08:35 – Barbara is off on a day trip with her friend Marcy, Frances and Al. Colin and I are on our own until this evening. Barbara reminded me to walk Colin about 17:00 and then keep the lights off to avoid invasion by little looters. No doubt Colin will get plenty of barking in this evening.
I’m doing laundry, but otherwise devoting the day to work on the prepping book.
10:45 – Reading Ross’s Unintended Consequences last night, I realized something. He had a kid back in the 50’s buying .22LR ammunition. A box of 50 sold for $0.78, which is about the same as I paid as a teenager in the 60’s. Bricks of 500 cost a bit less per round, call it $0.015/round. I remember walking to the gun store downtown and paying $6 or $7 for a brick. That was about 50 years ago, although even as recently as a decade ago WalMart sold bricks for $11 or $12, and often $8 or $9 on sale. But there’s no reason that .22LR ammo should be immune to inflation. When I was paying $6/brick in the mid-60’s, one could buy a decent new car for $2,500 or $3,000. That would be ten times as much today, about $0.15/round, but a brick of .22LR doesn’t cost $60 or $70. As a matter of fact, a month ago I bought a bucket of 1,400 rounds for $80, or about $0.057/round. I doubt we’ll ever see .22LR at a lower price/round.
Once we get relocated and make sure our finances are straight, I think I’ll buy a bunch more buckets. Kept dry, the stuff lasts forever. I’ve fired thousands of rounds of .22LR that was 30 years old or more, and had no problems with it. (It does degrade quickly if you don’t keep it sealed against moisture, but those buckets provide an excellent moisture seal.) It’s easy to sell any time, and it retains/increases its value versus the dollar. In my opinion, it’s a much better value store than precious metals. Not nearly as volatile, and there’s no danger of buying in at a high. Just eyeballing it, it seems to me that .22LR is now selling for not much over actual cost of brass, powder, and lead. There’s no room for the price to fall.