In mid-March or so, as people began realizing that corona was actually a pandemic and not a “democratic hoax,” panic buying in Floridan really ratcheted upward and paper products seemed to vanish more quickly than they were produced. The great mystery was about the run on toilet paper.
It serves only two purposes, really, to blow your nose or to use in the bathroom. We can’t eat or freeze it. It went faster than rice, canned goods, even beer and wine. Fortunately, I’d found a sale about a week before this panic buying started and we had enough to last us awhile – but not until summer. Or fall. Or through the end of the year. So I was always on the lookout.
Then, last week, I went to our local Publix in the early afternoon and in the paper aisle, I found a palette of TP that had just been put out. Limit: 2 rolls of a 12-pack. I bought the limit. A masked woman in the aisle also helped herself to two packs. “Wow, are we lucky or what?” she murmured as she pushed her cart past mine.
A few days later, a friend told me Winn Dixie had paper towels. I drove six miles to the store and yes, they had towels. One per customer for a buck. It’s the skinniest roll of paper towels I’ve ever seen, but hey, so what. Today, a new moon day, I stopped at a Walgreen’s and discover PAPER TOWELS. TOILET PAPER. Didn’t need the latter, but bought the limit – 2 – of fat paper towels.
In the bigger picture, these are small, laughable triumphs that I’ve experienced in the aftermath of hurricanes. But the aftermath of a storm is relatively brief – 10 days is the most I personally recall, after Wilma, when the power grid around here went down. Andrew in 1992 was worse and so was Karina in 2005. For Puerto Rico, the aftermath of Hurricane Maria was like Armageddon and featured trump tossing rolls of paper towels to people in a crowd.
From friends in various part of the country, I read about their particular shortages and concerns. Right now, in those states that are planning to reopen or already have, I hear:
How’re tattoo parlors, nail salons. hair salons, and massage parlors going to practice social distancing?
It doesn’t look like anyone on Jacksonville Beach is social distancing.
Huh?
I’m staying put even if the governor opens the state.
Cases in Florida continue to rise – more than 35,000 as of May 2. Worldwide: nearly three and a half million. Deaths in the U.S : more than 67,000. Worldwide: nearly a quarter of a million. Up, up. Not down. That’s nowhere near the 50 million dead from the Spanish influenza. But the bottom line is that we don’t know the truth total of cases because the millions of tests a day the administration has been touting aren’t there.
So here we are, waiting for a new normal with many speculations about what it may look like.
P.S. May 8 – on Monday, May 11, Florida begins its phase 1 of the reopen plan. Tonight, there are 39,999 cases of corona in our state and over 4 million worldwide. The policy seems to be, Pretend it’s the flu. Pretend it doesn’t exist. Go forward, folks. And good luck. You’re on your own.
I watched it coming so I was able to prepare before the panic, thus enough of everything to be able to stay out of everyone’s way and avoid lines. But I sure agree about staying out of the fray of this opening. We are truly on our own in this pandemic. Trump has given up fighting Covid-19, and now I heard your governor has instructed his medical examiners to obfuscate the real number of deaths in Florida. Fascism, plain and simple.
Yes, he’s a trump lapdog.
We experienced the shortage of paper products here in New Mexico as well. What was also critical for some of us was the run on purified drinking water. None to be had. Rice, beans, things like olive oil were stripped from the shelves. Frozen vegetables gone but plenty of fresh nonorganics. No vitamin C to be found anywhere in the city. Discovered some paper towels myself lately and purified water has reappeared. I’m stocked with toilet paper. I could really use a garden but the concrete everywhere is daunting.
Nowt that Florida is opening on Monday, supplies have loosened up somewhat.I actually found Vit C packets today, I’ve been able to find paper towels and TP, too. Drinking water has returned as well. At least if there’s a second wave of this, stores will continue to impose limits on how much you can buy of certain items.
No limits imposed by our stores. Which is why our shelves were stripped. But we are a smallish city.
Her, you have to wear a mask to even enter Whole Foods and some of the other places are now making them mandatory, too.
They’ve been mandatory outside the home for over a month, here. But people are not getting arrested or even stopped for not wearing them. Unclear what that means, mandatory. I haven’t been to Whole Foods, actually. Maybe I should check it out.
No arrests here for not wearing a mask. I don’t know if the Whole Foods policy is country wide or just applies to our WF.
There are many ways that the Covid crisis has brought out goodwill and community spirit in local communities, but what we are seeing nationally is our utter lack of leadership, and the immoral, cruel, ignorance of our corporate owned republican government. The result will be in lives, and most of those lives will be lost among the most vulnerable and poorest of people, and as happens with the most vulnerable and poorest of people, their deaths won’t be noticed. The same is happening here, with the wilful ignorance, and ACTUAL SUPPRESSION OF SCIENTISTS AND STUDIES, of Arizona’s governor, no doubt inspired by Trump. This is true fascism. And I, if anything, will be staying isolated even more this summer. Fortunately I have lots of toilet paper, brown rice, and beans, and tomatoes in the garden! What else do you need?
https://presswatchers.org/2020/05/trump-blocks-desperately-needed-national-testing-program-says-tests-make-things-look-bad/
https://www.azcentral.com/story/opinion/op-ed/laurieroberts/2020/05/06/arizona-not-ready-reopen-asu-ua-coronavirus-models-say-fired/5175510002/
It sure feels like Fascism, Lauren.