95% of the people shopping in our stores have masks on.
There are guards now at the door keeping people out if they do not have masks.
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95% of the people shopping in our stores have masks on.
There are guards now at the door keeping people out if they do not have masks.
We have security regulating the number in the store at any point in time. When I went in last night, the security had no concerns as the numbers were so low. If I wear a mask I must take out my hearing aids so I don't use a mask and go when the number is very low.Quote:
Originally Posted by Tybee
I just checked and discovered that one grocery chain not in my area is requiring masks of anyone wishing to enter. I believe that these stores are in high density areas.
Would a tie-on mask work for you? I hear they're more comfortable than other styles.Quote:
Originally Posted by razz
Thanks, Jane, for the suggestion. I have looked online for instructions fo a mask that does not rest on the ear and the tie-ons may be easier than the elastic loops that tug on the ear. I have the arms from my vision glasses as well so there is little room for anything extra. I have thought that Dado's suggestion of a tubelike mask with an extra layer added inside might work.Quote:
Originally Posted by JaneV2.0
Maybe that--something like a balaclave--with a pocket inside to hold a filter.Quote:
Originally Posted by razz
Seems to fit better here than in other threads; upthread we were discussing how sad it was that raw materials designated for food service were going to waste when consumers would buy it if they could. Kroger is purchasing 200,000 gallons of raw milk and will be processing it for food banks.
Ground Beef and fresh pork cuts are becoming more scarce.
Kroger announced (in Ohio and Wisconsin, and maybe elsewhere) the grocery stores they own would set limits of 2 purchases per customer., effective May 1. By limiting the purchases of each customer, Krogers' hope is that shoppers will not be panic-stricken by empty shelves in the meat section of their stores.
Costco is limiting purchases of beef, pork and poultry to 3 items per customer.
Wal-Mart reportedly is limiting the variety of cuts of fresh meat available in stores, rather than placing a limit on customer purchases.
Cannot remember if I already mentioned this, but we ordered a delivery of meat and seafood from a local restaurant supply company that had a special offer for non-commercial customers. Our freezer is packed.
I've been on a shopping schedule of going every two or three weeks and today was my day. My city requires everyone entering a public business to wear a mask and everyone was compliant. People seemed a little more relaxed about social distancing than my last trip. I went to both Sprouts and Safeway. Neither were especially busy at my early shopping hour. Safeway actually had a reasonable selection of flours for the first time in over a month. Both had purchase limits on meats but the shelves seemed well stocked. Being mostly vegan I've not noticed any shortages of meatless or dairy free alternatives. It was also the first time I've noticed that the egg shelves were well supplied.
My Grocery Shopping Adventure is to order ALL groceries on line using Instacart and have everything delivered to my front door.
I'm doing Amazon/Whole Foods delivery for the moment, as Safeway is currently not delivering without contact--for some reason beyond my understanding.
Another Aldi run this morning. Had to wait outside until shoppers rolled their carts out the front door; that's a first. An employee was wiping down carts for people just as they entered the store and accepted carts back from shoppers when they were done.
The store was pretty well stocked, with limits of two on most meat products (fresh or canned; frozen apparently is not restricted). Pallets of toilet paper and paper towels and two facings of bleach but still no disinfectant sprays or wipes. No cornstarch (???).
The floors are marked for one-way aisles, but maybe a third of the shoppers were clueless about that despite lots of signage. An overlapping third of shoppers did not have masks. Contrary to what I'd heard about Aldi checkouts, they were not wiped down between shoppers and you did not get your own cart back. Not a huge deal; just interesting that it's a policy they've been following elsewhere but not here. In and out in about an hour; good for the next two weeks minus some items I'll have to get elsewhere because Aldi just doesn't carry them.
ETA: Still easier for me than shopping on-line for groceries.
On our most recent Market Basket visit everyone was wearing masks as now required by law, although some wearing them incorrectly. The observance of the one-way aisles was probably about 50/50. I think they need to have some sort of signage higher up, since it's easy to miss instructions on the floor. That just isn't where you usually see information posted in stores, and it's easy to forget since you're going against the habits of a lifetime.
Steve, same deal with not getting our own cart back, although I hadn't thought about that until reading your post. Will have to notice next time if the bagger wipes it down. It doesn't really matter to me, since I assume my hands are "contaminated" until I get to the car and sanitize, but it does sort of negate the step of sanitizing cart handles when you get your cart initially.
We have been ordering from Safeway, mostly produce and dairy about once a week. No problems with getting anything we need. Costco was a madhouse the other day and I'll avoid them for a bit.
