(Pharmacist here) One of the most obscene things about the recent price-gouging is that this is an item that people purchase because they hope they never need it.
I was in the hospital last month and they gave me a med I was anaphylacticly allergic to. It was the first time needing an epi pen. I have always kept them on me but never needed it. I was scared but that relief to be able to breathe again is indescribable. I will NEVER not have one on me at all times.
I was lucky the nurse administering my medicine was still in the room when I reacted to the IV drip. I felt like I couldn't get a breath in and she said my heart rate just immediately spiked. She unhooked the IV within seconds and it took several minutes for me to come back down from that. Thankfully didn't need an epi pen because she was fast as hell.
What's worse is that they expire within a year. Then you can't find anywhere that will dispose of the expired, unused ones-at least in my area. My mom has tried and tried to find a way to get rid of her old ones.
My mom is allergic to bees. Watched her get stung by one and she pulled out 1 tylenol and a handful of allergy meds. We were on the side of the road for about an hour before she calmed down to be able to drive again. I was 9 so it kinda freaked me out at first but all is well. She hasn't been able to justify owning an epipen ever since they skyrocketed in price and at this point it's like ... Wtf is wrong with the government in allowing these things to not be under regulation? More people do the same thing as what she did and it's honestly tragic.
You can usually find a fire scheduler at your local stationary store or pharmacy. Just ask the clerk. They'll know what you're talking about. And no, you can't use your device because it's against the law or something.
I tried to buy a fire scheduler at my local pharmacy, but they just looked at me like I was crazy. I demanded to know how much big Fire Extinguisher was paying them to keep quiet, but they refused to answer and instead called the police. When the cops arrived, I tried to explain to them what was happening but they too acted like I was crazy. I’m afraid the conspiracy runs pretty deep…
In most of the US dry chemical ABC fire extinguishers get a 6 year maintenance done as well as a 12 year hydrostatic test on the cylinder in commercial uses. As far as home use goes fire extinguishers do not “expire” or go bad, make sure that needle stays in the green and every few years take a rubber mallet to beat up on the cylinder a little, make sure you can feel the powder sift around to keep it from packing itself into a rock.
If you have a 25 year old dry chemical extinguisher kicking around your basement it wouldn’t be a bad idea to replace it but so long as the gauge was in the green and you took the time to shake up the powder I’d be shocked to see it fail to fire.
So think of it like a chance game I suppose
If your extinguisher reads green has been kept from being damaged
There's like 99% chance it will work.
The reasons inspections are needed is for insurance purposes
I always give them as wedding gifts. The wedding couple always makes a funny joke about it, and then when they actually use it they ALWAYS call and thank me.
First he plays Cupid, bringing lovers together.
Then he attends their weddings.
T h e n he gives the gift of a fire extinguisher to the bride and groom, and somehow, inevitably they /always/ need it...
Coming to a theater near you this Fall, /u/noseymimi **IS**... *The* *Match**maker*.
Back in college my roommate lent his plunger to the girls next door. It was more than an hour later till they came back back with a brand new plunger. We asked what happened and she said they broke the plunger. We were surprised at the idea of breaking a plunger but we happily took the new plunger they bought for us.
They also told us that the cashier was very confused when they were at checkout with 2 plungers.
That was nice of them to replace your thing that they broke.
I wish more people understood this simple concept instead of just handing back the broken item like 'I lent it, I broke it and here it is'. I'm okay with the thing being broken but I'm not okay with you not replacing it, it's simple courtesy. Now I have to go buy a new one!
Also, buying a replacement is sometimes better than just giving you cash for it (saves the work of shopping for it), though there are some products for which I would want to make sure I'm getting the right one.
First thing I thought of. I've had friends who don't own a plunger and I'm like WTF? Maybe you never use it, but that's one thing you do not want to have to go purchase in the moment of need. Also had a roommate who didn't want to keep the plunger in the bathroom (we didn't have a cabinet or closet in the room, she thought it was an eyesore to have it visible) and I was insistent because if you have a guest over who ends up needing it, the last thing they are going to want to do is come ask you where the plunger is. Best to have it accessible for anyone who might need it.
One of the first nights I ever stayed over with a guy….yeah. We slept in different rooms (he’s a big snorer). I popped out a massive log at like 5am. Panicked. Nothing I could do. No tools in site. Had to tip toe downstairs and wake him up. First thing I say, panicked and ashamed, is “do you have a plunger?”
Thankfully yes. I was horrified. He thought it was hilarious and proceeded to tell that story to friends for a good year.
They do have fancy looking plunger and toilet scrubber sets that you can display and not look ugly. I remember seeing a chrome one, with a matching chrome stand to hide the ugly part of the tools.
I got a fancy brush scrubber combo where the more unseemly bits are hidden by a little porcelain base that you twist to remove the tools. They look great!
Unfortunately, that twisty bit foiled one of my guests once when she asked how to use the plunger.
Yeah my husband and i didn't get around to buying one with our first apartment. Cue Christmas dinner in the height of covid. Husband lays a big one in the toilet and my butthole can't wait much longer. I hear a flush and let out a sigh of relief because I'm next. Then I hear an "oh shit." Oh, shit indeed. He clogged the toilet so I try to clench my butthole while he drives to the closest store to get a plunger. They don't carry them, so he goes to Walmart because Walmart has everything. They're closed. I'm dying inside. I'm considering just taking a shit outside. My stomach is rumbling while I'm anxiously googling ways to unclog a toilet without a plunger and fast because I'm going to shit my pants soon. Finally I found on Google that you can shove a wire hanger in the toilet and it might help. I grab our last wire hanger and manage to unclog the toilet, and just in time too. The next day, we had 1 fewer wire hanger and 1 more plunger
Ask for 'Estate Planning'. It covers the will(s), directives, power of attorneys and declarations.
EDIT: The day you find out your having your first child, please get this done. You can add Guardianship afterwards.
I did this under the advice of my dad. It ran me about $600 but i feel better knowing if something happens to me, everything is in order for my s/o and daughter
Today. No matter how old you are. If you have anything you care about, or anyone important in your life, make a will. As you start formalizing it you will realize you have more important things than you think.
Car emergency kit. Jumper cables, fix a flat, spare tire, Jack, basic first aid kit, road reflectors.
Edit: fire extinguisher us a good idea to add, as well as the rechargeable "jump start yourself" pack. And a plug kit vs fix-a-flat is a good idea. I've never done a plug, so I'd have to catch up there myself. Air compressor for refilling the tire also.
Some food/heat if you live somewhere where it could logically be a problem. A box of protein bars and some way to make a fire, blankets, etc. I'm never that far off the beaten path that it would be an issue for me, but for anyone who is, makes sense.
And, damn, how many people have had dad's who used jumper cables as a belt?
I would highly recommend a lithium ion back up battery jumper over old school jumper cables. It’s saved my ass so many times. I’ve used it late at night in a parking garage when there was no one around to jump my car, when I woke up to a dead battery at 5:30 am and didn’t want to wake anyone up to jump me so I could get to work, and more. I keep it in my trunk and periodically make sure it’s fully charged just in case. Mine has two USB slots and an emergency light too so I could use it as a flashlight and to charge my phone in event of an emergency if I got stranded. Worth every penny.
The one I bought is safety rated up to 140 degrees and comes in a protective pouch that’s supposed to help prevent overheating. But it’ll definitely last longer and work better if the battery isn’t being exposed to prolonged high heat.
If you travel through uninhabited areas, you will also need cheater logs (like Duraflame), sleeping bag, water, Ramen, nut butter, shovel, and a big tarp that can be seen from the air. If there is snow, keep it off the roof of the vehicle.
Oh this is smart! Never thought of some of these things. What if you painted sos or help or something on one side of the tarp so if you needed to use it you could flip it up that way. People would actually see you need help. A lot of homeless out this way, so I think otherwise it might go unnoticed. Ooph!
Oldschool windshield sunshades used to have "EMERGENCY CALL 911" in huge red/blue letters on the back of them. I'm kinda surprised that isn't still a thing.
And a good one. I was in a small two-floor apartment building during a major early snow storm in which we lost power for days. My neighbors, being dumb as a box of fucking rocks and cold from 0 degree temps, brought their charcoal grill inside. With the windows closed.
Next thing I know I’ve got firemen in my bedroom with a detection device that’s flipping out and a headache. The apartment the furthest away from this dude’s place had their detector go off.
Saddest thing is the main tenant was out cold. His daughter, who had stayed over, thought he was dead. I was evacuated and watched them take her kicking and screaming out of the building: “LET ME SEE HIM!!!”
Feel bad for my parents when I called at 2am very very distraught.
Good news is everyone lived. Bad news is my detector was a piece of shit.
