09:32 – I got an interesting email from a guy who’s about my age, and has been a pharmacist for almost 40 years. He started in a hospital pharmacy, worked for an independent drugstore for a few years, and for the last 25+ years has worked for a national drugstore chain.
Things have changed a lot in that time. Years ago, he spent a lot of time keeping track of inventory, discarding drugs that were nearing expiration, and manually ordering to replenish the supply. Nowadays, it’s all computerized just-in-time. They get a delivery every day, with the computers at the central warehouse deciding what items to ship and how much of each. The only time he has to order manually is if he needs oddball items for which the demand is sporadic. If they need something they’re out of, it’s delivered via overnight express. He said that’s why having prescriptions partially filled is a lot more common than it used to be. I’d actually noticed that myself. In the last several years, Barbara has had several prescriptions partially filled and we had to return the next day to the pharmacy to get the rest of the prescription.
This guy has been a prepper since 9/11. As he says, most preppers understand that JIT inventory systems for supermarkets mean that there’s only about a 3-day supply of food in local supermarkets at any one time, but most don’t realize that the same or worse is true of pharmacies. If the trucks ever stop rolling for any reason, local drug inventories will be exhausted very quickly. Especially because in a serious emergency, just as with supermarkets, what would normally be a 3-day supply will disappear in a few hours as people refill prescriptions to make sure they don’t run out.
His advice for people whose lives depend on medications is to convince their physicians to write prescriptions for the longest term and most refills they’re willing to do and that their insurance will cover. Refill them as soon as possible, and ask your physician if each medication can be stored in the freezer. With the exception of some liquid medications, notably insulin, most can. Store any excess medications that are freezable in the freezer, where they will remain usable for years to decades.
For those of us who don’t routinely take prescription medications, the most important thing to store is antibiotics. You might never need them, but if you do it may be the difference between life and death. I wrote about that here, including links to specific antibiotics at aquabiotics.net. Interestingly, not long after I posted that article six months ago, aquabiotics received a visit from the feds and stopped selling antibiotics. Just the other day, I visited their site and found they were again offering antibiotics. If you haven’t already stocked up, you might want to grab some now while the getting is good.
I hope MrAtoZ and family are safe:
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-3669597/Storm-sweeps-Vegas-swamping-roads-stranding-people.html
I have no doubt HE is smart enough not to drive into water, but 21yo are not noted for brain….
n
(when I lived there, Vegas had a very good, and well practiced swift water rescue team. Like many things, you don’t often need them but when you do, you REALLY need them.)
Luckily The Twins are homebodies. Mr and Mrs Atoz are in Dallas. The big news from Vegas yesterday was the wiener dog romping through the puddles and mud in the back yard. He loves to get dirty.
nuthin more fun than an dirty weiner!
n
Dog! Jeez, what are you people thinking?
This guy?
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anthony_Weiner
He’s pretty dirty… 🙂
Our weiner dog was the same way up until he ran off with some chick he met on the Internet. He for some reason thought that would be a good idea since we discovered incriminating toothmarks on our daughter’s cheek.
Well, I can no longer encourage anyone to support Habitat for Humanity or their reStores, particularly the reStore in SE Houston.
They have decided that the over 800,000 CHL holders in Texas are no longer welcome in their store.
I really don’t understand how a business can afford to turn away customers in the current economy, or how it furthers their stated mission to do so.
DO NOT do business with or give money to people who tell you quite clearly that you are not welcome. Don’t do business with companies that reject your fundamental human right to defend yourself from those who would harm you. Do not do business with those who have the arrogance to believe that THEY know better than you do what threats you face.
nick
Do not do business with those who think criminal scum are going to read the signs and obey the signs.
Thanks to mentions on this site and elsewhere I have begun building an emergency medical stockpile for my fish. Received the first delivery yesterday, and unlike my gun collection, I will store it in a safe place so it doesn’t fall in a river. Now I only need some fish.
Yes, from what I’ve seen preppers are significantly more likely to own aquarium fish than the general population.
We have three aquariums, and I’m behind most of you in prepping.
