Panic buying

[Keith Addenbrooke]

12 hours ago, melmerby said:

Restrictions on quantities restarting

Morrisons is first to announce it.

At our local Morrison’s, various lockdown restrictions had gradually been removed in recent weeks - eg: managed queuing into the store and for the tills.  I noticed earlier this week they were being reintroduced - when I heard of quantity restrictions my hope was it was pro-active / preventative rather than reactive.  Perhaps I was being a bit optimistic / naive.

[Pacific231G]

7 hours ago, Hroth said:

 

You just have to let it defrost SLOWLY in the fridge. Don't nuke it in the microwave or leave it out to defrost and it'll be just as good as when you put it in the freezer.

 

I recently used the last bottle from the end of March without any problems.

 

Bread keeps quite well in the freezer too, just defrost it in the same way.

 

I've not tried freezing mik though friends do with no problems. I do though maintain a backup stock of 6-8 Litrres of UHT semi-skimmed in the kitchen (I used to drink it instead of fresh). The only thing you have to do is to rotate the stock and use an occasional carton before it's best before date. With fresh milk it pays to check the best before date but I shop weekly now- not always the same day-  I get through a two pint bottle in about a week andl it usually lasts for about ten days in the fridge.  I couldn't get fresh semi in Tesco on Wednesday but they had plenty of full milk.

 

I usually freeze bread and, for sliced bread, bring out say half a loaf  at a time to the frig. Many Breads, especially part-baked baguettes, don't seem to like being in the freezer for more than a few weeks but German black bread (which I only eat occasionally) seems to last for months. 

 

 

 

[fezza]

I noticed people buying suspicious amounts of toilet roll in trolleys again. 

 

Serious question: if you are that worried about the cleanliness of that part of you anatomy, why not install a bidet? Why are these almost non existent in UK bathrooms but universal in just about every other European country? And does this explain Brexit??! 

[jonny777]

1 hour ago, polybear said:

 

Do you have to empty a bit out of the bottle before freezing, due to expansion?

 

I never have. The plastic bottles have a bit of 'give' in them and just swell a little. I have never known one split so far, and have been freezing milk for many years. 

[Nick C]

Another advantage of freezing sliced bread is that you can jsut chuck it straight into the toaster (or under the grill) from frozen - we do this a lot as we don't tend to get through a whole loaf before it goes stale.

[Reorte]

57 minutes ago, jonny777 said:

 

I never have. The plastic bottles have a bit of 'give' in them and just swell a little. I have never known one split so far, and have been freezing milk for many years. 

I've had a couple of minor problems, the top's popped off one and a small hole in another (which might've been a bash as I took it out of the freezer).

[Hroth]

2 hours ago, polybear said:

 

Do you have to empty a bit out of the bottle before freezing, due to expansion?

 

I've not (touch wood) had any problem with either the 2 or 4 pint bottles splitting due to the expansion of the contents. Admittedly they do look a bit odd when frozen...

 

 

[choo1choo]

 

 

Just returned from our local Aldi and Home Bargains in Carmarthen. Signs of early locusts in Aldi....virtually all UHT milk wiped out...tinned fruit ,Paracetomol virtually gone. In Home Bargains which is next door loads of UHT milk but bog rolls a bit thin on the ground.

 

I just hope we are not heading for another situation like that of a few months ago. People do not seem to have learned the greed lesson yet.

[Hroth]

19 minutes ago, choo1choo said:

 

 

Just returned from our local Aldi and Home Bargains in Carmarthen. Signs of early locusts in Aldi....virtually all UHT milk wiped out...tinned fruit ,Paracetomol virtually gone. In Home Bargains which is next door loads of UHT milk but bog rolls a bit thin on the ground.

 

I just hope we are not heading for another situation like that of a few months ago. People do not seem to have learned the greed lesson yet.

