HERE WE GO AGAIN BOIL WATER NOTICE

UPDATE: 11/30/2022 - BOIL WATER NOTICE HAS BEEN LIFTED AND THE CITY IS RETURNING TO NORMAL.

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Well this caught the entire city off guard.  Things going along like normal, the end of a long weekend, getting ready to wrap things up and head to bed and then boom!  Don't drink the water!

ALMOST THREE MILLION PEOPLE AFFECTED.

But we are prepared, scroll further down for that.

Houston Public Works Issues Boil Water Notice: PUBLIC WORKS 11-27-2022

Houston Public Works Issues Boil Water Notice

Houston, Texas – A boil water notice has been issued for the City of Houston’s Main Water System (TX1010013). Earlier today, the water pressure dropped below the Texas Commission on Environmental Quality’s required minimum of 20 PSI during a power outage at the East Water Purification Plant on Sunday.

As a result of the Boil Water Notice, the public is advised:

*Do not drink the water without boiling it first.

*Bring all water to a boil for at least two minutes.

*Let it cool before using. 

*Individuals without power to boil water are advised to use bottled water for consumption. 

To ensure destruction of all harmful bacteria and other microbes, water for drinking, cooking, and ice making should be boiled and cooled prior to use for drinking water or human consumption purposes. The water should be brought to a vigorous rolling boil and then boiled for two minutes.

In lieu of boiling, individuals may purchase bottled water or obtain water from some other suitable source for drinking water or human consumption purposes.

When it is no longer necessary to boil the water, the public water system officials will notify customers that the water is safe for drinking water or human consumption purposes.  It could be Tuesday before the all clear is issued.

Please share this information with all the other people who drink this water, especially those who may not have received this notice directly (for example, people in apartments, nursing homes, schools, and businesses). You can do this by posting this notice in a public place or distributing copies by hand/mail.

This is not the first time, we had a random event a few years ago similar to this...and then during the epic freeze in 2021, we had the same issue.

We try to keep our "water cabinet" as we call it, fully stocked.  Jugs of water for our coffee/tea maker, some soft drinks for 2nd Man...

Flavored sparking water for variety and regular bottled water as a backup (usually for cooking).  This picture is from the last time we had this happen, we're a bit low now because I haven't been to the store since before Thanksgiving but...

...we have a water dispenser machine that we use for our main drinking.  We always have a max of 15 gallons on hand.  We have one in the machine, one beside it for when it runs out and another in the back of the closet for emergencies.  We have a delivery service and get two bottles every other week since that's about when we run low but last night, when the breaking news starting blowing up our phones and interrupting TV, I got the backup one out and when the one in the machine runs out, we are good.

No boiling for us.

Always be prepared!

WHAT CANNING JAR SHORTAGE

Was in Kroger grocery store the other day on the way back from the farm and saw this...

...a huge display of Ball Mason canning jars.  I don't think I've ever seen quite so many in one place ever (short of some place dedicated to canning supplies).

I had to take two pictures to get it all in.  Normally, a Kroger grocery store has one small section, in the baking aisle, of canning supplies.  Sometimes there are a few varieties of jars but I've never seen this many all at once.  We were wondering if the pandemic sales were so high over the last year that stores are stocking up?

I think we have enough jars right now, but we'll keep our eyes out.  Once I can go back to thrift store shopping I will see if a lot of jars "appear" as people change their minds from quarantine canning, ha. 

Canning definitely gained in popularity during quarantine.  Regular readers know I've dabbled in it (and enjoyed it).  I keep all of our supplies in a canning jar cabinet at the farm and some things in the apartment.  When we get something done with the house, I have been saving ideas for not only storage of canned goods but places to keep all the supplies including empty jars.

PLANNING FOR WATER IN A CRISIS

 Water...

We literally can't live without it and yet many of us don't realize how quickly it can become something you can't find anywhere.  We found this out during the recent epic freeze event.  This is some of what we saw:

You were limited to how many you could get...

The racks were empty...even the ice was gone...