Which reminds me every time I see signs in English and Spanish about the premises being equipped with a time delay safe, I wonder who the sign is there for. Because I thought everybody knew the people who rob such places are literally incapable of reading the sign in English or Spanish.
“FOUND CAT…. Cream color…. Well cared for…. No collar/tags…. doubt it’s chipped…..doesn’t appear to be neutered… seems friendly…. does not play well with other animals….great guard cat.for home protection….if he is yours please come and get him…I am running out of food.”
https://www.facebook.com/sam.fallecker/posts/1785375915028006
I’ve got one of these also on my office property. Very skittish animal. Seems to like deer meat.
I was going to ask if you have a cat on your office property why you have a rodent problem. Then I understood the deer meat reference.
Those large cream-colored cats are also excellent for two-legged rodent control. We’ve got bobcats up here and rumors over the years of cougars/mountain lions, with tracks and scat but no definitive evidence yet, from this area on down to western MA, esp. around the Quabbin Reservoir. We’ve seen bobcats just twice, at night, in our two decades here. Wife has seen bears and young moose; I saw the one full-grown bull moose in rush-hour traffic.
We also see bald and golden eagles, ospreys, all kinds of hawks, turkey buzzards galore, ravens, and great blue herons; we have a pair of cardinals here in the yard and some smaller birds, probably of the corvid family, who are furious with the cats and dive bomb and strafe them daily.
I’ve got one of these also on my office property. Very skittish animal. Seems to like deer meat.
I was going to ask if you have a cat on your office property why you have a rodent problem. Then I understood the deer meat reference.
We have a rodent problem at the house. And a 12 lb Siamese male cat who does not understand his job. We have talked about this several times. I actually threatened to withhold his cheese slices the other day and he promised me that he was on top of the problem.
Like your one neighbor, right?
Like your one neighbor’s mother, right? Or haven’t you gotten a close enough view of her back hair to confirm that she has ursine ancestry?
(And for all those of you trying to digest your lunch in peace: You’re welcome!)
“Like your one neighbor, right?”
The two sisters, in their 20s, obese and slovenly, more like porcine sows. One on the one side with her toddler daughter and the other on the other side, living with our neighbor guy, his wife, and his FIL, a 91-year-old Good War vet. Both sisters are married to the iPad and iPhone pixels, presumably paid for by mom and stepdad. And both are chain smokers.
“Like your one neighbor’s mother, right?”
Neighbor’s mom is deceased; she lived in the domicile where the one sister and her toddler now live; the old mom had to be 150 or so and was about four feet tall; this seems to be common with most French-Canadians and Franco-Murkans; they’s little folks. Neighbor’s WIFE, on the other hand, mom to the two sisters, is very thin with long silver hair and a nice tan and was probably quite hot back in the day.
We ar expecting “strong and severe” t-storm activity again later this afternoon, with gusting winds and possible hail. I saw this movie twice last week already. The radar shows a long massive line of storm cells moving east from western NY and Lake Erie, might be passing through the Capital District later, too.
“Tesla driver killed in crash while using car’s ‘Autopilot'”
http://www.chron.com/business/technology/article/Self-driving-car-driver-died-after-crash-in-8334982.php
Am I the only one who is thinking self fulfilling prophecy?
MrsAtoz and I managed to snag a 2:38p SWA standby to Vegas. Non-stop, even. There were three seats and four standbys. MrsAtoz was #1 and I #4. Mrs was called, so turned it down. She started to walk away to check the next flight, but I said hang on let’s see who shows up. Sure enough, only one person showed so we got the last two seats.
On SWA WiFi since I’m bored. Moochelle’s vacay is up to $1,000,000 so far and they aren’t back yet.
From Ars: Cop who drew gun on man filming him says he deserved it.
Moral of the story: Don’t film a cop with your hand in your pocket on your own property under penalty of a mag emptied in your ass.
“FBI Source to Fox News: Agents Are ‘Livid’ About Clinton-Lynch Meeting”
http://insider.foxnews.com/2016/07/01/fbi-source-fox-news-agents-are-livid-about-clinton-lynch-meeting
Am I the only who thinks that if the FBI were investigating me, that I would not get a private meeting with the FBI head ? Instead, it would be, “Spread ’em”.
