u/nakedonmygoat

Hey, everyone, if you're in the US and wondering what to buy a little extra of, consider flour and pasta if you eat wheat, since prices will likely go up. Check out the numbers below. I've highlighted the important points in bold. My source is today's crop report at https://www.nass.usda.gov/Publications/ and they publish monthly reports on all kinds of things here: https://www.nass.usda.gov/Publications/Calendar/reports_by_date.php?month=08

Happy(?) prepping!

>All wheat production for grain is forecast at 1.53 billion bushels, down less than 1 percent from the previous forecast and down 23 percent from 2025. The average yield is expected to be 47.8 bushels per acre, down 0.1 bushel from the previous forecast and down 5.5 bushels from 2025.

>Winter wheat production is forecast at 990 million bushels, down slightly from the July 1 forecast and down 29 percent from 2025. The average yield is forecast at 47.0 bushels per acre, up 0.3 bushel from last month but down 7.9 bushels from 2025.

>Durum wheat production is forecast at 66.4 million bushels, down 6 percent from the previous forecast and down 23 percent from 2025. The average yield is expected to be 38.4 bushels per harvested acre, down 1.5 bushels from the previous forecast and down 2.2 bushels from 2025.

>Other spring wheat production for grain is forecast at 474 million bushels, down less than 1 percent from the previous forecast and down 5 percent from 2025. The average yield is expected to be 51.1 bushels per acre, down 1.2 bushels from the previous forecast and down 0.6 bushel from 2025.

And it literally happened on a Tuesday! Yay me?

I woke up in the wee hours to find I had no internet. The router was working, but the modem was dead. I plugged it in elsewhere, but no luck. I got out my volt meter to check that the power was sufficient and it was.

So I went to use the phone to order a new modem, but had only one bar. One block away I have free wifi, but it wasn't safe at that hour, so I had to wait. An hour later I had two bars and could order a modem, rush delivery.

Then I decided to tether my laptop to my phone, but the only USB to phone cable I own has a nick in it. The wires inside the insulation aren't affected, but I still don't know why I didn't just order another cable. Back on the phone, new cable ordered, no rush.

But since the cable I had did work, I could still tether, right? Not so fast. It had been over a decade since I'd done it, and that was a couple phones and laptops ago. And even though I followed the instructions exactly, and even sought out other instructions, nothing was happening. I do have a tech background, but it's very old. Nevertheless, one basic principle never gets outdated: don't change anything that you can't easily change back. So I started nosing around and finally found the problem.

I'm writing now on my tethered laptop. A new modem and cable are on their way, and the instructions for how to do tether this particular phone and laptop are now saved in a document on the laptop. It's funny that I'd overlooked this type of prep. I'm always one to say how important morale prep is, and in so many other ways, I feel like I've got it covered. But this is one I had overlooked.

I recently tried two things for dealing with warm-weather extended power outages. The first was a cooling vest. It consisted of a vest with pockets for small cooling packs (included). It kept me cool, but even though it was waterproof and the cooling bags didn’t leak, there was sufficient condensation that it got me wet, which isn’t a good thing in high humidity situations. But it does bring down one's body temp, so it’s not entirely useless. It’s just not as useful as I had hoped it would be. Someone in a dry area might love it.

The other thing I tried is a cooling mat. I actually got it for the cats but decided to try it out personally. It kept me quite cool, almost cold, for about 30 minutes, with diminishing returns after that. After 2.5-3 hours, it was useless, but a 20 minute “rest” had it ready to go again. Since reviews of human-size ones are mixed, I kept the pet mat for myself and bought another for the cats. In an extended power outage, if I can only sleep well in short increments, that’s better than nothing. And honestly, my fans (both battery-powered and one plugged into a power station) will likely be enough once I'm asleep, just like the other times I've been in a summer no-power situation.

There are human-sized cooling mats, but they get mixed reviews. I suspect they're similar to the large pet mat I bought, but the one I have is big enough for my torso, and keeping your core cool is what's most important.

So for those in apartments or who, like me, can't afford a whole-house system for back up power in summer, one or both of these might be worth looking into!

I had to have an appendectomy this week. I felt great Tuesday, felt like crap Wednesday morning, and by Wednesday night, I had all the classic symptoms. I had surgery on Thursday. Why is this prep-related? For anyone expecting a doomsday scenario or even a Tuesday scenario that will impede your access to hospital care, appendicitis is a death sentence. A burst appendix leads to peritonitis, multi-organ failure, and death, and you may not have much time between the onset of clear symptoms to having a serious health emergency.

There are some links between appendicitis and age, gender, diet, constipation, and IBS, but none of those factors applied to me. As a 59 year old woman with a high-fiber diet and no health problems, I should've been in the clear.

It can be difficult to get a voluntary appendectomy in the US, but depending on what one is prepping for, it might be worth looking into. I went from feeling great on Tuesday to not being able to even keep a few sips of water down on Wednesday morning, so it can happen to anyone, even if they don’t fit the usual profile. And in a SHTF scenario, your access to life saving care may be limited or non-existent, and this isn't something you can just put a bandage on.