And the shelves at all the stores were empty.  Notice the sign above; they were limiting water to two packages per customer...then it was changed to one...and then there was none...

The city (and most around Houston) shut down the water, we were under a boil water notice.  People drove out of town to try to find water but the power failure was so widespread, everyone was the same. 

We were fairly well prepared but honestly, there was more we could have done and will do for the next time.

One thing we've found when prepping for a storm is that people always forget about flavored sparkling waters.  We happen to love them.  No sweeteners, no sugar, just carbonated water with random fruit flavors.  It's water.  Sure you can't cook with it or wash with it but it fulfills the body's need for water.  I picked up these two cases of La Croix when everyone else was looking for plain water; they had plenty and for some reason, the store didn't limit these.  On the plus side, we got to try two new flavors; key lime and hibiscus.

We have a cabinet in our dining room that has the Keurig machine on top.  We call it our drink center.  There are two drawers at the top, one is for 2nd Man's coffee and the other is for my tea.

Then there are two cabinets in the lower section:

On the left side, we regularly try to keep four 1 gallon containers of water for the Keurig machine (we use distilled for that)...and then on the shelf above that, some soft drinks for 2nd Man and some various boxes of tea bags for both of us.

And this is the cabinet on the right side.  We keep it stocked with those sparking waters on the top shelf (easily holds a couple dozen) and then we fill the bottom shelf with plain bottled water (also about two dozen).  We don't use the bottled water that often, it's there more for backup (situations like we just had) or to grab a bottle if we're walking to the park or taking a long drive somewhere.

For most of our drinking and kitchen usage...

...we use this.  This is one of those 5 gallon water dispensers.  We had this one at the farm for a few years.  It wasn't used as often out there as it could be here and so a couple of months ago, I brought it back into town (fortuitous, ha).  This one is what they call a bottom loading dispenser.  No more lifting big bottles up and flipping them upside down while pouring water all over the floor, ha.  You open the bottom door, there is a pump device that goes into the bottle and then you slide it into the machine and close the door.  It pulls water up into the reservoirs.  No heavy lifting (except getting it TO your machine but we use a dolly for that).  We love it for instant cold water to drink and instant hot water for cooking, tea, instant soups etc.  It has room temp as well.  As fate would have it, before our recent water outage, I had refilled our spare 5 gallon container and we had just put a new one inside the machine.  That gave us plenty of water for the duration.

This most recent boil water event however has made us make some changes...we are going to keep a third filled 5 gallon bottle in the closet at all times.  Just in case.  And since I pay close attention to the weather and news, the first hint of a storm that might come this way, I'll make sure our supply is topped off.

But without power, the dispenser above won't work.  We'd still have the water bottle that's inside of it, but how would we pump it out?  We just bought one of these cool items to keep in our emergency kit:

It's this awesome 5 Gallon Water Pump (affiliate link to Amazon).  It charges up via USB like a cell phone and when you need it, it just sits on top of a 5 gallon bottle with a hose into the water, you touch the button on top and it dispenses water!  We tried it out and it worked great.  It worked so great, I even bought a couple for two of my dear coworkers who were out of water and power for days as well.

For toilet flushing, we can still go down to the pool and scoop up water like we did this last time so a new bucket with a sturdy handle for carrying water and a snap on lid is all we need to have in order to upgrade our backup supplies.

Of course, for now, this applies to us here in town at the apartment.  The farm has well water so there shouldn't be too many situations where we would run out or even have a boil water notice but that doesn't mean we won't plan for needing water when we are out there and have our own well.  2nd Family has a manual pump for the well if there is an extended power outage.  When we have our own well dug, we'll make sure we have a manual pump too. 

It's not just hurricane season that we have to worry about, now it's year round.

Anyone have any other water prepping suggestions?

PANDEMIC PREPARATIONS HERE WE GO AGAIN

At work recently, the conversation turned to the pandemic and how things are going.  While Houston successfully reversed the trend lines over the Summer, things seem to be heading in the other direction again.  I try to be observant and notice things going on in stores and kind of extrapolate what else is going on, perhaps what is coming, people planning, etc.

