Don't piss on my leg and tell me it's raining

Gotta admit, I'm sick to death of listening to Biden talking about how he's rescued the country from the "disaster" it was when he inherited it. (Spoiler alert - he wrecked it, not whoever he's blaming it on this week. Don't care about your political party or who you voted for - this is recent.)

Gas prices in Southern California are back above $5/gallon, after a period of them going down. Not down to pre-Biden levels, but at least not in the $5+ range. That didn't last. Oh, and a bank just crashed and there's a good chance that starting tomorrow the stock market is going to do the same. Peachy.

Prices of everything are going up. I don't know how people are surviving, especially those that have to commute to work (1 hour+ one-way isn't unusual here in L.A.) and provide for children. The closest thing I have to a kid is the lovely Sophie, and even she's getting expensive. Case in point:

Yeah, there's cheaper cat food, but Sophie is old and has gotten picky as heck in her old age. In fact, if she'd eat the even more expensive specialty food for kidney disease that she rejected, I'd pay for that too. But I'm also not in the position of having to decide between feeding kids or the family pet, so I'll take the hit and she'll continue to get the fancy-schmancy stuff.

Anyhoo, this box of twelve servings has always been in the $11-$12 range, depending on where I buy it (Target, Walmart, or a grocery store). About a week ago I was at CVS and it was priced at a jaw-dropping $22. Not making that up. TWENTY. TWO. DOLLARS. I probably should have taken a picture, but I was too stunned by that number to think about it.

So instead I went over to Pavilions where I was sure it would be a lot more reasonably priced. Not, as it turns out. I was shocked to see what they were charging. Not as bad as the $22 CVS wanted, but the price has skyrocketed at the grocery store as well. EIGHTEEN DOLLARS.

 

"Regular" price. There's nothing "regular" about it.

The only thing that brought it down to close to the old price was being a "member". Otherwise, nearly twenty bucks. For twelve servings. She'll go through that in well under a week.

And that's just cat food. See that Diet Dr. Pepper? Next time I bought it (at Ralphs) it was nearly $4. For one 2-liter bottle. Looks like I'm going to have to think about giving up the luxury of soda like the good peasant I am. You know who isn't having to concern themselves with prices or sacrifices? Know who isn't worried about feeding their families and pets? You know who isn't going to be eating the food made out of bugs? Our political overlords and their fellow elite, that's who.

It's galling enough to watch the world fall apart around me, but I don't need the insult of our so-called "leaders" telling us how much better it all is than a few years ago. I mean, isn't going broke, a stock market crash, and the looming possibility of World War III so much better than a booming economy with record-low Black and Hispanic unemployment? Depends on who you ask. If you ask me, the answer is HELL NO. But there are politicians (and let's not forget the complicit media) who will look you in the eye and tell you everything is dandy. Because they have nothing but disdain for you and don't care what happens to you. And some of you will still continue to support them. I don't know how or where this is going to end, but it's looking pretty dire right now. Forget the concept of a dystopian future. That future is now. We're in it.

Sophie will be fine, but I'm now wondering when we're going to see stories about people having to give up their pets to shelters because they can no longer afford to feed them and the kids, and well, they can't very well drop the kids off.