10:01 – It was 44.4F (7C) when I took Colin out around 0715 this morning, with winds gusting to about 50 MPH (80 KPH). We had more rain overnight, and more is forecast over the next several days, turning to snow next Thursday and Friday.
Barbara stopped at the lawn and garden place yesterday and picked up bags of peat moss and dried cow manure to make up potting mix so we can get some of our garden plants started indoors. We’re going to try broccoli again this year, but instead of planting it in the garden, where it gets eaten, we’re going to grow it in pots out on the deck. I also want to try garlic, bell peppers, and a bunch of herbs in pots on the deck. If we have room, I’d also like to try at least a few turnips and parsnips.
Coming home from the gym yesterday, Barbara made her usual Friday stop at the Lowes Supermarket. There’d been rumors floating around for a week or more that that Lowes was going to close soon, and several days ago they posted a notice on the door that they were in fact closing down. The press release said they’d close by the end of April, if not sooner. As it turns out, it’ll be a lot sooner. Barbara said when she was in there yesterday they were completely out of milk and almost out of meat and produce. Even the canned goods shelves were looking sparse.
They’re obviously not restocking at all. My guess is that a Lowes tractor trailer will pick up any cased canned goods they have in the back storage area, and they’ll just let natural attrition draw down what’s already on the shelves. At some point, they’ll just decide not to open the following day and probably donate everything that remains to a local charity.
Everyone who works there has been offered jobs at other Lowes Supermarket locations, but my guess is that few will take that offer. The nearest Lowes will now be in Mt. Airy, which is a 90-minute round-trip drive. I think most of them will hold out to see what goes in to replace Lowes.
The property developer who owns the Trojan Village shopping center has announced that they’re in negotiations with Grant’s, a small supermarket chain that’s headquartered in Galax, VA. We’re hoping they do open a new store where Lowes was, because the only other supermarket in town is Food Lion (hawk, spit).
Obviously, we keep a very deep pantry, so about all Barbara bought at Lowes was milk, bread, eggs, and other perishables. We can easily get those at one of the two local dollar stores, Walgreens, or as a last resort at Food Lion. So the closing won’t really affect us much. I’m sure Food Lion is happy, though. This leaves them with no direct competition inside 30 miles or more. I predict they’ll coincidentally have a general price increase soon, if they haven’t already.
Speaking of bread, we just made up a large batch of dough to bake this afternoon. Barbara is grilling beef ribs for dinner to go with the freshly-baked bread.
* * * * *
Any word as to why they’re closing?
New corporate direction. They want only large supermarkets with lots of extra gubbage. The Sparta site is too small to fit their new corporate direction.
I’d be surprised if they have anything at all in the “back store room.” Modern grocery stores don’t keep stock. They get jit deliveries, sometimes multiple times per day. The stockroom is likely just a fancy loading dock, and possibly sorting area.
That is the problem the modern world has that makes prepping food eminently reasonable.
n
The property developer who owns the Trojan Village shopping center has announced that they’re in negotiations with Grant’s, a small supermarket chain that’s headquartered in Galax, VA. We’re hoping they do open a new store where Lowes was, because the only other supermarket in town is Food Lion (hawk, spit).
How close is Publix territory?
Food Lion was popular when they initially went into Florida, but Publix is relentlessly clean, 100% employee owned, and expands only with cash. Once the tainted meat story hit on “20/20”, it was Game Over for Food Lion except among North Carolina snowbirds who bought into “Same low prices as home” marketing.
“The stockroom is likely just a fancy loading dock, and possibly sorting area.”
Sure, that’s what I was talking about. When they unload a tractor-trailer, they need somewhere to stack it before they shelve it. I wasn’t implying that there was any great reserve stored in the back room.
“Game Over for Food Lion”
The nearest Publix is in Winston-Salem.
I remember Food Lion back when they were Food Town, in the 80’s. They wanted to expand into Virginia, which already had a Food Town chain, so they changed their name. Even before the tainted meat scandal, the Food Town/Lion reputation was pretty bad around here. Low-class/underclass customer base, understaffed and with unfriendly people, crappy store-brand products, etc.