Back in January (boy that seems like a lifetime ago) I read some stories about a pandemic in China that was spreading.  Over the first couple of weeks in February I noticed things getting low in stores.

I told 2nd Man and we started stocking up.  Thankfully we got most everything (I didn't anticipate the toilet paper shortage).  I had a post about it here in case you missed it:

Pandemic Preparations 

Flash forward to the other day when I put on my mask, and face shield and made a trip to a local grocery store.

Toilet paper gone...paper towels almost gone...

Hand soap mostly gone...

Even frozen veggies are running out...

Then yesterday afternoon, cell phones in Houston got this push alert:

Yikes!  After weeks of things going the right direction, we are suddenly heading the wrong direction.

Cases up 250%.

Then news organizations got a leaked report from the COVID task force and this was a quote from it:

"There is now aggressive, unrelenting, expanding broad community spread across the country, reaching most counties, without evidence of improvement but rather, further deterioration."

On the positive side, it looks like vaccines are coming but still a few months away.  In the meantime, things are going in the wrong direction again and I think we may be headed toward another lockdown/stay at home order so I'm stocking us up again.  We learned what we needed, what we didn't use as much of and I'll make sure we're well supplied.  

Oh and we already have a good supply of Clorox wipes, gloves, masks, hand sanitizer, soap and of course, the ever elusive...toilet paper.  

RETAIL CANNING SUPPLIES RUNNING LOW

Was at the grocery store near the farm (like going there because they are never really busy and they are good at enforcing the mask rule).  Anyway, it's a great way to top off things like milk, eggs, canned goods, cheese, etc. 

 While I was there I noticed this; the section with canning supplies.  It was pretty much gone.  We were thinking that it's a sign of what is going on in the world in general, especially being in the country.  People with gardens are filling their pantries.  

But then again, it turns out it's not just limited to the  rural areas around Houston...

...this is at a store here in Houston, near downtown of all places.  Almost all the jars are gone.  Pint and quart, widemouth and regular, all gone.  There was even a bottom shelf of bigger packages of jars that was empty too (I thought I got it in the photo).

SO I guess it helps to be prepared.  I didn't think about canning supplies when I was stocking up.  Of course we DO have quite a few jars at the farm but probably need some more rings and lids.  Still, a well stocked pantry should include canning supplies. 

I might just add a few more things to our supplies for canning.  We might not have our garden growing right now but stopping at the farmers market or even the grocery store for some fresh produce can give us what we need to can some more food to supplement what we already have in the pantry and fridge.

Anyone else notice a canning supply shortage in stores lately?

PANDEMIC FOOD PREPARATIONS

Thought we'd share what all we got before the shelter in place/quarantine.

I am a big news person, I watch a lot of what's going on in the world.  I told 2nd Man back in January that this virus in China was something we should keep an eye on.  In February I started stocking up just in case it made it here.  I noticed then a reduction in supplies of hand sanitizer, gloves, etc.  Food hadn't yet started to dwindle so I started stocking up.

This is the main pantry.  We've got all sorts of stuff in here.  Yes, you see that correctly, there are some processed food items, don't judge, ha.  In times like these you need comfort food, you need easy and you need shelf stable.  This pantry is deep which we love.  Normally we'd worry things would get lost in the back but this time it helps  That top shelf is filled two rows back.  Several boxes of cereal, crackers, Kraft mac and cheese, stove top stuffing, even some hamburger helper boxes.  Behind all that are several bags of potato chips.  Oh and pop tarts.

Because, well, pop tarts.

The next shelf has the baking supplies, honey, baking soda/powder, cocoa, chocolate chips, extracts etc.

Under that is a shelf with pie fillings, cans of sweetened condensed milk, "cream of" soups, lots of canned beans and some vegetables.  Then we have a lot of jarred sauces...for example alfredo, marinara, sauces for slow cooker meals etc and then a lot of tomato paste, sauce and cans of diced tomatoes.

