A report came out tonight saying that depositors in Bankia, one of the premier Spanish banks, have withdrawn over $1 BILLION Euros in the last couple days.

So it spreads.

In other news, Moody’s downgraded 16 other Spanish banks. Think that depositors will be pulling cash out of there too?

Oh, and Fitch has downgraded Greece from B- credit to CCC credit, which is the lowest it can get without being in complete default.

But back to Spain for a minute … Apparantly the Spanish banks are holding around $100 Billion Euros in bad real estate loans. Sooner or later those will get hit as well.

Folks, this isn’t getting better. It just isn’t.

Get ready. This will be one bumpy ride.

Have cash.  Have metals.  Have food.  Have water.  Have medical supplies.  Have guns.  Have ammo.  Have friends.

Have confidence.

Have faith.

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  This is why you need to have good water filters!

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We’re seeing some of those consequences begin to play out more rapidly in Europe.

Plainly put, they’re screwed.

Government officials throughout Europe are talking openly to the press about forcing Greece out of the EU and the Euro zone. This would force them to revert to the Drachma or adopt a new currency.

From what I’ve read, this would mean inflation of about 40% pretty much overnight. Basically, your assets are worth half what they were the night before.

The results of this talk is pretty predictable. Over the last couple days Greek people have withdrawn over a billion Euros from various Greek banks. Can you say Bank Run?

And today the European Central Bank said they’re not going to give any more money to a bunch of said Greek banks. Think they’ll last?

So now you’ve got a bunch of folks with Euros stuffed into their mattresses, waiting for Greece to be kicked out of the Euro Zone.

Remember what Ferfal said about Argentina? When the massive devaluation happened, Argentinians who had Dollars were fine. For a while. Sound a bit familiar?

Once again, history repeats itself…

Think this is limited to Greece? Think again. This cascades to Spain, Portugal, France, and more. Somewhere along the line Germany decides that enough is enough and leaves the EU before their citizens revolt. And rightfully so, since they won’t want to keep picking up the tab for all these soveriegn debt issues.

First Europe goes. I’m guessing this will actually give us a little boost here, as money flees Europe and the US Dollar becomes stronger. But math will catch up with us, and down will go this domino we call home. When? Don’t know. Inevitable? No, but almost.

Be ready. Time is short, and is getting shorter. Make sure you have what you need, and make darn sure you have assets outside the dollar. Metals or other, reasonably stable currencies.

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  Greek depositors withdrew 700 million euros from the nation’s banking system … Bank run, folks…

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Back to regular posts once the trial is over.  In the mean time, read the daily news posts!

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• Euro Officials Begin to Weigh Greek Exit as Euro Weakens – Bloomberg
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Last year when I hived my packages I did it without any sort of protective gear at all. I took quite a few stings. Joy.

This year, I didn’t take any at all. As is usually the case, the only protective gear I had on was a veil/helmet combo.

For those of you who are curious, here’s my process for installing packages.

• First, have a spray bottle full of 1:1 sugar syrup
• Before prepping the hives for the packages, spray down the package really well with sugar syrup. The bees start filling their honey stomachs.
• Prep the hives, in this case a single deep brood box. Take out the middle four frames which leaves three frames on each side of the box.
• Spray down the package again really really well.
• Right away lift the package up and slam it down on the brood box to dislodge the bees. Since they’re full of syrup and kinda wet, they don’t really try to fly yet.
• Then, use the hive tool to pry the feed can out of the package, pulling it out.
• Quickly grab the queen cage out and replace the feed can.
• Put the queen cage in a convenient pocket
• Remove the feed can again and dump the bees out into the hive box. Shake a bit, pour a bit, and get most of them out.
• Grab the queen cage and either release her into the hive OR put the cage in the hive. I won’t go into the choices here..
• Replace the missing frames by pushing the sides to the center, sweeping bees out of the way.
• Put the lid on and head out!

I usually feed my packages a gallon or two of syrup to get them situated.

In this case, I left the queen in the cages and will be heading back in a day or two to remove the cage. Unfortunately I dropped one of the cages into the ball of bees at the bottom of the hive, so that one will be fun to grab.

So now I’m back up to three hives. I’ve had a couple offers for more hives, but right now I’ll probably stick with three. But you never know … I do enjoy working with them!

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Sometimes you’re the bug.

Today, I’m the bug.

No post of substance today… check out the daily links post instead!