We are definitely busy right now, though mercifully not as busy as we were in a lot of 2020.
If you want to help, especially as we get into the holiday season, which is traditionally very busy regardless of *gestures broadly*, plug your zip code in here and donate to or volunteer with the food bank that pops up!
Last night I had to serve my family fettuccine and my little girl looked at me with tears in her eyes and asked me why we weren't eating bucatini anymore and I had to explain to her how the socialists had won. Dark times my friends.
I'm so mad, because my Nextdoor is just people asking for house painter recommendations, looking for missing cats, complaints about actual street racing going on and several posts about our ongoing coyote infestation.
if you paint the coyotes, they probably won't come back. That, or they will no longer be considered an eyesore that is tanking everyone's property value.
I am also a person who loves going to the grocery store. I go up and down every aisle when I do my big trip every other week just in case I see something new I want to try. Can't get enough of it.
Not placing periods at the end of sentences in text messages however is a buffoonery I cannot abide. Language has conventions, Mr. Book.
One of the meals that's in my usual rota (thos beans) casually requires a specific kind of beans I order from Greece, and I've never not been able to get them, but sure, food supply chains are under attack.
See, we go through too great a volume of apples in this house for all the fancy ones. We rotate between Gala and Fuji until it's apple picking season and then we go with whatever we can get a bushel of at Erwin's.
Heck, the Kroger by my house, which on multiple occasions over the last 18 months has been entirely out of eggs, consistently has five varieties of apples available.
Is this like the moment in "Best in Show" where Parker Posey and Michael Hamilton explain that they met each other "in Starbucks" but they were each in one across the street from the other?
When I try to explain to my kids what the grocery store produce section used to look like in the winter in the days before NAFTA, they look at me like I have three heads. You're darn right that the modern agricultural supply chain is a miracle. One fraught with other issues but an impressive achievement nonetheless.
I live where the frost-free date is May 24 and the first frost warnings come just after Labour Day. All year long I buy fruit and vegetables from Florida, California, Peru, Colombia, Spain, even New Zealand (those wonderful gala apples they grow better than anyone else). Moderrn food distribution is a wonder. If I can't get avocados at the mall, I can surely get them at Fresh Fruit down the road. Honestly, this Next Door dude is beyond belief.
Moving from California to Rhode Island in 1992 was an eye opener on that subject, I tell you what. I think that some of my former state-mates haven't realized that the gap has narrowed, but still.
You know the funny thing about this person is that growing up visiting more than one grocery store was the norm for my family and my friends. Yes, there were some that only shopped at one store, but it was quite normal to go to Big Bear, Phar-Mor on one trip. Even today, I could visit 3 stores on any given shopping trip. And it's fair to get upset if say one of the stores goes out of business that had the best grocery bakery because of mismanagement from corporate, but you get over it.
I distinctly remember my Mom going to multiple grocery stores (this one has the best produce, that one has the best meat, the other one has the best prices on staples, etc.). She's the reason I bring a giant cooler in the trunk of the car to put the cold/frozen stuff in, especially in summer.
I work in cat rescue and getting the right cat food for whatever various picky-ass ungrateful set of foster cats I have in my house at any particular moment can be a bit of a hassle.
There do seem to be some supply chain issues affecting cat food.
So I sometimes catch myself griping when it’s hard to find a specific can of grain-free grilled duck pate and rice with gravy, etc etc etc. But one can take a deep breath and look around and see that there are actually 47 kinds of cat food available. It’s irritating none of my cats will readily eat the ones currently available, but, you know, PERSPECTIVE.
They have all kinds of pet food that isn't readily available locally and better prices than the local PetSmart/Petco. They do prescription foods and medications, too. I needed to do that for my old cat before she passed. I also had to get special dog food for my first dog who had all kinds of food allergies and never gad an issue.
We get the dog food for our current pup sent with auto-ships every month. I also autoship all of our bird seed. You get a discount with auto-ships and anything over $35 ships free. Any time they are out of something that you have an auto-ship set up for, they send you an email with a coupon code for a discount on a replacement item.