The shelf under that has more canned tomato products (2nd Man uses those a lot), more beans, canned tuna, chili, manwich, different flavors of soup, cooking oils, vinegars, etc.

The bottom shelf has containers of rice (we have about 15 lbs), brown rice, instant potatoes, several jars of peanut butter, etc.

On the floor are two large baskets and two green storage containers.  The green containers are each filled with ramen noodle packages, a dozen each.  What college student hasn't lived on ramen noodles.  We like them on occasion but of course 2nd Man  always gives them an upgrade. 

The two baskets are used as follows: 

This one is full of pasta.  All shapes and sizes.  Believe it or not, this basket has 16 packages of pasta.  The long ones are on the bottom (spaghetti, fettuccine, linguine) and the rest are just other shapes, penne, rotini, rigatoni, farfalle, etc.  On the floor behind this basket are 3 bags of egg noodles.

The other basket has potatoes and onions.  We have it full (added some more from a last minute trip to the store before the quarantine).

On the counter we have these large jars.  They hold more onions (and it's full) our garlic (full with the last of our farm garlic from last Spring's harvest) and since we have regular potatoes in the basket...

...this one is full with about 15 lbs of sweet potatoes. 

We have another box in a different cabinet that is full of dried beans, lentils and grains.  Here is some of what we have in that box including couscous, pinto beans, kidney beans, 15 bean soup blend, barley/peas/lentil blend...

...and then bags of barley, farro, and red and brown lentils.

Since this is not like a hurricane prep where we might lose power, we decided to stock the freezer and fridge as well so we'd have meat to go with the pantry items and we can make meals. 

We bought 6 chickens (over the course of a few weekends) and roasted them two at a time, let them cool and pulled all the meat off the bones.  I bagged up the meat from each chicken into separate vacuum seal bags.  That way 1 pkg = 1 roasted chicken for any recipe we want to make (casseroles, enchiladas, flautas, pot pies, soup, etc).  2nd Man used the bones to make chicken stock which we also have frozen in the freezer.

Our freezer already has several packages of roasted turkey done in this manner as well.

We also bought some boneless/skinless chicken breasts and vacuum sealed them (uncooked).

Same with beef...we bought 6 lbs of ground beef and vacuum sealed them in 1 lb packages.  Also did six steaks this way (2 per pkg) and some beef chuck roast cut into chunks.

Same with pork...we have four 1 lb packs of ground pork vacuum sealed into packages, pork loins that I got on sale and cut into sections for pork roast dinners, and 4 packages of thick cut pork chops (2 each per pkg) as in the package above.

Also in the freezer we have a LOT of frozen vegetables.  All the bags of corn blend, stir fry blend, broccoli cauliflower blend etc, it's a great way to have  as close to fresh vegetables without them being canned.  A bag makes a great side dish and of course they also make great ingredients in other dishes.

In the refrigerator, we bought meats that we didn't have to seal up right away but would last a longer time without freezing.  We love the packages of sausage that are sold like this.  They are great for roasting in the oven, chopped up into pasta dishes, stir fries, etc.  It's a great meat to have on hand and they come in so many varieties for every taste.  The are also usually good left just like this in the fridge for a couple of months (these all have a best by date of May/June which is why I bought them).  

These thick sliced ham steaks are wonderful too.  Sealed and good for a couple months in the fridge.  We slice them in quarters and can make them last longer.  Good in a skillet with eggs, good on sandwiches, etc.

We wanted to regular creature comforts of breakfast food and so I bought a few packs of breakfast sausage.  In order to keep them longer I cut the packages in half and vacuum sealed them.  The vacuum seal is to help them last longer.  They had a best by date of end of April.  When we reach that date we'll freeze whatever we haven't used.

Got two large packages of thick sliced bacon and cut each in half and same thing, vacuum sealed to last as long as possible.

We also filled the fridge with eggs (4 dozen), a few quarts of milk and related products, lots of cheese (bags of shredded, sliced cheddar for grilled cheese, slice other flavors for sandwiches, some parmesan and similar cheeses), sandwich meat of course, hot dogs, and the usual like condiments, jelly, etc.  

