Tag Archives: Here’s your sign

Overnight price increase

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One nice thing about blogging is that it gives me some benchmarks to work with. Apparently, at the beginning of the year, boneless skinless chicken breast was $1.98/# at Winco. A bit later in January it jumped to $2.18/#…and increase of almost 10%. Today at Winco I was met with this:

Thats right, kids…it jumped sixty cents a pound in one swoop. Thats’s an overnight increase of 28%. Or, if you start with January, a 40% increase in chicken in six months. Put another way, if you spent the same amount of money as you did in January to buy 30 days worth of chicken, you’d only get about 21 says worth of chicken now.

So, unless you got a 40% raise in the last six months, you are gonna be at a net loss chicken-wise.

It must have been a very recent price increase because there were still a few lower-priced trays left:

Other than gas prices, this has been the most in-your-face thing I’ve seen. And this will be happening on everything.

Flour power

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I was up at Winco last night and, as is my habit, I took a pass through the food storage section they have in the back corner of the building. And…….

Whats missing? Wheat and flour. Also a large amount of rice was missing. So…more signs of the times.

I checked the Preponomicon just to make sure that I’m in the green on most things, but because I’m easily influenced by media I went ahead and went a little past 100% on a few things. I mean, it isn’t going to get cheaper anytime soon..and availability isn’t as certain as it used to be…so why not pick up extra detergent, meat, canned goods, etc.

It’s interesting to stand in line at the checkout and look at other people’s carts. You can kinda read their life’s story by whats in the cart. It was a fun game to figure out who was simply buying their normal quantity of groceries and who was stocking up ‘just in case’. Having been doing this sort of thing for many years, I can get away with just picking up a few ‘onesies’ or ‘twosies’ of something here and there and still be wildly well-supplied.

You know you’re heading for a bumpy ride when the White House has completely given up on denying things and is now saying “Yeah, we have inflation…and you should expect it to get worse.” And, all those price increases? Thats “Putin’s price increases”, “Putin’s oil hikes”, and “Putins market volatility.” Uhm..yeah…because no one apparently has a calendar. This nonsense has been going on since before Putin sent the tanks. But…now there’s a convenient bad guy to hang all the economic pain on.

:::shrug:::

At this point I really have trouble working up care for anyone who isn’t part of the tribe. It’s a savage and uncaring world out there and I am amazed at the outrage exhibited by people who are just now discovering that in wars people shoot civilians, bomb hospitals, control media, starve people, etc, etc. Thats actually business as usual on a large part of this planet. Heck, anyone who has even the slightest interest in history can easily point out that humans have been unbelievably cruel and hateful to other humans for the entire existence of the race. Oh, sure, be outraged…just don’t be surprised.

In the meantime, as far as Im concerned, worrying less about abroad and worrying more about your own house is the order of the day.

 

Scenes from the supermarket

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This is the sort of thing that makes my brain itch:

These signs were at the meat and deli counter at the supermarket. What I didn’t take a picture of was the other sign apologizing for the deli counter keeping limited hours because of ‘staffing shortages’.

Look, I’m the first to admit that I overthink things. I’ve spent the last twenty years on this blog not saying that the sky is falling, but rather that it is about to fall. Still maintain that.

Let’s look at things objectively. Inflation is among us, whittling away your saved money. Agreed? And fuel prices, which were already moving north, are going to definitely be going up now that World War Three is finally on deck. So..we can agree that fuel prices aren’t likely to come down anytime soon. Agreed? And we know that businesses do not stay in business by operating at a loss. Increases in costs (esp. due to that increased fuel costs) and shortages of material/manpower mean that consumer prices have to go…up.

So what you’ve got here, m’friend, is a virtual certainty that literally everything you buy is going to not go down in price, will likely not stay at its current price, and is pretty much guaranteed to increase in price. Assuming its even available. And not rationed.

I recommend that you cut the fat out of your budget, skip buying the jet ski, big TV, or skip the vacation, and funnel that money into food, ammo, fuel, clothes, diapers, or whatever else you buy often and want to avoid paying more for. Or that you don’t want to risk availability issues.

I’m not saying that because I think T-62’s and Russian paratroops are gonna be landing on our shores. I’m saying it because there’s at least a a half-dozen catalysts (war, inflation, pandemic, etc.) on the loose that by themselves would be cause for heightened awareness and thoughtfulness. But theres more than one..and their effect is synergistic.

If you’ve got a family or partner/spouse who thinks you’ve always been ‘a little out there’ with ‘all that survivalist nonsense’ you’re gonna have a rough time of it. You’re gonna have to decide if incurring the wrath of those close to you is worth giving them the margin of safety that comes from sacrificing the trip to Hawaii and buying canned goods instead. I don’t envy you. But sometimes you’ve got to get all 1950’s and put your foot down and say “I’m doing this because I believe it’s the right thing to do for us, to keep us safe, to keep us secure, and I make no apologies for it.” Lemme know how that works out.

