Whatcha Stocking?

Kasey Chang · Post by **Kasey Chang** » Sat Apr 18, 2020 11:26 am

I showed my dad Instacart's prices for Safeway. After looking at five items, he said he's not ordering anything because it's so F***ing expensive.

To be fair, my dad is used to Chinatown prices on groceries, and when Safeway is NOT having a sale, their prices are a bit high compare to Chinatown street prices for the items that my dad buys... nice fatty pork, baby bokchoy, and things like that.

Unfortunately, I have to eat some Western food once in a while. And I try to eat regular hours, while my dad, restricted to home duty (he's 70+ with COPD) doesn't wake up till 10, breakfast at 1100, lunch at 1600, and dinner at 2000, then Netflix all night. And he expects me to follow his schedule.

EDIT: Just went out to shop in Chinatown, mask and all. My Ikea bag (the large one) is invaluable, except to my shoulder (I probably bought too much) but the prices in Chinatown is hard to resist. SIX bundles of green onions for 1 buck (typically, 1 bundle for $0.99 in supermarkets) chicken drumsticks for $1.29 a pound (currently at Safeway: $2.99. Pork loins, "bacon cut" (good amount of belly fat) in Chinatown, $1.89 a pound (about $5-7 in Safeway, if you can get that cut at all). The problem is it's not nicely packed, and the place is crowded, sorta. Imagine the area of the Pharmacy in Safeway, containing the entire store. Yeah, that's the size of a Chinatown full-service market. I bought like $60 and it's a lot of stuff. (2 heads of cabbage, couple large carrots, six bundles of green onions, almost six pounds of pork, 2 medium frozen fish, 10 drumsticks (pretty big ones), 18 eggs, some preserved vegetables, couple pounds of canola (it's great stir-fried), one container of salt (normal Mortons), and maybe a few items I forgot. I couldn't find any potatoes or jalapenos.

dbt1949 · Post by **dbt1949** » Sat Apr 18, 2020 9:50 pm

I'll never forget that time I had fresh vegetables.

Jeff V · Post by **Jeff V** » Sat Apr 18, 2020 10:05 pm

dbt1949 wrote: ↑Sat Apr 18, 2020 9:50 pm I'll never forget that time I had fresh vegetables.

This is why I brave the stores twice a week. Wife insists we just go once per week...then come Tuesday everything we didn't get over the weekend becomes a pain point and I go to the produce store. Or the Filipino store. Or both.

Kraken · Post by **Kraken** » Sat Apr 18, 2020 10:18 pm

Jeff V wrote: ↑Sat Apr 18, 2020 10:05 pm
dbt1949 wrote: ↑Sat Apr 18, 2020 9:50 pm I'll never forget that time I had fresh vegetables.
This is why I brave the stores twice a week. Wife insists we just go once per week...then come Tuesday everything we didn't get over the weekend becomes a pain point and I go to the produce store. Or the Filipino store. Or both.

I just got groceries down to every other week. Fresh food doesn't cooperate with that really well, but if you plan it right you can avoid relying on preserved food just about every night. It's definitely changed the way I menu-plan. Wife still finds reasons to send me out every few days, but I consider the supermarket one of the riskiest trips and I can avoid that one.

Post by **ImLawBoy** » Sat Apr 18, 2020 11:18 pm

We do one major grocery run per week on Monday. The grocery store seems to be at a low traffic ebb at this point, so I feel best about this. Given that my wife is a vegetarian, we need to do a weekly stocking of fresh produce. We've got dried beans and frozen fruits laid away, but that's the emergency stash.

We also do a supplementary run - typically on Saturday - to the local mini-grocery/convenience store. I'm in and out of the latter in about 15 minutes, so I feel OK about it. We do tend to run out of milk by Sunday, so we need to grab some for the parasites. Plus I'm usually running perilously low on beer by that point, and I'd hate to have to rely on bourbon.

The Meal · Post by **The Meal** » Sun Apr 19, 2020 7:04 am

Friends surprised us with a do-it-yourself margarita kit yesterday afternoon:

So we did it ourselves:

The tequila-soaked boba pearls were a genius addition (or so I thought last night — this morning I'm not so sure). At one point we had a dozen of us, extended-Brady Bunch style, sharing videos of each other on Discord as we played online cards last night. Great fun.

Scuzz · Post by **Scuzz** » Sun Apr 19, 2020 1:49 pm

Jeff V wrote: ↑Sat Apr 18, 2020 10:05 pm
dbt1949 wrote: ↑Sat Apr 18, 2020 9:50 pm I'll never forget that time I had fresh vegetables.
This is why I brave the stores twice a week. Wife insists we just go once per week...then come Tuesday everything we didn't get over the weekend becomes a pain point and I go to the produce store. Or the Filipino store. Or both.