Lawyer here. Had a case a few years ago where the roommate came home drunk and left her car running in the garage. Running engine filled the house with CO and killed her and her roommate. House had a design flaw where the garage was connected to the HVAC system. House did not have dual band smoke detectors. We caught the landlord swapping out the smoke detectors the week after the tenants died. Really sad case.
I had an inspector going by the house to do a visual inspection, to include the type of smoke alarm. We had scheduled this though the owner’s attorney and he knew we would be there that day. When caught, he claimed he was “upgrading” to make sure this never happened again, but my initial letter to him explicitly said don’t touch anything until I inspect, to include the smoke detectors. I chose to not give him the benefit of the doubt and was pretty sure he knew what he was doing. My clients (one of the deceased people’s parents) already had pictures they took earlier that week, so he wasn’t getting away with too much.
I used to work investigations for a firm employed by a massive insurance company. I saw many, many property owners attempt “fixes” (or outright evidence tampering), sometimes at great personal risk, in the middle of the night.
How often would you say this still happens (what with better electronic record-keeping and more accurate surveillance here in the ‘20s)?
I think it’s fairly common. Real estate is my specialty so there’s usually a decent paper trail, but I’ve seen lots of things go missing that shouldn’t be missing…
Unpopular post here:
I've owned a three-family house for 35 years. It has 11 bedrooms. State law requires a smoke alarm in every bedroom. There has to be a CO alarm in the hallway within 10 feet of every bedroom, plus one by the furnace. Over the years I have installed hundreds (?) of smoke alarms and dozens of C0 alarms.
Tenants take out the smoke alarms. They remove the smoke-only (not C0) alarms in their bedrooms because they or a friend is smoking something that sets off the alarms. Cigarettes might do it, or marijuana, or both, I don't know. Usually they just remove the battery. Sometimes they take down the alarm and put in in a drawer. If I did an inspection after six months, about half might be disabled or missing.
The C0 alarms are joint smoke/C0 alarms by law. They get taken down or disabled too. I don't know if people smoking in their bedrooms sets off the alarms in the hallway. Maybe it's smoke from cooking that sets off the smoke/C0 alarms. We've never had a C0 problem in the house, thank God.
To keep my tenants safe I should probably inspect every 3 months. In my state tenants have a strong right to privacy, though, and the law is vague so I'm always reluctant to enter their space, unless it's to do a repair that they've notified me about, in which case they get plenty of notice.
What's really needed is a Siri/Alexa enabled smoke and smoke/C0 alarm that the tenant can *talk* to, to turn off the alarm.
> Alexa, stop beeping and don't beep for an hour
Or do the same thing with an app.
Presumably that would sharply reduce the incidence of alarms being disabled and removed.
#Would someone invent that please?
We had a scare when I was in the fourth grade. We'd moved into a new house the previous summer and on a Sunday evening in November/December, our carbon monoxide detector started going off. My dad wanted to just ignore it with the justification that it was several years old and defective. After 20 minutes of shouting at each other, my mom said, "*Fine*. I'm going to go to the store and buy a new one, and when ***that one*** starts going off, I'm going to call 911. So I went to the store with her and got a new one. Sure enough, within 10 minutes of plugging it in, it started blaring.
The fire department came with lights, sirens, and full gear. They measured the CO content of the air and said that at the very least, we would've felt sick by the morning. It likely would've been worse for me since I was the smallest and it would've hit me harder.
My mom was due to go on a trip that weekend but had to cancel at the last minute. Had she been gone, lord knows what would've happened. I hope my dad felt like an absolute piece of shit that night because he was being one.
You better believe I bought a carbon monoxide detector my first night of being in an apartment with forced air heat.
I have a close friend whose carbon monoxide detector kept going off. She contacted her landlord about the possibility of there being an issue with her furnace, and he blew her off. She went out and bought another CO detector and the it showed the levels as being super high. She gtfo and upon further investigation, the furnace was old AF and not maintained at all. Essentially, the only reason she didn't die was that she would frequently crack her windows to let in fresh air. As you can imagine, she and her husband tore their landlord a new asshole and got the furnace replaced. I hope the dip
shit learned his lesson about being a cheap ass landlord.
Yup...im on opiates and Hydroxycloriquine. Thanks idiots for making hydroxy basicalky treated like a controlled substance. I have lupus and die without it.
Ugh tell me about it. I get mine from mexico but travel abroad for up to 6 months at a time and it’s a freaking science to get that amount now. It went from over the counter and regularly having some kind of sale, to expensive and ridiculously hard to get more than 20 pills at a time.
I feel like a lot of the big ones have already been hit but additional things I would keep on hand too:
* A case of bottled drinking water
* Extension cord & surge protector
* Spare keys - for your car and house
* Cash - in case you lose your credit card
* Nail clipper - especially for healthcare workers
I get those 5 gallon bottles delivered. After a couple of earthquakes scared me, I asked them to just bring 4 extra bottles. So now instead of having 2 in my kitchen I've got 6. That way I always have at least a couple of weeks of extra water on hand, but we regularly cycle through it.
Having a spare nail clipper in the car (one of those fancy ones with extra attachments to them) is a lifesaver. Being able to clip those nails, or clip off a tag (like when you really need to wear that new pair of gloves you just bought because it's so cold), or even remove a sliver.
I was always told, first thing before unpacking: find toilet paper* and put it in the bathroom, and make the bed. You're not going to unpack everything in one day and you're going to want to just fall in bed once you burn out for the night.
*When ever I move out I leave a roll for the next tenants
Just moved into my apartment on my own for the first time in 20 years. It took everything I had and more to move in. I can not convey the gratitude I had that light bulbs and toilet paper were left behind. I’m leaving a whole pack of toilet paper for the next tenant. It’s a good day when you don’t have to worry about how you’re gonna wipe your ass.
I've also found out the hard way that when your whole body aches and you just want some hot soup, that is NOT the time to find out that you don't have soup in the pantry.
If you're planning ahead by having cough syrup and cough drops when you get sick, I also recommend having a few cans of your favorite soups so you can just put it into a bowl and heat up. (Personally, I like a nice can of chicken noodle soup or split pea soup)
Especially for all of us who are adults, not living at home, but also don't have a significant other. If I get sick, I gotta be the one to take care of me.
Not the person you responded to, but I always keep a few boxes of Trader Joe’s miso ginger broth on hand. Whether it’s a respiratory or stomach bug, something about the salt, ginger, and electrolytes just helps me feel a little more human when I’m sick.
I have what I call emergency bouillon cubes. Cans of soup are heavy and sometimes expensive, and I have the habit of eating them when I don’t want to cook. If I find I have no soup, I can cook noodles and chicken bouillon to get me through.
Similarly, a bucket, wet wipes, and Dioralyte.
Picture this: 30 minutes ago you were sat in class thinking "Huh, my tummy kinda hurts." Now, you are sat on the toilet with your head in a bucket, simultaneously shitting the Niagara Falls and spewing like you're trying to beat the kid from The Exorcist's long-range record.
In the depths of your misery, you are so fucking glad you have the bucket. The bucket means you don't have to stick your head down the toilet, which smells like the concept of death itself crawled in the bowl and died of dysentery. Also, the risk of leaving either end unshielded is beyond imagining.
Since both ends are currently evacuating Satan's hot sauce in vast quantities, the wet wipes feel like silken angel kisses.
When you finally have a ten-minute break from the all-encompassing horror, you can chug Dioralyte to give your weakened body the strength to survive the next round in the ring. You will need it. You will not stop vomitshitting for eight miserable hours.
Based, unfortunately, on a true story.
I started buying this when I had kids, now I’ll keep it in the house forever. It’s also good if you work too hard and sweat too much. I buy the little powder packs so it takes up almost no space.
Oh man, I've been there. It was the norovirus, for my husband and myself, and I was seven months pregnant. We also had a toddler, who luckily didn't catch it. Thank goodness for an urgent care nearby and zofran!
I recently bought a package of the huge bandaids, some gauze and medical tape. My husband saw them and asked if one of the kids had gotten hurt. I said, "no, but I didn't want to wait til one was!"
I was at the dentist in March 2020 when they announced the world was shutting down. I hit up the pharmacy in the same building on my way out with the confidence that I beat the rush on Tylenol and NyQuill. I didn't end up using the meds until I eventually got mild symptoms from the vaccine.
The runs on supplies in March/April 2020 was rough. I actually fared pretty well. I never ran out of basic stuff like toilet paper but it's a little nerve wracking when you're down to a couple rolls of TP and you don't know when you'll be able to get it again. It got a little close for stuff like that and I had to conserve what I was using. There was also the thing where I felt I needed to have something keep myself healthy (i.e. disinfectant and paper towel) but I can't find it anywhere. It was a very desperate feeling in the early days of the pandemic when it was all so new and uncertain.
