Day 49/183: Scenes from the pandemic apocalypse

[nanila]

Scene 1 Yesterday. The weather’s nice and we’re digging over the veg patch with the help of the children.

Him: “I’m just going to pop to the garden centre and get some manure and seeds.”
Me: “Good idea.”

45 minutes later

Him: “I bought 300 litres of horse shit and enough seeds and seed potatoes to get us through rationing, when it starts.”
Me: “...”

Scene 2 Today. Weather’s still nice. Veg patch has had manure dug into it and things planted in it.

Him: “If you don’t mind, I’m going to pop to the shops a bit earlier than I have been doing [after the children are asleep] and see if it’s better stocked. I’m not going to panic-buy anything.”
Me: “Sure. OK, no worries, I’ll make dinner.”

45 minutes later

Him, plonking six bags and some large bits of wood on the floor.: “I couldn’t find pasta, rice or eggs, but here are a bunch of gardening supplies and £110 worth of groceries, including tinned spinach.”
Me: “...”

I mean, I’m the American one in this relationship, aren’t I supposed to be the one who goes full underground survival bunker in this situation?

Comments

[(Anonymous)]

Keep calm and buy a ton of shit

[fadedwings]

This made me laugh, thank you ♥

[omnipotent]

300 litres of horse shit

LOL okay son

He's not the first person I've heard murmuring about rationing, though. I do wonder if such a thing may become necessary to cut down on people unnecessarily hoarding and disrupting the food supply.

[whatarewordsfor]

It’s all of us. I’m hoarding oatmeal because.... reasons?

[darkemeralds]

I'm fighting hard against a desire to buy too much. I might regret it later.

It sounds like you're going to have some delicious produce later in the season.

[siliconshaman]

It's a Blitz thing.. everyone knows what rationing means...

[azurelunatic]

Hopefully it's all stuff you'll be able to use!

[angrboda]

I was thinking the same thing. Look up sawdust bread.

[annofowlshire]

I am so sad right now we don’t have a garden I can plant in. I wish we’d managed to do that move to the countryside we’ve been planning for years now already. I did do some lettuce pots with some seeds potting soil we had from a couple of years ago and I’m making a sourdough starter so I don’t have to rely on acquiring bread yeast, so I guess that’s something....

Is the survival bunker mentality an American thing? I always thought it was just my family. My dad was a definitely a preserved food hoarder, but he always said it was because our family was ex-Mormons (his parents, I think, I think). Gave up God, but not preparing for the End Times. I’m finding during all of this (and also maybe my desires to have a small holding), that this might have rubbed off on me more than I thought O_O I’m not hoarding and I’m trying to use my powers for good (getting my neighbours on my prebooked grocery orders since they can’t get them, offering them odds and ends we can spare if they need it, etc.) , but I was definitely ready more prepared as this started than my neighbours.

[uninvitedcat]

I’m kinda wishing I’d bought 3 tonnes of well rotted manure last year, instead of only 2!

[antisoppist]

I have a teenage son who makes himself porridge to survive between meals and I have been stockpiling oats for weeks by just adding an extra packet whenever I was in the supermarket and I've found I've got 4 kg in the house.

[antisoppist]

Did Him grow up in the 1980s reading UK YA post-apocalyptic nuclear war fiction/SF? That, combined with parents or grandparents who can remember the war, leaves you with the firm impression that one day you will have to hole up in your home with a limited food supply because if you leave the house, you will be dead of nuclear fallout dust or attacked by Triffids. We have been mentally prepared for this all our lives.

[tree_and_leaf]

Yes, it's true! *looks nervously at the garden*

[cmcmck]

And aren't you the one who's supposed to do tinned (ech) spinach?..........

That sounds like a manbuy if I ever saw one! :o)

[kotturinn]

Tinned spinach? Goodness - that's further out than me! 😸😸😸😸
He may have a point about rationing, depending on how much of the supply chain is disrupted for how long. Hopefully not but yay for growing veg anyway.

[silveradept]

That's one possible way of dealing with the stress, I guess?

[redsixwing]

I admit to chuckling!

I also admit to having a truckload of wood mulch delivered, and inventorying my seeds for an unprecedented burst of gardening this year.*looks sheepish*

Virtual high fives to you and the bloke, and I sincerely hope we're overreacting.

[highlyeccentric]

Yes, I was going to say, this seems like a very British trait. Australians, conversely, are new to the hoarding thing en masse. Our apocalypses involve surviving in the wild and/or Being Invaded (by thinly veiled analogues for the Japanese).

[highlyeccentric]

... where do I get tinned spinnach? I can only find frozen here... (Switzerland)

[coughingbear]

I have been thinking about Triffids. So far I've resisted buying all the seeds and all the manure, but it's been a close-run thing.

[ljravengirl]

WOW
Yeah, that's... planning ahead, all right

[kotturinn]

It's not that common here really. I think I've mostly seen it in shops catering for indian subcontinent.

[fred_mouse]

I've been doing the same thing with soy milk, and got in trouble for buying more because there wasn't enough room in the box. But now that our schools are closed and partner and I have actually been moved to working from home rather than no-one having permission to work from home, I'm about to clamp down on number of times a week we go shopping, and I suspect the (mostly adult) offspring will suddenly discover just how much food the five of us go through in a week!

[fred_mouse]

well, except for those Australians whose family food hoarding patterns were formed in the Depression (my grandmothers both married in the late 1930s/early 1940s and had the habits to match)

[sunflowerinrain]

He really did? O_O

Ah, but you'll be able to sell vegetables to the starving hordes!