And then lastly we have flour (all purpose and bread) and sugar (regular granulated in the big one as well as things like brown sugar, powdered sugar etc in smaller jars).  These jars will be refilled soon, we have some bags we haven't poured in yet because 2nd Man has been baking bread and using up what we already had.  Found them years ago and love them because they hold about 10 lbs each.

I have not been to the store in over 2 weeks now which is kind of neat.  I think we'll be good for a while longer.  I've been taking pictures of what we've had, I'll start posting them just to share ideas.  We try to eat simply during the week, nothing too elaborate.  Some nights it's cereal and toast and other nights we have a sandwich or quesadillas. Other nights maybe pasta with a simple meat sauce.  On the weekend we try to make a meal that will last a couple of days or can be repurposed into a new dish, or we have something like steak, baked potato and veggies, just to have a "fancy meal", LOL, in the brave new world.

Hope you all are staying safe and eating well in this new normal!

PANDEMIC PREPARATIONS

We don't think we need any real introduction with this post.  There is a pandemic occurring around the world and it grows and threatens us here at home.

We have both been on this Earth more than 50 years.  Not even during the hurricane threats we've had,  have we EVER  seen what is going now in stores across Houston and we presume everywhere.

Masks, gloves and alcohol are gone.  This is the sight in several stores I frequent.

And forget about hand soap.  It's gone.

Hand sanitizer?  Ha, there is NONE to be had at ANY store ANYWHERE in Houston.

While regular masks are gone, one store put out these $5 packages of dust and filter masks. We keep hearing conflicting info about masks.  They help...they don't help.  I'm thinking if we step into an elevator where someone is coughing maybe they will do something?  Or just peace of mind?

They are limiting products at most stores.

All bleach products are gone.  So are the disinfecting sprays and wipes.

Water?  Gone.

There were a few soups left on this day but a few days later they were gone. I actually had someone in the store ask if I had seen any soup anywhere else.

Canned beans were almost completely gone.  Notice what they still had some of; garbanzo beans (chickpeas).  I guess those weren't flying off the shelf this day.  My guess is now, they are gone.

Crackers gone except for these three boxes (I put one of them in my basket).

This was wild.  The entire frozen vegetable section (it's about three times as long as this picture) was empty.  Hard to see in this picture because of the reflection but all that was left were a few bags of edamame and some frozen corn on the cob.

Ramen noodles, the dinner food of many a college student, gone.  We actually snagged a few at another store that were 15 cents each.  I picked up a dozen.  It can't hurt to have and when we have had them in the past, we like to doctor them up and make them more gourmet, ha.

This scene just blew my mind.  No toilet paper.  No paper towels.  No Kleenex.  I mean in pictures further up, there might be a few scattered items left in a category but not here.  There was NOT A SINGLE PRODUCT on this aisle.  Fortunately a couple of weeks ago before the run on the stores, I bought our normal 14 pack of mega rolls so we should be fine on that for awhile.  

When it comes to food, we are well stocked.  I've been buying over the last few weeks just in case and now that things seem to be getting exponentially worse, I'm glad I did.

We have plenty of food now.  Rice, beans (canned and dried), lentils, lots of pasta, soups, canned meats, tomatoes products, "cream of" soups, frozen veggies, lots of longer lasting meats (sausages, bacon, ham), cheeses, 4 dozen eggs, peanut butter, jellies, potatoes, onions, flours, sugars, coffee, waters, tea, condiments, and much more.  I don't think we've ever been this well stocked.  The freezer already has some frozen meats like pork loin roasts, pork chops, beef shank, and more.

The only thing we should get are some fresh meats like ground beef, chicken, etc.  We're going to get that this weekend and vacuum seal some to freeze, maybe cook a few chickens and take the meat off for use in future meals, things like that. 

We are living in an interesting and somewhat frightening times.  More on that in a future post.

Hang in there friends!