Early Retirement Extreme Forums

I confess i stocked up at the grocery store today, just in case quarantine becomes possible. I can see my company possibly telling us to work at home for a few weeks.

However, I still need to stop at the liquor store...

Anyone else stocking up a little, just in case?

I thought about buying massive amounts of covfefe, liquor and tobacco to trade them for sex in case of massive quarantine.

Chunky soup was a loss leader this week. So I got about 25. I'll probably be finding more to add to the stock pile next week.

EdithKeeler wrote: ↑

Sun Mar 01, 2020 2:18 pm

However, I still need to stop at the liquor store...

Well they do say to pick up canned foods.

The early crowd did it a few weeks ago. Some are always stocked up for something like this.
viewtopic.php?f=26&t=11152

It's interesting that even local governments are telling people to prepare now (see Washington State and MSM sources). It definitely pays to be ahead on this one. I think it's important to have plans for the following:

1. What if you can't leave your house for weeks to months? You need food, household necessities like TP et al, and maybe even entertainment so you don't get cabin fever too badly.
2. What if someone in your household gets sick? Can you set up an isolation room? How will you disinfect things so it doesn't spread to other members of your household? What medications do you all need? What about pets?
3. If you live alone, what will you do if you get sick? Transportation to the hospital? Pre-prepared food so you have something to eat while you feel terrible and are therefore unable to cook?

Nitrile gloves and rubbing alcohol can still be purchases, but N95 masks won't be available to the public now for likely a year or more.

Here's a pretty non-panicking article on what to expect: https://virologydownunder.com/so-you-th ... -pandemic/

We talked about getting some extra cans of soup and frozen vegetables. It is our monthly grocery run so we will probably just get some extra food.

Yes. This turned me into a prepper, not because I am extremely worried, mostly because it has always been my nature and I've been fighting it.

I bought medical gloves, and goggles. I already had a few masks but I remember standing in the ppe aisle at the store weeks ago and thinking I should buy more/better masks but deciding not to because my partner would think i was weird, because I didn't want to be the weirdo prepper, and because I didn't want to spend money. I should have bought them. I also bought a big jug of hand sanitizer and a couple of travel sanitizer bottles and a few flu medicines.

I also stocked up on groceries and soaps. I already have camping water jugs so I filled them. I also bought batteries since I was out and they were half price.

I hope I am not causing a shortage for anyone but it is all cheap insurance for me.

I haven’t changed my habits dramatically so far, but we usually have food for about three weeks at least, which we have upped to maybe a month/month and a half.
I have a number of masks at home, but that’s mostly in case someone in the family gets infected and needs to be isolated.

I plan to seek maximum relaxation because I assume we’re all going to come into contact with it eventually, and stress is the worst thing for the immune system.

So I’m going to eat well, sleep hard, maintain good cheer, and laugh every day.

I already have camping water jugs so I filled them

Ok.... this is a dumb question, I suppose, but I’ve seen several people say they are stocking up on water for this. Why? Is there any real danger that public water supplies won’t be available? I mean, it’s not like a hurricane or tornado or earthquake that could damage the infrastructure. Just curious what I’m missing.

No real danger. Ditto electricity. However, it's conceivable that if your mainline breaks, no plumber will show up to fix it while under quarantine. That is the only reason I can think of. It's always good to have some water stored, but not because of virus issues---that is unless they're in the water supply which is not the case here.

EdithKeeler wrote: ↑

Mon Mar 02, 2020 8:05 am

Ok.... this is a dumb question, I suppose, but I’ve seen several people say they are stocking up on water for this. Why?

Doesn’t make much sense. Our system is well based with multiple tanks on the hillside. It’s all automated and won’t go down unless there is a power failure. Even then the tanks are huge and will last a bit. Not to mention we have a secondary reclaimed system in parallel for landscaping which is potable but heavily treated with chemicals.

I keep water because I don’t like the taste of tap water. I’m just not letting my five gallon cooler jugs run down to nothing before I refill at the water shop. That’s just everyday life in earthquake country.

I too was kind of wondering why the people in the Costco Panic videos on YouTube are all buying pallets of water bottles. It doesn’t make sense. Kind of like their piles of toilet paper (there are alternatives ).. I expect my utilities to stay on.

Worse case scenario I can drink the water out of my fish pond after boiling. Yuck.

Wait...I just looked at this again.

https://youtu.be/BFMe2V6waEw

Maybe these people drink out of these little plastic bottles everyday under normal circumstances. It’s cringeworthy to me but if they need three bottles a day under normal conditions then the cartload is a month’s supply.

Why do I keep thinking this virus is helping the planet.

I'm not worried about water specifically, but I'm stockpiling some because shit happens in Stepford. I've been under boil water orders twice in the last two years so I'm not taking any chances.