We try to go out only once a week but usually my wife's need of fresh veggies and greens means there is a another trip (or Instacart) at some point.

Jeff V · Post by **Jeff V** » Mon Apr 20, 2020 11:55 am

So yesterday was shopping day. Wife and I hit up 3 stores, two of which required gloves. My wife prepared us with plenty of gloves and facemasks.

I dropped her and the groceries off at home, then proceeded to Menards to buy a carload of dirt. I was wearing a flannel shirt and it was sunny and warm, so I worked up a sweat loading the car. There were a couple of things I needed to get at another supermarket, so I stopped there after. While walking through the store, some spit when down the wrong pipe resulting in a coughing fit. So I'm visibly overheated and coughing...wonder how many people I put a scare into...

Kraken · Post by **Kraken** » Tue Apr 21, 2020 10:49 am

I've decided to make another comprehensive grocery run tomorrow. Yesterday Wife's super-deluxe masks arrived -- cloth ones with replaceable filters -- so I'll break one of those in at the supermarket.

Scuzz · Post by **Scuzz** » Tue Apr 21, 2020 2:26 pm

The wife, daughter and I hit the store today for the first time on two weeks. Still no paper products, but we should still be okay. We do have an Amazon order of TP still out there for delivery sometime in two weeks. We spent $503 today. Bought extra meat as there are meat plants having trouble now, and a two week supply of beer.

dbt1949 · Post by **dbt1949** » Tue Apr 21, 2020 2:29 pm

Is your family a baseball team?

LawBeefaroni · Post by **LawBeefaroni** » Tue Apr 21, 2020 5:26 pm

Did curbside pickup at my local butcher yesterday. Smoothest thing I've done since this whole mess started. Called when I arrived, a few minutes before my allotted time slot, and a minute later had a 12.1 lb bag of meat in my hands. Well, meat and some lovely olive salad.

Scuzz · Post by **Scuzz** » Tue Apr 21, 2020 6:38 pm

dbt1949 wrote: ↑Tue Apr 21, 2020 2:29 pm Is your family a baseball team?

Four adults and 3 cats. As I said we did buy probably $100 in meat, and probably $100 in alcohol. But the women like to cook and I think several things were replinished after being in lock up for a month. Three of us are getting our regular pay while the other is making $2 extra an hour because she still has to work her job.

Kasey Chang · Post by **Kasey Chang** » Tue Apr 21, 2020 7:07 pm

I got tired of my dad's cooking (he's the cook in the house) and ordered 12 inch pizza, salad, Phillie cheesesteak, chick side, and bread side. I plan to eat it over several days.

With delivery fees, tips, and more, it came out to be almost $50.

But at least it's variety. My dad cooks like one big pot and I get to eat the same thing for a couple days. ARGH.

Kraken · Post by **Kraken** » Wed Apr 22, 2020 10:51 am

Wife sent me to Cumby due to a Diet Coke emergency. I'm getting groceries this after, but the monkey was on her back this morning. Every time I go in there, they've taken more safety measures. Now there's a plexi shield between the cashier and the customer with a window to pass products through, much like an inner-city bodega.

Unagi · Post by **Unagi** » Wed Apr 22, 2020 12:04 pm

Kasey Chang wrote: ↑Tue Apr 21, 2020 7:07 pm I got tired of my dad's cooking (he's the cook in the house) and ordered 12 inch pizza, salad, Phillie cheesesteak, chick side, and bread side. I plan to eat it over several days.

With delivery fees, tips, and more, it came out to be almost $50.

But at least it's variety. My dad cooks like one big pot and I get to eat the same thing for a couple days. ARGH.

Does your dad keep you from using the kitchen yourself ?

Kasey Chang · Post by **Kasey Chang** » Wed Apr 22, 2020 12:16 pm

Never learned how. Best I can do is boil eggs (with an egg cooker). I guess I can whip out my pressure cooker and learn some new recipes...

Jeff V · Post by **Jeff V** » Wed Apr 22, 2020 12:28 pm

Kasey Chang wrote: ↑Wed Apr 22, 2020 12:16 pm Never learned how. Best I can do is boil eggs (with an egg cooker). I guess I can whip out my pressure cooker and learn some new recipes...

If only there were readily available teaching aids for this sort of thing...

