shortages? thoughts?

[tortoise]

while there may be some attempts and conspiracies to destroy things i suspect it is a vast minority of events.

Fear and insecurity change how people think and act. If someone believes there is danger, their brain will hold onto
Info that confirms it and "forget" any contradictory information. Great survival tactic for cavemen, but causes all kinds of problems in developed nations.

An amount of caution is beneficial, such as motivating people to be self sufficient. But too much fear or insecurity makes the wheels fall off the cognitive bus. Fact checking is a good way to cope. Mindfulness and taking regular breaks from media too.

 

[Chic Rustler]

You're not wrong, but you're doing a cognitive distortion called "kitchen sinking" as in the idiom everything but the kitchen sink. You're combining multiple unrelated things together in a way that increases anxiety.

Serious power grid issues are not new, especially for Texans. So the "and now" is the cognitive distortion.

Taxes (plural, as in all of my taxes) have not doubled, literally. Thats a cognitive distortion. Which taxes have increased by how much? Is a better way to discuss. Federal income tax rates are the same and since we live in different states, I dont know from your comment what changes you are facing or how significant they are.

We also need to compare apples to apples. I've always bought $7 lunch meat (when its on sale from $10-$12/pound). I have not seen $10 bacon or $8 hamburger. I've seen situations (in large sicial media groups) where someone complains about a high grocery price, and someone else says a store 15 miles away has a normal price for the same item. We have to remember our world views are geographically small and our online views very narrow because algorithms only show us what we agree with.

Social media algorithms are terrifying, frankly. Look at what happened to Brazil!! The deep political divides in the USA are due to social media algorithms. I deleted my accounts and use ad blockers. It is the only thing I can control. I wont be influenced by a computer algorithm.

my property taxes have doubled. car registration has doubled here as well. what im telling you in no fancy words is they are continually makin it harder and harder for a workin man to raise kids in this messed up place. everything but the kitchen sink can go right up ur keester.
we didnt have power grid failures before 2 years ago. ive lived here all my life, i never experienced that.

maybe we can say its because of this or that, but at the end of the day it all adds up to me and my kids getting the shaft.

working people in my county are getting ran out of town because they cant afford to live here and at the same time immigrants from California (thats right they aint native texan) are buying all the property at increased prices because they have a large amount of cash from selling in California, where they left because they couldnt afford to live.



i used to get mad about it, but now im just done. theres no arguing morallity or common sense to all these socialists and progressives because they have all been brain washed. they come at regular joes all the time with the same long list of fancy words and bull**** like you been doing.




but you just keep saying everything is ok and believing it while ur president sells the american people out daily. im gonna keep doing for myself and avoiding the communist propaganda like the plague.

 

[Mini Horses]

One reason small farmers can't compete is "regulation compliance" that make even more expense for already small profit margins. Some storefronts would prefer to buy from a local source but between their regs and the farmers, they often can't.

Milk is an example. In all but a couple states, you cannot sell raw milk. In most of those, you can use raw from your own animal. Thus we have "herd shares", where you buy into ownership, pay a fee, use your own milk that farmer gets from a group owned animal, that's living on his farm. 😁

 

[tortoise]

Barter. 😁👍. OBVIOUSLY these know it all's haven't been to a feed store. Now there's some increases to shout about!!😠😢

I'm seeing people listing livestock for sale or trade for hay. And I'm not in western drought area 😬

Looks like an opportunity to add to my flock. 🤑 gonna ask DH if we can put up extra hay for additions

I think eggs will come down somewhat as the avian flu soliloquy work through.

Produce is the most up now. Forecast for cooking oil is not good.

Dog food shortages still rolling. My dog's food was affected for a couple months. I was lucky, just switched brands, no biggie.

 

[Mini Horses]

Machete. That's what I use to chop squashes, turnips, melons, pumpkins, etc for the animals. Works really great on pumpkins in Fall. Whack and they pop open.

Also snakes and vines. 👍😁

Wish we had Rural King in my area. 🙄

 

[FarmerJamie]

With all the canning stuff bought this year (as availability permitted), only saw a few quality issues. One case had wonky lids, like 6 of 12 didn't seal first time, 2 of those didn't seal after reprocessing. One case of quart jars had a single broken jar - huge pieces missing, but no broken glass in the sealed case itself. Very odd.

Have not been shopping routinely lately, so not certain of shortage levels. Wife went to a local store one day last week and said the chip aisle was empty. Freaked her out, but I suggested that since those sections are typically stocked by the vendor, it might be a timing issue (plus being a small minor chain store). The discount stores and major chains the next day were amply stocked.

Some of it may be attributed to staffing issues, I am guessing.

 

[tortoise]

Sunbutter has been a challenge for us

I have a sealed jar languishing in my cupboard. Wish I could teleport it to you!

 

[tortoise]

This, yes. We haven't seen it since late last winter. It is all my oldest can eat in terms of any seed/nut butters due to allergies. She asked for it again this week, so I am on the hunt. It was already close to $8/jar I hate to see what it is now.

price gouging much? third-party seller on walmart.com. Top search result.

amazon has 6 pack of 16 oz for $38.88

 

[flowerbug]

Regular Jif doesn't have palm oil, but it has mono- and di- glycerides which mess me up in the same way. Their "natural" Jif has palm oil in it. IDK why peanut butter has to be so complicated, and why the products with fewer ingredients (peanuts, salt) need to cost more?

No luck on peanut butter tonight, but I was able to get cream!

i eat a lot of peanut butter but so far i've not found much difference in how my body reacts to any of them. my blood lipids are high but they are high in the good kinds so the docs tell me to keep doing what i am doing (get a lot of exercise, eat a fair amount of vegetables and beans and not too much meat).

i avoid palm kernel oil in anything if i can help it because of the damage the plantations are doing to the forests. i also find that any chocolate that uses it tends to have a rather icky texture so i also don't like it for that reason.

 

[farmerjan]

Thanks 👍 I looked for a gravity wagon over the summer, none could be found within a 100 mile radius 🙄 I would like to buy bulk feed, I just don't have anything to load it in.

Typical Gravity Wagon
View attachment 20029

Jesus is Lord and Christ 🙏❤️🇺🇸

@CrealCritter ... gravity wagons are okay... but we get our feed delivered and put into the grain bins by the feed store trucks.
Bins are round, have a hatch on top to open and feed run in by the auger arm on the bulk feed truck. Has a small slider on the bottom that I slide and fill 5 gallon buckets from. Poly dome makes a poly one, Sioux and Farmerboy AG make metal ones. Probably other manufacturers. If there are any dairy farms around there that have gone out of the dairy business, see if they have any. Sometimes the bottom neck and slide need to be replaced. There is sometimes some rust in the sides...pop rivet pieces of metal will fix. Any grain that gets even a little moldy can be fed out free choice to the chickens.
Most gravity wagons only carry a ton or 2 and they are awkward to take any distance to a feed mill.... AND they are open topped.... birds, mice, rats and other things like possums can get in them. Also, snakes after mice....
They are designed to be used behind a small sheller pulled behind a tractor shelling corn etc. They are definitely a plus, but we find that having the feed in an upright bin is much less likely to attract "vermin" , and it is less work and aggravation to get a mix from the feed mill just delivered. Our one local mill does not charge for delivery over 2 tons either.