If you’re lucky enough to be in a situation where those around you are ‘on the same page’, then sit down with them (with the TV and phones off) and talk about your-and-their concerns and make plans how youre going to address those concerns. And… Its time to talk to your like-minded buddies and agree to share information….what store has primers in stock? Who has sirloin on sale this week? What gas station did you see with the best price?

In all likelihood at this time next year things will look alot like they do now…we’ll still go to work, we’ll still have hot water and electricity, we’ll still go to CostCo on the weekends. I’d put it at the high 90% range. But that doesn’t mean there aren’t going to be hiccups between now and then. Do the things necessary to smooth out any bumps in the road that may appear.

 

Signs of the times

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Someone I know was recently doing a bunch of canning and needed some supplies. No problem, sez I, I’m running some errands today. Let’s go hit the stores.

So, we did. And noticed some interesting things. First, the local hardware store had a whole aisle of canning jars. There we’re Anchor Hocking, Ball, Kerr, and some made-in-China brand. The Ball were gone, the Kerr was getting picked over hard, and virtually no one touched the Chinese jars. Interesting.

Second thing: no lids. None. So we hit another venue. Again, jar’s hit hard but still on the shelf. No lids. Now I’m curious. Later in the day I hit a few other venues. Same story. No lids.

The natives, it seems, are restless. Or it’s that nebulous ‘logistics issue’ that seems to be the catch-all for when we see an empty shelf these days.

The local restaurant supply store, I thought, carried some canning supplies and when I went there I noticed the rice aisle was hit fairly hard too.

I guess the big question is are these empty shelves the result of panic buying or the result of simple resupply issues? :::shrug::: May not matter since the result is the same either way.

Cynic I am, I’m going with “harbinger”.

Tying one on

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As I’d mentioned last year, it seems like tourniquets are sort of a ‘newest and coolest’ sorta thing for the ‘serious’ first aid kit. I’ve been into survivalism for a long time and any references in fiction and non-fiction to tourniquets was almost always of the ‘loop a belt around it’ sort of variety. There were no ‘dedicated’ or purpose-built tourniquets that were readily available for Joe Sixpack survivalist…or if there were, you seldom read about them or came across them.

Cut to today’s episode. I’m talking with a fella I know and ask what’s up in his world. Turns out, his adult son had to go to the emergency room last night. Why? He was home, had a deer hung up and was cutting it up when he came to a frozen part of it. He put some extra oomph into his cut to get through it and the knife went into his wrist and severed a radial artery. Being alone and not precisely sure of how much damage he’d just inflicted on himself, he wrapped a towel around it and applied pressure. And applied. And applied. And the puddle at his feet just grew larger. So, he walks over to his neighbors house where the neighbor takes one look at him and calls 911. Medics arrive and….they apply a tourniquet …since at this point he’s about a quart low. They hustle him to the hospital and stitch up the leak. How close was he to cashing in his chips? Hard to say, I wasn’t there. But I am told that the amount of blood loss was rather significant and without something stopping it he probably would have been in some big trouble.

So, apparently there is a reasonable chance of need for a tourniquet outside of the apocalypse. Its not something I ever really thought to add to the first aid gear I keep around here because…well…it never seemed terribly likely to be needed. That mindset has now, of course, been kicked to the wayside. I’ll be finding a reputable vendor (to avoid Chinese fakes) and ordering a couple up for myself and one for a friend.

In talking to a few other people, it seems that severe cutting injuries resulting from deer processing/skinning/butchering are not that uncommon. Makes sense. Some guy standing alone in his garage with a hanged deer or elk slips and cuts himself deeply…I can totally see finding him the next day or two later laying DRT on the floor. Never thought about it before, but I can see it happening.

This is how you learn.

Article – Democrats Plan to Pursue Most Aggressive Gun-Control Legislation in Decades

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The Democrats apparently are going to try and snatch defeat from the jaws of victory:

WASHINGTON—Democrats say they will pass the most aggressive gun-control legislation in decades when they become the House majority in January, plans they renewed this week in the aftermath of a mass killing in a California bar.

Their efforts will be spurred by an incoming class of pro-gun-control lawmakers who scored big in Tuesday’s midterm elections, although any measure would likely meet stiff resistance in the GOP-controlled Senate.

Democrats ousted at least 15 House Republicans with “A” National Rifle Association ratings, while the candidates elected to replace them all scored an “F” NRA rating.

“This new majority is not going to be afraid of our shadow,” said Mike Thompson, a California Democrat who is chairman of the House Gun Violence Prevention Task Force. “We know that we’ve been elected to do a job, and we’re going to do it.”

Mr. Thompson, who represents a district in the Napa Valley north of San Francisco, said he plans to introduce legislation mandating universal background checks in the opening weeks of the new Congress.

Wait two weeks. Black Friday Friday Of Color sales will be occurring and that will be your best time to stock up. Palmetto State Armory will probably have complete lowers with Magpul stocks in the $120~ range, or some other ludicrously good deal.