Two weeks from today is the U.S. presidential election, and also of course the election for many non-presidential offices. If you are in the U.S., I recommend treating today and the coming days as you would have treated March 1, 2020 and THOSE coming days, had you known what was coming soon. Time to get ready to batten down the hatches. I recommend stocking up on the groceries and other supplies you will use ANYWAY, but just get ahead on them. I recommend getting the things you wished back in mid-March that you’d stocked up on: candy! books! pet food/supplies! cake mix! yeast/flour/sugar/rice/soup! vitamins! diet Coke! landscaping materials! ice cream! storage bins! coffee/tea/gin! and sure, let’s make the exhausted toilet paper joke again! I recommend running any errands you MUST run. Refill prescriptions when you can. I HUGELY recommend getting your flu shot. I recommend being ready to do a nice hunkering down. Won’t it be nice if this is all for naught, just a bunch of silly people being overly anxious! (Except it won’t be nice. We got ready for this in 2016 to a lesser degree, and the reason it turned out to be unnecessary is that the current president was elected, and so there was no violence from his supporters, no fighting of the outcome from his opponent.)
I decided I’m going to just go ahead and put up our Christmas decorations before the election, just in case I don’t feel like it after.
I have been doing a fair amount of Christmas shopping, just in case. And I was thinking of addressing my Christmas card envelopes—but possibly I won’t feel like sending those out at all, so perhaps not.
I was thinking about Christmas cards and the fact that Canada Post has signaled that they expect to be very busy in December and people should consider doing any online Christmas shopping early. I think I might get the cards ready (family photo, cards written, addressed and stamped) really early, then drop them in the mail just after Remembrance Day (November 11) to free up the postal service in December.
Or I could give into my bitterness about the fact that I send about 20 cards to friends and relatives every year and last year only received 2 and skip them this year I suppose? Nah, the way things go I’d get cards from all 20 this year because they felt bad about not sending one last year after getting one from me, then I’d feel guilty. Besides, I like sending cards, and have had the pleasant surprise of seeing our yearly photo stuck to people’s fridges when visiting months after Christmas.
Crossing my fingers for you guys! So many of us in Canada hope the outcome results in a peaceful transfer of power. Also, what did you decide in terms of early or in person voting?
Swistle, I am so thankful for your posts and the brilliant commenters here. This little slice of community has really helped keep me going these past seven months. This post, especially, articulated what I’ve been to afraid to say out loud. I wish this nightmare would be over in two short weeks, but I fear an ugly epilogue. Our store shelves are already reflecting the anxiety that a lot of people must be feeling – it’s all too familiar. We’ll get through this. Thank you so much for being a sensible, calming, consistent presence.
Long time follower, first time I think I’ve ever commented. I feel less crazy when I read you saying the same things I’m thinking about, being prepared for post election drama. Linking to an article if you click my name, about 10 things to know to stop Trump from stealing the election if he tries. Be prepared, be safe, fight back! Thanks for giving voice to this stuff.
Thank you for the link, erica. I’ve shared it with the fervent hope that my friends and acquaintances will read and prepare. We arein this together!
The problem is my brain is so fried I can’t seem to plan what I should stock up on. Like, making next week’s meal plan took all I had left after work and virtual schooling. Emergency prep takes more functioning neurons than I have. Or I just don’t want to think through what might be disrupted and what I should plan for. Or both.
Can you remember what you’ve fed people over the past few weeks and turn that into a meal plan? Can you look at old receipts and think of things you might need to buy again?
The only way I remember serving something is by finding the leftovers pushed to the back of the fridge. And I spend a lot of time misremembering what I bought when, so then I’m surprised when I run out. I know it’s a little weird that retailers have records of things I’ve ordered online, but I’d have no idea what the shampoo situation is otherwise.
I take a picture of our dinner every night – even if it’s takeout or something really humble / simple like scrambled eggs. Then, when menu planning, I can scroll through later to remind myself what we actually eat.
The only way I can do it is by walking the aisles and seeing what is familiar to me from buying it a million times before, and getting an extra of those things. Like, I walk past the blocks of cheese; I know we use blocks of cheese; I pick up a second block of cheese. I walk past the soup; I know we sometimes use cream of chicken soup; I buy a cream of chicken soup. I walk past the frozen vegetables; I know we use a few kinds of frozen vegetables for various things; I get those few kinds of frozen vegetables.
I love having chili mix and ground beef/turkey on hand–easy and yields plenty for leftovers. DIY subway sandwiches (hoagie buns and lunch meat, any fav toppings). And I always opt for the minute rice that’s microwavable because I can only handle so much and burnt rice is not one of the things I have the spoons for.
