Got to have something coming in before you can spend it... I presume all of you in the North are expecting fuel to drop in price? Don't count on it. As soon as demand goes up (first cold snap) back up it goes.

Perhaps the big city guys are doing better on this, but I can say for certain in my smallish resort area, things are getting VERY slow. People are still coming here, but they are spending less. A large portion of our community went crazy with the real estate bubble, and many are broke or soon to go there. Local banks will soon be going broke, that leveraged themselves to issue loans for inflated price houses (that no-one EVER thought would lose value!) and now no-one can afford the mortgages.

And, before the ultra-right patsy's trot this out again, none of these people were poor lower income people trying to get their first house. Most everyone round here is pretty well off. Or at least WERE, until they started trading homes around like playing cards.THESE are the folks that precipitated this crisis. Middle class America. The vast amount of debt is owed by them, not some inner city working mother... (grow a heart, you bastards )

Perhaps for now, the retired city OMB is going to be insulated from all this. But don't bet on it. Your retirements are often tied to mutual funds... anyone taken a hit, already? Rampant inflation is already being predicted by some cautious economists (reputable ones, that is), and that won't do any of us any good. This is a large economy, and it takes a lot more time for problems to surface and impact the average Joe Six-pack. But it takes longer to fix, too...

Joe is going to have to give up his micro-brews and start drinking Schaeffer Light pretty soon.

And he's far more likely to use an S900 than a T3 if he's got any sense or keep the arranger he has already got. But maybe this could be a good thing... Just imagine how much better as a PLAYER he could get if he wasn't counting on the arranger to make any improvements for him Imagine how much better as a player he will get by practicing rather than just working out the technical details and talking endlessly about what the NEXT über-expensive arranger is going to do for HIM...

"Ask not what your arranger can do for you... ask what YOU can do on your arranger"