Quote from: RE on Jan 15, 2024, 01:52 AMThe movers & shakers from Davos have seen the light.

Conversation over canapes at the after session cocktail parties will be comparing bunker amenities and self defense weapons.  Freeze dried Truffles available in the food vendor booths.



https://www.cnn.com/2024/01/10/business/wef-global-risks-report/index.html

The people paid to spot risks see high chance of 'global catastrophe' within 10 years

RE

Full doomer, but from their own point of view.  In reality the folks at Davos are not even close to being 'doomer'.  As a Marxist I have to give this report a thumbs down.  The author, Hanna Ziady writes from an capitalist point of view and generates her own MIS-INFORMATION.

Doom is coming, but genuine bad information, like a green new deal.  Not faux mis-information will be the cause of doom.  Mis-information can only start a fire.  By itself it can't do much.  AI mis-information may be tinder for a fire, but to burn a fire needs fuel.  The existence of Davos itself provides sufficient fuel.

People at Davos need continual economic growth so their money piles get higher at twice the rate of actual growth.  So Davos as usual, with crocodile tears will define doom in terms of their portfolio bottom line.  Doom for Davos will not be 5.6 million Americans starving to death in 2053.  Doom for Davos will mean difficulty finding energy supplies to fuel their rape of the planet and maintain their useless eater status.  This is the writing on the wall Davos sees.

The problem with Hanna is she imagines the information we already have is true and correct.  Fear of 'dis-information' is a natural result of a threat to her frozen in stone 'truth'.  A Marxist point of view considers the world to be in flux, constant motion, everything changing and the economic system we have must reflect current conditions. Reactionaries * to the contrary, imagine the system we have is the best possible.  It is, only outright slavery is more exploitive.  Oligarchies rule by bank account.  The money trick puts a layer of abstraction on slavery and gives it more power.

Years ago, (actually most of my life) I decided to imagine a times that all the 21st century ideas modernity is so proud of, actually were as ignorant of reality as we know an average European peasant from the 1500s was.  I did this from a personal point of view, to test the validity of my own DOGma.  I am only now sour enough to apply the comparison to everyone else.  I am aware this little trick of mine, through the years has made my DOGma far superior to the average.  This gives me the confidence and self-esteem to put the filter on other people.

Let's be real.  Hanna Ziady posits that disinformation will become a threat.  All people who want censorship agree with her.  Mis-information must be fought, and all wanna-be censors are standing in line ready to do it.  Then any information that threatens the supremacy and cultural hegemony of the Davos status-quo will be quashed.  Davos will paint shit white.

My 15th century trick turned me into a Marxist, and I did not even know what one really was at the time.  Likely the gentile reader does not know what one really is.  It is not your fault.  You live in America.

* reactionaries fight system change.  They react against it.

Of course, to paraphrase F. Scott Fitzgerald, Doom is different for the rich, because they have more money.    But  even though it's different, they still see Global Catastrophe in the next 10 years.  That's a Full Doomer type prediction.

RE

Consistent with the ongoing crash in the Commercial Real Estate market, the truth about the over valuation in the stock market is also getting talked about in the MSM, as opposed to the bullshit that has been promulgated that the FSoA economy is healthy and we would avoid a recession due to the higher interest rates needed to stem inflation.   Pretty much every warning light for a crash is flashing RED, from the yield curve inversion in bonds to the PMI, skyrocketing debt on the Federal level and consumer credit card debt now topping $1T and of course the unaffordable housing situation all just SCREAMS crash ahead!

Also pretty silly IMHO is the notion that a recession will be short lived, and we will hop back to growth in a year or even less.  The debt problem is systemic and very deep, and there is nothing you can point to that might provide an engine for growth.

Internationally, the Chinese economy is in a deep hole with their own RE disaster unfolding and youth unemployment above 20%.  Shipping and trade continues to be threatened by the war in the Middle East and the Indian rice export ban is going to wreak havoc with food prices in many countries where it's a main staple.  This means increasing political instability throughout Asia.