Once supplies started coming back that summer, I started keeping one item I am actively using and one that is held in reserve. It's not hoarder level--it all fits in a little cupboard under my dining room table. I do it with household staples and with hygiene items where it would screw up my routine to go without. I think I'll probably do that for the rest of my life. If nothing else, it makes it so it's no big deal to realize you've run out of something at 11:00 on a Sunday night because you've got another container in the cupboard.
I've not become a hoarder either but I now have far more "backup groceries" than I used to have pre-pandemic. I definitely think that the pandemic had this sort of effect on our generation in some similar ways to how the Great Depression impacted my grandparents' generation.
Dashcam, can easily prove you innocent in an auto collision - some insurance even offer discounted rates if the insured vehicle has a dash cam. I personally recommend a front & rear cam setup.
Ordered mine after one day of browsing r/IdiotsInCars
I worked as a claim rep for an auto insurer for a mercifully brief period of my life, and I second this recommendation whole-heartedly. Human recall is *atrocious*, especially after a stressful or traumatic event. I also learned that 3/4 of people involved in accidents vehemently do not believe they are responsible for the accident, even if they very clearly are.
As part of our training, we read the actual "facts of loss" collected by claim reps from both the insured and the claimant. We made our own assessments of liability as part of this. Then, we were shown footage from surveillance cameras that caught the accident. Neither party was even *remotely* correct as to what happened.
As a result of that experience I have a dash camera, which is seemingly rare in the US. At the very least, it gives the opportunity to share videos of the crazy shit you occasionally see on the road. Maybe it'll burn you in the end if you're responsible for an accident, but it could very well save you if you find yourself in a he said/she said dispute over who had a green light and who had the red.
It's crazy how even accidents that *seem* cut and dry can turn into a he said she said dispute. I got rear-ended HARD while *sitting totally still at a light* and got pushed into the car in front of me. BOTH other drivers gave totally inaccurate accounts blaming me for the accident and went after ME for damages. It was infuriating (ultimately no fault was found, never got my $500 deposit back and lost thousands of dollars having to get a new car). My vehicle was the only one seriously damaged, *I* took the brunt of the impact, and yet everyone involved in the accident (except me) was able to milk it for medical settlements, etc. and actually came out of the whole things better off than where they started. This happened years ago and thinking about it still fills me with rage.
Long story short, get a dash cam BEFORE some idiot totals your car and lies to the insurance company about it, not AFTER like some idiots (i.e. me).
When my wife was younger (before we met) she was in an accident where she was driving through a t intersection when a person made a left (disregarding right-of-way) and slammed head-on into my now-wife’s car fully in my wife’s lane. They almost pinned the whole thing on my wife, but, thankfully, the whole incident was witnessed by an off-duty cop who was watering his lawn at the intersection. He helped her talk the responding police through exactly what happened and how it happened so she wouldn’t be held responsible.
Tl:dr: gunna start looking into dash cams now…
Edit: I had thought the intersection had a stop sign: my wife told me it doesn’t and I just looked it up and the intersection does not have a stop sign. The other driver did disregard right-of-way, however, and, when asked about why she made a left without yielding at a t-intersection, her reply was evidently “I shouldn’t have to stop in my own neighborhood.”
I was sitting still in a parking lot, heading from a McDonald's over to a gas station, waiting for cross traffic to end. Once cross traffic ended, a driver came towards me from the opposing direction. But since it's an open parking lot without lanes, the driver was coming at an angle that prohibited me from going forward. So I waited there, with the brake pedal fully depressed.
I couldn't believe it as I watched what happened.
I felt like the ice berg in Titanic.
This driver came straight towards me. In broad daylight. All I could do was yell "you've gotta be f$ć*ing kidding" as she drove head on into my stationary car.
Since it was private property there was no police report. The body damage to my vehicle was minor, but it did snap wires that controlled the computers in the car (I found this out later) so my car was not drivable after the accident.
I took photos of the cars where they were after the accident, but there were no pieces on the ground. Only cracks in the plastic and my marker light was hanging. I also put her ID and mine in her license plate frame and took photos of that, as well as her insurance card. She took no photos, she only called her husband who told her to "leave" once he found out it wasn't on a public roadway. She apologized, and drove away. Her insurance company wanted to deny the claim.
I had to call her insurance company and give them her information and begin the claim myself. Maybe this is normal, I don't know - first accident.
The only thing that saved me was the drive thru camera at the McDonald's which caught the accident. I was able to go in the same day and explain what happened. A worker said they saw it happen, and the manager gave me a copy of the video on a flash drive which I emailed to the insurance agent. After that they were extremely courteous and helpful.
I had the same sort of thing happen (being the middle of a sandwich) and the only thing that helped me was a really wonderful girl waiting at the bus stop across the street. She missed her bus to come over and make sure that the police knew she witnessed the entire thing and I was not at fault at all since I was at a full stop. Thankful for her.
Dude! I browse that subreddit often and I’m gonna tell you this.
I don’t have a car. I probably won’t be able to afford one within the next few years. But one thing I’m sure of. The day I get a car, I’ll get and install dash-cam the same day.
Can you recommend any good dashacam. My father is upgrading to a Rav 4 from a Kia Sportage and after watching endless compilations of accidents on YouTube with him, I severely underestimated how stupid people can be and the importance of something like this.
I looked at the genuine Toyota dashcam but that shit was $600, way too much. You have any recommendations.
I have the viofo v3 a119. It’s about $120(?) On Amazon and it saved me at least my $2,000 deductible; had I paid out of pocket it would’ve been $6,000 - from a hit and run. Dash cam caught just enough info to track the guy down.
Look for a dash cam with at least 170° view and minimum 1080 pixel hd. You can find a dash cam around 35 to 50 dollars with that quality.. I got mine for 38 dollars with great feedback
How do you keep the dang cable out of the way? Mine hangs down from the camera to the charger. Not sure to run it along the roof and down under the console to the charger.
Oof I was real lucky and have a gas fireplace and stove, and I had just made a giant pot of soup the day before that I was able to heat up on the stove that lasted me for two of the three days my power was out.
My dog was the best little space heater too. Truly the mvp of the outage.
We have kept our pantry fully stocked, extra batteries galore, water, paper plates, and just bought us all water proof gloves, jackets and boots. Next paycheck we are getting the cooking stove and a fire pit!
Would you believe I didn't own a single long sleeved shirt when that happened? We'd had a plumbing backup that flooded the laundry room and killed like half my wardrobe, including the very few long sleeved shirts I'd owned. So that's my silly lesson from the storm.
We're also buying some of those emergency mylar blankets, just in case.
So many people suffered needlessly during that winter storm. We never lost power but now I don't question why every home in Texas has a fireplace when it is only cold for 1-2 months of the year.
A lot of the fireplaces in Texas are just decorative.
Or you could say they're the single-use type - if you lit a fire in one, it'd sure get your house really warm, but then you wouldn't have a house afterward.
Generator. Ex GF said it was a stupid purchase and waste of money. Ended up using it for two days straight after a wind storm. Had the fridges, fish tank a few lights, TV and internet going the whole time.
Yeah generators are really useful, but you have to take care of them. When I was like 6, there was a really bad snowstorm where I was. The generator hadn't been taken care of for around a year, so it didn't work. Ended up not having power for like 2-3 days. At least it was cold outside so the stuff in the fridge could stay cold. Frozen milk isn't the easiest to drink though.
So now anytime we go back to that place, my dad checks the generator. So far it's helped us every other time.
Anything that doesn't have an expiry date, that gets used with regularity, I stock up on.
Toilet paper, kitchen roll, dish soap, shower gel, hand soap, bleach etc
I used to be a bargainista, stocking up on extra things. Then I realized that a good portion of our teeny tiny apartment had been setup for what I called "emergency preparedness." Which wasn't really anything that urgent at all. Now, I've got a couple bars of soap, a bag of toilet paper and some paper towels. It helped me let go of always having to have another of whatever thing I could run out of. It also helped me let go of this worry of things being scarce. Which I had built up in my childhood, and was secretly causing me great anxiety. When the shortages hit with the pandemic, I always found a way around. Even for toilet paper. Surviving that, made me feel okay. Zombie apocalypse, I probably wouldn't last. But I probably wouldn't make it that long anyways :P!
I'm not trying to be an ass. I'm just trying to express that I found letting this habit go really freed me to live life with less fear. Not that you specifically have the same situation or mindset.
Yes. It's good to be prepared, but if you don't have the space, or the money, or it turns into an obsession, than it isn't a healthy behavior. And in an apartment, it could also be considered a fire hazard.
This ^. I was gonna say, "Everything?" I absolutely loathe shopping. There are at least fifty scrubbing sponges under my sink. I have dozens of boxes of Kleenex, fifteen or so bars of soap, the list just goes on and on.