Anonymous Bosch · Post by **Anonymous Bosch** » Wed Apr 22, 2020 3:02 pm

Kasey Chang wrote: ↑Wed Apr 22, 2020 12:16 pm Never learned how. Best I can do is boil eggs (with an egg cooker). I guess I can whip out my pressure cooker and learn some new recipes...

Given your fondness for gadgets and gizmos, go with the following and you'll eat like a king:

Here's a useful Beginners Guide to Sous Vide Cooking that'll get you cooking like a pro in no time at all.

WYBaugh · Post by **WYBaugh** » Wed Apr 22, 2020 3:25 pm

Kraken wrote: ↑Tue Apr 21, 2020 10:49 am I've decided to make another comprehensive grocery run tomorrow. Yesterday Wife's super-deluxe masks arrived -- cloth ones with replaceable filters -- so I'll break one of those in at the supermarket.

Where did you find masks?

Also, does anyone have a line on lysol/chlorox wipes? Willing to barter tp for them.

Daehawk · Post by **Daehawk** » Wed Apr 22, 2020 3:33 pm

Already planning for my next trip to town in about 1 1/2 weeks. All shiny and chrome.

Kraken · Post by **Kraken** » Wed Apr 22, 2020 3:53 pm

WYBaugh wrote: ↑Wed Apr 22, 2020 3:25 pm
Kraken wrote: ↑Tue Apr 21, 2020 10:49 am I've decided to make another comprehensive grocery run tomorrow. Yesterday Wife's super-deluxe masks arrived -- cloth ones with replaceable filters -- so I'll break one of those in at the supermarket.
Where did you find masks?

I only know that she has ordered them on/thru Amazon multiple times. Some of the orders fell through, and some came after long delays.

The supermarket was better stocked this time; I got everything on my list except pumpernickel bread (for reubens) and, for some reason, flour tortillas (for burritos). No toilet paper, of course; that won't be back until the lockdown is lifted. We're down to a 3-week supply and the lockdown will last at least through May (MA is just now peaking in new cases), so I reckon I'd better order some online. I did score two rolls of paper towel, so that's progress.

Mask compliance was 100% since our gov. made them mandatory a week or two ago. Very few people were following the one-way aisle markers, though. I mostly did.

Scuzz · Post by **Scuzz** » Wed Apr 22, 2020 4:41 pm

WYBaugh wrote: ↑Wed Apr 22, 2020 3:25 pm
Kraken wrote: ↑Tue Apr 21, 2020 10:49 am I've decided to make another comprehensive grocery run tomorrow. Yesterday Wife's super-deluxe masks arrived -- cloth ones with replaceable filters -- so I'll break one of those in at the supermarket.
Where did you find masks?

I have been wondering where these organizations that are donating thousands of masks to hospitals and rest homes are getting them. Some make sense, a group of companies that for some reason had stocked them realize others have more need, but there have been local donations (nice how they make the evening news) of tens of thousands of masks by groups that would have had no need of them on their own. Where are they getting them when the facilities that need them can't get them?

As an aside my wife made 20 of them per the instructions of a local group. I find it strange that my grocery store doesn't require them but in order to go into Petco and get turtle food I had to have a mask on. I do think if there were strict limitations on masks, and they were available, and people weren't stupid, probably more businesses could open. Of course that is a lot of "ifs".

Daehawk · Post by **Daehawk** » Wed Apr 22, 2020 4:56 pm

AFAIK you dont have to have one here but last time I was in town i wore a bandana all cowboy bandit style. Always wanted to

Jeff V · Post by **Jeff V** » Wed Apr 22, 2020 4:59 pm

Scuzz wrote: ↑Wed Apr 22, 2020 4:41 pm Where are they getting them when the facilities that need them can't get them?

China? My wife ordered and received 100 N95 and 100 blue pleated masks she bought on Alibaba.

LawBeefaroni · Post by **LawBeefaroni** » Wed Apr 22, 2020 5:22 pm

If it's N95 and from China there's a pretty good chance it's counterfeit. You can check here.

Daehawk · Post by **Daehawk** » Wed Apr 22, 2020 5:23 pm

Hope the N95 ones are real as theres a lot of fakes out there.

Jeff V · Post by **Jeff V** » Wed Apr 22, 2020 6:21 pm

LawBeefaroni wrote: ↑Wed Apr 22, 2020 5:22 pm If it's N95 and from China there's a pretty good chance it's counterfeit. You can check here.

I don't really care...neither my wife nor I are using it out of clinical necessity (wife's job finally started providing them for her). It's more convenient (and disposable) than a cloth mask that has to be washed all of the time, and serves the same purpose of curtailing projectile snot from sneezes.