Poor people need to eat too.
Unrelated, this is funny, actually got a LOL from me:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0Kx73mFVidM
might autoplay
n
The nearest Publix is in Winston-Salem.
Yeah, I went out and looked at the Publix location map out of curiosity. If Wegman’s sneaks into NC also, I’d say Food Lion’s days are numbered. A Wegman’s-Publix cage match in the Carolinas would generate a lot of collateral damage before one of the chains retreated.
Losing NC wouldn’t be fatal to Publix. IMHO, the only thing that would severely damage Publix at this point is if they followed through on the constant rumor that they are going to buy Whole Foods.
? @RBT AFAIK, Grants is a regional chain with 14 locations scattered across southern WV and southwest Va, headquarters in Bluefield WV. http://shopatgrants dot com. I’m guessing small potatoes compared to other grocery chains mentioned. We shop there fairly regularly. Galax and where we go I think are two of their newest stores.
35 today and another couple of inches of snow. We expect a full week ahead of the usual 30s and 40s and various intermittent showers of rain and snow.
Thanks, Mr. nick; that was indeed funny and brought a smile to my otherwise mean and grim warrior face.
I guess I’ll be keeping a close eye on our three local supermarkets; Food City, just two miles up the road; and the Price Chopper and Hannaford’s up on Route 7 north near the Swanton line (don’t pronounce the “t” and peeps will assume you’re from around here). So fah they seem to be doing regular biz and the PC stays open 24 hours; we’ve been there late at night and it’s pretty dead, though. But there are still, amazingly, several large manufacturing plants in this town/city, and multiple shifts, so I would imagine they get some of that crowd. The PC also has the best seafood section, while the Food City has the best meat. Hannaford’s is more “upscale” and has pretty much everything, including the hipster and hippie stuff. I’m not seeing as many Quebecois in those stores anymore for some reason, and the big Wall-Mutt “superstore” initially got a bunch of ’em but that seems to have faded. You can tell them by how they cluster in the middle of an aisle and chatter in their bastardized French, the womyn with hair a shade of black not found in nature, and they pretend they don’t see you coming with your carriage. I like to try out my Parisian French on them for a laff: Pardonnez-moi, mes amis, excusez-moi …
Then the buggers pretend they don’t understand you.
So I make giant shooing motions and start with the gutteral German:
Geh aus dem Weg, Schweinhunde, schnell!
That usually does the trick but they give me dirty looks. Oh well.
And now back to pig-dog chores and errands on this lovely April Fools Day.
Less funny is this video “A day in Luhansk. The consequences of shelling in Ukraine. Luhansk People’s Republic ”
From Kresosan – the crazy ukranian who plays with electricity.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OxP1oozgIvA&index=19&list=PLTVpTfT-O9UeboWth9LTrdclUzaO2LvfT
And from my daily The More Things Change, etc. Department:
“IN CASE YOU MISSED IT
Standing with Israel, Our Most Cherished Ally
Read More
President Trump Restores Confidence in the American Economy
Read More
President Trump meets with Danish Prime Minister Lars Lokke Rasmussen
Read More
President Trump and the First Lady Host the Women’s Empowerment Panel
Read More
UPCOMING EVENTS
April 3rd: President Trump welcomes President Al Sisi of Egypt to the White House
Read More
April 5th: President Trump welcomes King Abdullah II of Jordan to the White House
Read More
April 6th: President Trump hosts President Xi Jinping of China at Mar-a-Lago
Read More
April 17th: President Trump and the First Lady host the 139th Annual White House Easter Egg Roll on the South Lawn
A night in Luhansk. The consequencies of artillery attack. Ukraine Luhansk People’s Republic.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=v4mc5mHksl8
So I make giant shooing motions and start with the gutteral German:
Geh aus dem Weg, Schweinhunde, schnell!
I got a strange look from the staff when I did my best “Dr. Strangelove” in the Saturn V pavilion at Kennedy Space Center while explaining the background of Wernher Von Braun to my wife.
Big Smile!
