Day: May 22, 2022

STAYING HEALTHY

A few more things that should be mentioned regarding the need to store food away for the impending massive shortages are iodized salt, OTC medications, antibiotics and vitamins. A large bottle of your preferred pain/headache pills, some iodine, alcohol, peroxide, allergy meds, an OTC inhaler, bandaids and so forth to make up a well-stocked First Aid kit will be worth it’s weight in gold.

Have at least a supply of one-a-day multivitamins if you don’t want to stock up on a range of stuff like the B vitamins, D, etc. and also remember your teeth and what they may need in the future.

How well you prepare now will make the difference in how things go for you as the changes brought on by The Great Reset make things tougher for all of us. There’s no argument that it isn’t happening or that things will not keep on getting worse, with continually rising prices combined with increasing shortages, while new diseases keep popping up that attack poultry, pigs, cattle and people.

The latest ones are a form of Bird Flu that’s been appearing in chicken ranches and causing the culling of millions of chickens in an attempt to keep it from spreading, a useless attempt because the birds are no doubt getting it from the sparrows, robins etc.. The one that presently is of concern is Monkeypox, which started out as a few cases in the UK a week ago to many cases in 17 nations now. It’s reportedly spread through male homosexual contact, like HIV/AIDS. Mortality rate is very low.

This disease is out of Africa, where so many people are migrating away from rather than starve, and being welcomed into the nations of Europe and the West without any medical testing first. This policy ensures that Monkey Pox isn’t the only disease that’s going to be spread anew, and then there’s the parasites and varieties of fungus that most of the world had rid itself of, that are coming back because of the unchecked immigration.

This is just one more good reason to be well stocked on food and other supplies, as you may soon have to go back into self-imposed lockdown to wait out the next pandemic. Monkeypox is not looking like anything to worry about unless you’re queer and so far the Bird Flu is only infecting birds, but promoting pandemics has become a global crusade now and “they” may yet come up with something that’s truly very fatal.

One more thing to consider is that around 90% of those who’ve been vaccinated against Covid are the ones catching it now, meaning that the doctors who refused to be silenced are right and that the Vax harms the immune system, and 78% of Americans have had at least one dose of it now, as have 65.5% of the total global population.

This means that if you’ve been Jabbed, you’re more susceptible to diseases of all kinds than those who haven’t been. Keep that in mind when you venture into public places.

IT PAYS TO SHOP AROUND

(Article #3 in a series of articles on the changes happening in the USA and the world and how to deal with them.)

I should have remembered that before I married my first wife. Also my second. Oh, and also the third. In hindsight, they probably should have, too. But this is about actual shopping at the grocery store for more long-term storage food, for when the stores all run out. This morning I went first to Dollar General and found one item on my list that was low priced, Vegetable Oil. 2 year Use-By date. I have plenty but more is always good if the price is cheap.

Then went to Family Dollar and found some store-brand cans of veggies, green beans, creamed corn and sweet peas, with long Use-By dates. 4 cans of each. Their food shelves were all half empty or more, worst I’ve ever seen it there.

Then off to Von’s for the stuff the discount stores didn’t have, where I bought a Mega-size jar of Ibuprofin, 2 boxes of 2.5 minute Cream of Wheat and 2 large boxes of Raisin Bran, again with long exp. dates. Now’s the time to get wheat products if you haven’t already. It’s not that there won’t be any, there will, but there will be a lot less than before and the price has already soared for bread, etc.

Lastly to Grocery Outlet where I didn’t find anything else that I haven’t already stocked well up on except something I normally never buy, which is sodas. I bought a case each of Root Beer and Dr. Pepper. They’ll keep forever in my Cold Room and be an occasional treat to brighten my day. PLUS I scored on Chicken Wings.

Previously I mentioned that chicken wings are now $8 a pound at Vons. When I returned home from that shopping shock, I checked the subject out on Google and sure enough, prices for the ever-popular wings have gone crazy. But there in front of me in the meat section at Grocery Outlet was a big pile of packs of wings, priced at $3.49 a pound. Figuring I’ll never see them that low again, I bought 10 packs, which came to about 17 pounds and they’re now safely tucked away in my freezer.

The point here about those wings is that even though I sneered at $3.49 a pound wings just a week ago as being way overpriced, I shouldn’t have. Things have changed, folks, and they’re going to keep on doing it. If you can find a relative bargain like that for any preferred food, get it now. I do love a plate of hot, spicy chicken wings.

About my Cold Room, it’s a small shed built to fit in the space available in the back yard and is 7 feet wide and 12 feet long, with heavy, thick insulation. Not-fiberglass, the insulation is a sort of wood fiber on a paper backing. R-13. Walls and ceiling. Door is wood core, steel exterior, purchased already framed up and seals tightly.

To keep it cool there’s a Frigidaire 5000 BTU A.C. which uses about 500 watts when going full power, plugged directly into a Willhi model wh1436 programmable electronic thermostat from Amazon, ($29) that’s plugged directly into a 120 VAC outlet and is set to turn the AC on at 68 degrees and off at 63 degrees. Even if the outside temperature hits 100, this room stays between 63 and 68 degrees.

That means that normal use-by dates are greatly extended because of the constant low temperature the food is kept at. The little AC unit was cheap, the thermostat was cheap and considering the $1000’s of dollars worth of food in there, the system is a bargain. PLUS, my 1.2 kilowatt photovoltaic array will easily power it all if the electricity fails from SoCal Edison. The hottest part of the day is when the sun shines the most so steady power is assured.

SUMMARY: Even if you only have room for another refrigerator, get a used one as big as you have room to put it and fill it with canned and boxed food. It doesn’t have to stay as cold as you’d want it for stuff like milk and eggs, set it to stay between 50 and 65 if you can. A large frig loaded only with “non-perishables” like canned goods, dried and condensed food, can keep a person going for up to a year. At the least, find the coolest dry place in your home to store flour, sugar, noodles, etc. Worst case scenario is that you’ll have to eat it all sooner or later.