[cockney steve]

I have decided to be one of "the elderly and infirm " for the purposes of shopping. Down to my last half-carton of full-fat UHT (gave the spare reserve one to someone more needy) I went for the 8AM to 9AM reserved time....bought butter, eggs,milk. (none exhausted at the Cockney squat,but getting low) No UHT to be had.

In and out in under 20 minutes, essential vittles sourced from freshly-restocked shelves.

Ranting woman screeching at the queue, " You aren't all pensioners ,you shouldn't be here.... eventually finishes her tant, jumps in car and screams -off. tooting horn with long blasts.
Stupid cow couldn't embrace the thought that the infirm have people shop for them!

Signs all over , "limit -3 items of any product per customer " so hardly any hoarding going on!

[Miscellaneous]

Signs all over , "limit -3 items of any product per customer " so hardly any hoarding going on!

Tesco fella tells me the hoarding is rife with several family members buying the maximum number of the same items and going back in the same shop to buy the same again at different checkouts, then going on to different shops.

[Bill McCarthy]

Next, the government will be lambasted for not bringing in ration books .

[kanga]

Next, the government will be lambasted for not bringing in ration books .

(If this not in jest .. )

During the 1973 oil crisis, petrol rationing cards printed for Suez 1956 were brought out of hangar and warehouse storage on military sites, and issued from GPO-operated Crown Post Offices. Since early '80s, there has been massive sell off of such sites and their contentss, demolition of such storage buildings to save on maintenance, privatisation of GPO, and Treasury ideological opposition to strategic storage of anything for civil or military contingencies. I rather doubt that creation and distribution of ration books are now possible.

[Leodisflyer]

@cockney steve oat milk is very tasty and can be found. Standard milk has a decent shelf life too and is replenished daily.

[Leodisflyer]

@Miscellaneous I'm avoiding shopping unless really needed, but did go to a local store on Saturday for basics (eggs, milk and bread) and saw a couple of pairs of very healthy looking youths going quickly through the store with purpose. It did look as though they were going from store to store to get the more difficult things. There was nothing of interest to them in the store I was at.

Trying to keep track of when I've been out. Have been home since Monday lunch over a week ago. I think the last outings were a week ago to a veg shop, last Saturday to a local shop and today. Basically 3 careful outings in 10 days. Other family members have done two trips since lockdown - one to the allotment for exercise and retrieval and one for small essentials.

The queuing system will be a big deterrent. People I saw today were also using small trolleys and bags. Basically picking no more than they could carry in 3-4 bags. The Waitrose system of being able to use your phone to self scan straight into your own bags was appreciated, but you still have to touch a screen to close the shop out.

[Leodisflyer]

Meanwhile: https://www.theguardian.com/business/20 ... -stockpile

[kanga]

Texas Attorney General decrees that gun stores are 'essential' businesses:

https://www.cbsnews.com/news/texas-gun- ... -covid-19/

[but abortion services are not:

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/52012243 ]

[Flyingfemme]

Meanwhile: https://www.theguardian.com/business/20 ... -stockpile

A local chippy closed this week. He put up a Facebook post offering free spuds and left sacks of them outside the shop.

[riverrock]

The stock in our local Morrisons is still pretty low with no flour, yeast or jam. Milk appeared pretty much beck to normal, toilet roll was 1/2 pallet worth (they hadn't bothered shelving).
No Tesco delivery slots available now in the next month (although that could be because you can pre book a slot, then add things to your basket the night before) - last week my wife booked slots for the next 3 weeks so I suspect everyone else did that too.
Wife also tells me that 9 rolls of toilet roll aren't enough for the two of us. It take me a year to go through that many but I'm trying not to think about it!

Give it a week and things will stabilise, albeit there will changes to stock as items normally sold to catering firms appear in supermarkets. My local corner shop were selling 5kg bags of pasta!

[Miscellaneous]

Give it a week and things will stabilise...

That's what I've been thinking for the last 2 weeks and it hasn't happened.

[PeteSpencer]

Waitrose just sent me an email having identified my age from my My Waitrose account , saying they've opened up some extra online slots for priority oldie customers for online/delivery.

Apparently they're using 400 extra J Lewis drivers.

Just done an online shop for Monday afternoon (30th).

Remarkable and highly appreciated.

Thank you Waitrose

Peter

[Leodisflyer]

There are 2-3 local shops that I'd like to use, but their premises are very small. Suddenly occurred that I could phone up, ask them to put an order together and then collect without needing to linger in the shop. Called one, a fishmonger, they were more than happy to oblige and they also do daily artisan bread, which would be a nice treat. Will be going during a quiet time in the week and they are happy to help by saying when is a good time.

I've heard of one business bagging up and then putting goods directly into the boots of people's cars. Sounds an excellent idea, but don't know who they are or where they operate.

We don't need any meat at the moment, but is also occurs that there's a really good farm shop that would be a good place to use when we need it. Have bought in bulk from them over the years, they sell from a very spacious barn and pre-bag and box up my orders. It's close enough for the short trip in the car to be justifiable.

@PeteSpencer was very impressed with Waitrose the other day. Have only been for one supermarket shop since lockdown. The customers and the staff were great. Great queuing system and distancing. I did ask one of the staff who was stocking to weigh some broccoli for me so that I could self scan (you have to touch the screen to generate a barcode). She was already gloved up and was very understanding and helpful. Appreciate you are getting home delivery, but this might also reassure you about what is happening inside the store when they pick.

[eltonioni]

Ocado have bought 100k testing kits for staff. The cost of £1,5m seems like a good investment in both staff /customer health and the business.

Off to the butcher's now to prep for a Sunday joint. Hopefully the queue outside won't be a large as it was at 8am.

[kanga]

We have them here, too

https://www.itv.com/news/westcountry/20 ... xplosives/