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TjDEsGZLbio
Dr. Strangelove was patterned after Henry Kissinger and Edward Teller, btw.
while the Food City has the best meat
Agreed, meat is quite good, much better than other local stores except the local butcher in Oak Ridge. We have a Food City across the highway from our house. Krogers put a new store in Oak Ridge, a super center, tries to sell everything. I don’t like it because it is too big and you have to hunt to find things as they keep moving items I am used to purchasing. Food City does some of the same but the store is smaller.
Sometimes I go to Food City at about 11:00 PM (they close at midnight) to buy some small item. It is sometimes a good chuckle to see some of the low life hillbillies roaming the aisles. Probably a lot meth heads, certainly a lot of skags shopping for their loser boyfriends. Six packs of beer, waiting for someone to get their smokes, generally reeking of both items. An entirely different class of society and possibly a much lower level on the food chain.
Yeh, I am bitter today.
I did get my solar eclipse glasses today. $20 online from Rainbow Symphony. Included two paper framed glasses. All certified to be used for viewing the sun. Only took three days from the far left coast.
https://www.rainbowsymphonystore.com/products/plastic-eclipse-glasses
I will be traveling to Spring City TN to observe the eclipse. About 60 miles and 80 minute drive. Directly in the path of maximum darkness and duration. Having been in a solar eclipse before it is an awesome event. Only this time I can look directly at the sun during the event.
Ja, Herr Doktor Kissinger und Herr Edvard Teller.
No problemo picking up all the ex-Nazi scientists and refugees, but kinda not-as-cool grabbing up the ex-Nazi spooks and then using them against our former allies, lol. So we have pretty much the exact example in real life of Orwell’s new enemies every week or month or year.
I’m not real clear on who is who in the Ukraine situation and am also puzzled as to the actual ethnic identities involved, and I get less clear on it as time passes. I do know, however, that WE have zero business sticking our noses in it, and even less business tinkering with the alleged “stalemate” among the various tribal parties in Yemen, the Congo, and Syria. WTF?
But yeah, artillery shelling sucks, as does bombing. I got to see urban streetscapes in SEA that looked like Luhansk or worse, and virtual moonscapes out in the rural village areas and mountains, esp. in Laos. But a new war or wars in every generation keeps the Grim Reaper and Moloch well-sated.
“Yeh, I am bitter today.”
Not so much bitter as recognition of our sorry fucking reality in this country. Welcome to the club. Bitter Enders.
But some days are good for a laff or two still.
Tom Lehrer, and that dude at the rifle range, forex.
Oh, and WRT to hinky radio reception in recent months:
“BIG SUNSPOT FACES EARTH: 2017 has been a year of few sunspots. That makes AR2645 even more remarkable. In recent days, the young sunspot has grown rapidly into a behemoth more than 150,000 km wide with a magnetic field that harbors energy for M-class (moderately strong) solar flares. Because it is directly facing Earth, any eruptions this weekend could partially ionize the top of our planet’s atmosphere and alter the normal propagation of radio transmissions around the globe. Visit Spaceweather.com to view a movie of the growing sunspot.”/em>
And some info on the AMZ-Wall-Mutt “price war:”
https://www.recode.net/2017/3/30/14831602/amazon-walmart-cpg-grocery-price-war
Another Dad’s blast from his past:
Back in the late 1960s when I was the Night Manager at the Super-Valu in Ripon WI we kept a lot of staple items in our back-stock during the Winter months. We could be without deliveries for 2 or 3 days when the snow got real bad. Normally we got daily deliveries of dairy, bread, bakery, meat, some produce, beer, and soda. Weekly we got two big truckloads of case-goods (cans and bottles), and more dairy, bread, bakery, meat, produce, beer, and soda.
“Grants is a regional chain with 14 locations scattered across southern WV and southwest Va, headquarters in Bluefield WV. ”
My mistake. I thought Barbara said they were headquartered in Galax.
WRT Dad’s blast from the past; that’s a very good tip for us; somehow check into whether or not one or more of YOUR local stores has this policy in the north-country winters, or down south in the tornado and hurricane seasons.
Can YOU get your French toast ingredients during a major blizzard’s or hurricane’s aftermath?
