As I’ve posted here before, I have a background in emergency preparedness, as well having been through my own experiences with both natural disasters and economic hard times (and, by the way, I’ve used food storage far more during the latter than the former). Some years back, I prepared a one-page checklist for getting started on personal and family preparedness. I recently updated that sheet (PDF, 23KB); feel free to download and distribute it.

UPDATE: Subterranean Instalanche™ in progress; Glenn linked directly to the one-page sheet (instead of this post), so my server is feeling the load even though the hits aren’t showing up over on my Sitemeter gauge; Glenn’s now linked directly to this post. If the site and/or the sheet takes a while to download, that’s why.

UPDATE: Typo in sheet corrected, thanks to feedback from Tim Elliott.  ..bruce w..

…but I’m only two steps removed from accused Russian spy Anna Chapman on LinkedIn. Maybe I should see what my connectivity to Kevin Bacon is.  ..bruce w..

SunDog was the Apple II computer game (later ported to the Atari ST) that Wayne Holder and I (with others) did at FTL Games some 25+ years ago.  This video looks as though it came right out of the game. ..bruce w..

The e-mail above came in earlier today; clearly, my e-mail client (Thunderbird) didn’t think much of it.  ..bruce w..

Something to keep in mind as the economy struggles and the government bungles.  ..bruce w..

Back on May 22nd, I ordered an Apple iPad (3GS, 64GB) in the full expectation of being able to use AT&T $30/month unlimited data access plan. It was scheduled to ship on June 9th and arrive here in Colorado around the 15th.

However, today AT&T announced that this plan would go away on June 7th, a little over two months after the iPad started shipping. That changeover would happen before my iPad arrived; therefore, I would never have a chance to sign up for that unlimited plan. As I stated elsewhere, I can’t believe that Apple didn’t know about this either as a possibility or a certainty. It is, perhaps, the most profoundly stupid and self-defeating business move I have seen in years.

On the other hand, if AT&T really did blindside Apple with this, Apple will likely use it to break exclusivity agreements with AT&T and open up both the iPhone and the iPad to other telecom provides. If I were at Sprint or Verizon, I’d be on a plane to Cupertino this morning with an unlimited data plan proposal in hand.

In any case, I went online to Apple today and canceled my iPad order. When I did so, I was given a drop-down list to state the reason for the change. My answer: “I made a mistake.”  ..bruce w..

[Note for nit-pickers: yes, I placed the order on May 22nd and have the e-mail from Apple to prove it. However, they didn't process the order until May 25th, hence the date above.]

…ponder the state we’re in, and what’s likely to hit the fan over the remaining seven months of 2010.

Then start working on your emergency preparedness.  ..bruce w..

Henderson has been busy (see above, taken in England a week or so ago), as have I. But let the posting start anew.

Now we just have to figure out what to post about.  ..bruce w..

Just saw this over at Rasmussen Reports. Gee, and it’s been years since I’ve been to Jersey; nice to know they still remember me fondly.

Oh. As it turns out, they’re talking about Bruce Springsteen instead of either of us here at ASIP. I have no clue why they ran this poll, unless it happens to be related to this.  ..bruce w..