MrsAtoz and I managed to snag a 2:38p SWA standby to Vegas. Non-stop, even. There were three seats and four standbys. MrsAtoz was #1 and I #4. Mrs was called, so turned it down. She started to walk away to check the next flight, but I said hang on let’s see who shows up. Sure enough, only one person showed so we got the last two seats.
True love!
I’ve never had any trouble refilling my prescriptions, which I get from a very very large, well known mass merchandiser. Most of my scrips come in 30 day blister packs, akin to how birth control pills are packaged. I do, however, order then several days before I run out, and I have 30 days worth stored in the freezer.
My kids and I don’t take any prescriptions. My wife and her mother take a bunch. My wife refuses to acquire a reserve in case of problems, because there’s never been a collapse therefore there never will be. I can’t talk clearly enough with my mother-in-law to be sure I’m getting the point past language and senility barriers, but she’s largely dependent on my wife anyway.
-shrug- It’s not a problem. Considering that I don’t plan to feed them in case of collapse, they’ll have bigger problems than running out of their medications.
That could be known as uber-normality bias. LOTS of Murkan derps are afflicted with this syndrome; everything will be fine, the government won’t let things get outta control. Quit worrying, you sound like a nut. You’re a bummer to be around and you’re killing my buzz.
I gotta run the prescription-reserve thing past my wife again; she really SHOULD have a minimum 30-60-90-day reserve. I only take a tiny little pill every day for BP, which has never been beyond borderline anyway. I bookmarked that aqua-biotics site and will be following up with Dr. Bob’s recommendations accordingly.
We got us some strong winds and a steady drizzle but no t-storms yet, which seem to have passed through the state well to our south. Maybe later, though, as I can see more red-orange splashes on the radar over Lake Ontario and heading east.
My kids and I don’t take any prescriptions
Reminds me of the latest scam from the insurance company. My wife takes some medication that is about $400 for a 90 day supply. Never had a problem for five years when I was paying the cost. Now that my maximum out of pocket has been reached and the insurance company pays 100%, guess what? Suddenly the supplier to the online pharmacy is unable to provide the medicine. Not making enough. Required a trip to the doctor by my wife to get a new prescription, something not as effective, that requires over twice the dose. But guess what, it is cheaper. That same supplier had no difficulty in providing.
Also ran into a case last week where my wife needed eye drops for her cataract surgery. Of course the generic for which the insurance would pay 100% was not available anywhere close. The brand name was fully in stock and because a generic was “available (being in stock is not part of the equation)”, the insurance company would not pay for any of the drug, not even the cost of the cheaper generic. Thus I was out a couple hundred dollars. When I had my cataract surgery my deductible had not been reached and I had to pay 100% of the cost of the generic, which was readily available.
Thanks Obuttwad for your health insurance plan that is causing all the rates to skyrocket and insurance companies to basically scam their clients. Obama, you are hemorroidal asshole.
Yah, my negativity is frequently criticized, most frequently by my wife. (To be fair, I spend more time around my wife than around anyone else except possibly my daughter.)
Son#2 and I visited my dad yesterday. The old man was fulminatingly and obscenely critical of insurance companies. I can only guess that he or his wife got screwed over by an insurance company recently.
“Passwords To Be Phased Out By 2025, Say InfoSec Pros”
http://www.darkreading.com/endpoint/passwords-to-be-phased-out-by-2025-say-infosec-pros/d/d-id/1326112
I’ve seen a lot of prophesies in my life that never came to pass.
The t-storms cut northeast into northern NH and are now hammering the western Maine mountains; bypassed us entirely, except for a bit of wind and rain.
And Garrison Keillor’s last night running “Prairie Home Companion” was tonight, and good riddance to the boring old squarehead libturd fart. Some of his skits and gimmicks used to be pretty funny but them days are long gone. We used to listen to VPR’s lineup of shows every Saturday night up here but quit doing that several years ago. Now it’s either the streaming Album Station, with classic oldies rock and blues, or classical stuff out of the Moh-ree-all station, which, incidentally, streams actual, genuine Christmas music during that season and none of the treacly commercial bull-chit that most other stations play.