I am not a spokesperson for them, I have just received exemplary customer service from them in the past and love the services they provide.
Yeah, I think all of us in the rescue use chewy (and even have a wishlist with them, and Amazon). During lockdown chewy was frequently out of the stuff my resident cat liked. I tried everywhere. Then I'd scout the aisles of local places trying to find some.
As much as I like Chewy, I try not to buy too much of any one thing because cats absolutely pay attention to the stock in the house. The minute you lay in a three-months supply of their favorite food they will treat it as 100% inedible.
We use Chewy for our cats and their picky diet. Prior to being bought by Petsmart, Chewy would send random "care packages" of stuff free of charge to thank you for being a repeat customer. One time we received 2 painted portraits of our cats out of the blue.
My middle class suburb is in the same Nextdoor designation as the >$1 million houses a few miles away, so mixed in with the normal petty stuff, we get rich people problems.
An all-caps rant from a distraught person who had to put down one of their horses (IT WAS LIKE FAMILY) because someone heard the noises of putting down said horse and called the cops for animal abuse (IN OUR TIME OF PAIN, YOU CALL THE COPS! ON *US*! WE PAY TAXES YOU KNOW!)
Also, since this was partially about the food industry: the modern grocery store is both a miracle and one of the purest examples of capitalism in existence. It’s great for the consumer except when it isn’t extremely profitable to be so.
I don’t have a good answer, but given the value of house in their specific neighborhood, I assume they choked it to death on the Hope Diamond. If you don’t use it for something, it’s just a paperweight, you know.
I have two uncles in Minnesota that both have a couple of horses (they live next door to one another out in the country and are not wealthy by any means). Based on some random conversations with them over the summer I would guess that the horse was probably injured and "screaming" until they could get an emergency vet to come there to euthanize it or as long as it took to run in the house to get a gun or syringe to put it out of its misery. My uncles horses do rodeo stuff so they are pretty sturdy, but fancy, expensive horses are very fragile and it takes very little to end up with a broken leg and a horse out of its mind in pain that needs to be put down.
Are there annoyances? Yes. Have I had to go to a couple of other stores to get things for my son's school lunch? Yes. Did I do this largely because that small amount of effort saves me a massive headache each morning? Also yes.
Improvise, adapt, overcome. It's not that hard. Well, it shouldn't be.
Borrowing from the comments on my Facebook post of this article:
"Nextdoor is the 'Oops! All Comments' of the internet."
I’m howling
*waves hi from an anti-hunger nonprofit*
We are definitely busy right now, though mercifully not as busy as we were in a lot of 2020.
If you want to help, especially as we get into the holiday season, which is traditionally very busy regardless of *gestures broadly*, plug your zip code in here and donate to or volunteer with the food bank that pops up!
https://www.feedingamerica.org/find-your-local-foodbank
Last night I had to serve my family fettuccine and my little girl looked at me with tears in her eyes and asked me why we weren't eating bucatini anymore and I had to explain to her how the socialists had won. Dark times my friends.
"look at this, now we have to share pasta bowls?"
"we're at Buca di Beppo, dad"
"they've gotten to you too, huh?"
I *really* want to print this out and nail it to the door of some of my neighbors, Martin Luther in 1517 style.
[tomorrow's top Nextdoor post] THESES NAILED TO DOOR - NOT COMMON AROUND HERE?
FECES NAILED TO DOOR -- PLEASE DO NOT ESCALATE DISPUTES OVER DOG POOP BAGS.
I'm so mad, because my Nextdoor is just people asking for house painter recommendations, looking for missing cats, complaints about actual street racing going on and several posts about our ongoing coyote infestation.
I'm pretty sure two of these are connected
if you paint the coyotes, they probably won't come back. That, or they will no longer be considered an eyesore that is tanking everyone's property value.
Possibly three
I am also a person who loves going to the grocery store. I go up and down every aisle when I do my big trip every other week just in case I see something new I want to try. Can't get enough of it.
