Originally published at Notes from the bunker…. You can comment here or there.
Okay,
I’m taking a deep breath and moving on.
This is me breathing…
As I have been relentlessly harping about, warning against, and predicting, magazine and AR availability taking a sharp jump for the worse. Somehow, and I don’t understand this, there are people who didn’t think it might be a good idea to stock up on guns and mags until after the election results were in. These are the same folks you see jammed in the Publix four hours before a hurricane hits snapping up milk, bread and eggs (because, apparently, hurricanes are French toast weather). And that isn’t the worst of it…there are still people sitting on the fence who won’t take action until Carter Obama is in office … and then theres another row of fencesitters who won’t take any action until the legislation is up for a vote… and then theres a final row who wont do anything until the legislation becomes law. And during that long, painful period from now until Assault Weapon Ban II the prices will go up and the availability will go down.
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Gas prices continue to drop, although for how long is a mystery. Folks are telling me there are some places in town that are as low as $2.20/gallon. This means that not only will I be done with my fuel storage for now, prices may come down enough that a little in-state traveling may now be in the affordable range. For example, Ive been wanting to hit the gun shows in Great Falls, Bozeman and even Billings but $4 gas made that a very expensive propostion. Montana isn’t exactly a small state and you can travel some pretty long distances between major population centers. Current stockpile is 10 5-gallon cans with one empty Blitz can left over. I’ll fill that one in the next few days, treat it, and be done for the year.
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Last night was an example of food storage paying off. It was late, I hadn’t eaten, and I was hungry but didn’t feel like going out in the cold and trudging to the supermarket. I wanted something hot, filling, satisfying, and in large quantity. So a quick trip into the deep freeze for some vacuum sealed ground beef, ca. 2006; a pound of spaghetti from the short term stage bins, ca. 2007; and a jar of spaghetti sauce purchased on sale back around April. Cook the whole mess up and eat. Didn’t even have to leave the house. And, according to the spreadsheets, I could do this another 30 times if I had to. Convenience, my friend…just another benefit to thinking ahead.
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If theres anyone out there who hasn’t got some spare parts sitting around for your favorite thundertoys, you should probably get busy on that. May not be able to simply buy a new handgun if something goes bad on your old one without going through a hideous amount of hoop-jumping. Assume they even offer a hoop.
PUBLIX!
Nice attention to detail.
Gas may fall even further. It’s down to $2.59 even here in Seattle. But oil prices are down to $60.77 a barrel, and with Saudi Arabia having left OPEC, OPEC is essentially powerless to raise prices — they’re all producing at 100% capacity, and Saudi Arabia & Russia could easily take up any slack OPEC left by cutting production. So, essentially, the only people who can raise oil prices are the House of Saud, who can do so only by cutting what is essentially their sole source of income during a recession. Doesn’t seem terribly likely in the short term.
Publix is awesome.
Gas can be had for $1.89 or less in the Houston area.
Can’t I wait until Obama gives me a gun for me stint as a compulsory public servant?
Gas will go back up again, and relatively soon. All the big oil holes are making sucking noises, especially our favorite ones.
I had the idea today that Bush/Cheney may have called some favors to keep oil and gas prices low until after 20 Jan 2009. Just an idea.
I think they make the hurricanes.
I just saw $1.90/gal here in middle Indiana
2.18 here this morning (Northwest Brevard County, FL).
Milk, eggs and bread
I can personally confirm that french toast is indeed hurricane food. I recommend adding a little cinnamon, vanilla extract and a scattering of pumpkin spice to your batter mix. Mmmmmm.
Speaking of which, I recently started adding spices to my food storage. I always had salt of course, but things like onion powder, garlic powder, cinnamon, chili powder and black pepper certainly can make food more enjoyable while the power is out. These are easily marked with the date purchased and get rotated out with normal cooking attrition.