Don't you just get the feeling that Bushco is struggling to keep

[rzemanfl]

the worst of the bad news about a bunch of things, like the real extent of damage to the fuel infrastructure, from becoming generally known until it is too cold out most places for folks to take to the streets?

[TallahasseeGrannie]

1. This winter might be a disaster

equal to Katrina. I'm not a prophet, but just common sense tells you it is going to be rough.

[greekspeak]

2. Yeah, unfortunately, the poor and elderly, especially among minorities

will be the ones that pay with their lives. I fear that your comparison with Katrina may well be spot on. I can hear in my ears now the finger pointing right wing blaming the victims again for being poor or wasting their money on Cadillacs and illicit drugs.

Speaking of drugs, they will come about 4th on many peoples' budgets...after food, rent, and heat. Maybe they can get the rent and food, but after that it will be dicey.

[TallahasseeGrannie]

3. I crochet blankets all the time for our homeless shelter

and I think I'll be working fast and furious from here on out. I highly reccomend it if you don't have a lot of money. Yarn is cheap, And while I work I think good thoughts into the stitches. Very, very satisfying.

[rzemanfl]

7. You can do that in Tallahassee, in the North you'd need to quilt.nt

[greekspeak]

9. People love something made by hand too. It makes a special item

A little warmth for the heart as well as for the body. Good on you, ma'am! :hi:

[Boo_Radley]

10. That's really nice.

I don't do much to help strangers. When I get hit up for a cigarette by a homeless guy, I'll usually give him a couple, and I pitch money into the hat for street performers, and I call Goodwill out instead of throwing old stuff to the curb, but that's about it.

I need to find some good ideas like that, that I'm capable of doing, can do in my spare time, that would be worthwhile.

[TallahasseeGrannie]

11. If you knit or crochet

ask all your friends for their old yarn and just get started. Nothing fancy. I make stripes of varying colors, usually double crochet. I don't knit much, but just a knit/perl combo would do.

[Southsideirish]

12. Do you have a simple pattern? I haven't crocheted in years

but I would love to give it a "go. Maybe I could find one online...

[TallahasseeGrannie]

13. Just chain about 100

and double crochet from there, then edge with some fringe.

I make full sized blankets, baby blankets and also long, half sized blankets that can be used as bed shawls, wraps, etc. I have had the gratification of seeing one of my shawls on a woman walking down the street pushing a grocery cart. It isn't much, but my time and good thoughts went into it. If it gave her comfort, then I am happy about that.

And you are right, there are lots of patterns on line.

[rzemanfl]

4. I said it first:

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_topic&forum=132&topic_id=2059224

[HereSince1628]

5. A projected 70% increase in home heating costs

and $3 gasoline...with inevitable rises in the cost of transportation raising the costs of everything from commuting, through food, to keeping warm..

Price hikes in Utilities, Food, Transportation are going to have impacts.

Middle and working class shoppers will likely avoid even the modestly up scale stores in malls.

Three dollar gasoline may even keep them from driving to the big box stores located out on the edge of town like Walmart.

[OneTwentyoNine]

6. Come winter heating Oil along with gas will be put on credit cards...

That will make the 18 MILLION per day that CC companies make now on their transaction fee for gasoline purchases look like chicken shit money.

Ahh...its a GREAT time to be alive if your a oil baron on a credit card exec. The raping and pillaging is endless.....

[pretzel4gore]

8. cowboys on bucking broncos

only the bronco is a nuclear power which put man on the moon 2 generations ago and by inches has seen the promised land and struggled mightily to move towards it- she overcame the slave vultures of the old south when they gave her no choice, she overcame the robber barons and their 'rape is beautiful' mentality, she overcame the joe mccarthys and the murderers of the kennedys.....now she will overcome the reagan and bush criminal mobs (again, like the Unionists in 1861, she has no choice but to fight back)
this time, the whole lot (the slaver vultures, the robber barons, the joe macarthys, the killers of progress, and the petty thieves in costly clothes) are all tied up in one neat package, to be hunted dowwn and punished so no future conman will even think of trying what these cheap punks actually pulled off, almost