> I'm not so much worried about the USA having any "major" problems with the y2k issue as I am with other, less fiscally solvent nations. Think of all the nuclear missles still sitting in silos around the former Soviet Union and in China, and think of how little money those places have to fix these kinds of things. I'm afraid we're all going to wake up on 1/1/2000 to a rain of ex-Soviet or Chinese missles that freaked out when their clocks ticked over to 1/1/1900 or something. *shudder*

Nah, that's the least of my worries. Perhaps my logic is a bit skewed, but here is my reasoning: even though that scenario is entirely feasable, and in fact your reasoning is very good, that is a point at which worrying does no good. What's the worst that can happen? You don't wake up. You die instantly in your sleep (who could wish for a better death?) Well, that is, if you're sleeping at the time, and, um, it's also assuming that you are close to a direct hit (otherwise you die like the nuke plant operators did at Chernobyl, which is a sometimes slow and gruesome way to die).

Anyways, how is that supposed to ease your fears? Simply this: if a TEOTWAWKI (The End Of The World As We Know It) event _does_ occur, then there is _nothing_ you can do to defend yourself (shy of spending millions of dollors on subterranian bomb shelters). Therefore, (and this assumes that you, like I, don't have millions to spend), if there is nothing that you can do about it, then what's the use about worrying about it? "Who of you, by worrying, can add a single day to your life?" On the contrary, worrying can increase your stress levels, thereby decreasing your expected life span (and it can also sour what few days you may have left.) Now, if I weren't a Christian, and didn't know what lay ahead of me after I didn't wake up, then I'd be scared...

As for TEOTWAWKI, my philosophy is that I shouldn't worry about things that I can't control, because it just doesn't do any good. I don't know if that's the best policy or not, it's just the one that's always worked for me.

Now, something that you might be able to prepare for is the banking situation... which is to say, even if every American bank becomes 100% compliant (which seems doubtful right now), all it takes is some foriegn banks who had managers that didn't give a rip about Y2k to accidentally send corrupted financial information to our banks, which would corrupt ours.

Keeping track of all of your important paperwork is a good place to begin...