So overall we are likely to see a major economic slowdown which will reduce demand for oil, and unless the wars escalate further to increase military demand for oil, consumer prices for fuell here in the FSoA probably won't change too much, at least to begin with.  However, if demand drops enough and they are forced to drop oil prices, that will mean the more expensive oil plays will be shut in.

It looks like the next couple of years will be a critical turning point in the whole energy-economy ball game.  Get ready for a real roller coaster ride, cuz it appears that TSHTF day is approaching.

https://markets.businessinsider.com/news/stocks/stock-market-outlook-economy-recession-bear-market-earnings-tech-bubble-2024-1

Stocks look 'highly vulnerable' and the economy is likely to enter a yearlong recession, a 30-year market veteran says

RE

40% decline is optimistic.

https://seekingalpha.com/article/4671474-is-it-1929-deja-vu-all-over-again

Is It 1929 Deja Vu All Over Again?

RE

Next to margin calls, short sellers and bank runs, nothing warms the cockles of my heart more than corporate bankruptcy filings.     What are cockles anyhow?   The pressure is building for a market crash on Black Tuesday, which coincidentally falls on October 29^th this year, just as it did in 1929.  It would be the perfect set up for the POTUS election on the following Tuesday, November 5th.  I can't think of a more perfect scenario for the arrival of SHTF Day, a day of infamy awaited by all Dedicated Doomsted Diners since we began the original Diner in February of 2012.  It's been a long wait, and perhaps we will at last be rewarded for our patience, my soul free to exit my current meat package and cash in my ticket to the Great Beyond, still with plenty of juicy fat marbled meat on the bones to earn a Prime Long Pig USDA designation from the Cannibals at the FSoA Dept of Agriculture.

Of course, actually calling this historic moment is a crapshoot, and we'll have to continue to wait a while longer, which is OK too.  I'm still enjoying following the daily progress of collapse, which is really a process and not something you can really pin to a single day, or even year, although sometimes with enough historical perspective later it can be narrowed down a bit.  Still, after more than 1500 years, pinning the Collapse of the Roman Empire to 476 AD with the fall of Rome in the Western half of the Empire doesn't really identify when the collapse began, or when it ended.  In some ways it's still with us in the deepest records of property ownership held in bank vaults in Switzerland and the catacombs of the Vatican by the Holy Roman Catholic Church.

For Industrial Civilization, collapse has been underway for a long time and in the FSoA you could point to a few moments as significant mileposts, the financial crisis of 2007-8, the collapse of the WTC on 911, the victory of consumerism and greed over the rebellion against capitalism and the back to the land movement of the hippies, best signified by the end of the 60s at Woodstock in the summer of '69, to name a few significant and symbolic events.  So even if Black Tuesday is a major milestone this year, it's unlikely all the lights will go dark the next day or the dollar's exchange value will fall to zero either.  Whatever happens, the trajectory is clear andthe pace of collapse is accelerating.  The end of the age of oil is on the horizon, and the sun is setting on capitalism, globalism and the control of the many by a tiny fraction of greedy billionaires pulling the strings of politicians and legislators and judges they own is coming to an end.  What follows will not be pretty, as nation states dissolve into anarchy, food becomes scarce and the vast majority of the current population die of starvation.

However, in the immortal words of Uncle Joe Stalin, you can't make an omelet without breaking a few eggs. 



https://www.marketwatch.com/story/corporate-defaults-are-happening-at-fastest-pace-since-financial-crisis-according-to-s-p-a2a096a6

Corporate defaults are happening at fastest pace since financial crisis, according to S&P

The scenario of the End Times has been around longer than the internet has been around to propagate it. Which isn't even close to how long Apocalypticism has been around. Bumped into it on reddit, and the definition is really good, within the context of how consuming the topic is. And how it has survived so long.

Apocalypticism is the religious belief that the end of the world is imminent, even within one's own lifetime.

"Religious belief" being the hiccup of course, with this definition from unless we accept the standard Merriam Webster Online definition of religion:

a cause, principle, or system of beliefs held to with ardor and faith

and presto...we have all arrived where others have since Jesus was around.

