Weds 24 Aug 2022 1343hrs BST

 

According to my son I am officially a 'foodie' (still looking for the holy grail of salt and pepper mills, dammit) owing to my two latest 'kitchen gadget' items. 

 

One - a worktop 'mini' oven. I used the ' ' for that word 'mini' because this so-called mini-oven is the same size as my current integrated oven but sits conveniently on the worktop (HUZZAH - no more aching back and potential dropped meals, I bloody hate having Essential Tremor!) and uses a third - YES, A THIRD! - of the electricity per kwh as my integrated one. Blimey, a triple win in my book. We chose the worktop oven after comparing the cost of replacing the integrated (and ancient) oven (including rewiring the kitchen and building a heat-proof cabinet to raise the new unit) to the cost of the worktop one that stands on the worktop and plugs into the mains without any other cost than the unit itself. 

Two - a twin crock slow-cooker unit - INVESTMENT COOKING AT A MUCH LOWER COST THAN USING THE OVEN OR HOBS, YES PLEASE!! Today I'm making two braised beef joints, a 1kg topside cut in half with each half in one of the twin crocks. One for the dinner table tonight (with leftovers being shredded for sandwiches tomorrow) and one for the freezer. Next up, twin crocks of chile con carne then Cajun red beans and sausage, spag bol sauce with mince, and then... I love investment cooking.The twin crock unit joins the other three slow-cookers in different sizes from 1.5L to 4L.

My DIL and friends on the US West Coast tell me the 'cost of living crisis' is hitting them as badly as it is hitting us here in the UK - we're all wracking our brains to find ways to cut costs on everything. 

 

I'd feel smug about my head-start on preparing for this nightmare as I've been anticipating this since 2015 and have been busily squirreling away all sorts from non-perishable home medical supplies to clothing and homewares. 

 

But I don't feel smug at all, and I don't love everyone else is looking at misery with me now.

 

I've always been a food squirrel but ratcheted that up in December 2019 when news began trickling out of China of a 'weird novel new pneumonia' killing people there and I realised my heart wobble in March of that year was quite likely this new pneumonia when the news of it being found in Spanish sewage as far back as February 2019...the dental hygienist who did my semi-annual cleaning early March 2019 spent the entire hour telling me all the details of her lovely weekend break to Spain and within ten days of that visit I was having the wobble of all wobbles.

 

Thought it was just a particularly bad acute flare (recurrent pericarditis) but when I finally went to the GP in late April, the blood draw indicated 'presence of unusual SARS-like antibodies' and by February 2020 we knew it was Covid and I joined a group of Britons having regular antibody checks. Ftr, I've had the Omicron variant now as well as the 'Wuhan' variant - and my antibodies are still 'robust'. Three years later I'm finally coming out of 'Long Covid'. 

 

So in December 2019 I just had a feeling things were about to go wonky in a big way. I anticipated quarantines, and supply chain disruptions owing to warehouse worker and lorry driver illness. I ordered a chest freezer and a tall bookcase to convert to a 'pantry of doom'.

Since then I've been in warp-drive, despite the physical limitations of what we now know was Long Covid, trying to keep the house stocked with enough stored food to get us through several months if supply chain failure-lockdowns-you name the damned disaster happen.

I don't feel smug at all, thanks to the cost of living nightmare we're all facing I have moments of gut-wrenching anxiety at the possibilities, actually. Every morning I wake up to spend hours looking for gaps in the preps and thanks to that absolute bastard Putin threatening using tactical nukes on us, one of my now-filled gaps is iodine tabs and kelp powder 'just in-case'. 

Blankets, cold weather clothing, off-grid heating and cooking, medical supplies (because getting in to see a medic is harder than pulling hens teeth), food, OH GOD WHAT HAVE I FORGOT??!!

Right, panic moment over, the biggie just now is the cost of living crisis that includes food and electricity and natural gas. We gave up the car a year ago (DAMMIT!!) so the eye-watering cost of petrol isn't a huge problem to us and we're still saving money despite the rise in delivery costs. But now we're looking at the cost of electricity and natural domestic gas supplies going unaffordably high on top of everything else.

 

So, no, I don't feel smug at being somewhat better prepared than most. What I feel is sick at heart over being right things were on the verge and that it wouldn't take much to start a cascade of catastrophe. I am happy about my cost-saving measures (slow-cookers, 'mini' ovens, filled pantry and freezers, more) but I'm utterly horrified to have been right. 

 

The cascade has begun.

Things are worse thanks to all the union strike actions, it does feel as though all these vital services worker strikes (rail, bus, post, binmen - all striking the now and credible rumours are nurses and doctors are about to strike) are deliberately striking now in a concerted effort to bring down not only the Government but society itself. 

Crime including extremely violent crime is on a horrific up-tick as a consequence of both budget cuts to force strength and the absurd focus on 'Internet hate crime' rather than, you know, actual crime. 

 

Our military strength is also at the lowest point it has been ever in living memory (but our navy is still in the Channel 'rescuing desperate migrants' who are in actuality criminals attempting to enter the UK illegally). 

 

Behind it all? BLM, Socialists, and fascist Klaus Schwab and his minions (GO TO HELL ROBERT DOWNEY JR AND NICOLE KIDMAN - I'LL STARVE BEFORE I EAT BUG PASTE, YOU NUTTERS!) who are gleefully rubbing their hands at the 'great reset' rubbish they're pushing with what looks like the full cooperation of most of our 'dear leaders'. 

 

Damn them all, I hope I live long enough to see their big fail. 

 

I hate to say this but things are as bad as I anticipated back in 2015. Perhaps worse.