Shopping trifecta of Hell! VA check comes the 1st Wed. of the month!

Actually it’s not to bad for me as I don’t have to shop on the 1st of the month for anything because of my preps and the bills I need to pay can be done over the internet or by mail.

For those that don’t know most SS checks go out on a Wed. of the month depending on the numbers on you card. VA checks go out on the 1st of the month and a lot of states have EBT cards refilled on the 1st of the month. So a lot of stores get hammered on the 1st of the month trying to keep stuff in stock and employees scheduled for the first as many folks are literally living paycheck to paycheck.   Add in heat, rising prices and you got a bunch of very cranky people to deal with shopping on the 1st.  If for no other reason I would prep just to avoid shopping  when 1st and a Wed. are the same day of the month. Thursdays tend to be my favorite day to shop because of smaller crowds of people and the folks that are shopping tend to be more relaxed and the time of day does not seem to matter much overall.

Good news on getting food safe buckets for storage from Paul’s grocery store.  A while back they had stopped selling the buckets as they use them to store pie crusts for the bakery.  They now have enough buckets and started selling them again!  Hurrah!  I  picked up another 5 for me and got Mom a couple for her storage.  As river said in his write up you can’t have to many buckets and these are a great size, slightly smaller than the big 5 gallon “food safe” buckets, these hold 25 pounds of rice, beans or flour but will hold 50 pounds of things like salt or sugar, which makes a inventory a breeze.  The price is  a bargain at $2.00 per bucket.  I can now commit a few buckets for a laundry setup and do a test using the plunger method of laundry.  I’m looking to get a mop bucket/ wringer setup in the future to use for laundry but this is a start!

The big purchase this check is the portable propane camp shower/pump, and one more 15 gallon barrel for water and I’m feeling confident of my water preparation.  I’d still like to get a couple of the collapsible rain barrels from Amazon or Sportsman’s guide for the house and the RV, but I want to get the Big Buddy heater on the 15th and a few boxes of ammo so we will see if I can manage it or will have to wait until Sept.

Sportsman order came in and I got my little power pak doing the basic’s for charging the battery with AC power run it down a bit and give it another charge. The  6-1 400 Mobile power pack does not have a solar panel as I originally thought.  It can be charged via DC power or a solar panel so it’s still a good deal. This gives me 2 little power paks  that I can charge on AC power and recharge via solar/DC power as well as 2 small inverters that will run a few low wattage items jump a car battery or air up flat tires gives me a lot more flexibility for not a lot of cost.

Mom got a 3 pack of the Viatek crank led Lanterns. They come with a small lithium battery that works with the crank you can add additional AAA batteries in the little lantern. Or a cord rated at giving 6 volts DC to charge it up.  It’s a good size and could be used as a flashlight easily. I tested one in the bathroom and right out of the box it gave off plenty of light for the bathroom but it would be a little tough to put on makeup by. It’s the the standard blue tinged light you see on most of the LED lanterns. It’s got a nice wide base for it’s size and bottom heavy so it won’t tip over easily, nor does it feel flimsy.  Using the crank gives you a comforting little bit of resistance without being difficult to use. I think $18.00 for the 3 pack is a good value overall.

Mom ordered a new emergency radio so I got the old one she had on hand. It’s a nice setup with several shortwave bands along with VHF and the usual AM/FM channels.  It looks like the batteries won’t charge in the radio, but my new little power pak charging cable is the perfect size for running the radio from and AC outlet or I can plug into the DC power side of the power pak and run it off the Big battery.  So now I have a multi- band radio that I can at least listen to for news and will run on AC/DC power.

It’s not perfect or pretty but something even better it works!

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