How to buy toilet paper

In case you're wondering how to buy toilet paper these days I offer this:

I'm not in a panic. We have a few weeks of T.P. and food stuffs left , maybe three if we're careful. After that we'll have some not very fun food storage left like beans and rice and flour,  and some cans of soup and spam.  But I am thoughtful these days about what we'll do when we run out, so I thought I'd try to see what I could find this morning and I had a plan based on some earlier observations.

When we tried Smith's by our house yesterday on our way home (after dropping off a car for repairs) at about 5 minutes before they opened at 8:00 a.m. we found a long line of people waiting to get in the doors. Since I was with my daughter and she was not up for a challenge on her only day off, we decided that I would come back later.

 When I went back an hour later the shelves were empty of t.p. but I picked up one of the last packages of Paper Towels. Water is also gone but I don't really care about that because that is the one thing I have plenty of.  I like to fill up used vinegar and juice bottles and keep a good water supply. Well except that I like to have distilled to run our humidifier. oh well. I got eggs and milk. 

This morning I figured I'd try my luck and figure out how the line works.  I arrived at 7:45 a.m. thinking if I could handle waiting in line for 15 minutes.  There were about 40 people in line ahead of  me.  Others arrived and got in line, but there were others who saw the line and just stood by the cart stand in the parking lot near the front and in other places thinking they would just go in on their own when the doors opened without getting in line. I was nervous about them as there were murmurs from people in line about them not being in the line. Oh geez I thought, is there going to be a stampede or something. "I am not going to run, no matter what." I don't need anything that bad.

 At 8:00 a.m. an employee came out and yelled some instructions that I could not hear, someone ahead of us told us that he said "One Toilet Paper package per household" and "put 3 ft between you and other people".  He opened the doors and allowed the line to go in, when the others from the parking area who were hoping to go in started for the doors some of the people in the line started screaming at them; "You're not getting in here!" and "Get in line like the rest of us!"  it was embarrassing and I felt bad about this because some of the people were older. Not elderly, but one guy was definitely in his 70's. I didn't feel bad for the four middle aged men who had a bit of an attitude,  looked like they were hunting buddies, and maybe came together. (?)  They looked to me like they thought they were tough guys that didn't need to get in line. If they hadn't been there I think the others would have been accommodated by the line Nazi's.

Ok, once inside the store, people went all kinds of directions and a few of us towards the bath tissue isle, which I found curious. Weren't these people ALL here for the hottest commodity too?  The isle was completely empty of people and t.p. and I was bewildered!  I circled back to the milk and asked a woman who had t.p. in her arms-holding it like a baby, where she got it. She told me they were unloading it in the Floral department. How did I manage to miss that sort of important bit of information? 

By the time I got there the big packs of Angel Soft were gone and they were handing out little Cottonelle packs. I told the lady handing them out that I waited in line and then went to the toilet paper isle and found it empty. She said "Sorry you missed the announcement, you should have followed all the people."   Like a little kid who got in the wrong line for lunch I dejectedly took my little package and left. 

I immediately vowed to my own brain "I'm not ever doing that again!"  but then realized I have told a few elderly neighbors who will also need toilet paper soonish, that I would pick up some for them!  I can imagine many different senarios a store could implement that would be better than what I saw today;  handing out tickets, letting elderly customers go first, having signs up about line procedures or explaining where the goods have been moved, etc

On the way out of the store I yelled out to several random nervous people coming in "Toilet Paper's in Floral !"  I wanted to also yell "God help you!" or "May the force be with you!" but I didn't.

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