Us old farts here have the experience to have seen this all play out across our lifetimes. RE's list, of the faith and ardor that before leaving this mortal coil, FINALLY the results will be revealed to all the non-believers.

But for those of us with age and experience, and paying attention to the history we've lived through, we can't ignore how often these results have been announced, seemed to be occurring, discussed at length.
 
The old Diner, peakoil.com, ROE, dieoff.org and oilcrisis.net going back into the last century. And those are ALL after the stagflation of the late 70's, the Cold War, the Great Dieoff, the world running out of oil proclaimed by Jimmy Carter no less...before the end of the 1980's.

We've been here before. We've been here multiple times, those of us who protested the destruction of the natural world when the Trans-Alaskan pipeline was built, or the development of Prudhoe Bay. We're cheered on Jimmy when he announced the world was running out of oil by the end of the 1980's, believed in Ehrlich when he spoke of the pollution and dying via starvation of large swaths of the world population in 1970.

And all we got were the go-go 80's and a lingering after taste...soon satiated when Colin Campbell himself kicked off a catastrophe of a global peak oil. In 1990. And then within a few short years, internet, the scientific community and their opinion on the topic ran smack into modern disinformation and dissemination of ideas and the merry round picked up some speed once again.

34 years since Colin restarted a kernel of an older idea, and the internet took it, and others, and that first decade of the 21st century sure looked like the time had come. Again.

Everyone here is old now. I asked before, does anyone have kids? Kids might at least mitigate the natural tendency to buy into every world ending event that looks like it is approaching, lending a little optimism to our ideas if only for their sakes...the  apocalypse always just over the horizon...always just off in the future as we continue to wait....just wanting a glimpse so all the fascination won't have been for naught.

Rather than being happy to finally see it, and having failed in attempting to change the world back in the mid-70's and through stagflation, I found it better to just live life. It worked out pretty well. I'll continue doing it until my personal doom arrives, and it won't much matter as to why and how. But it will have been a good ride regardless.

Religious apocalypticism is something reserved for lower life forms.  I am of a scientific bent, and the math says we are going down.  Belief has nothing to do with it.  Facts have everything to do with it.

QuoteAll we got were the go-go 80's and a lingering after taste...

I found it better to just live life too.  Nothing is changed by the efforts of one.  But, if Julian Assange is flown in, I stand fully ready to support spray can art.  Among other things.  I wanted more than high fructose corn syrup.  I want more than idiots deciding what is good for me.

Quote from: TDoS on Mar 14, 2024, 08:45 PMBut for those of us with age and experience, and paying attention to the history we've lived through, we can't ignore how often these results have been announced, seemed to be occurring, discussed at length.

Ah!  I knew that one would pull you out from lurkerville!   Baiting you is so EZ!  Along with the corporate defaults, another thing I can count on as I observe collapse moving along its inexorable path, is that you will be sure to drop in and refresh us with your firm belief that since the defining SHTF Day moment has perpetually failed to arrive for all recorded history, since no collapse was really the Apocalypse because, hey, we're all still here, right?  LOL.  Every Kollapsnik who ever predicted collapse since Homo Sap first became self aware has been wrong, so it's a fair bet I'll be long dead before it comes to pass, as it of course must, because the Sun will run out of hydrogen eventually of course.

Now perhaps I am not as old or have as much experience as you, but then again I'm less likely to be suffering from the early symptoms of Alzheimer's either.  If you bothered to read the post for comprehension rather than the slick little misdirection of prior moments in the downward slide that just mark waypoints, you would grasp that what I am saying is that you can't really ever pin a collapse to a single event, day or even year.  A couple of fun ones I didn't mention were Dec 31, 1999 & 12/21/2012, my favorite Mayan prediction because Roland "Master of Disaster" Emmerich made one of his specialty City Destroying Cataclysm CGI spectacles for that one.  Collapse is a process, not a day or an event, and generally takes a few generations to play out.  Then in retrospect (if there are any historians around and any records survived) you may be able to point to events that were significant in the downfall, like the sacking of Rome by barbarians.

