I came back stateside recently to news of one of the driest marches and aprils in recent history and one of the wettest mays so far in recent history. Which is really, really bad for a great plains state. Pretty much none of the fields that are normally grown for the spring harvest are grown, cattle are either in mud pits or grass that looks like it's already august, and the small town I'm staying in has had water pressure issues county-wide for the last 6 months.

Anecdotally from a gardening family, pretty much nothing they've attempted to grow this year so far has worked out, while some non-productive drought-resistant plants they didn't even know were on their land have flourished. And that's with manual watering and trying to protect from the 50 degree F temperature swings some days.

This will probably dox the state if you're clever, but half the state has reached drought conditions that are unprecedented since records started being kept, and half the state has had some of the harshest storms on record with the expectation that it'll continue well into autumn.

That's putting aside the ridiculous level of food inflation. I was in china the last couple of years -- what do you mean a bag of flour is almost an hour on minimum wage? What do you mean cheap 70-30 ground beef is more than an hour on minimum wage? what the fuck do you mean a 5 lbs bag of rice is almost $7 now? What do you mean potatoes are spoiling within a week of bringing them home because the stock is so old? What do you mean bell peppers are a dollar or more each?

Food in China, even imported meat, is actually 150-300% cheaper than in the rural midwest compared to income. Every stage of the US food production and retail cycle is fully collapsing.

I'm friends with a miller and he's been having lots of trouble getting grains to the point where he is alarmed about it. He only does organic though but he said even the big corporate sources are turning up empty. Worth noting because he said he's never seen anything like this

Local lakes serving the corpus christi industrial/ refinery complex are down to only 8% now catastrophic levels . It would probably take two consecutive hurricane direct hits to refill. The industry is major american refinery complex and plastic and steel/aluminum as well that could be shutdown right as this iran shit is all poppin off. Its a large enough output that it can have some global market level effects

For years the refineries have been sucking down millions gallons per day while fucking over the populace and contaminating the water supply. They tell the citizens to take shorter showers while they get special privileges . They could have done desalination years ago but they didnt want to compromise by dumping the salt in a way that wouldnt murder the entire coastal ecosystem. Now the city has been pumping like 27 emergency wells that are highly contaminated with beta particle activity from naturally occurring radioactive geology, also about to cause major salt water intrusion into the gulf coast aquifer from such rapid pumping.

its getting pretty serious . Water quality is what i would casually call toxic for the past couple years of this drought as they draw from various bad sources.

"there are specific lubricants that manufacturers require to meet spec for their cars. Those oils can only be made with group III base oil. We make almost 0 group iii base oil domestically. The plant that makes nearly 40% of all group iii base oil was blown up and has been offline for months"

Hearing chatter of Shortages of many lubricants hitting stores.

https://youtu.be/hCEJDU9_p4Q

A youtuber takes a look at the water levels on the Colorado river / Lake Powell in winter 2026.

The YouTube comments are about the lack of snow throughout the american west.

snowfall and cold degrees across sweden equally

cold north cold south with meters of snow

elders in the south speak of winters like these in the south last happening in the 60s 70s

i recall winters like these in the north in my youth last - 00s

This was the stormiest summer I can remember since I was a kid. Very erratic weather patterns and high heat/humidity. This is in the Upper Midwest. By contrast the summers before - 2nd half of 20 & all 21/22/23 were summers of absolutely parched drought. We have had wild swings in this part of the world owing to increasing climate instability.

Huge proliferations of wildflowers along with the moist conditions.

There seem to be ongoing crackdowns on homelessness and various kinds of unlawful behavior such as speeding, drunk driving, etc - there is a very strong feeling of a police state again after a lax period during and after Covid.

I recently found out that a neighbor of mine is collapse-aware and so are both his adult daughters.

Their three lives are an interesting set of responses. Each took a different path.

Person #1: radical simplicity, prepper, gardener, minimalist

Person #2: party animal, live for today, just enjoy it while it lasts, cook, party, have a fun time, develop no plans or commitments

Person #3: career driven and trying to get as rich as possible before it's no longer possible, driven towards individual independence from society

For a while I've felt that some ancient Greek philosophies relate to collapse. Each of the three people would fall into a different ancient Greek school of thought.

#1 = skeptic/stoic

#2 = epicurean

#3 = cynicism

Previous thread: https://lemmy.zip/post/42743815

Corpus got some big rains so lake back up to 20% right from the edge of doom

arrgh. there are thes little things that hit me all the time but of course atm can't think of them. Its like you see an ad or something on the news and its like. what. which jogs my memory a bit. One is this add for ai with homes or houses dot com and people ask for whatever they want and its like. I got a list here for yeah. Comercial never gets into the point where they realize they will never be able to afford it. Then like in the US this old largest steam engine is making a tour for the 150th. Largest steam engine ever. Originally it was coal but its been converted to burn used motor oil. Seriously! this is how we are celebrating. That monstrosity should be parked in a museum and not burning oil to tour the nation. Its kinda funny because when you read about it they kinda paint it as a good thing. Its burning used motor oil which is toxic to the envorment so its good we are burning it and putting it into the air. Sigh.

since @vagrancyand@sh.itjust.works @anarchitect@lemmy.zip lists as being banned and im not sure why I will just add here that I see what he is talking about. Quality of produce has fallen and I have this thing with paper towels. I know it may sound wierd but we have used these items for years and yeah you might have a sheet that does not tear right once a year. heck maybe even once a month. oftentimes it was you just tearing badly. Lately. In the last year. We can't get a roll that does not have a bad perferation so it cannot tear right. No we did not change to a cheaper knock off brand. Its bounty we would get in bulk. Im like 100% they likely are not maintaing the equipment properly and that is likely because they are running without appropriate levels of staff and likely have lost their most knowledgeable ones and stuff is needing to be figured out. Its like the most glaring thing I have seen right in my face but you can kinda see it with everything. Like even canned goods don't seem to be done to the same level of quality.

Insanely dry in the Midwest. More bad storms than ever before. If it does rain it floods.

Gonna get a lot worse. Trying to floodproof my house.

https://old.reddit.com/... hate to link reddit here but this thread about how retarded kids are now is apocalyptic