Hoarding for Covid-19

A big topic of discussion, media reports, etc, has been the widespread panic shopping and the hoarding of supplies that people are doing for a quarantine at home of indeterminate length.

Our intrepid mail carrier showed up today with these. I'm not sure I'm doing the hoarding thing correctly...

Self-Quarantine Supplies

All kidding aside, I am grateful for Amazon, eBay shops, and any and all other online ways of getting the things we can no longer go out and easily get ourselves (if at all). I'm even more grateful for the USPS, UPS, DHL, Amazon and other carriers, truckers and delivery folks that get those goods from one place to another. Plus airplanes. Trains. All that.

This is Day 30 for us, and in that month, I have been to Costco or Wegmans maybe 5-6 times (more frequently earlier, less so recently - we're now trying to do only once a week for groceries). I've been to a Walgreen's once to do a propane tank swap. I've been to a Sherwin Williams paint store twice for a curbside pickup order where everything is done on the phone and then they put stuff in my trunk without anyone getting near anybody else. I think that's it.

We've also ordered a bunch of stuff from Amazon, and I've placed a couple of online mailorders for art supplies with Jerry's Artarama. And a couple of small purchases from eBay shops.

Even with that little bit of contact with the outside world, we're still suitably paranoid. Anything coming into the house gets wiped down with Clorox wipes (while we still have them) before they go anywhere else. It would be comical if it wasn't so serious. Our "decontamination station" is the laundry room. Dirty stuff goes on the top of the dryer. After getting wiped down it goes on top of the washer. Then it sits there for a while marinating in its Cloroxyness before getting put away.

Overkill, perhaps, but I don't think so, and we are still all healthy. Knock wood.