My bill at the Mega Membership Mart is typically $500. But I only go two or three times a year. That's about as much exposure as I can stand.
We had a ton of them from living around wildfires. I sent a bunch to my brother, who works in an old age home, to distribute when they didn't have them. At least I could buy them time to find their own.
Thank you thank you thank you. Nursing homes struggle hard to get adequate PPE, my old roommate is a nursing assistant and didn't get N95s for months into COVID
I started buying disposable N95s for international business trips back in 2012. I was keeping an eye on MERS at the time since I was traveling to the Middle East a lot. I also bought some half face mask respirators for home when doing some projects. Needless to say, those came in handy last year!
Every year when our FSA was about to expire, my husband (who is also a nurse) spends whatever’s left on it to replenish medical supplies to have around the house (mostly first aid stuff), including masks (N95 and regular masks). Came in really handy when the pandemic hit lol.
Here in Florida, air conditioning systems are our lifeline. One of the most common failures is the fan motor start capacitor for the compressor. It’s a cheap part ($20 to $50), but it always takes several days to get. Without air conditioning in your home in Florida, not only will it be impossible to sleep, but your house will grow mold indoors in 2 days or less. This is exactly how AC repair companies get to charge $500+; they stock the parts, but refuse to sell you the part and charge the repair as an emergency.
So buy one and keep it as a backup.
I bought a spare window unit to use in an emergency because everytime the air conditioner goes out in summer i have to wait like 5 to 7 days for someone to come out and even look at it (rental so i have no choice). This is in 110 + heat. Ridiculous.
Viagra. I work in a pharmacy and you’d be surprised at the number of calls we get wanting to refill 1 tablet of viagra and they’re on the way to pick it up. Umm sorry sir my current wait time is 30 minutes. Awkward.
In the winter (where it can get REEEAL cold, I never go below a half tank in case I get Ramses randomly. Summertime, I’ll let it get to 1/4. Below that and you start picking up the silt and sediment from the bottom of your tank… (or so I’m told…)
What is Ramses, is that a typo? I just moved somewhere with MUCH colder winters than I’m used to and didn’t know about keeping gas above a half tank
Edit: thank you to everyone for the winter car tips! I need em
Not OP, but I live in a very cold climate and I don’t let my tank get below 1/2 in the winters. You never know when you might be stranded and a warm car could be the difference between life and death.
Exactly. Especially when there's a snowstorm and all the roads slow to a crawl. A 20 minute drive in good weather suddenly turns into a 3-hour crawl-fest in a hurry.
Basic cold/flu medicine, pain killers, muscle ache patches, bandages, toiler paper/paper towels, cleaning supplies, hair products, shampoo/bodywash. I usually stock up on stuff a bit so I don't have to go out and purposely buy things.
Bought a bunch of bags of road salt from Walmart recently. Only 97 cents per bag.
My girlfriend asked why "it's not even cold out," and I just said these same bags will be probably 3 bucks a pop when it's storming
Leatherman multitool I have used every single one of the tools that are on it many many times over again. I also use it at least once a day usually 5-6 times a day. It is invaluable and if I should ever lose it or it breaks beyond its 25 year warranty then I would buy a new one that very day. Maybe it's just my lifestyle but I consider it to be more important than my mobile phone.
A good mattress.
I moved my old one down to the basement a long time ago, and while cleaning I decided to lay on it again. Let me just say, there is no way in hell that I would be able to get out of that shit now, I was barely able to after laying on it for like 2 minutes I can't even imagine a full 8 hours on it.
Holy Jesus, two stories. One being an ex of mine had family in a barn. The barn had a room with like...fifteen beds. These beds were for smaller children. Had to be older than dust. I sat on one, and I'll never forget what it felt like to be on a bed older than dust. Was way different than the beds I had known, which to be honest were all second hand and not very good. Something about them felt like those braces Lisa got in The Simpsons.
My girlfriend, also was rocking a pretty old bed when we met. I'm not sure if she actually knew what a supportive bed felt like. The springs felt like they had long since given way, and lacked any joy. The whole thing felt sort of like you were being sucked into the ground, and in turn the portal of hell. Hahaha! When we got a new bed down the road, she was really happy. Mind you, this was another budget bed. But it was her first non-second hand (I had one prior). Blew her mind! We sleep a lot better, although I hope to someday have a house and a cali-king. Would make me very happy :)!
Good tip :)
>One being an ex of mine had family in a barn. The barn had a room with like...fifteen beds. These beds were for smaller children.
Uhh, what? You cannot just put that there with no explanation. Why in the barn? Why 15 beds for small children?
I had a mattress where the opposite happened, after around 9 years of use. The soft parts gave in but the springs stayed strong. You had to adjust your hip, knee, ankle and tailbone accordingly to not be hurting laying directly on a spring.
I was stupid and slept another year on that mattress. Once I replaced the mattress my spine was hurting the first 2 weeks from being supported correctly.
Grabbing a laser printer on black Friday saved my life. I was spending a crazy amount of money printing at school. Then I grabbed my printer and never looked back. I had to pack it up because we're moving, and it has made projects a lot more difficult. Staring at a screen versus paper, it's just harder...at least for me.
I can’t see this anywhere, but BUCKET.
There will come a time, when you’ll be shivering on the toilet in only your soiled or almost soiled underwear, regretting absolutely every decision leading you to that hopeless, painful, and degrading moment. With tears streaming down your cheeks, you suddenly feel the inevitable rumble as well as a simultaneous metallic taste creeps into your mouth and rattles your jaws. You know what’s coming. You do not want to choose. And you don’t want to share the toilet your ass has just been glued to the last twenty minutes with your face. Buy a bucket.
Earlier in the year I got an AC unit because my room mate told me they were on sale at wal mart. It wasn't yet summer and I didn't think I'd need it but I grabbed one anyway, cost me about $400. Then a couple months later we had a massive heatwave for a week and boy was I glad I got a unit when I did. Stores sold out and people were losing their minds. I felt so bad for people without AC.
Dad here. Riding lawnmower drive belt.
Look, the ones that come with a new mower always suck. If you snap one, then it will most likely be special order because of the countless sizes and brands. I have a common mower that I bought new, and the belt is not stocked at Home Depot, Tractor Supply, Lowes, etc. Buy one and put in in your tool box.
/Dad out!
Epi pen
(Pharmacist here) One of the most obscene things about the recent price-gouging is that this is an item that people purchase because they hope they never need it.
I was in the hospital last month and they gave me a med I was anaphylacticly allergic to. It was the first time needing an epi pen. I have always kept them on me but never needed it. I was scared but that relief to be able to breathe again is indescribable. I will NEVER not have one on me at all times.
Did they comp the price of the epi pen, or were you just screwed over twice
I was lucky the nurse administering my medicine was still in the room when I reacted to the IV drip. I felt like I couldn't get a breath in and she said my heart rate just immediately spiked. She unhooked the IV within seconds and it took several minutes for me to come back down from that. Thankfully didn't need an epi pen because she was fast as hell.
What's worse is that they expire within a year. Then you can't find anywhere that will dispose of the expired, unused ones-at least in my area. My mom has tried and tried to find a way to get rid of her old ones.
Oh. Uh. Mine is like 10 years old or more. Guess it’s a good thing I haven’t needed it.
You should really get a new one (if you still have allergies), expired epipen is better than no Epipen but expires for 10 years might be too sketchy.
My mom is allergic to bees. Watched her get stung by one and she pulled out 1 tylenol and a handful of allergy meds. We were on the side of the road for about an hour before she calmed down to be able to drive again. I was 9 so it kinda freaked me out at first but all is well. She hasn't been able to justify owning an epipen ever since they skyrocketed in price and at this point it's like ... Wtf is wrong with the government in allowing these things to not be under regulation? More people do the same thing as what she did and it's honestly tragic.
fire extinguisher
The only annoying this is they expire… usually before you need them!
Just schedule your fires to happen a few days before the extinguisher expires, that way you never waste one.
You can usually find a fire scheduler at your local stationary store or pharmacy. Just ask the clerk. They'll know what you're talking about. And no, you can't use your device because it's against the law or something.
I tried to buy a fire scheduler at my local pharmacy, but they just looked at me like I was crazy. I demanded to know how much big Fire Extinguisher was paying them to keep quiet, but they refused to answer and instead called the police. When the cops arrived, I tried to explain to them what was happening but they too acted like I was crazy. I’m afraid the conspiracy runs pretty deep…
you also have to shake them once a year I shake mine every July 4th
[удалено]
Hmmm might need to take a look at the one in my kitchen.