Since mid-March in this pandemic except for the Sprouts run, I've mostly shopped two local SoCal chains, they don't even exist outside of CA, expensive, one reason the grocery bill is up and the bill is always "ouch", but not completely insane in terms of number of shoppers etc.. I will survive, it's not like I'm spending money on anything else pretty much.
Paper towels last week even (although I consider them much more optional than TP). Food has come back for most things, still limited selection of canned beans, but all else I want (uh most of the time I don't even think about buying flour, I'm not much for baking). TP still hard to find, but I have managed to acquire a decent amount of the industrial TP (the kind that doesn't fit on household dispensers). I got tired of worrying about TP, and luckily at least there is that, and going to tons of stores trying to track down TP, would not be social distancing.
I'll see if I even need to make a grocery run this week, maybe not.
I am now finding water with no limits, TP with limits, but no disinfectant spray or wipes. This is hard for my son with his severe OCD. Almost every day he goes to Walmart looking but they must all be snapped up during senior shopping hour, which everywhere is the first hour of the day. He cannot find them online either. I cannot wait for things to return to normal so the hoarding stops.
I have not seen a container of disinfectant wipes since the stay-at-home order started. I think we'll scare up a spare sprayer bottle and make up a bleach solution for home use and save the wipes for travel. My pharmacy did put on their "we have today" board wipes, TP, paper towels, disposable masks, and some other things that are not commonly found these days; I haven't felt I need to take them up on that offer.
Quick run to my usual small grocery for items Aldi did not have. They had everything I wanted. I did not cruise past the meat aisle to see if they were limiting purchases there (meant to; forgot). No paper towels today. No limit on TP but what they had was the generic stuff and there wasn't much of it on the shelf anyway. I noticed that their bulk section is open again; for several weeks it was cordoned off (wonder what that indicates?).
DW wanted raisins to make banana bread (?? but I don't eat it so whatever); very little in the way of raisins there. And all of one package of frozen broccoli in the store. Lots of other frozen vegetables but apparently broccoli is pretty popular here. Kind of amusing to see what some stores still don't have in stock.
I've found that dried cranberries make a good substitute for raisins, and I have a bag in reserve.
My 10a.m. to noon Amazon/WF delivery arrived on my doorstep at 9:45 with only one--very minor--substitution. I'm a happy customer.
Mix 1/3 Cup bleach in 1 gallon of water. Put in a stack of old washclothes. Tell him not to redip but put in laundry. Make a fresh bowl of it daily or every 2 days. Could make half of that if 1 gallon is too much.Quote:
Originally Posted by Yppej
Save a bloody fortune as well with an OCD human in the home.
We don’t use hand sanitizers but hot water and soap.
Hubster and I each keep a small bottle in our vehicles and have for a long time. We use it now often. I was able to get a 1 liter bag from a winery to do our refills!Quote:
Originally Posted by Teacher Terry
If you have an empty Lysol wipe container, or perhaps a similar size container, put in a roll of paper towels (cut in half to reduce the length so it will fit). Add about a cup of what you want to use to sanitize with, i.e. diluted Lysol or rubbing alcohol with a bit of dish soap. After the paper towel soaks up the Lysol you can pull the cardboard roll out of the centre as it is wet and comes apart easily. Put the lid back on and start pulling the towels from the center just like Lysol wipes. The paper towels aren't quite as "tough" as the real thing but they work pretty good. My friend taught me this when I couldn't find wipes in the store.Quote:
Originally Posted by Yppej
i love this idea. It is a great idea for all of us who are doing regular wipedowns. You could use an torn up rags too, if you don’t have a stack of old washcloths, or cut up an old towel. Of course some of us are able to zig zag or serge the edges, way less fraying. I hate buying anything that comes in a plastic container or bottle that is single use.Quote:
Originally Posted by Gardnr
I believe with the splashless Clorox the ratio has to be higher of Clorox to water. I would google the exact recipe. Those containers don’t say kills 99% of germs or something.
I emailed him the suggestion but he is in a bad mood now. Hopefully he is more openminded later. Thank you folks.
I actually went to Aldi's two days ago - first time to that store in a couple months. I usually only shop there to buy the rolls of frozen ground turkey to cook in bulk. I figured they would have limits, but no! I was able to get my normal amount for my normal stock-up. Still can't seem to find tofu anywhere!
Time for the biweekly grocery run at our now-regular smaller independent supermarket.