Not placing periods at the end of sentences in text messages however is a buffoonery I cannot abide. Language has conventions, Mr. Book.
Are we going to acknowledge that the entire piece talks about Kroger but that is clearly a Meijer bread aisle? ;)
Well, you see, what had happened was--[overturns display of bread, runs]
how do you know the Krogers weren't reselling Meijerloaves? Desperate times call for desperate measures.
One of the meals that's in my usual rota (thos beans) casually requires a specific kind of beans I order from Greece, and I've never not been able to get them, but sure, food supply chains are under attack.
thinkin bout thos beans
Can we talk about how we're in a golden age for apples? There were red, "golden" and green apples when I was a kid. It wasn't THAT long ago. I swear.
{whispers in a Brian Floydian hush} CosmicCrisp.
oooh. I was introduced to Pixie Crunch this year (which to bring this back was NOT at the grocery store, wtf!) and it's amazing.
Sweetango posse here.
See, we go through too great a volume of apples in this house for all the fancy ones. We rotate between Gala and Fuji until it's apple picking season and then we go with whatever we can get a bushel of at Erwin's.
Sweetango are the truth. We some for the first time a couple of weeks ago- I took a bite and stopped what I was doing to text my wife about an apple.
They're unreal.
The difference between that mealy Red "Delicious" of my youth and the amazing variety of actual apple flavored apples you get now...
Heck, the Kroger by my house, which on multiple occasions over the last 18 months has been entirely out of eggs, consistently has five varieties of apples available.
This Kroger fails to meet my needs. THAT Kroger will love me better, and it will break the first Kroger's heart.
Is this like the moment in "Best in Show" where Parker Posey and Michael Hamilton explain that they met each other "in Starbucks" but they were each in one across the street from the other?
Exactly that
When I try to explain to my kids what the grocery store produce section used to look like in the winter in the days before NAFTA, they look at me like I have three heads. You're darn right that the modern agricultural supply chain is a miracle. One fraught with other issues but an impressive achievement nonetheless.
I live where the frost-free date is May 24 and the first frost warnings come just after Labour Day. All year long I buy fruit and vegetables from Florida, California, Peru, Colombia, Spain, even New Zealand (those wonderful gala apples they grow better than anyone else). Moderrn food distribution is a wonder. If I can't get avocados at the mall, I can surely get them at Fresh Fruit down the road. Honestly, this Next Door dude is beyond belief.
Moving from California to Rhode Island in 1992 was an eye opener on that subject, I tell you what. I think that some of my former state-mates haven't realized that the gap has narrowed, but still.
"You should not end those texts with periods. It feels unnaturally curt. I know you will, and I cannot do anything about that."
Look, it was all fun and games when were mocking these Nextdoor people. But let's not lump in well-meaning texters whose feelings may actually matter.
Especially when some of us have figured out how to text from our laptops because we're much faster that way.
iMessage forever
Google Messages for those of us who ruin other people's group chats :)
You know the funny thing about this person is that growing up visiting more than one grocery store was the norm for my family and my friends. Yes, there were some that only shopped at one store, but it was quite normal to go to Big Bear, Phar-Mor on one trip. Even today, I could visit 3 stores on any given shopping trip. And it's fair to get upset if say one of the stores goes out of business that had the best grocery bakery because of mismanagement from corporate, but you get over it.
I distinctly remember my Mom going to multiple grocery stores (this one has the best produce, that one has the best meat, the other one has the best prices on staples, etc.). She's the reason I bring a giant cooler in the trunk of the car to put the cold/frozen stuff in, especially in summer.
I work with someone who rotates - Kroger one week, costco the next, Whole Foods the one after. It’s logistically impressive.
I work in cat rescue and getting the right cat food for whatever various picky-ass ungrateful set of foster cats I have in my house at any particular moment can be a bit of a hassle.
There do seem to be some supply chain issues affecting cat food.
