Coin Shortage

Our local news recently included the following story on Kroger running out of coins.

https://www.newschannel5.com/news/kroger-to-no-longer-return-coin-change-to-customers

First toilet paper and now coins.  I swear…2020 is just fucking with us now.  I don’t know what comes next in this soviet staple shortage, but I would start hoarding coffee if I were you. 

I don’t understand how we can have a shortage of coins…where do they go??  [If you are prepping for the apocalypse by saving nickels…I think you’re doing it wrong.] 

What makes this scarcity of scratch so alarming is that printing money is literally our country’s entire Covid strategy.  I mean….have you seen any OTHER action come out of Washington since this started?  Now after hundreds of years of coinage, we’ve suddenly lost the ability to get even that right.  Did someone let Jared Kushner near the US Mint?  And what does that tell you about our ability to get vaccines to 300 million people??   [Depending on the timing of its introduction, I am betting the vaccine distribution issues disproportionately affect “that woman” in Michigan]. 

Don’t get me wrong – I have long been a fan of getting rid of pennies.  I throw them away just to show my annoyance (to whom – I don’t know, but I am a defiant discarder nonetheless). Rita is not a fan of my penny disposals.  And she catches me frequently since she is forever monitoring the household trash deposits lest something should be composted or recycled or reused or something.  She thinks I should save them and donate them to a good cause.  I think any “good cause” would prefer twenties.  Remember when Unicef used to distribute those little cardboard coin banks as a fundraiser?  Yeah – now they have paypal.  Rather than saving pennies for our charitable cause, let’s just save the castoff bills I send through the laundry and redirect those to the offering plate.  That is going to be a MUCH better deal for St. A’s. 

In response to the coin shortage, the Federal Reserve recently issued the following encouragement to banks:

“The Federal Reserve System and the United States Mint are taking corrective steps to meet this demand and have made plans to distribute coins where they are most needed until inventories can be returned to acceptable levels. We ask that you, as the public's depository institutions, assist in reducing the strain of low coin inventories by making it easy for your customers to deposit coins.”

“Reduce the strain of low coin inventories.”  That is NOT what qualifies as a strain in the age of Covid.  Nonetheless…banks should “make it easy for your customers to deposit coins.”  Looks like we have a patriotic duty to return our coins to the banking system.  Fine.  I will return my pennies. 

Just call me Rosie the Depositer.

Home Cooking

Knowing that she was going to be unable to get around for four weeks, the number one question people asked Rita after her ankle surgery was “What are you going to eat?”  I think it would have been nice if people would have asked how she was doing – but I guess folks knew if she was eating my cooking food from me, they wouldn’t have to ask how she was doing.

Luckily, we were referred to a local chef who, during Covid, has been making pre-prepared weekly meals.  Someone should tell her how she saved our marriage. 

Rita and I have a pattern of asking for the food to be extremely healthy (sans grains and cheese and sugar and butter and….) and then regretting that direction once we realize how good something would have been with cheese sauce instead of the cashew queso.  Maybe the chef could just TELL US there’s no gluten in here, but then “accidentally” include a loaf of sour dough.  [Rita will strenuously deny she feels this way, but there is a cheeseburger wrapper in the trash that suggests this is not all my embellishment.]

Our order includes about five dinners a week.  Which, unfortunately, still leaves a few windows for me to fill in.  I try to remind Rita how we loved that one dinner of popcorn and wine, but Recuperating Rita doesn’t think a complete lack of nutrients is the way to go. 

The first meal I made for Rita during her confinement was….coffee.  You may think that doesn’t count as cooking, but you’ve never seen Rita’s coffee.  Anything that requires a measuring spoon, a blender and an opportunity to use the wrong kind of oil [<= all true, btw] should get me at least silver medallion in kitchening, right??! 

After practicing on the coffee for a week, we moved on to the main event….me making dinner.  That’s right, 2020 has McC cooking and again I say….what the $@^#&, 2020?!

Oddly, I think Rita may have taken extra pain meds that particular day.  As did I.  Now…I want to ask you….do you remember being a little stressed the first time you cooked dinner for someone?  [Granted you were probably 17, but think back.]  Now imagine that “someone” is…Rita. 

To satisfy your curiosity – the lucky meal was orange cajillo street tacos.  “Street tacos” being the current foofy way of describing one of the simpler meals someone can make.  It’s a fine line (or tortilla, as it were) between a taco and a sandwich.

I don’t know why I picked chicken tacos because Rita is certain that cooking raw chicken is a sure-fire ticket to salmonella-ville for everyone but the surest of chefs.  So I'm sure she wasn't worried at all.  I decided I should turn the water on in the sink a whole lot so she thought I was washing EVERYTHING all the time.  Besides, which is worse, salmonella or Covid?

If we suddenly start eating out, you will know we've decided not to risk salmonella again.