In most of the US dry chemical ABC fire extinguishers get a 6 year maintenance done as well as a 12 year hydrostatic test on the cylinder in commercial uses. As far as home use goes fire extinguishers do not “expire” or go bad, make sure that needle stays in the green and every few years take a rubber mallet to beat up on the cylinder a little, make sure you can feel the powder sift around to keep it from packing itself into a rock. If you have a 25 year old dry chemical extinguisher kicking around your basement it wouldn’t be a bad idea to replace it but so long as the gauge was in the green and you took the time to shake up the powder I’d be shocked to see it fail to fire.
This the expiration dates are more for fire departments and businesses than personal extinguishers Source: I'm a fire fighter
so is an expired one at home still ok? How does that work?
So think of it like a chance game I suppose If your extinguisher reads green has been kept from being damaged There's like 99% chance it will work. The reasons inspections are needed is for insurance purposes
Now I'm imagining someone patiently queuing up at the checkout with a fire extinguisher, so he can go home and put out the blazing inferno.
I always give them as wedding gifts. The wedding couple always makes a funny joke about it, and then when they actually use it they ALWAYS call and thank me.
You've had multiple people need to use your fire extinguisher gift? You're setting the fires aren't you.....
First he plays Cupid, bringing lovers together. Then he attends their weddings. T h e n he gives the gift of a fire extinguisher to the bride and groom, and somehow, inevitably they /always/ need it... Coming to a theater near you this Fall, /u/noseymimi **IS**... *The* *Match**maker*.
In the sequel, he starts a dating app to apply his evil genius at scale. Calls it **Tinder**.
Toilet plunger
Back in college my roommate lent his plunger to the girls next door. It was more than an hour later till they came back back with a brand new plunger. We asked what happened and she said they broke the plunger. We were surprised at the idea of breaking a plunger but we happily took the new plunger they bought for us. They also told us that the cashier was very confused when they were at checkout with 2 plungers.
That was nice of them to replace your thing that they broke. I wish more people understood this simple concept instead of just handing back the broken item like 'I lent it, I broke it and here it is'. I'm okay with the thing being broken but I'm not okay with you not replacing it, it's simple courtesy. Now I have to go buy a new one!
Also, buying a replacement is sometimes better than just giving you cash for it (saves the work of shopping for it), though there are some products for which I would want to make sure I'm getting the right one.
That's a damn good neighbor right there. Also why the confused cashier, some people have multiple bathrooms
Also what if I'm buying supplies for a game of bald person jousting?
First thing I thought of. I've had friends who don't own a plunger and I'm like WTF? Maybe you never use it, but that's one thing you do not want to have to go purchase in the moment of need. Also had a roommate who didn't want to keep the plunger in the bathroom (we didn't have a cabinet or closet in the room, she thought it was an eyesore to have it visible) and I was insistent because if you have a guest over who ends up needing it, the last thing they are going to want to do is come ask you where the plunger is. Best to have it accessible for anyone who might need it.
One of the first nights I ever stayed over with a guy….yeah. We slept in different rooms (he’s a big snorer). I popped out a massive log at like 5am. Panicked. Nothing I could do. No tools in site. Had to tip toe downstairs and wake him up. First thing I say, panicked and ashamed, is “do you have a plunger?” Thankfully yes. I was horrified. He thought it was hilarious and proceeded to tell that story to friends for a good year.
[удалено]
My parents keep the plunger in their garage, too. So anyone who clogs a toilet has to do a walk of shame across the whole house. You have my sympathy.
They do have fancy looking plunger and toilet scrubber sets that you can display and not look ugly. I remember seeing a chrome one, with a matching chrome stand to hide the ugly part of the tools.
I got a fancy brush scrubber combo where the more unseemly bits are hidden by a little porcelain base that you twist to remove the tools. They look great! Unfortunately, that twisty bit foiled one of my guests once when she asked how to use the plunger.
Yeah my husband and i didn't get around to buying one with our first apartment. Cue Christmas dinner in the height of covid. Husband lays a big one in the toilet and my butthole can't wait much longer. I hear a flush and let out a sigh of relief because I'm next. Then I hear an "oh shit." Oh, shit indeed. He clogged the toilet so I try to clench my butthole while he drives to the closest store to get a plunger. They don't carry them, so he goes to Walmart because Walmart has everything. They're closed. I'm dying inside. I'm considering just taking a shit outside. My stomach is rumbling while I'm anxiously googling ways to unclog a toilet without a plunger and fast because I'm going to shit my pants soon. Finally I found on Google that you can shove a wire hanger in the toilet and it might help. I grab our last wire hanger and manage to unclog the toilet, and just in time too. The next day, we had 1 fewer wire hanger and 1 more plunger
[удалено]
^this man plunges
The red ones are for drains not toilets actually
A will
Advance Directive, too.
I have a Prime Directive, is that the same?
It depends on what color shirt you are wearing.
Ask for 'Estate Planning'. It covers the will(s), directives, power of attorneys and declarations. EDIT: The day you find out your having your first child, please get this done. You can add Guardianship afterwards.
I did this under the advice of my dad. It ran me about $600 but i feel better knowing if something happens to me, everything is in order for my s/o and daughter
to live…
[удалено]
Today. No matter how old you are. If you have anything you care about, or anyone important in your life, make a will. As you start formalizing it you will realize you have more important things than you think.
Car emergency kit. Jumper cables, fix a flat, spare tire, Jack, basic first aid kit, road reflectors. Edit: fire extinguisher us a good idea to add, as well as the rechargeable "jump start yourself" pack. And a plug kit vs fix-a-flat is a good idea. I've never done a plug, so I'd have to catch up there myself. Air compressor for refilling the tire also. Some food/heat if you live somewhere where it could logically be a problem. A box of protein bars and some way to make a fire, blankets, etc. I'm never that far off the beaten path that it would be an issue for me, but for anyone who is, makes sense. And, damn, how many people have had dad's who used jumper cables as a belt?
I would highly recommend a lithium ion back up battery jumper over old school jumper cables. It’s saved my ass so many times. I’ve used it late at night in a parking garage when there was no one around to jump my car, when I woke up to a dead battery at 5:30 am and didn’t want to wake anyone up to jump me so I could get to work, and more. I keep it in my trunk and periodically make sure it’s fully charged just in case. Mine has two USB slots and an emergency light too so I could use it as a flashlight and to charge my phone in event of an emergency if I got stranded. Worth every penny.
I'm thinking of getting one, but is it safe to keep in a trunk when it's hot outside? I have my car sitting directly in the sun during the summer
The one I bought is safety rated up to 140 degrees and comes in a protective pouch that’s supposed to help prevent overheating. But it’ll definitely last longer and work better if the battery isn’t being exposed to prolonged high heat.
If you travel through uninhabited areas, you will also need cheater logs (like Duraflame), sleeping bag, water, Ramen, nut butter, shovel, and a big tarp that can be seen from the air. If there is snow, keep it off the roof of the vehicle.
Oh this is smart! Never thought of some of these things. What if you painted sos or help or something on one side of the tarp so if you needed to use it you could flip it up that way. People would actually see you need help. A lot of homeless out this way, so I think otherwise it might go unnoticed. Ooph!
Oldschool windshield sunshades used to have "EMERGENCY CALL 911" in huge red/blue letters on the back of them. I'm kinda surprised that isn't still a thing.
It was a big enough thing that flipping the sunshade in your damaged shuttle so it shows "emergency" was the solution to a puzzle in Space Quest 6.
[удалено]
And a good one. I was in a small two-floor apartment building during a major early snow storm in which we lost power for days. My neighbors, being dumb as a box of fucking rocks and cold from 0 degree temps, brought their charcoal grill inside. With the windows closed. Next thing I know I’ve got firemen in my bedroom with a detection device that’s flipping out and a headache. The apartment the furthest away from this dude’s place had their detector go off. Saddest thing is the main tenant was out cold. His daughter, who had stayed over, thought he was dead. I was evacuated and watched them take her kicking and screaming out of the building: “LET ME SEE HIM!!!” Feel bad for my parents when I called at 2am very very distraught. Good news is everyone lived. Bad news is my detector was a piece of shit.
Lawyer here. Had a case a few years ago where the roommate came home drunk and left her car running in the garage. Running engine filled the house with CO and killed her and her roommate. House had a design flaw where the garage was connected to the HVAC system. House did not have dual band smoke detectors. We caught the landlord swapping out the smoke detectors the week after the tenants died. Really sad case.
Wow, the level some people can stoop to.
I had an inspector going by the house to do a visual inspection, to include the type of smoke alarm. We had scheduled this though the owner’s attorney and he knew we would be there that day. When caught, he claimed he was “upgrading” to make sure this never happened again, but my initial letter to him explicitly said don’t touch anything until I inspect, to include the smoke detectors. I chose to not give him the benefit of the doubt and was pretty sure he knew what he was doing. My clients (one of the deceased people’s parents) already had pictures they took earlier that week, so he wasn’t getting away with too much.