“Fuchsia: Google’s new operating system”
http://www.osnews.com/story/29747/Fuchsia_Google_s_new_operating_system
“I’m not saying Google will replace Android with Fuchsia – I’m saying Fuchsia is the answer to the thought experiment “if we could start over, what would we do differently?””
This goes to show large an organization that Google is today this is a huge venture. And since they make their money by selling advertising and people’s habits, I’m sure that this will be ingrained in the new O/S.
Well, the daughter has been sick for three weeks. The wife has been sick for two weeks. And now I have it. Life gets better by the day.
There’s only one answer, Lynn: whiskey and looking at cat videos on the internet. The spirits will kill the germs and the cat videos will lift your spirits.
And if that doesn’t work, there’s only one answer: suicide. It’s ok for you, because you’re not Catholic. OFD can’t off himself, or at least isn’t supposed to, but you can. Don’t listen to those little voices that tell you that you have something to live for. Just do it.
I have more great advice on any number of topics, if you need any. Just ask.
And he doesn’t even have to buy one.
http://www.nickscipio.com/pod/2005/08/07/free-cat/
“…. Six packs of beer, ….”
Just got back from my Kroger (called Ralph’s here). YUUUP, two (must buy two) twelve packs on sale for $2 off for the pair. Going to have family BBQ with some steaks from there. Weber gas (CH4) bbq in backyard for grillin’.
Hey, if Algore knew anything CH4 cooking is less CO2 than charcoal!
“…No problemo picking up…”
Oh oh, missed a verb there, it’s: No hay problemo ….
In English: Not (or no) problem…
In Spanish, literally: There is no problem….
“Hey, if Algore knew anything CH4 cooking is less CO2 than charcoal!”
Yes, but more of that evil dihydrogen monoxide vapor.
Thousands of people die of that every year. We need to ban it, or at least heavily regulate access to it.
Thanks, Mr. Slim; as is obvious, OFD ain’t really conversant in the ol’ Espanol, but does know where the language came from…
“There’s only one answer, Lynn: whiskey…”
“OFD can’t off himself…”
So shit. WTF am I supposed to do? I can’t off myself and I can’t drink anymore. Shit.
I’m left with cat vids on the net? That’s it?
Naw, if I start feeling the last bit sick, as from germs acquired elsewhere somehow, I immediately start gobbling C and drinking gallons of (non-alcoholic) beverages, eating like a pig, and getting out in the fresh air for hours daily, and then making sure I get my full eight hours of uninterrupted sleep. So fah this has worked to the point where I might have to only take a couple of aspirin and/or Benadryl to get through it.
But I do remember combating cold symptoms by pouring a triple shot of a good whiskey heated up with a lemon squeezed into it. One or two of those and then hitting the sack.
“We need to ban it, or at least heavily regulate access to it.”
Oh absolutely.
First, though, a series of committees to examine all angles, for which we also hire one or more outside “expert consultants” at exorbitant fees.
Then a “task force” to discuss and implement the ban and/or regulations.
A whole new office with staff and directors to follow through and maintain, and if possible, expand the bureaucracy in leaps and bounds, or incrementally, but always larger, never smaller.
This kinda shit employs many hundreds of thousands, probably millions, throughout the country. Eliminate it and they’re all out of work with no decent experience or training to do much of anything else.
Thus my own solution: labor battalions. Get them all out of their offices and prolecube farms and pushing shovels and wheelbarrows. No work, no eat, comprende? LOTS of infrastructure to repair and constantly maintain, nationwide.
Don’t forget to give CGI a billion dollars to build a registration website which doesn’t work. Gotta keep the playas happy, you know.
Here I thought the gas grills burned C3H8
“Don’t forget to give CGI a billion dollars to build a registration website which doesn’t work.”
And that is precisely what our gummint wizards and their hired expert contractors did here in Vermont. Still not fixed; wife has tried several times during the series of “enrollment” periods unsuccessfully. Get so far, and then lose it, or the page fails to load, etc., etc. So she’s gonna be under my VA health care plan in a peripheral way but which will work for her. She needs at least one eye surgery, and probably both ASAP. Plus the ongoing thyroid problem. All I got is a sore back and “chronic and severe” PTSD.