For me, it really is irrelevant when I buy my ticket to the great beyond, because I've already seen enough to know where it's going.  I don't need to see 4B people die in a year, because I know that in the absence of FFs the earth won't feed 8B meat packages.  the Die Off is as inevitable as the Sun running ut of hydrogen to fuse.

I shall count on your return many more times to remind everyone that predictions of the apocalypse never come true.  It's a feature of Alzheimers, to become fixated on something like that, even when it's not actually being predicted.  You might want to check on that.  I think there are some meds now that will slow the progress.

RE

Quoteyou will be sure to drop in and refresh us with your firm belief that since the defining SHTF Day moment has perpetually failed to arrive for all recorded history, since no collapse was really the Apocalypse because, hey, we're all still here, right?  LOL.  Every Kollapsnik who ever predicted collapse since Homo Sap first became self aware has been wrong, so it's a fair bet I'll be long dead before it comes to pass, as it of course must, because the Sun will run out of hydrogen eventually of course.

Always a perpetual argument about what human nature is.  One thing for sure.  Humans can't appreciate a collapse timeline.  Check the news about the Iceland volcano activity every day, and after about three weeks of doing that you are going to believe it is not going to erupt.  But it will.

Iceland volcanoes erupted three times last year, and there is seismic activity to show eruptions will happen again.  Your 'human nature would need calibration.

Personally I miss the herds of buffalo  I will never see.


Collapse has been happening for a long time.

I will never dine on Passenger Pigeon in my private Pullman rail car rattling the rails to Chicago from New York.

I have an ancestor who had his own Pullman.  The private jet of its day in the 1880's.  At the time he was worth a few million.  He did it by owning lots of chicken farms.  Consumption of Passenger Pigeon is a reasonable assumption.

He put my grandmother through an Ivy League college.  She was his granddaughter.  At the time he was 107 years old.

So fuck Robert F. Kennedy Jr.  It should be my turn.

Collapse has been happening for a very long time.

Quote from: RE on Mar 15, 2024, 04:15 AMIf you bothered to read the post for comprehension rather than the slick little misdirection of prior moments in the downward slide that just mark waypoints, you would grasp that what I am saying is that you can't really ever pin a collapse to a single event, day or even year.

Yeah, and you must have missed me detailing or referencing not only the claims going back to Jesus but those spanning the last half a century and piling up of multiple consequences to get to the expected outcome. 20 years ago. An explicit acknowledgement for those reading that even after many of them have been piled on top of each other, we still don't get the result some seem to look forward to. 

I'm happy that personal doom for any of us, same as regular folk, is far more likely than anything happening that results in a resounding "We told you so!" from those who have been watching events unfold since Jesus was born. 

And peak oil was all about a given point in time, a single event, day and year, and folks went for that hook, line and sinker. Thanksgiving Day, 2005. You can talk to me about dementia because it runs in the family, what's your excuse missing one this obvious? Selective memory? Indigestion? Irritated because the next day the blessed consequences hadn't appeared yet?

Quote from: TDoS on Mar 15, 2024, 03:30 PMAnd peak oil was all about a given point in time, a single event, day and year, and folks went for that hook, line and sinker. Thanksgiving Day, 2005. You can talk to me about dementia because it runs in the family, what's your excuse missing one this obvious? Selective memory? Indigestion? Irritated because the next day the blessed consequences hadn't appeared yet?

Because I never was much of a Peak Oil aficionado, despite beginning my investigations into the dynamics of collapse on the peakoil.com website.  I was always more drawn to collapse by the economic manifestations, not because of fossil fuels or climate change or species extinctions.  My original ID on peakoil was Rogue Economist, I only switched to Reverse Engineer after being booted off for being too argumentative with the moderators and not buying thee party line they were selling completely.  You are as much of an ideologue as those folks in the opposite direction, obsessed with proving that Peak Oil is a flawed concept.  Fortunately for me, you are not the moderator here, I am. I'm a little more lenient than those guys, because I find your repetitious attempts to discredit anything peakoil connected to be hilariously counterproductive.  So I periodically bait you into writing another one of your diatribes, rehashing the same tired objections over, and over, and over, and over again.  I'm a cripple in a Gulag on the Last Great Frontier, what better do I have to do with my time?