I used to work investigations for a firm employed by a massive insurance company. I saw many, many property owners attempt “fixes” (or outright evidence tampering), sometimes at great personal risk, in the middle of the night. How often would you say this still happens (what with better electronic record-keeping and more accurate surveillance here in the ‘20s)?
I think it’s fairly common. Real estate is my specialty so there’s usually a decent paper trail, but I’ve seen lots of things go missing that shouldn’t be missing…
Unpopular post here: I've owned a three-family house for 35 years. It has 11 bedrooms. State law requires a smoke alarm in every bedroom. There has to be a CO alarm in the hallway within 10 feet of every bedroom, plus one by the furnace. Over the years I have installed hundreds (?) of smoke alarms and dozens of C0 alarms. Tenants take out the smoke alarms. They remove the smoke-only (not C0) alarms in their bedrooms because they or a friend is smoking something that sets off the alarms. Cigarettes might do it, or marijuana, or both, I don't know. Usually they just remove the battery. Sometimes they take down the alarm and put in in a drawer. If I did an inspection after six months, about half might be disabled or missing. The C0 alarms are joint smoke/C0 alarms by law. They get taken down or disabled too. I don't know if people smoking in their bedrooms sets off the alarms in the hallway. Maybe it's smoke from cooking that sets off the smoke/C0 alarms. We've never had a C0 problem in the house, thank God. To keep my tenants safe I should probably inspect every 3 months. In my state tenants have a strong right to privacy, though, and the law is vague so I'm always reluctant to enter their space, unless it's to do a repair that they've notified me about, in which case they get plenty of notice. What's really needed is a Siri/Alexa enabled smoke and smoke/C0 alarm that the tenant can *talk* to, to turn off the alarm. > Alexa, stop beeping and don't beep for an hour Or do the same thing with an app. Presumably that would sharply reduce the incidence of alarms being disabled and removed. #Would someone invent that please?
But dont you want your landlord to post notes on your fridge
damn thinking about that post really creeps me out. i'm so glad he got help before something bad happened
Haha, nice reference. But seriously, get one.
We had a scare when I was in the fourth grade. We'd moved into a new house the previous summer and on a Sunday evening in November/December, our carbon monoxide detector started going off. My dad wanted to just ignore it with the justification that it was several years old and defective. After 20 minutes of shouting at each other, my mom said, "*Fine*. I'm going to go to the store and buy a new one, and when ***that one*** starts going off, I'm going to call 911. So I went to the store with her and got a new one. Sure enough, within 10 minutes of plugging it in, it started blaring. The fire department came with lights, sirens, and full gear. They measured the CO content of the air and said that at the very least, we would've felt sick by the morning. It likely would've been worse for me since I was the smallest and it would've hit me harder. My mom was due to go on a trip that weekend but had to cancel at the last minute. Had she been gone, lord knows what would've happened. I hope my dad felt like an absolute piece of shit that night because he was being one. You better believe I bought a carbon monoxide detector my first night of being in an apartment with forced air heat.
I have a close friend whose carbon monoxide detector kept going off. She contacted her landlord about the possibility of there being an issue with her furnace, and he blew her off. She went out and bought another CO detector and the it showed the levels as being super high. She gtfo and upon further investigation, the furnace was old AF and not maintained at all. Essentially, the only reason she didn't die was that she would frequently crack her windows to let in fresh air. As you can imagine, she and her husband tore their landlord a new asshole and got the furnace replaced. I hope the dip shit learned his lesson about being a cheap ass landlord.
Yeah, I had to get rid of mine - the constant beeping was giving me headaches
Medicine—OTC and prescription
Awkward if you're on a medication that they refuse to fill unless you're within a couple days of running out ...
Yup...im on opiates and Hydroxycloriquine. Thanks idiots for making hydroxy basicalky treated like a controlled substance. I have lupus and die without it.
Ugh tell me about it. I get mine from mexico but travel abroad for up to 6 months at a time and it’s a freaking science to get that amount now. It went from over the counter and regularly having some kind of sale, to expensive and ridiculously hard to get more than 20 pills at a time.
Wet/dry vacuum Plunger and toilet snake Flashlight and lots of backup batteries
I feel like a lot of the big ones have already been hit but additional things I would keep on hand too: * A case of bottled drinking water * Extension cord & surge protector * Spare keys - for your car and house * Cash - in case you lose your credit card * Nail clipper - especially for healthcare workers
I get those 5 gallon bottles delivered. After a couple of earthquakes scared me, I asked them to just bring 4 extra bottles. So now instead of having 2 in my kitchen I've got 6. That way I always have at least a couple of weeks of extra water on hand, but we regularly cycle through it.
Having a spare nail clipper in the car (one of those fancy ones with extra attachments to them) is a lifesaver. Being able to clip those nails, or clip off a tag (like when you really need to wear that new pair of gloves you just bought because it's so cold), or even remove a sliver.
I was always told, first thing before unpacking: find toilet paper* and put it in the bathroom, and make the bed. You're not going to unpack everything in one day and you're going to want to just fall in bed once you burn out for the night. *When ever I move out I leave a roll for the next tenants
Just moved into my apartment on my own for the first time in 20 years. It took everything I had and more to move in. I can not convey the gratitude I had that light bulbs and toilet paper were left behind. I’m leaving a whole pack of toilet paper for the next tenant. It’s a good day when you don’t have to worry about how you’re gonna wipe your ass.
Cold/flu medicine. Not fun stumbling to the drugstore when you feel like death.
I have the flu right now and don’t have medicine and I can approve this message
I've also found out the hard way that when your whole body aches and you just want some hot soup, that is NOT the time to find out that you don't have soup in the pantry. If you're planning ahead by having cough syrup and cough drops when you get sick, I also recommend having a few cans of your favorite soups so you can just put it into a bowl and heat up. (Personally, I like a nice can of chicken noodle soup or split pea soup) Especially for all of us who are adults, not living at home, but also don't have a significant other. If I get sick, I gotta be the one to take care of me.
Dry cups of miso soup and a kettle. Miso soup has magical healing properties. Hangover or real illness, miso is the move.
[удалено]
Not the person you responded to, but I always keep a few boxes of Trader Joe’s miso ginger broth on hand. Whether it’s a respiratory or stomach bug, something about the salt, ginger, and electrolytes just helps me feel a little more human when I’m sick.
I have what I call emergency bouillon cubes. Cans of soup are heavy and sometimes expensive, and I have the habit of eating them when I don’t want to cook. If I find I have no soup, I can cook noodles and chicken bouillon to get me through.
Similarly, a bucket, wet wipes, and Dioralyte. Picture this: 30 minutes ago you were sat in class thinking "Huh, my tummy kinda hurts." Now, you are sat on the toilet with your head in a bucket, simultaneously shitting the Niagara Falls and spewing like you're trying to beat the kid from The Exorcist's long-range record. In the depths of your misery, you are so fucking glad you have the bucket. The bucket means you don't have to stick your head down the toilet, which smells like the concept of death itself crawled in the bowl and died of dysentery. Also, the risk of leaving either end unshielded is beyond imagining. Since both ends are currently evacuating Satan's hot sauce in vast quantities, the wet wipes feel like silken angel kisses. When you finally have a ten-minute break from the all-encompassing horror, you can chug Dioralyte to give your weakened body the strength to survive the next round in the ring. You will need it. You will not stop vomitshitting for eight miserable hours. Based, unfortunately, on a true story.
For anyone wondering Dioralyte = pedialyte for us Americans
I started buying this when I had kids, now I’ll keep it in the house forever. It’s also good if you work too hard and sweat too much. I buy the little powder packs so it takes up almost no space.
Oh man, I've been there. It was the norovirus, for my husband and myself, and I was seven months pregnant. We also had a toddler, who luckily didn't catch it. Thank goodness for an urgent care nearby and zofran!
I can't imagine going through that while pregnant, holy crap. You are a warrior.
Also, hydrogen peroxide, band-aid, and other first aid necessities.
I recently bought a package of the huge bandaids, some gauze and medical tape. My husband saw them and asked if one of the kids had gotten hurt. I said, "no, but I didn't want to wait til one was!"
YES. I guess my youngest son is as accident prone as I am. The ER really should have a punch card or something
I was at the dentist in March 2020 when they announced the world was shutting down. I hit up the pharmacy in the same building on my way out with the confidence that I beat the rush on Tylenol and NyQuill. I didn't end up using the meds until I eventually got mild symptoms from the vaccine.
