COVID 19 and your plans

[RD]

We have come to a compromise re: the resupply trip to "town". We have decided to give the Walmart "Shop online, pick up at the store" option a try. I placed my order last night (Sunday), and will be picking it up on Wednesday.

We are still good on TP, but would buy a package of our regular brand if they had it. All that came up in the app was TP hangers and rollers, not the TP itself. Not an issue at this time.

We usually don't get our meats from Walmart, but have opted to in this case in order to limit exposure to others. However, we are limiting what meats we buy. We have refused to buy Tyson products for many years due to their pollution record, and the only other option is Smithfield, which we are reluctant to bring into the house right now.

The store employees will be bringing it out to the car. I want to tip them in cash for doing so. The total is going to be right around $200. What would you consider a reasonable tip amount? Our typical 20-25% for restaurant servers seems a bit excessive, but I do certainly want to help them out, as they are providing a very valuable service for us.

How would you go about giving them the tip? Any special handling, i.e. put it in a Ziploc bag with a Clorox wipe? Some other method?

I agree with KK, but you can cut your tp usage with one of these. https://getaclearrear.com . Shut up, I seen the idiotic crap a bit back and ordered one just because. I will tell you it works and I would beat your ass "if you got by my dobies" try to take it.


RD

[redman2006]

Walmart here will not allow it, but Kroger/Dillons will.

[Kailani Kealoha]

I would think $20 would be a good amount. Maybe order a Walmart giftcard and tell the worker it's for them? I don't know if they offer those for curbside pickup.

[kickstand]

We have come to a compromise re: the resupply trip to "town". We have decided to give the Walmart "Shop online, pick up at the store" option a try. I placed my order last night (Sunday), and will be picking it up on Wednesday.

We are still good on TP, but would buy a package of our regular brand if they had it. All that came up in the app was TP hangers and rollers, not the TP itself. Not an issue at this time.

We usually don't get our meats from Walmart, but have opted to in this case in order to limit exposure to others. However, we are limiting what meats we buy. We have refused to buy Tyson products for many years due to their pollution record, and the only other option is Smithfield, which we are reluctant to bring into the house right now.

The store employees will be bringing it out to the car. I want to tip them in cash for doing so. The total is going to be right around $200. What would you consider a reasonable tip amount? Our typical 20-25% for restaurant servers seems a bit excessive, but I do certainly want to help them out, as they are providing a very valuable service for us.

How would you go about giving them the tip? Any special handling, i.e. put it in a Ziploc bag with a Clorox wipe? Some other method?

[Kailani Kealoha]

They are to a good extent. I was at the park with little K this morning and there were plenty of people walking around with masks on following the two meter rule. Obviously stores are a bit more difficult but everyone seems to be doing their best. One of the things I've noticed is that people who have medical conditions as well as the elderly have been self isolating with the government providing support so they can stay home. I haven't been back to Stockholm though so I don't know how things are going there beyond what I see on the news.

[kickstand]

Hi KK! Great to hear you're ok. I'm curious though, are the people there actually practicing Social Distancing at the stores, etc? Or is it more like business as usual?

[Kailani Kealoha]

Hey all. It's good to hear that everyone is doing well. Things have been going good here in Sweden. I'm mildly aggravated that I had to leave all my preps when I moved but my parents are finding them useful. I'm sort of ashamed to admit that I didn't buy any preps until I started to see signs of a problem in January. The SO thought I was being a little crazy but I think it makes more sense now. I bought a decent supply of gloves and N95 masks along with some hand sanitizer. I have probably a 6 month supply of many foods. I stocked up on plenty of non perishables so I've only needed to go to the store once every couple weeks for fruits and vegetables.

For reasons beyond me, the government here has been really laid back with their coronavirus policies. They have cancelled schools but for the most part, they're trusting the people here to social distance without any lockdowns. It's kind of nice in a way. I guess it's to prevent the economy here from collapsing. Only time will tell if it was the right decision or not.

[redman2006]

Does anyone have a source of bulk grains, beans etc. We lost some to mice, and I would like to replace them, but all sources seem to have dried up

[IronWarriors3/354]

Although we haven't *needed* to, we have decided to start using some of our aging preps. Even though we haven't been shopping since the end of February, we still have a couple of months of current food stocks before we needed to start hitting the preps.