Independence Day is Monday:
https://westernrifleshooters.files.wordpress.com/2016/07/screen-shot-2016-07-01-at-9-33-32-pm.png
And…from The Religion of Peace Department:
https://westernrifleshooters.files.wordpress.com/2016/07/obamanothing.jpg
From the Department of Feebie Glory and Wonder:
https://westernrifleshooters.wordpress.com/2016/07/01/a-note-from-matt-bracken/
I’ve seen a lot of prophesies in my life that never came to pass.
I expect that this one will. I already use two-factor authorization for online games, most of the banks in Europe do for ATM use. When I was working, we had multi factor authorization to log in – password, code from a token, and a smartcard inserted into a reader in the keyboard. (And the hard drive was encrypted, with all data files on servers.)
I expect that we’ll see it spread, probably as a code sent to your cell phone rather than the physical tokens. Some banks are already doing that when you log in from a strange IP address or computer. There are some algorithms that generate a “signature” for your computer based on CPU, memory, and peripherals that can be crosschecked with the IP address to figure out if you are on the same hardware.
In other words, they’ve got our number.
Some comments from the other day at Club Orlov:
“A somewhat thoughtful question that is sometimes asked (after people are done making spurious claims that Donald Trump is insane, a misogynist, a racist, a fascist, a bad businessman, generally not very nice or whatever else) is whether he is qualified to govern. To my mind, this question reduces to a much simpler question: Is he qualified to fire people? And the answer is, Yes, he most certainly is qualified to fire people. In fact “You’re fired!” is one of his trademark utterances. In fact, he just recently fired his very own campaign manager. Hillary Clinton, on the other hand, heads up the entire cohort of people that need to be fired. And that is why I think there is a good chance that the “little people” will finally rise up and vote for somebody who will do just that.”
http://cluborlov.blogspot.gr/2016/06/firing-elites_28.html
I think that most of the pharmacies (at least the smaller ones) get all their drugs on consignment. Since I’m on the province’s senior’s drug plan, I can only get a maximum of a 90 day supply. It’s not at all unusual to find that they do not have the full amount and I have to wait a day to get the full prescription. It would be difficult to stockpile more. On the other hand I am not taking life critical medications.
In Ontario (and maybe other provinces) prescription drugs are sold at cost and the pharmacy adds a dispensing fee. The dispensing fee is usually about $12. The dispensing fee is independent of the cost of the drugs so the fee is the same for a 30 day or a 90 day supply. Unless someone else is paying, everyone goes for the 90 day. Almost no insurance plans will cover more that 90 days. For seniors, drugs that are covered cost $4.11 after a $100 deductible (which will rise to $180 next year). Every year the list of drugs that is covered grows shorter.
Lynn: I remember you saying that you paid something in excess of $50 for less than 100 Naproxen tablets. The last time I checked, a few weeks ago, a bottle of 200 costs between $25 and $35 depending if you want store brand generic or name brand. These are standard 220mg. Naproxen is an over the counter medication in Ontario and probably in the rest of Canada as well. Isn’t Naproxen over the counter in Texas?
Re Naproxin:
Walmart has 100ct 220mg Naproxin for under $6.00 OTC.
http://www.walmart.com/ip/Equate-Pain-Reliever-Fever-Reducer-Naproxen-Sodium-100-Ct/10532769
So I am confused (as usual) about a $50 cost for 100 tablets.
Naprosin is the branded time release version of naproxin and the names are often used interchangeably but they are different.
n
(And for all those of you trying to digest your lunch in peace: You’re welcome!)
Thank you MrSteve..
Shame about “Prairie Home Companion”, I enjoyed the Altman film..
GK does have a great face for radio……
A better way to put it is, Shame about PHC, that they didn’t end it when it was still good and still had an audience that would miss it.
OFD is right: they some excellent shows… in the past. They were always hit-and-miss, but it’s been years since they had a good one. I stopped listening regularly probably ten years ago, and checked in less and less frequently as good shows failed to occur.
Odd you can’t freeze insulin.
I freeze HCG and recall freezing other peptides for the ferrets.