 

This time round, its probably the people who couldn't get stuff when the locusts had stripped the shelves last time getting in their preemptive collecting.  I'm not defending them, but there is reason behind the madness.

 

Paracetamol and Ibuprofen stocks have been "difficult" since before lockdown started in March, I expect that they won't improve any time soon.  Both Aldi and Home Bargains have also had problems maintaining stocks of vitamins, minerals and other dietary supplements too.

[jonny777]

The cynic within me tends to believe that the media generally publish pleas of the 'do not panic buy' kind, knowing full well that on reading those articles most people will stock up on essentials, just in case.

 

The same media can then report on the empty shelves with their usual air of disdain, and complete absence of responsibility for their part in generating the situation in the first place. 

 

Our problem in the UK is with the 'just in time' stock replacement policy. Any time when demand exceeds normal expectations, the shelves will empty rather quickly. I'm not sure that it is necessarily panic buying, of the 'stuffing your car to the gunwales with bog roll' as seen back in March (not yet at least), but simply that most people do not want to run out of products they deem to be vital for another lockdown scenario. 

 

 

[melmerby]

Tesco latest supermarket to put restrictions on quantities or certain items.

[Keith Addenbrooke]

34 minutes ago, melmerby said:

Tesco latest supermarket to put restrictions on quantities or certain items.

Interestingly, I had to go into two Supermarkets this morning (the second one for an essential work item that wasn’t in stock in my usual supermarket when I did my shopping first thing).  In the first, there were large quantities of toilet roll on the shelves and stacked in front of them and at the end of the aisle.  This was not the supermarket advertising restrictions.  
In the second shop (Tesco) my route to the tills took me past the toilet roll aisle - restrictions clearly marked, but far less stock available.

[melmerby]

2 hours ago, jonny777 said:

 simply that most people do not want to run out of products they deem to be vital for another lockdown scenario. 

 

 

But shopping has never been in lockdown

[Keith Addenbrooke]

Re: plastic milk bottles splitting when freezing:

 

5 hours ago, Pacific231G said:

I've not tried freezing mik though friends do with no problems.

 

4 hours ago, jonny777 said:

I never have. The plastic bottles have a bit of 'give' in them and just swell a little. I have never known one split so far, and have been freezing milk for many years. 

 

3 hours ago, Reorte said:

I've had a couple of minor problems, the top's popped off one and a small hole in another (which might've been a bash as I took it out of the freezer).

 

3 hours ago, Hroth said:

I've not (touch wood) had any problem with either the 2 or 4 pint bottles splitting due to the expansion of the contents.

 

It just so happened that when I was queuing for a till in Tesco today the lady in front of me had a 4pt plastic carton of milk that sprang a leak when she put it on the conveyor belt and started emptying itself over the rest of her shopping.  The plastic is very thin these days, so if it splits it may not be due to freezing anyway, as Reorte observed.

[MJI]

We keep highish stocks of rotatable stuff simply due to locusts.

 

So we will keep in stock a months supply of pasta, a minimum of a months supply of bog roll.

 

So we can avoid locusts, in the early lockdown we were fine with toilet paper until it started becoming available again.

 

Some people were buying hundreds of rolls, I just grabbed a pack of 24 the day I finished office work. Two days before panic.

[34theletterbetweenB&D]

Came out of our local Tesco circa 10:10 this morning, didn't see any limitation notices on bog roll, and used that aisle as we did need supplies of FiL's favoured nose blowing tissue packs.

5 hours ago, fezza said:

...if you are that worried about the cleanliness of that part of you anatomy, why not install a bidet? Why are these almost non existent in UK bathrooms but universal in just about every other European country? ...

Two pieces of porcelain to potentially clean after a dump? I can hear the protest now: "Make me clean two and I am not washing my hands, in order to recover the lost time". I cannot think of a serious reason, especially given the early lead in sanitaryware in the UK, you'd a thunk they would have been after selling more product. The Japanese have cracked it though, combined bog/bidet in one pedestal.