With all of that said, we have decided to start using up some of our older preps, just to keep them from going to the dump. Y'all may have read about our 8 year old MREs. Today's lunch was canned ham and Kraft Mac & Cheese. Both had "Best By" dates of sometime in 2015. We haven't had Kraft Mac & Cheese since probably about the time that box was produced, usually opting to make it from scratch. We noticed no discernable difference in taste or consistency from what we expected.

Edit: Good to see you around IronWarrior

Thanks Kick more and more now days had me thinking about these AA forums. Working from home 10 a day plus doing the guns on the side busy times. And yes I agree on that I did have to throw away two buckets of homemade preps as they aged out. I was willing to try em but they lady was not so thrilled with the idea. LOL.

[kickstand]

Although we haven't *needed* to, we have decided to start using some of our aging preps. Even though we haven't been shopping since the end of February, we still have a couple of months of current food stocks before we needed to start hitting the preps.

With all of that said, we have decided to start using up some of our older preps, just to keep them from going to the dump. Y'all may have read about our 8 year old MREs. Today's lunch was canned ham and Kraft Mac & Cheese. Both had "Best By" dates of sometime in 2015. We haven't had Kraft Mac & Cheese since probably about the time that box was produced, usually opting to make it from scratch. We noticed no discernable difference in taste or consistency from what we expected.

Edit: Good to see you around IronWarrior

[IronWarriors3/354]

Im guessing most on her were ready for this anyways, this is basically what brought us all together on this forum. I havnt had to break into any of the stock at all but have been making regular supply runs about once a week, mostly for beer and whiskey :-p On a side note gun sales have been off the charts although I am conducting most business on my patio now days. ATFE says as long as its on the property of the FFL address I am good. Seeing a lot more open carry going on here in Oregon then normally too. Living in a smallish town has its advantages here. Hope all you AA brothers and sisters are doing good. Ride it out there will be light at the end of this tunnel just remember to diversify all preps including your finances.

[0utlaw]

I think getting supplies while they're available is the best course of action. Gear up, mask, gloves, gun. If it lasts much longer supply chains are going to break.

[kickstand]

What would you do?

Mrs Stand and I have enough food for several more months of quarantine, if necessary. Some of it might not be thrilling to consume, but it's there. I would guess that we have enough TP for another two to three months, maybe a little longer. Paper towels, maybe 2 weeks, but we can do without those. Our Deep Freezer is still about 1/2 full, mostly of meats, some frozen veggies and other misc stuff.

The cat gets dry cat food mixed with wet cat food, twice a day. We will be running out of wet cat food in about three weeks, but we have a decent supply of canned chicken (people food) that we can use instead.

We have enough dog food for probably another 6 to 8 weeks.

Mrs Stand and I are both in higher risk categories for COVID being deadly.

I'm told that stores "in town" (20+ miles away, 100k people) are starting to get things back in stock. With the exception of a couple of low contact, limited supply trips to the local Stop-N-Rob, we have been at home since the end of February. We really want to just avoid town all together if possible.

The only reason that I am considering making a supply run is the possibility of supply line failures as the various lockdown restrictions are lifted. I would hate to wait too long, only to find out that the supply lines have broken down, and no meat, TP, or other necessities are to be found anywhere.

With all that information, would you just stay home, or risk making a supply run to town soon? If I go to town, I will be wearing an R95 mask.

[kickstand]

A prodigal son. Welcome back miatitude. Did you ever get those pecan trees in?

[miatadude]

No holes in our preps. Luckily, we are good on masks and gloves. I had a dozen N95's on my workbench and always keep 3-4 boxes of nitrile gloves as I use them when working on cars and equipment. Both the wife ans I work for a government agency that keeps the planes apart. We are not controllers but are on the technical side. She is working from home and I work 8 days on, 6 off. We have reduced staffing at our facility with some people working from home. We don't have chickens yet, but my good friend and neighbor up the road has plenty. I help them out with my tractor and they keep us in eggs. We have some of our 2 big gardens planted. Waiting on the soil temps to come up before planting corn, green beans, butter beans, black eyed peas and okra. Y'all stay safe and healthy.