As you (almost certainly don’t) recall, I tracked the progress of pandemic panic shopping in the Vienna, VA area. That started with with the disappearance of all dust masks from the local Home Depot before Virginia had even one COVID-19 case. Progressed to “genteel panic shopping“, where only the good stuff was gone. Passed through the Soviet-style hundreds-of-people-lining-up-at-the-rumor-of-toilet-paper phase. And finally seemed to settle down into the occasional shortage of the odd item or two. (Yeast? Apple cider vinegar??) This was summarized, with dates and references to original posts, in Post #816.
Along with slow internet, I thought that the poorly-stocked grocery store was now a thing of the past. Been there, done that. Got the merit badge.
But from what I’m seeing and hearing, that’s just not so. And so, both by the evidence of my own eyes, and by a few credible reports, I’d say that grocery store shelves seem to be thinning out once again.
And so, if your life didn’t seem quite enough like Groundhog Day,* you can now look forward to modest repeats of the same shortages you dealt with earlier this year.
* ” … doomed to spend the rest of eternity in the same place, seeing the same people do the same thing EVERY day.” Rob Harthill, IMDB.com
For the life of me, I can’t quite figure out why.
Continue reading Post #865: Getting ready for a hard winter, 5: Grocery story deja vu