[Andy Hayter]

6 hours ago, fezza said:

I noticed people buying suspicious amounts of toilet roll in trolleys again. 

 

Serious question: if you are that worried about the cleanliness of that part of you anatomy, why not install a bidet? Why are these almost non existent in UK bathrooms but universal in just about every other European country? And does this explain Brexit??! 

 

Universal?  Really?

 

In 24 years living in a couple of those European countries and visiting many others on business and pleasure visits, I think the only time I have seen a bidet has been in a showroom for sanitary wares - and even then it was far from common.

 

 

[melmerby]

44 minutes ago, Andy Hayter said:

 

Universal?  Really?

 

In 24 years living in a couple of those European countries and visiting many others on business and pleasure visits, I think the only time I have seen a bidet has been in a showroom for sanitary wares - and even then it was far from common.

 

 

Probably mainly a hotel thing.

 

I stayed in an Egyptian Hotel in the 1970s where the bidet function was a pipe with a tap, fitted to the toilet bowl. Very primitive.

Poo, spray, done!

(The hotel was actually built for Russian construction engineers for the Aswan High Dam and had some other "oddities")

Edited September 25, 2020 by melmerby

[Andy Hayter]

8 minutes ago, melmerby said:

Probably mainly a hotel thing.

 

 

 

No.

 

I did a lot of business travel (1)and never found a hotel with a bidet.  Admittedly we were not usually afforded 5* luxury hotels but normally 3*and 4*.

 

(1) by lot, I mean most full working weeks I would be in a hotel room at least 3 nights and usually I would not be in the same hotel for more than 2 successive nights.

[Andy Hayter]

Just to add, I had a look at the big French DIY stores to see what they offered.

Castorama had 4 bidets on offer compared with 38 WCs.  Then it occurred to me that the store is part of the Kingfisher group (B&Q) and might be contaminated with the English disease so I also consulted Leroy Merlin - 8 bidets (aha perhaps Fezza was right) against 138 WCs (perhaps he's not)

[rockershovel]

We freeze milk all the time. The only thing is, that it out on the draining board and check for leaks as it starts to thaw. If so, place it in a large mixing bowl, with the apparent split upwards and leave it until enough has thawed to decant it into another jug or bottle. Repeat as necessary. 

 

I’ve always refused to use hotels or camps with exotic foreign sanitation of any description. I just wash my wellies under the tap outside. 

Edited September 25, 2020 by rockershovel

[boxbrownie]

3 hours ago, 34theletterbetweenB&D said:

 

Two pieces of porcelain to potentially clean after a dump? I can hear the protest now: "Make me clean two and I am not washing my hands, in order to recover the lost time". I cannot think of a serious reason, especially given the early lead in sanitaryware in the UK, you'd a thunk they would have been after selling more product. The Japanese have cracked it though, combined bog/bidet in one pedestal.

Space, basically U.K. homes have always been short of space especially in the bathroom/washroom areas.......have you tried one of those Japanese cleaning toilets? My friends just outside Tokyo have them and they are really quite useless,  don’t really “clean” too well and leave you with a damp bum even after the warm airflow drying cycle.......great talking point though.

[boxbrownie]

1 hour ago, rockershovel said:

 

 

I’ve always refused to use hotels or camps with exotic foreign sanitation of any description. I just wash my wellies under the tap outside. 

[melmerby]

2 hours ago, Andy Hayter said:

 

No.

 

I did a lot of business travel (1)and never found a hotel with a bidet. 

Most of the modern hotels we stayed in when on holiday had them, older places not.

Modern hotels were usually 5 star, the older ones typically 3 star (or less)

[andytrains]

How the F.. did we get onto Bidets and Hotels.

Far prefer proper bog paper, if you can get it, now.

Went to Asda earlier and it looked like a plague of locusts had gone through the T paper aisle.

Loads of Pasta and Flour, but the beer aisle was quite sparse.