New Tariffs generate a lot of crap.

Do proposed tariffs cause frequent bowel movements ?

       We were shopping in COSTCO today. This wonderful store is both well-equipped and organize by knowledgeable staff. It is a pleasure to shop there.

           For some reason, the store was unusually crowded today. Hoards  of our older population were meandering up and down the aisles. perusing all of the products being offered. This is different from the usual crowd of manic shoppers, racing up and down the aisles, trying to over fill their  large shopping carts with all of the provisions that they might need to feed a hungry invasion of visiting family and guests.

           What we did notice however was that almost every one of the Senior shoppers had about eleven hundred rolls of toilet paper stacked up in their carts. We hadn’t seen a need like this, to protect the integrity of their lower intestinal tracts, since the early days of Covid.

            We concluded that the intestinal uncertainty was caused by all of the television news hoopla, about the international Trade war currently being waged. “Shortages, shortages,”  the media screamed. “Prices are rising by 400 %.”  It has people worried. We figured that they reacted to their increasing stress levels by “panic buying.” We had observed this phenomena many times  in Western New York, during the Winter months. Intense T.V. coverage, of a coming blizzard or storm, virtually emptied the shelves of grocery stores. Bread, milk and fresh produce disappeared in a day. Then as now, we could never figure out why people bought so much toilet paper. Maybe the increased stress levels collectively  loosened the bowels of everyone over  a certain age?

     By our reckoning, every senior citizen in Florida already had seven hundred rolls of toilet paper cached away, from their Covid Days. And now they were adding to that cache? Oy Vei ! They would have to jam all of this new paper in amidst the fifteen dozen eggs, that they had bought last week, during the Bird Flue shortage and price rise scare. Those must be some pretty big basements!

       We also noticed that Pepcid, and other stomach medicines for indigestion, disappear during period of stress like these. Do you think the bottles of Pepcid are secreted beneath the eggs in their stash?

        We felt almost guilty in not having purchased some Charmin or any of the other name-paper products, reasoning that Georgia Pacific and other American paper companies would rise to the occasion if they were needed. 

        Maybe the medical community should start proscribing watching the evening news, for bouts of constipation? Something in that hot air connection is producing a lot of crap.!

                                                    =30-

                                           (438 words)

                                   Joseph Xavier Martin