Lots of interesting posts. Here in Baghdad, when I first got here everyone was working on their laptops linked via peer to peer network into a wireless bridge into a satellite uplink for 1 meg bandwidth internet service. File sharing amongst the laptops was an atrocity. The first thing I did was order a fileserver and a UPS. We do daily backups of all new work onto CDs in open format, so no decoding problems. All the work is done from laptops within various subdirectories in the server. If the power fails, we do a controlled power down of the server with everyone saving off their open work from their laptops within 5 minutes. Then we take our laptops with us to a new location with power. We lose grid power here daily. All the network systems are on UPS power as well. If I wanted to, I could keep my laptop going and still access the internet for another half hour after the grid goes down. All this assumes that our generator has not kicked in within 5 seconds of grid failure. Usually, before we can even get started on shutting down the server, the generator has taken over.

What prevents us from staying in the office and working during a power failure ain't the computers, it is the loss of AC, which turns this little room into a sweatbox in about 10 minutes.

The little birdies here don't fly around much during the heat of the day. If they do, their little beaks are wide open and they pant, just like a dog would, only very quickly. It is odd.

The homeless know how to survive in an environment rich with fresh refuse. In a crisis, the refuse supply would likely dry up quickly, and without the ability to stockpile any resources, or to acquire more somewhere else, I think the homeless would be in great peril. Nope, their survival depends far too much on the excesses of others, and that would not be the case if things went sour. That's another reason I don't like urban dwelling. The desperation that you would face would look like something from "The Omega Man".