Mrs. OFD is out in her nicely warmed up studio sorting through her piles of stuff, mainly glass and shell and coral jewelry makings; we are agreed, finally, that she needs to jack up her prices two- and three-fold from now on.
I haven’t done chit today, other than help her out there with some stuff and putter around with nothing much in the house. The snow is melting and everything is sloppy and wet and we have MUD. Well, as we all know, April showers bring May flowers.
Which is about all we can grow successfully here so fah, other than tomatoes. We have virtually no sunlight in most of the yard that we’d be growing anything, so we’re gonna try to be more creative this season.
MUD? Minority Urban Delinquents? Seems implausible, what with y’all having no urbs and very few minorities.
But now that I tossed together that backronym as a joke, I’m sure I can use to insult people in the future.
“Oh oh, missed a verb there, it’s: No hay problemo ….”
Good explanation and very close to the correct way which is: No hay problema.
Spanish has gendered words and many words ending in o are male whereas many words ending in a are female. Draw your own conclusions…
Unfortunately, having said that, problema is actually masculine: El problema. 🙁
“Here I thought the gas grills burned C3H8”
No, that’s propane grills. Natural gas is mostly methane.
We have Majority Rural Delinquents, and can’t make an acronym out of that…gimme a minute here….STAMP….Small Town Asshole Majority Punks. Who need to be stamped out. Or maybe just stamped on. Same punks who broke into our little village post office and wrecked the folding metal barrier that they use to lock off the counter area at night. And break into the bay store regularly. Who’ve rummaged through one of our vehicles and the ones across the street, and cracked my windshield. Who pound on our doors late at night and then run away.
So fah it’s just stupid vandalism here in the village and theft of beer and ciggies; but not far from us are other denizens who run one-pot meth houses and run other capers here and there; we’re watching and waiting. And meanwhile I’m building up the security on the house and studio and yard accordingly and collecting intel.
Can YOU get your French toast ingredients during a major blizzard’s or hurricane’s aftermath?
In The South, head to the Waffle House after a hurricane. They *WILL* be open.
If the Waffle House isn’t open, the apocalypse is nigh.
California raises ciggie taxes from $.87 to $2.87. Going to get everybody to stop. Now what happens to Meathead’s social propaganda program for the First Five?
http://www.mercurynews.com/2017/03/31/cigarettes-go-up-2-a-pack-on-saturday/
FEMA phones Waffle House to check how serious a situation is. If WH doesn’t answer the phone, FEMA pulls out all the stops. I am not making this up.
There used to be a Food Lion across the street from our beach condo building. It was very convenient, but your assessment was spot on. Hawk, spit. Especially the meat. And the produce. Their produce section reminded me of produce sections in stores that serve underclass markets. They closed up shop, which left the Publix way up the beach as the nearest food source. Then a Dollar General Market moved in. They make Food Lion look like Publix. My wife grew up poor (poorer than me at least) so she always gravitates towards cheap. She LOVES dollar stores. Old habits die hard, I guess. I like Publix because they are clean and they have good quality produce–and I like my veggies. Everything else they sell is good quality. I will pay the extra money at Publix.
“No, that’s propane grills. Natural gas is mostly methane.”
10-4, I get my cooking gas from a pipe teeing off my hot water heater, space heater and clothes dryer. However, when cooking at our campsite up in the High Sierras, I do bring propane bottles from Kroger.
My experience with 24 hour grocery stores was always that at most one extra employee was needed. There was a normal restocking crew, plus one clerk to run the register. And she (usually) was always restocking the impulse buy areas near the register.
[snip] I immediately start gobbling C [snip]
There’s your problem; start gobbling Pascal, with some assembler mixed in. 🙂
[snip] that evil dihydrogen monoxide [snip]
Around here, the government distributes it via an underground network. And they *make* the sailors, airmen, & coasties at the various local bases consume it. Sadly, half of all the kids who use it as tykes will grow up to be of below average intelligence.
Okay, none of those are original, but they are dammed funny. And Algore isn’t smart enough to grasp any of them!