RE

Quote from: RE on Mar 15, 2024, 04:15 PM

Quote from: TDoS on Mar 15, 2024, 03:30 PMAnd peak oil was all about a given point in time, a single event, day and year, and folks went for that hook, line and sinker. Thanksgiving Day, 2005. You can talk to me about dementia because it runs in the family, what's your excuse missing one this obvious? Selective memory? Indigestion? Irritated because the next day the blessed consequences hadn't appeared yet?

Because I never was much of a Peak Oil aficionado, despite beginning my investigations into the dynamics of collapse on the peakoil.com website.  I was always more drawn to collapse by the economic manifestations, not because of fossil fuels or climate change or species extinctions.

I completely believe you. Most collapse folks tend to have the wideband interest, not the specific. Unfortunately, that is correlated with some folks using mechanisms they aren't familiar with to achieve their prognostications of doom and whatnot.

Quote from: REMy original ID on peakoil was Rogue Economist, I only switched to Reverse Engineer after being booted off for being too argumentative with the moderators and not buying thee party line they were selling completely.  You are as much of an ideologue as those folks in the opposite direction, obsessed with proving that Peak Oil is a flawed concept.

Well, peakoil.com always had a beef with folks being argumentative back when peak was as much a faith based concept as anything. They banned me shortly after I began participating as well...mostly for pointing out, as you say, flaws in the theory as it was known at the time. However, we are talking about the 2005-2008 timeframe. By 2010 or so the USGS built a new system covering part of the geoscience puzzle, used it for new estimates, and presented the domestic results beginning at the 2012 AAPG Long Beach California national convention. Part of the global update of the 2000 World Assessment work I believe. Published the method in 2015. Also in 2012 if memory serves, the geologist who led the  USGS 2000 World Resources project but was in industry in 2012 spoke the truth of a new concept in resource estimates during an AAPG meeting in Tulsa of that year. His concept included a more dynamic interpretation of resources in the geoscience world rather than static ones that previously infected how peak oils were calculated. In neither of these cases were economics involved, just basic geoscience ideas. In 2017, 2 years after the USGS had made their new method public, EIA analysts at the world energy modeling convention in Maryland demonstated the real world results of the use of a system based on these new ideas, and threw in economics to boot.

Peak oil was a flawed idea, way back when. From several perspectives. It isn't any longer. The only flaw remaining, or final improvement if you'd prefer, is who inside the two organizations who have built these systems will incorporate stochastic principles and publish everything they know.

K-Dog has indicated previously he doesn't seem to think there is much value in research. I disagree. And just demonstrated why.

Quote from: REFortunately for me, you are not the moderator here, I am. I'm a little more lenient than those guys, because I find your repetitious attempts to discredit anything peakoil connected to be hilariously counterproductive.

Power of God. I remember. 

Quote from: RESo I periodically bait you into writing another one of your diatribes, rehashing the same tired objections over, and over, and over, and over again.  I'm a cripple in a Gulag on the Last Great Frontier, what better do I have to do with my time?
RE

Well, your baiting seems reasonable, for exactly the reasons you've described. But I don't just post objections, refuting recycled talking points from the 1990-2010 peak oil period claims isn't even entertainment anymore. The research and work have been done. What I posted is information that you, and old school peak oilers, don't even know came into existence across the last 14 years. Peak oil was solved right under your noses and you missed it. 

Lets discuss something more interesting that you do have experience with. I'm headed out to see the eclipse ina couple of weeks, and I know you and K-Dog did this a couple years and websites back. Any suggestions on equipment or things to watch out for, other than don't drive an unreliable car like whatever K-Dog was using that needed towed home?
 
 

Quote from: TDoS on Mar 15, 2024, 08:13 PMWell, your baiting seems reasonable, for exactly the reasons you've described. But I don't just post objections, refuting recycled talking points from the 1990-2010 peak oil period claims isn't even entertainment anymore. The research and work have been done. What I posted is information that you, and old school peak oilers, don't even know came into existence across the last 14 years. Peak oil was solved right under your noses and you missed it.

