Apparently grocery stores have been jammed all day here in Southern California, with lines literally snaking out the door. It turns out that people are stocking up in order to make it through the 18 hours of rain we're expecting tomorrow. This is happening all over, including places that are in zero danger of flooding—which is most of them.
Life is weird.
Luckily my condo is on the second floor. The grocery store was totally out of bananas, broccoli (!?) and avocados. Very bizarre.
And from whence would the bananas, broccoli and avocados have come? It likely does not take a huge disruption in the shipping system for those to have even "normal" purchasing rates result in out-of-stock situations.
I live in a region where the roads get cut by floods every two or three years. It never lasts longer than a few days, yet you can guarantee that the supermarket shelves will be stripped bare of bread, meat, milk and water within hours of any forecast of heavy rain. I can only assume lots of people do their grocery shopping on a just-in-time system. I could comfortably survive being cut off for two weeks, and wouldn't experience any real hardship for a month, and it's not as if I have a bunker full of tinned goods and bottled water.
Sounds like Boomer training. Shopping for more than a day or two. Using an actual grocery list (I finally given up a paper list and work off my phone). Eating home much more often than eating out, which we still see as a bit of a special occasion.
The other thing to remember is that, even if you shop in bulk, like I do, how long could you last without electricity/gas?
To some extent (and not completely irrationally) the excess shopping being done is of foods that will be usable even if the fridge, microwave and stove stop working for two or three days (which is unlikely for MOST people, but you never know if you will be one of the unlucky few who have your local substation or feeder power line taken out, by an uprooted tree or whatever.
Yeah it’s weird. But you can never be sure when the weather person is gonna be wrong.
Worst case scenario this will be a pretty comical final blog post. 🙂
It does no good if he's not around to experience his hubris!!
My niece visited the Trader Joe's in Aliso Viejo (just a little south of Kevin) and found that entire categories were sold out, including eggs, pasta and produce. Her father reported that the situation down the road in Laguna Beach was quite otherwise, nothing out of the ordinary.
I had to go to a second, SF Bay Area Trader Joe's to find the gnocchi we wanted for dinner last night. At the first Trader Joe's, while green beans were plentiful, they were out of the gnocchi. At the second Trader Joes, while the gnocchi was plentiful, they were down to their last three packages of the green beans. #firstworldproblems I suspect ... but it may simply have been a matter of which one was still in the midst of restocking what on a Saturday.
Trump alone can fix Trader Joe’s inventory system!
😄😄😄😄😄
no one can fix TJ's inventory system. They are always out of something that is standard stock in every other supermarket. If they don't have it, they expect you to happily drive to another TJs across town to get it. 🙁
Have you taken no precautions at all?
Remember when the COVID started, and people were buying all the toilet paper in the stores?
Yup. I took special note of what was left in the stores otherwise cleaned out. I've noted down a number of potential sources of emergency fine to medium sandpaper substitutes.
Another reason to subscribe to a print newspaper. Personally I prefer the soothing banalities of our local rag.
The massive stocking up is something people do when big storms are unusual. In places that get blizzards you get a bit more shopping in advance of a major snowfall (some people have to move up their shopping by a day or two), but it's rarely widespread empty shelves. Once you are used to having 24-36 hour stretches where leaving home is made very difficult by the weather, you get used to buying an extra loaf of bread a few days in advance, and raiding the freezer if going to the grocery store seems like a big hassle.
"...some people have to move up their shopping by a day or two .."
Two days of shoppers in one day makes the store twice as crowded.
Your internet/cable will be down sometime Sunday afternoon. Power will be intermittent until it just goes out, perhaps for hours or maybe a day or more. The issue will be the prioritization of hundreds of incidents of downed power lines across the region from fallen trees. The roads will be a mess. Every low-lying area will be inundated with feet of water. Then there's the storm surge that will inundate areas close to beaches with water popping up from sewers.
Hundreds of thousands of homes that were designed with "flat" roofs (less than 1:12 slope) will discover that their roofs have leaky spots and water will be coming in from everywhere. Others with old windows will see pressure driven rain pushing between the cracks. Basements will flood. Most of the hillside homes will get to learn all about debris flow.
It'll be a total mess.
Or maybe KD's right and whateves, it's just a little wind and rain.
"Hundreds of thousands of homes that were designed with "flat" roofs (less than 1:12 slope) will discover that their roofs have leaky spots and water will be coming in from everywhere. ..."
It seems unlikely that roofs that were fine with rain in January will suddenly start leaking with rain in August.
Rain from a heavy winter storm is not quite like the deluge of rain coupled with low pressure/constant wind from a tropical storm. People will find out.
Watching coverage of Palm Springs, Riverside and elsewhere just a bit ago confirms Kevin's prediction not a good one. Looks pretty hurricane-y to me. I get that it is not officially a hurricane, but the footage looks pretty bad.
I've noticed folks in the U.S referring to Hurricane Hillary - but it's hitting California.
No hurricane will ever strike California for hurricanes only happen in the Atlantic, it's a tropical cyclone (if it was further west it might be called a typhoon), not a hurricance.
Tropical cyclones in the northeastern Pacific (north of the Equator and east of the 180th meridian) are also called hurricanes. No tropical cyclone has ever made landfall in California at hurricane strength, but both Mexico and Hawaii have been struck by Pacific hurricanes.
