[SLL] dmesg != console boot messages

[Mathew D. Watson]

I noticed that dmesg doesn't report messages I see during boot up, and 
it's making it hard to debug this mouse/keyboard/X strangeness I'm 
experiencing.

I found
http://www.linuxquestions.org/questions/history/237482
On it one poster says
"yup. dmesg. please note, though, that those are only for the kernel 
boot messages. any output afterwards (IE: rc scripts), will not be a 
part of dmesg output".

The thread ends without anyone posting how to get those missing messages.

More googling suggested looking in the /var/log directory. Syslog has 
some interesting tidbits in it, but it's not a record of the boot process.

Does anyone know of a "sure fire" way to collect all that potentially 
useful information that goes whizzing by unit you get the login prompt?

Mat