Well it looks like gold has shaken free of the artificial restraints. I read that we would see $1500 per troy ounce by January 1st, and I think we will see it. We also saw predictions of $2000 and $3000 and ounce, but I dismissed those out of hand. Gold's price has been artificially manipulated for a while now, of this I have no doubt. I'm not claiming the Illuminati are doing it to further their plans of galactic, inter-dimensional conquest of the left wing conspiracy or whatever. Just with the inflation we have with a fiat currency gold should have broken $1000 a while ago, and is now going to correct itself relative to the weak US dollar.

Speaking of a weak dollar, I'm now having to pay attention to what stuff costs. And my dollar doesn't go that far at all. Not that the prices have changed that much, it's the contents and packaging. For example, Lay's Salt and Vinegar potato chips used to go on sale for $.99 for a 7oz bag. Now they no longer make them in that size, all you can buy is a 12 oz "family size" for $2.99. Huh, three times the price for less than double the amount of product. And Lay's saves production costs using less packaging, etc. Not that it's Lay's gouging us to make a huge profit, their costs have gone up as well.

I've been noticing this all over the place in the grocery store. I fully expect this trend to continue as people, even my frugal butt, don't notice these sorts of things until money becomes such an issue. They are sheeple for a reason, contentedly browsing the pasture, oblivious to the wolf in the woods.

One good thing about being a prepper, is you tend to buy a lot of extra when on sale. I bought all kinds of italian sausage the other day, as it was $1.99 a package instead of the normal $3.99. Took it home, vacuum sealed it in the foodsaver and tossed it into the freezer. Like wise, I bought a ton of pre-cooked breakfast sausage for a $1 a package. Handy because I actually eat breakfast these days. For a quick meal I'll heat them up and eat them with pork 'n' beans.

Back to the economy. Shadowstats.com has the unemployment at 22% nationally. Almost one in four people are out of work. How come there is no rioting in the streets is beyond my comprehension. I've been hitting the pavement real hard looking for a job, but it seems that almost all the companies slowed down their hiring this quarter. All the phone calls I was getting have dried up. I still have a few irons in the fire, but I'm not hanging my hat on anything.

Talking with guys at the club, or neighbors, or random strangers when standing in line, I get a pervasive sense that people are trying to be hopeful, but there is doubt lurking in the shadows. Everyone, and I mean everyone I spoke to has a brother or sister, son or daughter, mom or dad that has been out of work for months. As a country, we can't take much more of this. Someone is going to have to keep paying for the family member out of work. What happens when there are two, or three people in the family out of work? How much more debt can they pile on?

Stores are already running their "black Friday" sales, in order to lure customers into them. I wonder if they are trying to get the cash they need to stay afloat, hoping to lure consumers to spend more on the holidays then they normally would?

There is so many strange things going on, and it's not adding up. Consumer and retailer behavior are out of sync, the government is playing doctor instead of focusing on the economy. It's like they see the economy as fixed, when obviously it isn't. Maybe they realize it cannot be fixed, so they are throwing the mother of all smoke and mirrors show to distract everyone from something they would really freak out about?