Kasey Chang · Post by **Kasey Chang** » Thu Apr 23, 2020 1:06 am

The Chinese ones would be marked KN95, which is their version of N95 "equivalent", but not certified by NIOSH to be same N95 as ours.

Jeff V · Post by **Jeff V** » Thu Apr 23, 2020 10:37 am

Kasey Chang wrote: ↑Thu Apr 23, 2020 1:06 am The Chinese ones would be marked KN95, which is their version of N95 "equivalent", but not certified by NIOSH to be same N95 as ours.

Correct, but certification is not important to us.

Max Peck · Post by **Max Peck** » Thu Apr 23, 2020 10:45 am

If people are looking for non-medical cloth masks, a Twitch streamer I follow is selling custom-made ones from her crafts store.

https://monostache.storenvy.com/

Just tell her that Max sent you, to receive absolutely no discount whatsoever.

Blackhawk · Post by **Blackhawk** » Thu Apr 23, 2020 11:23 am

I looked all over to find masks. I had zero luck finding any that were in stock or could be shipped prior to May. Then someone pointed me to Etsy, and there were literally hundreds of custom made options from crafters all over, non-gouged prices, and normal shipping.

Post by **ImLawBoy** » Thu Apr 23, 2020 11:24 am

I mentioned it in another thread, but it's great that we have a very crafty neighbor who dropped off a bag of 5 homemade cloth masks for my family.

LawBeefaroni · Post by **LawBeefaroni** » Thu Apr 23, 2020 12:16 pm

The wife made some nice masks for he family but the design makes my big ears stick out massively. Have N95s (that suck to breath through) in reserve and surgical masks that I just got issued at work. So right now my mask of choice is surgical.

Menard's has been coming through big time for everything out of stock elsewhere.

Scuzz · Post by **Scuzz** » Thu Apr 23, 2020 5:11 pm

ImLawBoy wrote: ↑Thu Apr 23, 2020 11:24 am I mentioned it in another thread, but it's great that we have a very crafty neighbor who dropped off a bag of 5 homemade cloth masks for my family.

My wife made 20 for a group thing. The first one took her a couple days, because the starter kit was useless, but after she figured out what they wanted and supplied some of her own touches they were easy, I guess. They are warm though. I pity people who have to wear them for 8 hours (or more) a day.

Post by **ImLawBoy** » Thu Apr 23, 2020 6:12 pm

Yeah, it's not the most comfortable thing. I probably had it on for 60-90 minutes for my shopping run, and it was bearable for that. Added bonus was that she put in something to help conform the top of the mast to the nose and face so it didn't fog up my glasses.

Jeff V · Post by **Jeff V** » Thu Apr 23, 2020 6:22 pm

Glasses fogging is what make them impractical for me at work. So far I'm dodging the enforcers -- my St. Charles office failed to provide me with one (never mind the dozen or so in my backpack my wife gave me). Same with Bolingbrook...they didn't even give one to my employee who is always there. There's like 5 people (in an office normally filled with 200) there, but today one of those 5 was the business unit president and he gave my employee some crap so I gave him a mask (he didn't see me so I didn't wear one).

Scuzz · Post by **Scuzz** » Fri Apr 24, 2020 12:20 am

ImLawBoy wrote: ↑Thu Apr 23, 2020 6:12 pm Yeah, it's not the most comfortable thing. I probably had it on for 60-90 minutes for my shopping run, and it was bearable for that. Added bonus was that she put in something to help conform the top of the mast to the nose and face so it didn't fog up my glasses.

Yea, I wear glasses and that was a problem. i had to adjust them often so I imagine if I had to wear them long term it would drive me crazy.

dbt1949 · Post by **dbt1949** » Fri Apr 24, 2020 9:15 am

Eggs were off the ration list this morning. They also had name brand toilet paper and paper towels.

LawBeefaroni · Post by **LawBeefaroni** » Fri Apr 24, 2020 10:33 am

Jeff V wrote: ↑Thu Apr 23, 2020 6:22 pm Glasses fogging is what make them impractical for me at work. So far I'm dodging the enforcers -- my St. Charles office failed to provide me with one (never mind the dozen or so in my backpack my wife gave me). Same with Bolingbrook...they didn't even give one to my employee who is always there. There's like 5 people (in an office normally filled with 200) there, but today one of those 5 was the business unit president and he gave my employee some crap so I gave him a mask (he didn't see me so I didn't wear one).

I quit wearing the mask at my desk. Of 7 offices in the suite, only 2 other people were in and we all have our own walled offices. Yesterday the CFO stopped by and asked where my mask was and I pointed to it on my desk. "Not doing much good there, is it?"

Busted.