Country life might not be so bad...

Banks are actually failing today. I cannot believe it.

I suppose what is even more unbelievable is that this is not the big news story today; the "Obama" cartoon on the cover of the New Yorker, as foul as it is, is the big headline.

Here's a picture of people making a run on an IndyMac branch in California. The article isn't too cheery, either. And the voice in the wilderness, Jim Kunstler, has written a frighteningly upfront blog entry about how life as we know it is over. Over and done. I love these paragraphs the most, I think:

"It's hard to imagine what kind of melodramas were unspooling on the Hamptons lawns this weekend, while everybody else in America was watching Nascar, or plying the aisles of BJs Discount Warehouse for next week's supply of mesquite-and-guacamole flavored Doritos, or having flames and chains tattooed on their necks, or lost in a haze of valium and methedrine.

"With the death of the IndyMac Bank last week, and the GSEs Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac laying side-by-side in the EMT van on IV drips, headed for the Federal Reserve's ever more crowded intensive care unit, there was a sense of the American Dream having passed through the event horizon that denotes the opening of a black hole."

Washington Mutual, National City, Zions Bank, and a couple of others are on the way down and out, closing at lowlowlow values today; tomorrow may be Black Tuesday V.2.

Okay. Time to get serious. Now is the time to have your "come-to-Jesus" moment about your job, your spending habits, your bank account, your gas tank, your garbage, your bicycle, your health, your loved ones, all of it. I know I've written about this before (and after reading my blog posts from 2006 looking for a "be prepared" entry I wrote, I got sidetracked reading and never found it)--but get your "community (friends and family that can be trusted and helpful)"and your business in order. Think ahead to what your winter home heating bill might look like if this crap continues. Plan ahead.