Re: PHC y’all are just a bunch of dullards unable to perceive the fine humor at which the enlighten chuckle under their breath at your backward views.
“Odd you can’t freeze insulin.
I freeze HCG and recall freezing other peptides for the ferrets.”
Freezing peptides and proteins is a very complex subject. The issue is that the folding in proteins affects their biological function, and freezing can disrupt the conformation of many proteins.
I’m not basing my comment about freezing insulin on any testing I did personally. Insulin manufacturers generally recommend storing it close to but not below freezing, and I suspect that’s with good reason. IIRC, there is at least one type of commercial insulin that can indeed be frozen safely, but I don’t recall the details.
I take synthetic thyroid hormone daily, so I’ve been checking on the Internet for information about proper storage. Apparently it needs to be stored between 59 and 86 degrees F in a low humidity environment. Both of those lead me to believe freezing is not a good idea. I guess I just need to build up as much supply as I can and rotate through it.
@dave, or find a natural cave nearby…..
Or a root cellar.
n
But a root cellar would be relatively high humidity wouldn’t it?
Which reminds me of a comment I meant to make. The experts on the Internet make it clear you should not keep your synthetic thyroid hormone in the bathroom. Which makes sense, because the bathroom is the warmest and most humid room in the house.
So who thought it would be a good idea to put a medicine cabinet in the bathroom?
You control the humidity by picking the container, the cellar just provides the lower temp….
n
Objection! Question assumes facts not in evidence.
Thinking. How droll. Most people don’t think, which explains much about our society, culture, and problems faced by individuals.
Because of our previous conversations about EMP, someone in another venue posted this link to the DOD milspec for HEMP protection of ground based facilities.
https://docs.google.com/file/d/0B6Swa8Pwy-0KMWZhZWQzOWMtZmFiOS00ZTY0LWE3MjEtOTZkNTM5YzBhYTlm/edit?pref=2&pli=1
There’s a lot of info there. I’m going to offer it as the definitive guide and leave it as that. Sometimes, you just have to trust the experts.
n
(anyone who wants to argue better be prepared to show a CV with a LONG list of jobs in relevant classified areas as NO ONE has more incentive, experience, or budget than DOD.)
Anyone doing so is probably either lying or breaking the law. A lot of the more interesting classified work is classified to the extent that its name, its codeword name, and even its existence is classified.
“A lot of the more interesting classified work is classified to the extent that its name, its codeword name, and even its existence is classified.”
Achtung! Mr. SteveF is clearly lying here and breaking the law, as nothing is classified and we have complete transparency, thanks to our beloved President Barack Hussein Soetero, many blessings be upon him and the Prophet. And the Attorney-General and President Jefferson Clinton really WERE just chatting about golf and grandchildren at that airport. Nothing whatsoever to do with the following day’s Department of Justice appeal for a 27-month extension on the Clinton Foundation emails….
Put me in the class with @SteveF. Anything the DOD (and most other related agencies) allows the public to see is a diversion and actually packed with misinformation. My DadCooks just might happen to be a deep cover persona, but you’ll never know it 😉
What supposedly happens to thyroid hormone if you get it below 59 degrees F? I mean, is this anything more than some guy in some office having a “lower limit” box to fill out, and just choosing 15 degrees C as a nice round number that’s a bit lower than comfortable room temperature? Because the general rule is lower is better (with exceptions for things like freezing).
The old chemistry rule of thumb is that a 10C change doubles or halves reaction rates. I can’t think of any reason that storing this at 5C (41F) would have any effect other than ~doubling shelf life.
Lynn: I remember you saying that you paid something in excess of $50 for less than 100 Naproxen tablets. The last time I checked, a few weeks ago, a bottle of 200 costs between $25 and $35 depending if you want store brand generic or name brand. These are standard 220mg. Naproxen is an over the counter medication in Ontario and probably in the rest of Canada as well. Isn’t Naproxen over the counter in Texas?
Sorry, not me.
Thinking about it a bit more, the reason they say to keep thyroid pills warm-ish might be that the moisture in the air inside the medicine bottle will condense and wet the pills a bit. That can be prevented by sticking in a silica gel packet, or probably just by going all the way to freezing temperatures.