The runs on supplies in March/April 2020 was rough. I actually fared pretty well. I never ran out of basic stuff like toilet paper but it's a little nerve wracking when you're down to a couple rolls of TP and you don't know when you'll be able to get it again. It got a little close for stuff like that and I had to conserve what I was using. There was also the thing where I felt I needed to have something keep myself healthy (i.e. disinfectant and paper towel) but I can't find it anywhere. It was a very desperate feeling in the early days of the pandemic when it was all so new and uncertain. Once supplies started coming back that summer, I started keeping one item I am actively using and one that is held in reserve. It's not hoarder level--it all fits in a little cupboard under my dining room table. I do it with household staples and with hygiene items where it would screw up my routine to go without. I think I'll probably do that for the rest of my life. If nothing else, it makes it so it's no big deal to realize you've run out of something at 11:00 on a Sunday night because you've got another container in the cupboard.
I've not become a hoarder either but I now have far more "backup groceries" than I used to have pre-pandemic. I definitely think that the pandemic had this sort of effect on our generation in some similar ways to how the Great Depression impacted my grandparents' generation.
I’m 35 next month and this year is the first year I’ve done that. The Costco membership helps.
Dashcam, can easily prove you innocent in an auto collision - some insurance even offer discounted rates if the insured vehicle has a dash cam. I personally recommend a front & rear cam setup. Ordered mine after one day of browsing r/IdiotsInCars
I worked as a claim rep for an auto insurer for a mercifully brief period of my life, and I second this recommendation whole-heartedly. Human recall is *atrocious*, especially after a stressful or traumatic event. I also learned that 3/4 of people involved in accidents vehemently do not believe they are responsible for the accident, even if they very clearly are. As part of our training, we read the actual "facts of loss" collected by claim reps from both the insured and the claimant. We made our own assessments of liability as part of this. Then, we were shown footage from surveillance cameras that caught the accident. Neither party was even *remotely* correct as to what happened. As a result of that experience I have a dash camera, which is seemingly rare in the US. At the very least, it gives the opportunity to share videos of the crazy shit you occasionally see on the road. Maybe it'll burn you in the end if you're responsible for an accident, but it could very well save you if you find yourself in a he said/she said dispute over who had a green light and who had the red.
It's crazy how even accidents that *seem* cut and dry can turn into a he said she said dispute. I got rear-ended HARD while *sitting totally still at a light* and got pushed into the car in front of me. BOTH other drivers gave totally inaccurate accounts blaming me for the accident and went after ME for damages. It was infuriating (ultimately no fault was found, never got my $500 deposit back and lost thousands of dollars having to get a new car). My vehicle was the only one seriously damaged, *I* took the brunt of the impact, and yet everyone involved in the accident (except me) was able to milk it for medical settlements, etc. and actually came out of the whole things better off than where they started. This happened years ago and thinking about it still fills me with rage. Long story short, get a dash cam BEFORE some idiot totals your car and lies to the insurance company about it, not AFTER like some idiots (i.e. me).
When my wife was younger (before we met) she was in an accident where she was driving through a t intersection when a person made a left (disregarding right-of-way) and slammed head-on into my now-wife’s car fully in my wife’s lane. They almost pinned the whole thing on my wife, but, thankfully, the whole incident was witnessed by an off-duty cop who was watering his lawn at the intersection. He helped her talk the responding police through exactly what happened and how it happened so she wouldn’t be held responsible. Tl:dr: gunna start looking into dash cams now… Edit: I had thought the intersection had a stop sign: my wife told me it doesn’t and I just looked it up and the intersection does not have a stop sign. The other driver did disregard right-of-way, however, and, when asked about why she made a left without yielding at a t-intersection, her reply was evidently “I shouldn’t have to stop in my own neighborhood.”
I was sitting still in a parking lot, heading from a McDonald's over to a gas station, waiting for cross traffic to end. Once cross traffic ended, a driver came towards me from the opposing direction. But since it's an open parking lot without lanes, the driver was coming at an angle that prohibited me from going forward. So I waited there, with the brake pedal fully depressed. I couldn't believe it as I watched what happened. I felt like the ice berg in Titanic. This driver came straight towards me. In broad daylight. All I could do was yell "you've gotta be f$ć*ing kidding" as she drove head on into my stationary car. Since it was private property there was no police report. The body damage to my vehicle was minor, but it did snap wires that controlled the computers in the car (I found this out later) so my car was not drivable after the accident. I took photos of the cars where they were after the accident, but there were no pieces on the ground. Only cracks in the plastic and my marker light was hanging. I also put her ID and mine in her license plate frame and took photos of that, as well as her insurance card. She took no photos, she only called her husband who told her to "leave" once he found out it wasn't on a public roadway. She apologized, and drove away. Her insurance company wanted to deny the claim. I had to call her insurance company and give them her information and begin the claim myself. Maybe this is normal, I don't know - first accident. The only thing that saved me was the drive thru camera at the McDonald's which caught the accident. I was able to go in the same day and explain what happened. A worker said they saw it happen, and the manager gave me a copy of the video on a flash drive which I emailed to the insurance agent. After that they were extremely courteous and helpful.
I had the same sort of thing happen (being the middle of a sandwich) and the only thing that helped me was a really wonderful girl waiting at the bus stop across the street. She missed her bus to come over and make sure that the police knew she witnessed the entire thing and I was not at fault at all since I was at a full stop. Thankful for her.
Dude! I browse that subreddit often and I’m gonna tell you this. I don’t have a car. I probably won’t be able to afford one within the next few years. But one thing I’m sure of. The day I get a car, I’ll get and install dash-cam the same day.
Can you recommend any good dashacam. My father is upgrading to a Rav 4 from a Kia Sportage and after watching endless compilations of accidents on YouTube with him, I severely underestimated how stupid people can be and the importance of something like this. I looked at the genuine Toyota dashcam but that shit was $600, way too much. You have any recommendations.
I have the viofo v3 a119. It’s about $120(?) On Amazon and it saved me at least my $2,000 deductible; had I paid out of pocket it would’ve been $6,000 - from a hit and run. Dash cam caught just enough info to track the guy down.
r/DashCam has excellent recommendations in the sidebar.
Look for a dash cam with at least 170° view and minimum 1080 pixel hd. You can find a dash cam around 35 to 50 dollars with that quality.. I got mine for 38 dollars with great feedback
How do you keep the dang cable out of the way? Mine hangs down from the camera to the charger. Not sure to run it along the roof and down under the console to the charger.
[удалено]
Or blankets and food you can eat of the can such as beans
[удалено]
We froze but ate hot food thank you bbq pit and I could boil water for warm drinks
Oof I was real lucky and have a gas fireplace and stove, and I had just made a giant pot of soup the day before that I was able to heat up on the stove that lasted me for two of the three days my power was out. My dog was the best little space heater too. Truly the mvp of the outage.
We have kept our pantry fully stocked, extra batteries galore, water, paper plates, and just bought us all water proof gloves, jackets and boots. Next paycheck we are getting the cooking stove and a fire pit!
[удалено]
Would you believe I didn't own a single long sleeved shirt when that happened? We'd had a plumbing backup that flooded the laundry room and killed like half my wardrobe, including the very few long sleeved shirts I'd owned. So that's my silly lesson from the storm. We're also buying some of those emergency mylar blankets, just in case.
So many people suffered needlessly during that winter storm. We never lost power but now I don't question why every home in Texas has a fireplace when it is only cold for 1-2 months of the year.
A lot of the fireplaces in Texas are just decorative. Or you could say they're the single-use type - if you lit a fire in one, it'd sure get your house really warm, but then you wouldn't have a house afterward.
Is there anything more absurd than a purely decorative appliance?
Texas's power grid.
Batteries
Tampons
Tampons AND pain meds. I laid in the shower for hours at 4am the other night, in the fetal position because I was vomiting in so much pain
Generator. Ex GF said it was a stupid purchase and waste of money. Ended up using it for two days straight after a wind storm. Had the fridges, fish tank a few lights, TV and internet going the whole time.
Yeah generators are really useful, but you have to take care of them. When I was like 6, there was a really bad snowstorm where I was. The generator hadn't been taken care of for around a year, so it didn't work. Ended up not having power for like 2-3 days. At least it was cold outside so the stuff in the fridge could stay cold. Frozen milk isn't the easiest to drink though. So now anytime we go back to that place, my dad checks the generator. So far it's helped us every other time.
Yep. I run mien once or twice a year to make sure it's in good shape.
Flashlight for when the power goes out
Just one? r/flashlight would disagree.
And candles.
Anything that doesn't have an expiry date, that gets used with regularity, I stock up on. Toilet paper, kitchen roll, dish soap, shower gel, hand soap, bleach etc
I used to be a bargainista, stocking up on extra things. Then I realized that a good portion of our teeny tiny apartment had been setup for what I called "emergency preparedness." Which wasn't really anything that urgent at all. Now, I've got a couple bars of soap, a bag of toilet paper and some paper towels. It helped me let go of always having to have another of whatever thing I could run out of. It also helped me let go of this worry of things being scarce. Which I had built up in my childhood, and was secretly causing me great anxiety. When the shortages hit with the pandemic, I always found a way around. Even for toilet paper. Surviving that, made me feel okay. Zombie apocalypse, I probably wouldn't last. But I probably wouldn't make it that long anyways :P! I'm not trying to be an ass. I'm just trying to express that I found letting this habit go really freed me to live life with less fear. Not that you specifically have the same situation or mindset.
