Since today's normal upload was just 2 pictures, I thought I'd post a brief update from today's shopping. One of the rules that the state has made to allow grocery stores to stay open is to require markers to show the recommended 6-foot spacing between people waiting in line. Fred Meyer made up some quite nice custom stickers that they used for this purpose.
Don't sit on the furniture! One of the big rules -- which I think most other states have as well -- is to require food businesses to be take-out only with no seating available. I suspect that the display seating in the Fred Meyer furniture department was a victim of this rule, since Fred Meyer is probably only able to remain open because they sell food. I went today because I needed a new power strip, and I was slightly worried that they would be only selling food items, but luckily that wasn't the case. As a side note, I really like the pillows and rug in this picture!
Retail Retell, this one's for you! (And anyone else facing a bread shortage, that is... I hear that many parts of the country are having that problem.) The selection was looking slightly bare here, especially since the Safeway-brand bread section was filled out with large quantities of only a few of the varieties of bread that they normally have, but there's clearly no shortage of bread to go around! And one thing that they've consistently had lots of through this weird time is my preference, potato bread! Apparently that's not very popular for some reason, but it's always been my favorite.
Here's a glimpse at Safeway's solution to the 6 foot demarcation rule -- red duct tape stuck to the ground. Certainly a lot less professional looking than what Fred Meyer has... Honestly, I'm not even sure what the markings in the self checkout section are even supposed to show, and the sign isn't very helpful since it shows a very different configuration to what actually exists here!
To wrap this up, here's a brief glimpse of what Metro is doing for transit service during this weird time. They're requiring rear door entry on all buses except for people who need the ramp (which also includes removing fares, which is nice), and have recently installed new signs (which look rather long-term) on the doors and the funny bands (they're calling them "safety straps") to block off the accessible seating area and driver's area from the rest of the bus.
Hope everything is going well for you guys! Around here, I'm getting very mixed feelings -- the state has announced lots of new restrictions on what people and businesses can and can't do, and people are really starting to get nervous about long-term impacts, but at the same time, some things (like grocery stock levels) are returning to normal -- Safeway even had toilet paper back in stock today! Not much of it, but still, that's a big change from the last few weeks. Hopefully we'll start seeing a turning point in everything soon, but I'm not holding my breath.
Toilet paper and all that other paper stuff is still in hot demand here, and bread has been getting picked over pretty quick too. Target had big red dots on the floor to push the social distancing thing, and I've seen a few other stores do the tape markings on the floor too. Publix, Winn-Dixie, and Target also have dedicated "cart wipers" standing by the front door too. When someone walks in and asks for a cart, the cart wiper will take a Clorox wipe and wipe the handle of the cart or basket down before letting the customer have it. Compared to other states, Florida doesn't have any crazy restrictions out besides closing movie theaters and switching restaurants to drive through or carry out, although some of the harder hit counties in South Florida (Broward, Palm Beach, and Miami-Dade) got more restrictions from the governor than the rest of the state. We don't have a statewide stay at home order either like most states, and our governor said he won't issue one due to how it would unfairly impact the Panhandle Counties (where most have zero reported cases of the virus) and cripple what's left of the state's fragile economy. A few counties issued orders on their own (Orange and Osceola - which make up the Orlando area, as well as Palm Beach, but those are the only ones I know off the top of my head). Personally, I'm ready to never hear the word "coronavirus" ever again!
ReplyDeleteI'm ready to be all done with coronavirus stuff too, but it seems like it's not going anywhere fast! It will be interesting to see what happens with Florida... our governor said the same thing as recently as a couple weeks ago but as matters just kept getting worse he ended up changing his mind. Remember, we were the first to get hit with the crisis, and with everything moving south and east, you'll probably be among the last areas to be affected. Hopefully everyone in your area will learn from what we did, good and bad!
DeleteSome grocery stores around here have the same cart sanitation thing going on, but others don't which is kind of surprising. But at least they're starting to get stock in again, which is a good sign! It feels like things are starting to reach a turning point on the long road back towards normalcy... or at least they aren't getting worse quite as quickly as they had been over the last few weeks! 🙂
Ha, thanks for the shout-out... yep, been forever since I've seen a bread shelf stocked even that well! It's slowly getting better, but still selling out quickly whenever it is stocked, evidently, since I haven't been able to find the brand I like. Toilet paper is nonexistent as well, but water has finally come back in stock - boatloads of it, in fact! Unfortunately no one seems to be buying it since we all stocked up during the panic :P
ReplyDeleteI saw those same checkout distancing things at Target, but not anywhere else. And while Sam's did have one of those cart wipers AFB mentioned last week, this week they had no such thing - and in fact were out of wipes entirely.
It seems like we're definitely getting back to normal with most groceries around here, which is nice to see! Since we were hit first up here, people stocked up earlier than they did in other areas, so (like what you were saying about bottled water, though that isn't something that people panic-bought around here) now no one's buying stuff as it's coming back in stock -- which is great for people like me who didn't panic buy! Stuff like soap, hand sanitizer, and cleaning supplies is still sold out, but other items -- most notably toilet paper, but also food like tortillas, pasta, and frozen food of all kinds -- that had been sold out for a while is starting to slowly show up again. For whatever reason, though, bread was never really affected, and what you see here is even with Safeway running a very good sale on their brand bread (which sometimes results in this store running low even without a crisis in progress!).
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