09:37 – Barbara is back to using her regular cane. She used the walker frame on Tuesday, my four-foot cane yesterday, and declared last night that she was ready to start using her regular cane again. She took the final anticoagulant shot yesterday, and started this morning on one 325 mg aspirin daily, which she’ll continue for a month.
I see the Greeks are revolting, for what good it will do them. Most of the MSM are calling it “protests”, but throwing rocks and Molotov cocktails at the police is a bit beyond protesting. Attempted murder, say. It seems that most Greeks are blaming the EU and IMF for their problems, and the socialist government is near collapse. No one knows what will replace it, but the Communists are pushing hard. I expect we’ll see the current rioting devolve into actual revolution if things don’t greatly improve soon. And things are likely to get much, much worse, not better. As the infection spreads and other southern-tier countries default, we can expect to see similar violence as governments teeter and then topple in Italy and Spain and Portugal and Belgium and France. Not Ireland, thank goodness, nor the northern-tier eurozone countries. Unless they’re foolish enough to commit their economies to subsidizing the southern tier.
Unfortunately, the US is on the same course, albeit probably five or ten years behind. And there’s no one to bail us out.
13:32 – Barbara went to the doctor this morning, just to get looked over and have a few tests done. Her doctor didn’t seem too concerned about her brief loss of consciousness Tuesday. He seems to think it was caused by her severe pain immediately before the event, which caused her body to be flooded with adrenaline. He’s going to keep an eye on her low hemoglobin levels, but for now he basically said to take an extra multi-vitamin tablet every day and be sure to drink plenty of fluids. He also said that she was doing extremely well in terms of knee movement and so on, especially for only two weeks after her surgery.
Here are a couple of articles that caught my attention. First, despite the Guardian’s early report that a consensus had been reached before Sunday’s upcoming crisis summit for a huge effort that would finally resolve the euro crisis, it soon became obvious that not only had no such consensus been reached, but that Germany and France were farther apart than ever. This article sums things up pretty well. Franco-German deadlock over ECB’s role in rescue fund
Then we have Who Will Bail Out the Rescuers?, which starts by talking about the inability of France to contribute to bailouts and then goes much farther afield. I’m not entirely sure, but I think the article recommends stocking up on firearms and ammunition to shoot back at rioters. And police.
15:04 – Okay, this is interesting. I’ve had Sons of Anarchy S3D1 at the top of my queue since several weeks before it released, which has been a month or two. The status has never shown anything except “very long wait”.
We’re on the two-discs-at-a-time plan, and my DVD queue is getting down to the dregs. Other than Sons of Anarchy S3, Netflix just shipped us the last disc I really care about today. Our anniversary date is next Wednesday, and I’d already put a reminder in my calendar to downgrade our account to streaming-only and wait a few months for more DVDs we wanted to become available. And then this email arrived.
Re: Arriving Later: Sons of Anarchy: Season 3: Disc 1
From: Netflix
To: Robert Bruce Thompson
Date: Thu Oct 20 13:43:20 2011****************************
NETFLIX – Shipping update
****************************Dear Robert,
“Sons of Anarchy: Season 3: Disc 1” was not available from your local shipping center. Fortunately, it was available from a shipping center in another part of the country. It’s on its way and should arrive within 3 to 5 days.
You’ll notice we also recently sent the next available DVD from your Queue to enjoy while “Sons of Anarchy: Season 3: Disc 1” makes its way to you.
Your Queue now shows this extra DVD rental. Enjoy.
-The Netflix Team