A few admin items, first, Re <<Rickard's provides a solid and useful enough sounding board >>VIDEO He doesn't have to know a lot. Only needs to guess one item more than we might discern. Re <<... posting about in a series over on Aristocrats... but will pen the core here, as conversation, and re-post there... >>Thank you! All hands on deck, else journey towards TeoTwawKi much more challenging Re <<After issues in sourcing of news... awareness in the elements of "strategery" perhaps included in Tuesday's now obvious Lucy/Charlie Brown/Football ploy... >>I see the image, very fugly Re <<SBSW ... "not nickel... yet" ... pricing of palladium ... Putin has no more control over events, or any ability to direct or redirect them... than any other has now >>... all seems quite baked-in as far as the periodic table goes Re <<... "shock" is normalized ... many already anticipating it ... accelerating the pace ... "things fall apart" ... faster ... with more certainty ... less shock ... even before things get far worse... Stocks lower.... commodities higher... no escape... as physical reality, not market manipulation, dictates supply limits. Palladium... perhaps dodged a bullet in the short term... giving a brief BTFD opportunity... Not different than silver, gold, oil... Fiat failing... faster... only while sustaining existing inequality... as no better offers exist... Clocks ticking... louder... Two weeks... >>Two weeks sounds right. Five Armies clash The pain shall be transitory, sharp, and outcome clear, stalemate, checkmate, or indeterminant ... will work out somehow and we might experience the good old days Team Russia threatens, which is quite different than bluffs, that zerohedge.com Team USA seem enthusiastic to open a two-front hot-peace zerohedge.com Team China being quite enigmatic, on the one hand globaltimes.cn OTOH reuters.com Even as we know China can war-imperative turn its worldwide internet into China-wide intranet at flick of flipping switch zdnet.com EU? What EU? Oh, meaning Germany, France, Italy, and assorted other minor states, domains, and villages? Victoria Nuland uttered ‘f*ck the EU’ and has done so, mission accomplished.VIDEO Team India doing rug-pull so as to preclude being rug-pulled livemint.com And Team USA tee-ed up another f*cking f*ck, possiblyVIDEO Greenwald, a known-known notes greenwald.substack.com The operative alarm is this by CS Message 33753430 posted by Marcher - exciting drama possibilitiesBut, never mind all that fog of war doom porn stuff. The thing that might matter be Neon gas and cyber war, as they might relate to Palladium and SBSW, and gold ... sorry, I meant of course GOLD VIDEO Especially if Neon should go Unobtainium , perhaps not just another meaningless symbol on the periodic table en.wikipedia.org (1) Neon gas for the world is mostly from Ukraine , and specifically Odessa. Here is the situation in Odessa VIDEO We watch & brief youtube.com (2) Should Odessa fall , and certainly likely, Nasdaq done-done.Most of the rest of Neon gas proof-of-work for this galaxy, for all practical purposes, sits in CCP China China China , pricing already 6X-ed, and was calibrated to only make China self-sufficient in Neon gas, and not meant for the usual export export export, unlike just about everything else. So, yes, as in no, we ignore CSPR and pay attention to Ne in the coming week, for TeoTwawKi (The End of the World as We Know It) is just around the corner, or the next corner, or the corner after that.Before TeoTwawKi, or after, or both, we might run into one or several TwoAPucs (The Worst of All Possible Unintended Consequences). It is not too late to dial 1.800.GET.ME.OUT, but only if we know where to run toward.(3) Some backgrounder links February 11th 2022 reuters.com February 25th 2022 bloomberg.com February 25th 2022 wsj.com February 26th 2022 global.chinadaily.com.cn February 28th 2022 globaltimes.cn March 7th 2022 technosports.co.in March 8th 2022 marketplace.org March 11th 2022 reuters.com March 11th 2022 nasdaq.com (3) We, meaning you and I both, and all of us here on the channel, know that MSM tend to exaggerate, for FUD porn earns advertising moolah, scratch, bread, tokens, or coins, but in the case of Neon, no one appears to be paying attention all considered. The way one might go long Neon gas is to short all of the semiconductor ETFs , or simply short QQQ, or simpler-still, go long SQQQ Watch & brief finance.yahoo.com (4) We are living in a baked-in scenario with very few off-ramps, where players go Go, Chinese Chess, Chess, Poker, Checkers, and Tiddlywinks are ready and order of battle primed(5) Today I intend to go buy a vacuum tube radio to go with my not-as-smart phone, to teach the kids what true electrical engineering is all about WWIII is happening in a hurry, we are standing, but might retro in a hurry What streaming might be in 6 months time, and connectivity can look like in 12? As photo reminders of good old daysYes, China alibaba.com still make 'those' along w/ Slovakia and ... drum roll ... Russia VIDEO VIDEO VIDEO VIDEO (6) Musical interlude VIDEO (7) Song respiteWonderful Soca music in the best of Caribbean tradition VIDEO (8) Reminder of earlier episode, the dress rehearsal of QQQ hiccup, made by another and I circa 2002, the good old days and terrible every nightVIDEO Finally, a picture worth a lot of words, and two worth twice as much, for your weekend pondering Smart phones vs dumb paper weight Smart watch against mechanisms Old fashioned hard wallet Smart book and dumb paper Smart but unseen and untouchable moolah and ancient social network coins Unclear to me how vacuum tubes can express in iPad and desktop, calculator, never mind washing machines and refrigerators, cars, planes, and rockets, never-ever mind space travel, submarines, 24/7/365 geo-position systems, and headsets But, hey ho, let us bravely bravely go forward, accelerate and charge into the fog We are closing ... brace brace ... hedge hedge ... no way out