So I sometimes catch myself griping when it’s hard to find a specific can of grain-free grilled duck pate and rice with gravy, etc etc etc. But one can take a deep breath and look around and see that there are actually 47 kinds of cat food available. It’s irritating none of my cats will readily eat the ones currently available, but, you know, PERSPECTIVE.
Have you tried Chewy.com?
They have all kinds of pet food that isn't readily available locally and better prices than the local PetSmart/Petco. They do prescription foods and medications, too. I needed to do that for my old cat before she passed. I also had to get special dog food for my first dog who had all kinds of food allergies and never gad an issue.
We get the dog food for our current pup sent with auto-ships every month. I also autoship all of our bird seed. You get a discount with auto-ships and anything over $35 ships free. Any time they are out of something that you have an auto-ship set up for, they send you an email with a coupon code for a discount on a replacement item.
I am not a spokesperson for them, I have just received exemplary customer service from them in the past and love the services they provide.
Yeah, I think all of us in the rescue use chewy (and even have a wishlist with them, and Amazon). During lockdown chewy was frequently out of the stuff my resident cat liked. I tried everywhere. Then I'd scout the aisles of local places trying to find some.
As much as I like Chewy, I try not to buy too much of any one thing because cats absolutely pay attention to the stock in the house. The minute you lay in a three-months supply of their favorite food they will treat it as 100% inedible.
We use Chewy for our cats and their picky diet. Prior to being bought by Petsmart, Chewy would send random "care packages" of stuff free of charge to thank you for being a repeat customer. One time we received 2 painted portraits of our cats out of the blue.
They are great. They always sent us Christmas cards and sent us condolence cards when we have lost pets.
I didn't know that they were bought by Petsmart. I hope they don't ruin it (narrator's voice: they will).
My middle class suburb is in the same Nextdoor designation as the >$1 million houses a few miles away, so mixed in with the normal petty stuff, we get rich people problems.
An all-caps rant from a distraught person who had to put down one of their horses (IT WAS LIKE FAMILY) because someone heard the noises of putting down said horse and called the cops for animal abuse (IN OUR TIME OF PAIN, YOU CALL THE COPS! ON *US*! WE PAY TAXES YOU KNOW!)
Also, since this was partially about the food industry: the modern grocery store is both a miracle and one of the purest examples of capitalism in existence. It’s great for the consumer except when it isn’t extremely profitable to be so.
I know this isn't the point but what on earth were they doing, in the realm of horse euthanasia, to make that much noise? Did they release the hounds?
I don’t have a good answer, but given the value of house in their specific neighborhood, I assume they choked it to death on the Hope Diamond. If you don’t use it for something, it’s just a paperweight, you know.
I have two uncles in Minnesota that both have a couple of horses (they live next door to one another out in the country and are not wealthy by any means). Based on some random conversations with them over the summer I would guess that the horse was probably injured and "screaming" until they could get an emergency vet to come there to euthanize it or as long as it took to run in the house to get a gun or syringe to put it out of its misery. My uncles horses do rodeo stuff so they are pretty sturdy, but fancy, expensive horses are very fragile and it takes very little to end up with a broken leg and a horse out of its mind in pain that needs to be put down.
Whomst among us hasn't woken up the neighbors while dispatching a mammal or two?
There are four next door posts, per my local NC feed:
1. Petty personal nonsense
2. Petty political nonsense
3. Whose dog is this?
4. Is this a copperhead?
My neighborhood's version of #4 is "I saw a possum in my backyard! Should I call animal control?"
Yeah we get terrible advice like "you gotta pick him up to see if he got orange on his belly"
How often is it a copperhead?
Depends. Are we counting the overlaps with items #1 and #2?
Damn you, Vallandigham
[shows picture of a duck] IS THIS A DANGEROUS SNAKE?
The unique twist lately was it was a cottonmouth, which imho is much worse
Probably 1/5
Are there annoyances? Yes. Have I had to go to a couple of other stores to get things for my son's school lunch? Yes. Did I do this largely because that small amount of effort saves me a massive headache each morning? Also yes.
Improvise, adapt, overcome. It's not that hard. Well, it shouldn't be.