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OT: Supply Lines


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And as strange as it may seem....... pressure treated lumber at both Lowe's and Home Depot in the Richmond market is virtually non-existent.  I need a couple of sheets of 1/2" to 3/4" pressure treated plywood for an outdoor project.  None in stock, has not been in stock or available in the foreseeable future.  A few 2x4's and 2x6's on the rack and a very small amount of 5/4 deck boards.  The only "possible" reason is the plants producing the product are shut down due to the virus.  It is not just food items.  TGFA (Thank Goodness for Amazon).  Local availability of many of the hardware items and even appliances is poor.  We bought a new LG refrigerator at Home Depot the end of June.  But the earliest possible delivery is August 8th.  Same story at Lowe's.  Back last September I bought an "Amazon Renewed" Dell M4800 business laptop - Core I7, 3.8 Gig, 1T SSD, 12 gig memory, etc. for under $400.  It was a deal and I love it.  I checked today thinking I might buy another for my 10th grade grand daughter.  I was shocked - the cost for the same machine has almost doubled today.  Possibly because of the demand for laptops and Chrome Books for online programs schools are going to.  Campers or RV's are at a premium and in short supply.  The demand is high.  Want to buy a pontoon boat?  Again, demand is high and the plants that make them are closed.  It is a strange new world....... Can you even imagine what the Black Friday and Christmas shopping scene will be like this year?

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Appliances? China sourced. Computers? Same. Manufactured goods from the grocery store? Plant likely just coming back from shutdown, and running with reduced staff. Food stuffs? Farmer's markets are stocked, but sell out fast, grocery stores carry mostly "Factory" food, and suffering labour shortages, factory slowdowns, and general hoarding. Have a friend selling beef on the hoof, delivered to the slaughterhouse for just above cost, just to get the animals out of the pens. Slaughterhouse is booking out almost 1 month. Price of animal plus abattoir work is still under what the grocery store wants for meat.

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11 hours ago, Alie&Jim's Carrilite said:

I think hoarding is still occurring on the staples.  Meat will catch back up as processors catch up.

I am very happy for once that the cattle in our pens does not belong to us. Several of our neighbors have fat cattle in the pen that is already sold. But have delivery dates pushed back several weeks or months out. They have to keep feeding those cattle out of their own pocket. One neighbor got lucky. He contracted his cattle to go out on such and such a date instead of selling on the open market like the guy I just mentioned. The date came and went and now the packer has to pay him for his feed.

Anyway the packers slowed production drastically because of the virus. That is why there is no meat to be had. I suppose there is some hording.

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Well, to my surprise Lowe's had what was labeled "Water Resistant Outdoor Plywood" on their racks today.  No pressure treated..... just this "new" stuff.  No price posted.  Nancy could not find her favorite "Oat Bran" bread in any of 4 different grocery stores.  BTW - big recall on hand sanitizers (which ones??) because they "may" contain some trace amounts of methanol rather than pure ethanol.  Tell me Doc - if you are not drinking it what difference does it make?  Gotta find news somewhere 😗.

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10 hours ago, RandyA said:

Well, to my surprise Lowe's had what was labeled "Water Resistant Outdoor Plywood" on their racks today.  No pressure treated..... just this "new" stuff.  No price posted.  Nancy could not find her favorite "Oat Bran" bread in any of 4 different grocery stores.  BTW - big recall on hand sanitizers (which ones??) because they "may" contain some trace amounts of methanol rather than pure ethanol.  Tell me Doc - if you are not drinking it what difference does it make?  Gotta find news somewhere 😗.

same happened here ,once the contractor found he to wait a day or so for 2x4 s ,They swore 'never again' 

the store told me contractors now buy enough wood for the next 3 houses and store at there own yard ......... and starts a cycle of shortage.

just in time will be forgotten for a while ,in every industry

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Sorry if I am hijacking Carl's thread.  What the news is saying: "The methanol is absorbed through the skin and can lead to serious medical issues."  An ongoing list of "dangerous" sanitizers can be found here.  I'm 74.  I grew up in Oak Ridge, Tennessee, where I was exposed to radiation from my Dad's clothing when he came home from work and improperly managed radioactive waste.  After all the methanol, acetone, lacquer thinner, MEK, gasoline, mercury, leaded paint fumes, lead in gasoline, lead in solder, aluminum dust, asbestos, toxic smoke from fires in EMS work, PVC paint fumes, dust from sawing arsenic treated lumber, DDT, carbon tetrachloride, etc.  I should have been be pushing up Daises long ago.  Tests run a few years back at my request showed no liver damage, heavy metals, kidney problems or respiratory damage.  Maybe I am just lucky..... but I believe there is a consistent over reaction to exposure of such chemicals.  Speaking of drinking sanitizer.... not a recent statement from a prominent political leader to drink bleach.... I wonder if the use of alcohol based mouth wash or maintaining a higher than normal blood alcohol level would be beneficial against contracting Covid-19?  In many ways the virus is a real paradox - how do you kill something that is not really alive?

Edited by RandyA
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It amazes me how well an unhindered capitalistic supply chain works. If you want something and are willing to buy it, someone will make and sell it. I hope the pandemic monkey wrench in the works, will pass and things will return to near normalcy before too long. I'm sure we will see a new normal in some areas, though. Oh, by the way, when I used to make biodiesel I used methanol and lye in the transesterfication process and kept a bottle of vodka on hand as an antidote for methanol poisioning. The emergency proceedure for getting drenched in methanol was to immediately ditch your clothes and counteract it by drinking an approiate number of swigs of vodka. If it was good as an antidote, I figured a reasonable amount of vodka, taken orally as a preventative measure was in order. 🤪

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It seems logical that lumber is in short supply, as the hardware stores have had a great year, what with everyone being home and bored.  Our local mom/pop hardware store has hired more people to keep the shelves stocked.

Honey-do lists have gotten shorter..........

Houses are selling fast, and folks are fixing up things.  Our old house sold in 8 minutes from when the listing went live, and my mom's house sold in a couple hours.

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