When I went on a tour of the local water treatment plant (I know ... 'L' ) they said they had minimum staffing requirements for effective operation. They also said another problem would be the inability to get the treatment chemicals and supplies. They did say that they had the ability to connect to other systems and sources should the need arise. Apparently that's common (?).



We're on natgas here, so I'm not worried about a disruption in supply only skyrocketing prices. I'm also going to make sure we keep the gas tanks, spare tanks, and propane tanks full in case those prices skyrocket as well.*

*Does anyone have a guess if that would happen? Supply issues vs. crashing demand ... I'm not sure what that means price-wise.

Sclass wrote: ↑

Mon Mar 02, 2020 9:00 am

Why do I keep thinking this virus is helping the planet.

Based on some early quarantine reports, some are getting a crash course in adulting skills like "how to cook and feed yourself at home", "how to entertain yourself in your own company", and "how to survive withdrawal symptoms from recreational shopping".

Jean wrote: ↑

Sun Mar 01, 2020 2:24 pm

I thought about buying massive amounts of covfefe, liquor and tobacco to trade them for sex in case of massive quarantine.

I would think toilet paper and chocolate would provide better currency in that area. The necessity/luxury dynamic desired in disruptive situations like internment, hostage situations, diaspora etc. where people want to be reminded of comfortable domesticity. Unless its a regional thing and you happen to live in an area where find yourself amongst some hard living women who want to wake up only to get drunk and smoke.

jennypenny wrote: ↑

Mon Mar 02, 2020 9:06 am

When I went on a tour of the local water treatment plant (I know ... 'L' )

*Does anyone have a guess if that would happen? Supply issues vs. crashing demand ... I'm not sure what that means price-wise.

I love touring the local water treatment plant. It’s free and you get to see all of their fancy automation systems. Irvine Ranch Water District has the most advanced water reclamation system in the state. The Mayor periodically drinks a glass of the reclaimed water on camera to show off the system’s effectiveness. Our parks have kind of a chlorine smell but they say the water is drinkable in an emergency. Right up the hillside from my house we have two giant tanks, (1) one tap water, (2) reclaimed water for public greens. I have my eye on the pink pipes over my fence in case I need to tap them. In a pinch I can divert the sprinkler plumbing during the watering cycle and fill a trash barrel lined in plastic. Tank (1) will go empty before (2) if people hoard water. In a pinch. Ain’t happening tho.

Not sure what natural gas or unleaded is going to do. We have a glut of natural gas out here in CA (we vented it to the atmosphere in Porter Ranch for weeks). The cars are a good source of campstove fuel. I keep some ice-maker line and a vacuum pump to conveniently siphon off a cup if needed for my Coleman stoves. I don’t think I’ll be doing this though.

We always have a lot of extra food in rotation so I am not doing anything out of the ordinary in that respect.

As mentioned in the other thread, our upstairs neighbor returned from a cross country flight last Sunday and went to the Emergency Room on Monday before they had the ability to test for the virus. She was sent home with a hacking cough and has had it ever since. I wake up early and can hear her up there suffering. We've offered to pick things up for her but she's been ordering necessities online.

It is not unreasonable to think that the home delivery services may be overwhelmed and the over the counter supplies to treat a really bad flu may not be available. So I stocked up on that stuff.

The other thing I did was get the tools I would need to determine if things are bad (pulse oximeter and stethoscope) and the tools to perform the non-ventilated treatment myself (steam inhaler and nebulizer, meds). I would have purchased an oxygen concentrator had I found one cheap, but I have not yet found one. Perhaps I went overboard. At first Mrs. Ego was lightly mocking me. Yesterday she was asking questions about how to use it.

I still have lots of expired masks. I gave some away and have not used any yet.

We ordered a lot of disinfection products and gloves for the property. I've been disinfecting the keypad on the entry console, door handles, elevator doors - it's one of those old manual double-door cage elevators that have to be opened and closed by hand - and elevator buttons two or three times a day for the past week or so.

Based on some early quarantine reports, some are getting a crash course in adulting skills like "how to cook and feed yourself at home", "how to entertain yourself in your own company", and "how to survive withdrawal symptoms from recreational shopping".

A 2-3 week quarantine sounds fabulous to me. Opportunity to get a bunch of chores done around the house, catch up on my reading and Netflix queue, catch up on sleep. I see NO downside to being told to hunker down at home for a while.

EdithKeeler wrote: ↑

Mon Mar 02, 2020 8:05 am

Ok.... this is a dumb question, I suppose, but I’ve seen several people say they are stocking up on water for this. Why? Is there any real danger that public water supplies won’t be available? I mean, it’s not like a hurricane or tornado or earthquake that could damage the infrastructure. Just curious what I’m missing.

For me, it is because I already have the jugs. It took 10 minutes to fill them. If the people down at the water plant get sick and stop showing up I have a week of drinking water before I have to start hauling it from one of the 10,000 lakes or collecting rain. The cost is very low so I might as well do it.