March 12, 2020

Toilet Paper By the Square? Really?


Eli stayed home from school today because he's sick.

Ordinarily, I would just think it's no big deal--he has a cold with the classic cold symptoms. And I'm pretty sure that's all it is! But with this huge coronavirus outbreak, I kept him home from school--he doesn't have a fever, but he's congested, coughing, and feeling very tired (he slept all day).

Yesterday, I noticed we were running low on toilet paper, so Jerry stopped to get some on his way home from work. He went into Kroger and then sent me this picture:


There was NO toilet paper!

What the heck? I haven't been on social media much, but if I had been, I would have seen that people are hoarding toilet paper. Why toilet paper? I don't get it.

This coronavirus is getting a little crazy. I know that it's serious, and I'm taking it seriously, but not to the point of "hoarding toilet paper" seriously.

However, we needed toilet paper and the hoarders took it!

In these cases, I try to think outside the box when it comes to finding something we need, and considering Lowe's is pretty much my home away from home, I thought that they might be in stock. Most people don't think of Lowe's when they need something like toilet paper.

This morning, I dropped Noah and his friend off at school, and on the way home I stopped at Lowe's. Sure enough, they had toilet paper! I bought a couple of packages. Later, Jerry asked if he should pick up one more, just to be safe, since everywhere is sold out (I even looked on Amazon, and nothing was in stock). I told him to go ahead and grab another pack.

Well, Lowe's was sold out by 2:30 PM! When I was there at 7:45 AM, they had about 60 packages (I checked the app to see what was in stock before I went). By the time Jerry got there at 2:30, it was ALL gone.


I told him to try Staples, and thankfully, they had another few packages in stock. I'm not one to hoard supplies, but when people make it completely unavailable, it's kind of nerve-racking.

Out of curiosity, I looked up toilet paper on eBay to see if people were selling it at insane prices, and I couldn't believe what I saw:



People were selling it BY THE SQUARE. How ridiculous is that?! Do buyers not read the description before purchasing?

Seeing how many things have been canceled over the last few days, I'm really glad that we canceled our trip to San Francisco. And now I'm wondering whether Eli and Jerry should go on Eli's class trip to Washington D.C. at the end of April. I'm SO glad that I bought insurance with their tickets, so that we can cancel for any reason up until the date of the trip and get a full refund. We'll wait until it gets closer to decide.

This whole situation with the virus has been so surreal. I don't think my kids fully understand what a big deal it is that whole countries are closed!

4 comments:

  1. Hey Katie, I think the school will cancel the trip DC in advance; but, my suggestion if they don't--stay home! Most of the Smithsonian museums (U.S. Capitol Visitor Center) and entertainment venues (e.g., Kennedy Center) have closed until further notice. There wouldn't be anything for them to do here.

    Hope Eli is on the mend soon! ~ Janet

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  2. I know it's crazy. Everything is cancelled here in CA.

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  3. I've seen the thing about toilet paper as well, and I wonder if a lot of people thought along the same lines as you? As in, they need toilet paper, go to buy some, realize everyone is buying it up, so they buy more than they need, compounding the problem, etc. I am curious if people are actually "hoarding" supplies or if it's just everyone is shopping more than normal. The convenience store near my apartment is out of a lot for instance, but there are over 1000 people that live in my building alone (not to mention the 1000s that live within 1-2 blocks of me). So it's understandable that things would run out, without it necessarily meaning people are buying more than they need. Just interesting to think about!

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  4. How will they get those squares in time? I'll just take a shower every time if it comes to that!

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