It is called herd mentality. Like lemmings, we all follow the crowd over the cliff in total irrational behavior.

 

Has everyone gone nuts?

Cleveland stores showed some effects on Wednesday. I went to my closest Walmart early Friday (7:30) and there were a lot more people than usual. It is on the outskirts of Oberlin city. Everything to do with paper was empty, except the gift wrapping section.

I actually needed paper towels, so I drove to my little village about 7 miles South. Things were basically normal. Maybe all the human herd-type live in bigger cities. Or, maybe farmers (it is an active farm community) are more down to Earth.

 

My local Meijer grocery store yesterday. They had hamburger on sale and I went to get some, along with other staples such as eggs and bread. I'd heard all these were becoming scarce, along with toilet paper. Still, I wasn't prepared to find this:



And the freakin' lobster was still $17.99/lb.

 

I went inside and bought some regular food but there was no gallon waters left,

No sane reason. Why are people buying bottled water? It's not like we're experiencing an infrastructure problem. The only water problem I've heard about is utility companies turning off water for non-payment. Given the current situation, that's inhumane.

My Wife said some old guy was trying to buy canned soup, but there weren't any good varieties left. He tried Costco and said the line was too long.

This is a situation where living in a rural area and not having city plumbing is an advantage. Not many people around, fairly abundant wildlife, land to grow your own food, water that can't be turned off.

 

Cleveland stores showed some effects on Wednesday. I went to my closest Walmart early Friday (7:30) and there were a lot more people than usual. It is on the outskirts of Oberlin city. Everything to do with paper was empty, except the gift wrapping section.

I actually needed paper towels, so I drove to my little village about 7 miles South. Things were basically normal. Maybe all the human herd-type live in bigger cities. Or, maybe farmers (it is an active farm community) are more down to Earth.

Possible (probably), but another aspect is that people in farming and rural communities tend to naturally stock up more on most items, if for no other reason than convenience. Living in a city with three grocery stores between you and work makes it easy to get things just-in-time. So you think about getting paper towels when you put the last roll on (or even when the last roll runs out), knowing that you can always just hop over to the store in just a few minutes. If the hop to the nearest store is half hour or hour long round trip, you tend to plan a bit better. Add to that the fact that people that live in a rural area generally know that they are more likely to lose services and, if they do, the services are more likely to be out for longer than their city cousins are likely to experience, so some degree of prepping has always been the norm in such communities.

We are pretty set, though we did get caught a bit flat-footed. I normally try to stock up on staples and non-perishables a bit right about this time of year (i.e., it's a Spring Break To-Do List item). So our stocks on a number of items were getting pretty low. Normally I will buy four or five big packs of toilet paper as that's usually enough to get us through an entire year. Last week I tried to get some and the first four places I went were completely out. The last place was actually just bringing out their nightly stock and they had some. I could have gotten my annual stock, but I opted to just get one big pack. I may regret that, but I didn't want to add to the problem (even with just my normal buying pattern) and more than necessary.

We also let our non-perishable food stocks lapse -- too many other things on our plate the last couple years and it just wasn't a squeaky wheel -- and so we had no where near the 30-day bare-bones supply I shoot for as we go into winter. I was able to stock up some last week, but I doubt we are fully to 30-days (guessing two to three weeks if we are careful). Moving forward my goal is to take inventory and make a list of needs/options and then stop at the store any time I go into town and see if I can fill at least a few things on the list while also getting stuff to keep us from digging into what we already have set aside.

 

This is itself a hoax.

Quote - "From claiming Democrats were making the coronavirus "their new hoax"
From - https://www.businessinsider.com/fiv...inistration-downplayed-the-coronavirus-2020-3 I can PM you more reporting and video of him saying it.

 

My local Meijer grocery store yesterday. They had hamburger on sale and I went to get some, along with other staples such as eggs and bread. I'd heard all these were becoming scarce, along with toilet paper. Still, I wasn't prepared to find this:

And the freakin' lobster was still $17.99/lb.

I noticed that none of the prices seem to have changed -- up or down. There are always a smattering of truly good deals (in addition to the background clutter of fake sales) and they seemed to be posted on both in-stock and out-of-stock items at about the level I've come to expect -- I took advantage of some of them even though it meant getting more stuff than I really wanted. The handful of paper products they did have were at their normal price, though yesterday they had a limit of one on all of them. Some of the specials required buying multiples, but without even saying anything they honored the multiple price on single units. The roll of paper towels I got was buy one get one free, so they just charged me half price. At this point I can't really complain about how the stores are dealing with it all.