The disinfectant wipes stand that was by the carts is gone now. The (new) hand sanitizer dispenser in its place was empty. The store itself still is quite empty; maybe a dozen shoppers at 10 a.m. on a weekday. Kinda made me wonder how/if they'll stay in business and then I got to the cleaning/paper goods aisle, which is largely empty except for air fresheners, laundry detergent, and furniture waxes/metal polishes and the like.
The deli counter is now dark; lunch meat, salads, and the like now are prepackaged in the deli coolers. The bulk bins are available but no one seems to be cleaning the handles that everyone must touch to serve themselves so ... I'm not sure how well that's going to work. Still lots of everything except for the weird stuff (large jugs of white vinegar, drink flavorings, frozen cauliflower -- what is up with that??). Beef was expensive (I thought) with chuck roasts going for $9 a pound. This store is on the kinda-expensive side for most things but it's got most of what I want and it's an easy in and out and that counts for more right now than some other things. I bought some Korean beef short ribs, which seemed like a bargain at "only" $6 a pound. I rarely buy them so they'll be a treat.
Most everyone was wearing masks, including the cashier I've seen a couple of times in previous visits who usually wears hers under her chin. It hasn't been typical for employees in that store to wear masks but they are wearing them now and somehow managing to get their work done. Short of an item or two, we're good for another couple of weeks.
My bi-weekly grocery run consisted of opening my front door and loading WF bags into my Versacart to roll into the kitchen to put away, doing a little wipe-down and washing my hands. (Have I mentioned how much I love my Versacart? One of my smartest purchases.)
We're trying to shop my lockdown pantry, which involves walking out to the garage and eyeing the weird assortment of things I thought essential during the panic-buying phase of the pandemic. Why so many dog treats and bottles of valerian?
I/we have developed a new habit of grocery shopping very early. Used to leave the house around 9:30a and get back by lunch. Now we are out the door at 7:00 a and back by 9a. Stores are cleaner, better stocked and not very crowded early in the morning. Not so fearful anymore so going out 1-2x a week with mask and distancing. Stopped "sanitizing" everything. Glad to see that most things are back in stock.
I am just the opposite. Now I am MORE fearful than before. Since it has started to open up, people seem to be less concerned and are not social distancing or wearing masks.Quote:
Originally Posted by pinkytoe
Well how fearful one should be I guess depends on how many active cases there are around, but that's not easy to find sometimes. But regardless if going to the grocery store is something that must be done, then wear a mask, limit trips, wash hands, and keep calm and carry on, because worry beyond that point doesn't do anything. People here wear masks though (it's the law) and social distance as well in the grocery, that hasn't changed. Stores are less packed mercifully though.
It's not helping that I am daily hearing horror stories of acquaintances of friends who spent weeks in hospital, on ventilators, etc. and are only slowly recovering. And deaths. This isn't anything like a flu I've seen before.
I am not saying I am fearless - just less so than perhaps 2-3 weeks ago. I too am befuddled how many people are out and about without masks etc. Traffic is as heavy as ever.
ANM - the scientific community has said the actual infection rate appears to be about 10X or more the tested positive rate.
RNs and Docs on vents as long as 19 days. Some in the hospital 50 days! This ain't no sissy shit! Not to mention all the dead ones>:(Quote:
Originally Posted by JaneV2.0
All the people I am hearing about - people who I know, or people who they personally know - sick with covid are the elderly or people with underlying issues who might have experienced the same outcomes with the flu. One person told me her mother had such a poor quality of life that it was a blessing she died. If this is most people's lived experience it will not matter what the pundits say., they will want to reopen the country and get back to normal. Reports of covid as exceptional come across as crying wolf when they do not match people's lived experiences.
I don't personally know anyone or anyone who knows anyone with Covid-19. A childhood friend I've recently become Facebook friends with reported that his mother had it but that was before she was tested, she didn't have it afterall.
One of my daughter's best friends had it (35 y.o.). Her mother had it. They both recovered, but it was not fun.
I just found out about an hour ago that one of friend's father was just tested positive. 94 years old. In a nursing home in CT.
Well not knowing anyone who had it, I see the numbers for the state of CA and the huge population of the state, no it's not many presently. Doesn't mean it couldn't be as hey it is running through a virgin population everywhere on earth pretty much with no exposure, that' what one is actually looking at, all "anecdotes are data" arguments aside. Including the places where many have died, even then most have not been exposed.
Most people with underlying issues do not die from the regular flu. The Covid numbers are much more than the deaths from the flu. Luckily I know no one IRL who is taking it lightly whether young or older.