No one asked, but I started making Minute Rice in the instant pot because I have never had success on the stovetop. It turns out GREAT with one minute of pressure cooking. Recommend. My instant pot is a mini so it’s not much trouble to haul out, YMMV.
I’m starting to think about stockpiling, but we did in fact just buy a house so I don’t want to move too much stuff! Especially frozen or cold stuff. But as Swistle said, I often just grab things I know we use all the time: black beans, chili stuff, taco seasoning/accessories, jelly, potato chips, granola/Nutri-grain bars. Pretty much every time I go to the store. I decided I would buy toilet paper every time I shopped too. We were ok last time but our last child stopped wearing diapers over the summer so our needs have increased!
This is an excellent reminder. I have been focusing on the weeks leading up to Nov 3rd with nary a thought about after but you are absolutely right. This weekend will include some stocking up! Like we did in April: extra milk, cheese, canned goods, baking supplies, wine (ha!), eggs, pasta. And something decadent for either celebrating the outcome or eating my feelings away if it goes south.
Extra disposable masks/gloves or detergent for washing masks
Being in Canada I don’t have to worry about an election throwing things off, but the local cases have been climbing and the weather has been getting kind of cool and we’re in a second wave, so I’m limiting trips and contacts outside the house again (which I never stopped doing, but I’m talking even more than during the summer, when I might have gone on 3 different trips within a week: groceries and pet supplies and dropping donations at the goodwill and picking up some clothes for my fast-growing daughter, etc.). Which means that I’ve been buying large amounts of things on my increasingly rare trips to the store. I’m being confounded by the ever-more-obvious need to defrost my freezer! I’d need to empty it by eating everything, but this doesn’t seem like the time to use up all our frozen food stores!
I stocked up on baking things a few weeks ago because I suspect the summer increased availability was at least partly due to people not wanting to turn on their ovens in the heat. I saw a JAR OF YEAST and you can bet I scooped that baby right up!
I’m sorry if I’ve misunderstood but you don’t need to eat all the food to defrost the freezer. You can just take out all of the items and either put them in an Esky/chilly bin or put them in the laundry tub under a quilt for insulation and then use a hairdryer or pan of hot water to deice quickly and put everything back before it defrosts. This method stand up fine to our Australian summers.
Sorry if I’m off base, I think I might be teaching granny to suck eggs.
You’re not off base. I did think of that, and being in Canada I could actually just wait until winter then chuck everything in a laundry bin and put it outside while I deal with the frost, but I hate dealing with lots of frozen stuff. Fingernails on a chalkboard don’t really bother me but you know what sound I absolutely cannot abide? The squeak of frozen things rubbing together. *shudder* The only time I’ve managed to get around to defrosting that sucker was when I ate enough of it to put the remaining frozen food into the freezer compartment of my fridge.
Monday was the first day of early voting in my state. I went directly after work to the polling site, donned my mask (the one with bees printed all over it of course) and did my part to flush all the crap out – up and down the ballot. Then I drove right to the store and bought double my normal weekly groceries and supplies.
I’m going to prepare some meals in advance for my family in case of the need to join peaceful protests. And some easy snacks to go. Like preparing for the first weeks of having a baby…but instead it’s about saving Democracy. This website, Choose Democracy, gave me a lot to think about. https://choosedemocracy.us/
Wait why would the election results affect groceries? Am I missing something?
I believe there will be increased unrest in the country which ever side wins. However, that risk is even higher when one side says they will not agree to a peaceful transfer of power. This will lead to people protesting (the majority will be peaceful; some will be violent). The reasons to hunker down and stay home could be two-fold:
1) avoid the violent mayhem that could ensue;
2) avoid the Corona virus spread that will inevitably occur when people congregate unmasked.
We are already dealing with a kidnapping plot against a state Governor and an assassination threat against a Presidential and Vice-Presidential candidate. We are in for a rough ride.
I’ve been avoiding the news for my mental health, I never even thought of there being unrest after the election. I remember when the Gore-Bush election didn’t have a conclusive result, and the country was peaceful waiting for the verdict. I was really proud of the country then, like people had faith in the government and that all would be resolved-whoever you voted for. Now it seems to be a whole different story, and it’s very sad. I’ve always told my husband, we are a very young country-and there is no guarantee that our way of life will continue. Our country as the United States, is only 244 years old-it blows my mind to think about that. That is a speck of dust in world history. But it’s my speck of dust-and I want the best for it!!
I feel the need to issue the disclaimer that I am not normally anywhere near spitting distance of being a prepper. But if there was a post about what to buy/how to prepare for the next two weeks on the blog, that would be helpful. Through the Swistle reader lens, of course – not panicking, just…calmly preparing.
I’ve had the post about emergency prep from 2016 in a tab for most of the fall but a revisit would be useful.
I still have the big jug of bleach and the big jugs for water that I bought after that post!