One Sunfresh grocery store in Kansas City Mo reports drastic increase of sales of bottled water, toilet paper, and batteries on Tuesday Dec.25th. Quote for manager - "Water sales were up 500% and he is bringing 18 - 20 pallets of water everyday this week."

-- james willis (KC, MO ) (joshua@kctera.net), December 29, 1999

Answers

I can concur. Saw that this morning. I wonder what Westport will be like tonight.

-- Simpleminded (nope@wont.never), December 29, 1999.

Where I live, in "upper bracket" suburban Kansas near the KC, MO line, the people seem oblivious. I noticed the gas stations were, at times, completely empty today. Convenience stores still had piles of small bundles of wood for sale at $3.99. The places that looked really packed were the shopping malls and the restaurants. Water sales in the super markets are up and there is some sign that canned food may be experiencing a slight increase in sales, but nothing drastic. The woman who delivered my wood said business was good, and although I got an excellent price from her, I have a few friends that really got gouged by other suppliers that cited Y2K demand as the reason for the exorbitant price. The bottled water company I deal with said business was booming, but I believe it's more a matter of Y2K pushing people who were already considering putting in a water machine with 5-gallon bottles of water...to finally do so. I don't think a lot of people are really stockpiling water in any great quantity. For two years I have studied the Y2K issue. And, in that time, I have read over 100,000 pages of documents and essays on it. Yet, in all our friends and acquaintances, only one person has ever asked me for more information on Y2K. The, upper bracket, stock- market invested people I know through the neighborhood, my childrens'schools and other activities are just not interested in hearing anything about Y2K. It clearly made them feel uncomfortable and they refused to even consider the issue. It has certainly been an interesting and eye-opening experience for me. Now I have met a few interesting folks in the craft trades (plumbers, electricians etc) who are taking Y2K seriously but the common denominator there seems to be the fact they were all in the service at one time. Having been in the military, has no doubt given them a broader, more cynical view than the one held by the general public (in my opinion anyway). At this point, 11:30pm on 12-30-99, I would describe the people in my area as fearless and clueless...let's see what tommorrow brings.

-- Meg Davis (meg9999@aol.com), December 31, 1999.