January 27

Our snow has ended and is already melting off the pavements. The sun is out right now which makes it hard to see to read or stitch even with the blinds down.

We did our shopping today though the only stop we really needed to make was the dairy. Our favorite clerk had reserved two quarts of their yogurt and we picked up the usual gallon of milk. She mentioned something that was interesting. Though almost all of her customers had friends and family that have contracted COVID but none of her customers themselves. I told her that reminded me of an article I read just recently which said that having a healthy gut "microbiome" seemed to provide some protection and pictured some of our favorite cultured foods: yogurt (which we eat 3 or 4 times a week, sauerkraut, pickled beets. She said most of her customers also consume yogurt and other fermented foods frequently.

Thankfully we didn't need any of their Amish produced meat because they had been run out over the weekend and Monday. Our Clerk said her customers were reacting to the weather predictions. As we left Mom and I laughed a bit. We didn't react to the prediction other than to decide not to go out while the snow was falling. We have enough to shift shopping two or three days either way.

I was surprised at our second and last stop: gas was up to $2.49/gal. I wondered about that and what might have caused an increased of $0.30/gal. My brother noted the same thing and attributed the increase to President Biden's cancellation of the Keystone pipeline. I don't think that alone was responsible since that pipeline was not yet transporting oil and all of the oil, from what I had read, was slated for export, i.e. not for our market. Brother also said he was glad he didn't live in a neighboring town (where he had once lived) because they are imposing a tire tax. I am not surprised since almost all governments are in a fiscal crisis thanks to the increased demands of revenue and reduction of tax receipts due to the pandemic. That is a big bite for Brother because he owns several vehicles. So far our town hasn't done the same.

Just finished reading an interesting piece by Alfred McCoy on Tomdispatch: Rip Van Biden. It did feel like we had awakened from a nightmare when Biden was inaugurated though we woke up to find that all the problems we had when we went to sleep are still present, are all more extreme and have only been exacerbated while we napped.