

This thread seems to show building demand from the fairer side of the Y2K crowd that you might have to set up a similar operation. Maybe fifteen minutes or an eight-count pin in the mud with the King per bucket of rice?

Ought to make the midway at Yourdon's Traveling Circus an equal opportunity event. Most guys would be inclined to vent frustrations throwing baseballs at the dunking booth target and the women seem to be announcing their desire to vent their desires on the King.

It ought to be a great show. ;)

WW

-- Wildweasel (vtmldm@epix.net), January 01, 2000.

Before the King of Spain enters the mud pit, he hands his golden crown and golden staff to his assistant. Then he takes off his golden robe and golden boots. Many women swoon at the sight of his physique. He ceremonially spits in the mud and dabs his royal right toe into the royal spittle, mixing it into the ooze. Now he is ready to meet his challenger.

-- dinosaur (dinosaur@williams-net.com), January 01, 2000.

Your Majesty, I have bad news. Mice have gnawed through the white, 5-gallon, food-grade buckets and the mylar bags which contained your eergency supply of dehydrated mud. They have also gnawed through the plastic bottles of Evian and have mixed it with the dried mud. I found them, wrestling shamelessly and shrieking, "oo la-la!" and "sacre bleu!" with the odd "voila!" and "holee merde" thrown in for variety. I have fired up the Ronco dehydrater and am feverishly processing more mud for storage--this time in metal garbage cans. I have also been to the store and laid in a supply of Perrier in glass bottles. I think you will like the fizzy effect.

-- Old Git (anon@spamproblems.com), January 01, 2000.

Old Git: LOL!

KoS: Here's mud in your eye!

-- dinosaur (dinosaur@williams-net.com), January 01, 2000.

Old Git, I have sent my mice over to scamper with yours. I am hoping that the generic rodent who has been scuttling about inbetween my walls (we call it The Big Mouse so as not to scare the children) will join the festivities.

-- Firemouse (firemouse@fcmail.com), January 01, 2000.