Since I mainly follow economics, I never looked at Peak Oil as a problem in need of solution.  The problem in need of solution for me is in the value of money and its ability to function to adequately distribute resources to the global population of homo saps.  You're the one who is obsessed with Peak Oil here, not me.  You rant on and on about it, and consider the problem solved, which I don't believe is true but even if it was, the problem of the piss poor condition of the monetary system the world runs on hasn't been solved, and is in fact in far worse condition than it was in 2008-10.  Unless you believe that the problem of population rising and resources depleting was solved when the problem of Peak Oil was solved right under my nose, Houston, we still have a problem as far as I am concerned.  I generally don't even bother responding when you start referencing studies which you feel corroborate your thesis that the Peak Oil problem was solved.  It's exactly the same debating technique Dr. McStinksion uses when he gives one of his lectures to establish the scientific bona fides behind his belief that the question of Near Term Human Extinction has been resolved, and science proves we all went extinct back in 2016, just we haven't noticed yet.  The research you cite is only part of a much bigger picture and proves nothing about the viability of industrial civilization as we move forward here.  Nevertheless, you regale us with this information over and over, and over and over again as though these earth shattering revelations prove all discussion of collapse are wrong, because they're always wrong, etc, etc, etc.  It's ridiculous, and if you weren't so fixated on it you might be able to see how ridiculous it makes you appear, but you can't see it.  That is not my problem, it is your problem.
 

QuoteLets discuss something more interesting that you do have experience with. I'm headed out to see the eclipse in a couple of weeks, and I know you and K-Dog did this a couple years and websites back. Any suggestions on equipment or things to watch out for, other than don't drive an unreliable car like whatever K-Dog was using that needed towed home?

The car was I believe his Mercedes.  I think he  replaced that one with a newer model, though not brand new itself when he bought it.

Main things to have are the practically opaque sunglasses needed to look directly at the eclipse and a good still camera and video camera to record it.  You'll need filters that fit over the lenses of those cameras, but don't spend the ridiculous amount of money for custom ones for your Nikon or Hasselblad unless you're Elon Musk, you can buy the filter polymer in 8x10 sheets for a few dollars and use cardboard, glue & duct tape to make ones that fit your cameras, or cell phone if you're a cheapskate satisfied with phone quality photography.  Otherwise, make sure you have the right clothing and rain gear and portable shelter with you, and arrive early at your viewing location tograb a good spot.  Camping out a day or two before is wise.  Bring plenty of booze, drugs and smokables as well as snacks and BBQ grill.

If you are as lucky as we were and get a perfectly clear day with no clouds to impede the view, it's an unbelievable experience if you are in the Path of Totality.  Unless you are on that narrow swath, it's no big deal.  Where and when will you go see one?

RE

Quote from: RE on Mar 16, 2024, 12:24 AMSince I mainly follow economics, I never looked at Peak Oil as a problem in need of solution.

Okay. But you most certainly had it in your handbag of doom symptoms/causes/precursors.

Quote from: REYou're the one who is obsessed with Peak Oil here, not me.

Research isn't obsession. It just means I am far more informed on this particular topic than the generalists.

Quote from: REYou rant on and on about it, and consider the problem solved, which I don't believe is true but even if it was, the problem of the piss poor condition of the monetary system the world runs on hasn't been solved, and is in fact in far worse condition than it was in 2008-10.

The solution to peak oil (in the predictive modeling sense) doesn't require your belief, any more than 2+2=4 does. And you have been using economics in your own way as an explanatory part of your doom trigger going back decades now....Rogue Economist....I didn't need to be told your username earlier.    

Quote from: REUnless you believe that the problem of population rising and resources depleting was solved when the problem of Peak Oil was solved right under my nose, Houston, we still have a problem as far as I am concerned.

The other than peak oil problems generated by humanity are legion. Of course we have a problem. We consume.

Quote from: REI generally don't even bother responding when you start referencing studies which you feel corroborate your thesis that the Peak Oil problem was solved.