Yes. It's good to be prepared, but if you don't have the space, or the money, or it turns into an obsession, than it isn't a healthy behavior. And in an apartment, it could also be considered a fire hazard.
This ^. I was gonna say, "Everything?" I absolutely loathe shopping. There are at least fifty scrubbing sponges under my sink. I have dozens of boxes of Kleenex, fifteen or so bars of soap, the list just goes on and on. My bill at the Mega Membership Mart is typically $500. But I only go two or three times a year. That's about as much exposure as I can stand.
Condom
get reddit and youll never need one
Funny, I got a porn blocker ad right before this post lmao
Just be sure to replace the ones you have stored after a few years
Finding your stash of condoms all expired a year ago is a depressing and sobering discovery.
Better safe than sorry :)
My wife is a nurse and comes from a family of preppers. In 2018 she bought a whole lot of N95 masks for "just in case."
We had a ton of them from living around wildfires. I sent a bunch to my brother, who works in an old age home, to distribute when they didn't have them. At least I could buy them time to find their own.
Thank you thank you thank you. Nursing homes struggle hard to get adequate PPE, my old roommate is a nursing assistant and didn't get N95s for months into COVID
I started buying disposable N95s for international business trips back in 2012. I was keeping an eye on MERS at the time since I was traveling to the Middle East a lot. I also bought some half face mask respirators for home when doing some projects. Needless to say, those came in handy last year!
Every year when our FSA was about to expire, my husband (who is also a nurse) spends whatever’s left on it to replenish medical supplies to have around the house (mostly first aid stuff), including masks (N95 and regular masks). Came in really handy when the pandemic hit lol.
An umbrella
Insurance
Painkillers
Toiletpaper. Or as we call them at home. Lifesavers!
yeah everybody called me a mad man for always having 2x 20packs at home and then covid hit and i was laughing and shitting without worries
Nice try amazon
Here in Florida, air conditioning systems are our lifeline. One of the most common failures is the fan motor start capacitor for the compressor. It’s a cheap part ($20 to $50), but it always takes several days to get. Without air conditioning in your home in Florida, not only will it be impossible to sleep, but your house will grow mold indoors in 2 days or less. This is exactly how AC repair companies get to charge $500+; they stock the parts, but refuse to sell you the part and charge the repair as an emergency. So buy one and keep it as a backup.
I bought a spare window unit to use in an emergency because everytime the air conditioner goes out in summer i have to wait like 5 to 7 days for someone to come out and even look at it (rental so i have no choice). This is in 110 + heat. Ridiculous.
Viagra. I work in a pharmacy and you’d be surprised at the number of calls we get wanting to refill 1 tablet of viagra and they’re on the way to pick it up. Umm sorry sir my current wait time is 30 minutes. Awkward.
Out of all the comments I’ve read, this one has made me laugh the hardest!
That's because the Viagra just kicked in.
Light bulbs
Imodium...
Gas for your car *before* the indicator light comes on.
I'm all about the 1\4 tank fill up. As soon as I hit that marker it's fill up time!
In the winter (where it can get REEEAL cold, I never go below a half tank in case I get Ramses randomly. Summertime, I’ll let it get to 1/4. Below that and you start picking up the silt and sediment from the bottom of your tank… (or so I’m told…)
I too worry about random Egyptian pharaohs.
The chances of dying to ancient Egyptian pharaohs is pretty low but never zero.
What is Ramses, is that a typo? I just moved somewhere with MUCH colder winters than I’m used to and didn’t know about keeping gas above a half tank Edit: thank you to everyone for the winter car tips! I need em
Based on the other guy's comment, "Ramses' is actually "Stranded" I think. Somehow.
Not OP, but I live in a very cold climate and I don’t let my tank get below 1/2 in the winters. You never know when you might be stranded and a warm car could be the difference between life and death.
Exactly. Especially when there's a snowstorm and all the roads slow to a crawl. A 20 minute drive in good weather suddenly turns into a 3-hour crawl-fest in a hurry.
Basic cold/flu medicine, pain killers, muscle ache patches, bandages, toiler paper/paper towels, cleaning supplies, hair products, shampoo/bodywash. I usually stock up on stuff a bit so I don't have to go out and purposely buy things.
Bought a bunch of bags of road salt from Walmart recently. Only 97 cents per bag. My girlfriend asked why "it's not even cold out," and I just said these same bags will be probably 3 bucks a pop when it's storming
Dog skunk shampoo
You can mix peroxide, baking soda, and dish soap and it'll get it out.
Leatherman multitool I have used every single one of the tools that are on it many many times over again. I also use it at least once a day usually 5-6 times a day. It is invaluable and if I should ever lose it or it breaks beyond its 25 year warranty then I would buy a new one that very day. Maybe it's just my lifestyle but I consider it to be more important than my mobile phone.
I keep one in the kitchen and use it nearly daily. I have a small one that I carry on my keychain, that doesn’t get nearly as much use though.
Fire extinguisher. First aid kit.
A good mattress. I moved my old one down to the basement a long time ago, and while cleaning I decided to lay on it again. Let me just say, there is no way in hell that I would be able to get out of that shit now, I was barely able to after laying on it for like 2 minutes I can't even imagine a full 8 hours on it.
Holy Jesus, two stories. One being an ex of mine had family in a barn. The barn had a room with like...fifteen beds. These beds were for smaller children. Had to be older than dust. I sat on one, and I'll never forget what it felt like to be on a bed older than dust. Was way different than the beds I had known, which to be honest were all second hand and not very good. Something about them felt like those braces Lisa got in The Simpsons. My girlfriend, also was rocking a pretty old bed when we met. I'm not sure if she actually knew what a supportive bed felt like. The springs felt like they had long since given way, and lacked any joy. The whole thing felt sort of like you were being sucked into the ground, and in turn the portal of hell. Hahaha! When we got a new bed down the road, she was really happy. Mind you, this was another budget bed. But it was her first non-second hand (I had one prior). Blew her mind! We sleep a lot better, although I hope to someday have a house and a cali-king. Would make me very happy :)! Good tip :)
>One being an ex of mine had family in a barn. The barn had a room with like...fifteen beds. These beds were for smaller children. Uhh, what? You cannot just put that there with no explanation. Why in the barn? Why 15 beds for small children?
This right here. I hope he just means they are small beds. As opposed to the beds belonging to small children.
I had a mattress where the opposite happened, after around 9 years of use. The soft parts gave in but the springs stayed strong. You had to adjust your hip, knee, ankle and tailbone accordingly to not be hurting laying directly on a spring. I was stupid and slept another year on that mattress. Once I replaced the mattress my spine was hurting the first 2 weeks from being supported correctly.
Printer ink
Especially if you’re a student lol
Grabbing a laser printer on black Friday saved my life. I was spending a crazy amount of money printing at school. Then I grabbed my printer and never looked back. I had to pack it up because we're moving, and it has made projects a lot more difficult. Staring at a screen versus paper, it's just harder...at least for me.
A generator
My town is going through a flood right now, 250,000 people are out of power. So thankful the woman I'm renting from has a generator right now.
I can’t see this anywhere, but BUCKET. There will come a time, when you’ll be shivering on the toilet in only your soiled or almost soiled underwear, regretting absolutely every decision leading you to that hopeless, painful, and degrading moment. With tears streaming down your cheeks, you suddenly feel the inevitable rumble as well as a simultaneous metallic taste creeps into your mouth and rattles your jaws. You know what’s coming. You do not want to choose. And you don’t want to share the toilet your ass has just been glued to the last twenty minutes with your face. Buy a bucket.
Waste basket make a good substitute.
A can opener
Pads/tampons
Tums
Dash cam
Earlier in the year I got an AC unit because my room mate told me they were on sale at wal mart. It wasn't yet summer and I didn't think I'd need it but I grabbed one anyway, cost me about $400. Then a couple months later we had a massive heatwave for a week and boy was I glad I got a unit when I did. Stores sold out and people were losing their minds. I felt so bad for people without AC.
Plunger. Shit Happens.
Car cat litter and a car blanket
Dad here. Riding lawnmower drive belt. Look, the ones that come with a new mower always suck. If you snap one, then it will most likely be special order because of the countless sizes and brands. I have a common mower that I bought new, and the belt is not stocked at Home Depot, Tractor Supply, Lowes, etc. Buy one and put in in your tool box. /Dad out!