Hot, “but of course”… and humid, ‘cuz we “can’t have one without the other” in Houston. Temps are creeping up as summer continues. No end in sight, just gotta let the calendar run.
No rain in sight either, despite being on a little spur of “thunderstorms and rain possible” on the national forecast.
Did some things yesterday. Less than I’d hoped despite the early start to my day. Today will have to be long and have a lot of driving as a consequence. I may head to the BOL with a truck load late in the day. I’ll have to see how it shapes up. Not that I can afford to not do things around the house. I cut the grass yesterday and had to take half width passes or the mower would stall. The grass was LONG. There is a lot of stuff I’ve been putting off or haven’t gotten to and it’s all stacked up.
We’ll see how it goes.
Spent some time chatting with a friend. He’s really p!ssed about what’s going on in the country. His family has some medical setbacks, and some financial hardships and neither is getting better as the economy craters. He’s not the only one I talked to this past week that lamented that his kids aren’t going to have a world like he did to grow up into. If we get the depression that seems to be coming he’s absolutely right. Growing up during that will mark our kids forever. I had a great aunt who was young during the “Great Depression” of the 30s. Even long afterwards, when she was well off, she’d STILL buy canned goods with no labels that had been marked down so she could save money, and get more food.
If there’s anyone here who has never wondered what they were going to eat, not “which of these things should I eat” but “what can I find to eat”, I’ll tell you it changes you. Doesn’t matter if that situation is long or short term, although how you change and the magnitude of the change are different, you CHANGE. If you’ve never had a meal ONLY because someone saw what was going on and gave you food to eat, or if you’ve never eaten an onion sandwich because that’s all that was in the house, or if you’ve never stolen food to eat, well, you are in for some new experiences coming soon to a place near you. UNLESS YOU PREP.
I know it’s doom and gloom and it seems really hard to believe it could happen here. It DID happen here. We are NOT in a better place if it happens again. We aren’t a cohesive nation with a common society, and a history of toughness and individuality, coupled with a strong civic sense of community and responsibility anymore. There are pockets of that, but even outside the cities, illegal immigration and drugs like meth and cannabis have splintered and destroyed communities. The people growing weed in the national forest in Oklahoma are not stand up citizens. The people cooking meth in no tell motels are not going to support their neighbors in a time of trial. That stash house on the county lane with 22 illegals locked inside isn’t going to lend a helping hand if you need one.
Hard times are coming and if you don’t believe that and do something about it you will not get through it to the other side. Whatever Russia and Ukraine would have exported to feed other countries isn’t there. It won’t be there NEXT year either, no matter what happens with Vlad and the Ukrainian money laundry this year. Those crops are not in the ground. The tractors are not in the equipment sheds. We are looking at crop issues ourselves, and our reserves have been tapped for the last few years due to floods and poor harvests and the wuflu nonsense. Those people in far off lands will DEMAND food. Governments will provide it or fall. Ours is likely to starve us so that they can play their games overseas, because that is what they do. They send $40B to Ukraine, but cut benefits to seniors and vets (if not already then coming soon.) You can be sure that there will be USAID food “relief” provided for all the starving kids in africa, and we’ll have our own starving kids.
Don’t put yourself and your loved ones in that position. Stack some food now. You can always eat it later if I’m wrong, you are just pulling the spending and the stacking forward in time. And it’s still cheap compared to what it will cost when it goes pear shaped. Remember when we were watching Venezuela? There was never one point where you could say “OK, that’s it, I’m outta here” based on one change or one condition. People just woke up two years later and there was no food to eat, no meds at the hospital, and their savings were worthless. It happened incrementally. WE ARE GOING THROUGH THE SAME THING. Inflation is robbing us of purchasing power. Our money buys less every day. If the deflation sets in, the prices (for some things) will crash, but there won’t be anything left to buy or anyone who can buy it.
The decline in the stock market in 2008 worked the same way. Look at the charts, small ups and downs but the overall trend was down.
Our stores are short on goods. Our pharmacies are short on meds. Civic services are deteriorating, or taking longer to get the same service as the past. Those are all signs it is already underway. Does anyone thing it will all be back to “normal” in 3 months? Or 6? If so, why? And if not, then DO SOMETHING.
Like stacking all the things…
nick