I didn't espouse a thesis, I related historical information leading to a very specific statement as to how many folks figured it out. 

Quote from: REThe research you cite is only part of a much bigger picture and proves nothing about the viability of industrial civilization as we move forward here.

A) I cited no research. I provided a timeline of an event leading to a specific statement as to how many folks have figured it out, and important milestones along the way. If I cited research I would have used footnotes.
B) I've never argued the viability of industrial civilization one way or the other.

But this does raise the implication that your "experience" and understanding of the viability of industrial civilization based on a hobbyists understanding IS valid. Generally speaking, I will admit that self learning can be highly effective. But when your application of that level of understanding allows you to conclude that Toyota would be bankrupted during the 2008-2009 recession at peakoil.com, and the same of Tesla years ago on reddit, I might recommend that you put a little more physical science rigor into "solving" what ails your analysis at the micro scale of market watching prior to applying it at the macro level.

Quote from: RENevertheless, you regale us with this information over and over, and over and over again as though these earth shattering revelations prove all discussion of collapse are wrong, because they're always wrong, etc, etc, etc.

You've never seen the timeline before that I just provided. Therefore you've never seen it over and over. It wasn't earth shattering, it was research, spanning more than a decade, arriving at a result. And I didn't say anything about how it relates to collapse.

If you want to just make shit up, you don't need to pretend I'm involved at all.

Quote

QuoteLets discuss something more interesting that you do have experience with. I'm headed out to see the eclipse in a couple of weeks, and I know you and K-Dog did this a couple years and websites back. Any suggestions on equipment or things to watch out for, other than don't drive an unreliable car like whatever K-Dog was using that needed towed home?

The car was I believe his Mercedes.  I think he  replaced that one with a newer model, though not brand new itself when he bought it.

Main things to have are the practically opaque sunglasses needed to look directly at the eclipse and a good still camera and video camera to record it.  You'll need filters that fit over the lenses of those cameras, but don't spend the ridiculous amount of money for custom ones for your Nikon or Hasselblad unless you're Elon Musk, you can buy the filter polymer in 8x10 sheets for a few dollars and use cardboard, glue & duct tape to make ones that fit your cameras, or cell phone if you're a cheapskate satisfied with phone quality photography.  Otherwise, make sure you have the right clothing and rain gear and portable shelter with you, and arrive early at your viewing location tograb a good spot.  Camping out a day or two before is wise.  Bring plenty of booze, drugs and smokables as well as snacks and BBQ grill.

If you are as lucky as we were and get a perfectly clear day with no clouds to impede the view, it's an unbelievable experience if you are in the Path of Totality.  Unless you are on that narrow swath, it's no big deal.  Where and when will you go see one?

RE

Thank you for the information. I hadn't planned on taking pictures, so I hadn't considered much in the way of my camera equipment. I'll probably modify that plan now. My plan is to spend the night before within 2 hours or so of the path of totality. I've found a location in nowheresville along a small secondary road which just happens to have plenty of pulloffs, intersections with big dirt parking areas. I'm going to go find one and park. If everyone else in the texas/arkansas intersection is doing the same, I will wing it in terms of where I pull over to watch. Paris TX through Mena AK is the general location.

QuoteAny suggestions on equipment or things to watch out for, other than don't drive an unreliable car like whatever K-Dog was using that needed towed home?

I still have the car and it is actually reliable.  Cruising around Washington State in it is fine.  There are thousands of Mercedes here.  Montana is a different story.  If something goes wrong with it in the middle of nowhere you are screwed.  At the time there was only one Mercedes dealership in Montana and it turned out to be the end of a strip mall with one car on display and something about as big as a Jiffy Lube to work on customer cars.  It would have taken weeks to get it fixed in Montana before I could get it home.

This one is a 2008 mine is a 2007.  Mrs. Dog has a 2008.  They are both black.

We arrive at a place together driving separately.  People think we actually get along.  The truth is we have been trying to get rid of each other for more than forty years.  Neither one of us can do anything right.

There was an issue with the transmission.  It has been fine since.