Here’s something to either piss off or amuse anyone with an interest in STEM courses and the economic and social benefit STEM workers bring: Are STEM Syllabi Gendered? A Feminist Critical Discourse Analysis
Or just read this, which mocks that paper well enough that I won’t bother to do so.
The grocery store I worked at had full staff on all shifts and we were open 24/7/366. Green Giant had a 24/7 processing plant and Speed Queen had a 24/7 assembly line. At the end of each shift we would get busy for several hours and on the weekly paydays we were slammed and had to add extra crew. This was also in the days BEFORE bar-code scanners so the stockers had to price everything and re-price everything that was on sale in the weekly ad. A good stocker had his own Garvey Price Marker and holster and cared for it like the fine tool it was. Even though I was management at the Super-Valu, my years with Jewel Companies meant I could stock and price mark with the best.
That STEM business is just another one of the frauds promulgated by the left wing educational bureaucrats. Remember that after each one of the proceeding failures, they have to institute a replacement, which will also fail.
If you mean the “STEM” name and “marketing” hype, perhaps.
If you mean the grouping of curricula which require calculus courses and usually more math, I disagree. These courses and this field of work have been important to technological and economic progress for centuries, and only a small fraction of the species is able to perform them. Putting a new label on them doesn’t change anything.
Well, a big thanks to Mr. SteveF for that link because OFD learned another new word today:
interdiscursivity
And I note two things about the article and its author: that’s the way that fembat critics talked and wrote 25 years ago; I know, because I heard them speak daily and I read the shit they wrote. Nothing’s changed, except it is now the lingua franca of all the academic totalitarian matriarchies. And she’s a prof at the University of North Dakota, which is about as far out and away from the Clinton Archipelago as one can get, but it shows how much and how far this rubbish has now spread.
Needless to say, our chances of seeing any womyn or minorities be any kind of new vanguard for contributions to “… technological and economic progress…” drop further with every new vapid and ignorant utterance by this “professor” and her ilk.
And now back to my medieval epic poetry, some English and some Scottish. Tomorrow back to the Latin and Greek and Roman Catholic theology. No STEM for this boyo. Too late. (also, I haven’t used algebra since the dry-as-dust fossilized Mr. Fargo made us do quadratic equations in 1967).
Here ya go: http://theothermccain.com/2017/04/01/oh-wow-psychologist-ive-frequently-cited-files-discrimination-suit/
“Here ya go…”
From what I’ve seen over the years in academia and elsewhere, all too many womyn psychology professors became nutty-as-fruitcake fembats and then got way crazier than any of their patients or students. They’re scary crazy, and I don’t say that lightly.
Let me stop a minute and wrack my brain, see if I ever knew or had any decent, squared-away womyn professors….nope…all nutty as a Snickers bar….or just plain incompetent and tiresome. But hey, we’re all equal, amirite? And let’s just lower the standards for those who are…what…? Not equal???
How come Mrs OFD never became an English Lit prof?
I ever knew or had any decent, squared-away womyn professors
It goes further than that. When I started subbing one of my assignments was at the middle school. A female principal. Worst assignment I ever had and I have never returned and will not take any assignments at that school even if they paid $1000 for the day. That lady was crazy and she hates men. Watched me like a hawk and made several condescending statements to me. Should have known better from the start.
All the teachers are female. A couple of male students I knew in high school went on to be teachers and eventually got a teaching job at the school. They only lasted a year before they were run off or left because they could not stand the lady. A couple of female students who went on to teach are working at the school with no issues. After discussing with others her hatred for, and bias against, men is well known. And apparently some of that is being impressed on the students.
Here ya go…
There is a link in the comments on salaries at UO. Geez, all the top salaries are for “athletic” coaches. Millions of $$.
Here’s something to either piss off or amuse anyone with an interest in STEM
My Twins are in STEM at UNLV. I encourage them to offset the foul, masculine, language in the syllabus by wearing pink pussy hats.
No mention of Race in this horrible assault:
Chicago police arrest 14-year-old boy over gang rape of 15-year-old girl that was streamed on Facebook Live
Not hard to guess looking at the pictures. Imagine if WHITEY! was there.