Water may not be safe to drink due to flooding overwhelming the system, though granted I don't know if that already applies. Without bottled water supplies or power you may not have access to clean water for several days.
Finally I can unload the warehouse full of toilet paper I bought during covid!
And the other warehouse, full of sweepings from the Cheetos factory when I had the brainstorm people would love adding Cheeto powder to cereal, mashed potatoes and whatever.
Natural disasters are nature's opportunity.
For most people, the loss of electricity for several hours would be the biggest hardship.
Beyond making sure you have the minimum of water, the important supplies are: any medicine you need to take, and a battery operated radio.
p.s there is a scheduled NFL football game in Inglewood (near LAX) on Sunday at 4 PM PDT. Saints vs Chargers.
And for those of us with feline overlords, cat food and cat treats. Priorities, people!
There's a battery-powered radio in my car. Will that do?
If you have gas or if your battery is new enough. You may not be able to access gasoline for several days.
However if your car is parked on the street it may be washed away by flood waters.
Wishing you the best. NJ used to get winter storms but no hurricanes outside the shore, but over the past 25 years have been hit regularly by major interior storms that flood and do serious damage.
In 1999 we had no clue how to deal with Floyd, and it was our lack of preparation that was so dangerous. By Hurricane Ida in 2021 we were much better as local governments managing the disaster, and as people knowing to prepare and -- except for a very few -- knowing to stay the hell home and if you do go out avoid standing water.
I wish you and the rest of the folks in Cali (and Mexico) all the best in dealing with this kind of storm, and hope you don't have to learn how to over the next 25 years like we have.
To the best of my knowledge, the storm is not expected to strike Colombia, so while the residents of Cali likely appreciate your best wishes, they may be better directed towards the residents of (Southern) California. 🙂
For a while in the 90s and 2000s, USC would correct broadcasters who called it "Southern Cal".
And don't write "LA" because that's Louisiana.
And don't call California "the world's fifth largest economy." It's not. Why? Because California isn't a country, so it doesn't belong in any list of the world's largest economies.
Everyone gets to be in a movie for the next few days.
It's like a vacation that comes to you.
Y'all need to acquaint yourself with Universal Hub's "French Toast Alert System", which Boston uses to gauge the severity of nor'easters...
https://www.universalhub.com/french-toast
My guess is you're at about 4 slices.
This is great! I grew up in the Midwest and the STORM ALERT newscasters had so much fun every year!!
Humans are structually bad at risk analysis (outside of the evolutionary base of a small chimp-sized band), simple as that.
Hang in there Kevin and hope your cells and laptops are charged. Hang onto the felines.
This is how FL is when there’s a mid-major hurricane coming our way. For a tropical storm? It would be life as normal.
Lord Xenu is coming to wreak havoc on the Gold Base!!!!
Stock up the fridge...and the power goes out....
That's why I stocked up a Katella Bakery with bagels and croissants 😉
Sounds like generalized and on-going anxiety finding a specific outlet (analogous to lightning or a spark of static).
Agree it's something like this.
At the local State Bros, there was another run on toilet paper. They were completely out of chicken. Why chicken? I have no idea. But something is broken or worn out in the minds of Americans.
Why chicken? Because they have yet to learn to appreciate SPAM…
Chicken is something you can cook a bunch of in advance and store in a cooler if you lose power
In NY State (about 1 hour north of NYC), lost power for 10 days after hurricane Sandy in 2012. The power crews came in from 1000+ miles away to help fix the deconstructed power grid, needing to replace hundreds of snapped power poles just in my little town.
Stocking up on perishables may not be the best strategy. Needed to go 25+ miles in the direction of less damage to get gas for my generator.
My son and family live in SD, so I am hoping for a less damaging outcome. Faux News will probably running this event nonstop and treating it as justice served on the woke liberals, commies, LTGBQ, Biden loving democrats.
Even if you’re not in an area that will be flooded it’s rational to stock up on stuff that you might need for a few days because stores may run out and not be able to restock
I'm happy to no longer live in Houston for that reason (among a few others). I now live in an area of the country that does not nearly as regularly have weather disasters, and I do not miss the stress associated with approaching hurricanes (although the Great COVID Toilet Paper Freakout (TM) dredged up the sort of stress reaction for a few weeks in early 2020).
I took notes - went through the ravaged toilet paper sections of several supermarkets and noted which brands NOBODY would buy. Put them on my "do not buy under any circumstances" list.
So many people have too much faith in modern supply chains.
Even in "good times", things happened. I lived in Brooklyn during the power outage in 2003, and remember our building running out of water, because the pumps were out for longer than the rooftop reservoirs were designed to last.
Earlier, I grew up in the poor rural south in the 80s, power outages were routine, as were road outages due to flooding or trees. And some essentials were a 40 mile drive. So you just stocked up on anything you didn't want to randomly do without, and outdoor cooking modes were practical rather than a treat.
I live in a major metro and always have a couple weeks of water, basic edibles, and some other stuff on hand.
Well folks, it hasn't been nearly what we were led to expect. We did have some heavy rain, during which I drove 20 miles to meet friends for brunch. We all survived. Then we had an earthquake -- how much more California can this get? Right now I have windows open and there is a gentle breeze. Looks like I won't have any excuses to not go to work tomorrow.