At some point I expect to see people out in the parking lot hawking hard-to-get items at inflated prices, but nothing yet.

 

Has everyone gone nuts?

Yes, but six weeks too late. This level of action might have mattered before the virus was 'everywhere' already. Now it's futile and will merely drag it out. Driving folks to the grocery stores so they can then hunker down isn't a great idea if a bunch of shoppers may be carrying the virus.

 

Good news for those who have spent their life upon "Resident Evil" series...boiled Salvia officinalis+Thymes is the herbal patch and works like a charm.

 

@WBahn I am with you. After all the hype around Y2K I generally like to have a 30-day supply of food and essentials.
The problem is making sure that we cycle through all supplies to make sure food doesn't go past the best before date.

 

the hype around Y2K

Was it just hype?

 

Was it just hype?

I think it was, a combination of lazy engineering/programming practices, consumer and management ignorance, media hype, opportunistic lawyers, and management paranoia over liabilities.

 

The grandmother of my ex, every time she heard rumors that a military-led revolution had started (a common occurrence in this country in the past), used to run to the supermarket and buy a huge amount of dry-pasta which stuffed in the pantry.

 

I think it was, a combination of lazy engineering/programming practices, consumer and management ignorance, publicity hype, opportunistic lawyers, and management paranoia over liabilities.

I do get a bit fed up with people saying it was all a made up hoax. I was one of the small army running around checking which systems had the problem and getting new bios updates, and patches from software manufacturers, installing all this and then re-checking.

 

I do get a bit fed up with people saying it was all a made up hoax. I was one of the small army running around checking which systems had the problem and getting new bios updates, and patches from software manufacturers, installing all this and then re-checking.

I didn't say it was a hoax. It was real. But it could have been mitigated years earlier. And we continue to make the same mistakes.
How does one interpret a date such as 03/04/05?
Why were years only assigned 8 bits or two BCD?
Take a tip from The Long Now Foundation established in the year 01996.

 

I didn't say it was a hoax.

No, you didn't but folk do.

 

My local Meijer grocery store yesterday. They had hamburger on sale and I went to get some, along with other staples such as eggs and bread. I'd heard all these were becoming scarce, along with toilet paper. Still, I wasn't prepared to find this:

View attachment 201647

And the freakin' lobster was still $17.99/lb.

Yeah see that's what i saw too in the chicken isle. Didnt check the beef isle as well so not sure about that.
But yeah what the heck is with the paper rush? Afraid they wont be able to wipe or something ha ha.

 

https://www.cbsnews.com/news/restaurant-layoffs-coronavirus-risk-millions/

An estimated 4 million U.S. restaurant workers face the risk of layoffs within a matter of weeks as states and cities desperate to contain the coronavirus order eateries to close their doors.

That dire statistic, from outplacement firm Challenger Gray & Christmas, comes as California, Illinois, Massachusetts, Ohio and Washington, as well as New York City, force restaurants to stay closed at least until the end of March.

Although many food establishments are permitted to serve takeout and delivered meals, the sudden loss of so much business leaves most restaurant owners with few options but to cut staff. Ryan O'Donnell, founder of the Chicago-based restaurant group Ballyhoo Hospitality, said he felt "terrible" Monday as he laid off 240 workers.

How long before the 2020 great depression starts from these drastic measures?

https://apnews.com/b64cf00f37d8da2fad3533aa7686c53d

Officials in six San Francisco Bay Area counties issued a “shelter-in-place” order affecting nearly 7 million people, requiring most residents to stay inside and venture out only for food, medicine or exercise for three weeks — the most drastic measure taken yet in the U.S. to curb the spread of the virus.

 

I was one of the small army running around checking which systems had the problem and getting new bios updates, and patches from software manufacturers, installing all this and then re-checking.

Yes I was also doing the Lawyers "Due Diligence" ad infinitum. Y2K Compliance certificates for every possible device that MAY have had a clock in it. And On-Site at midnight and a tour of every control on our large plant to inspect for any surprises. Nada...

 

Here is my take on this.

Shut the global economy down for 20 days.
All interests, rental fees be nullified for the duration.
Get all banks and financial institutions and major employers and institutions on board with this.
No layoffs or wage decrease permitted.
Governments to assist in financial hardship of individuals and small businesses.

This would sound rather radical but should have been put into effect a month ago.