The Crunch Hits Home

The "downturn" in the economy has come home to roost in the Adseg unit. We've always had a budget and needed to stick to it. I don't know how much money we have to spend and I don't really care. It's not my job to watch the nickels and dimes. It's my job to watch the inmates.

But we have been running out of supplies at an alarming rate. It started out as little things. Now it's getting really inconvenient.

Being an Adseg unit and having some of the nasty loose in our house as we tend to, we are usually a little more hygiene conscious than most places. I wash my hands about ten times a day and use that hand sanitizer stuff in between and I go through maybe a dozen pair of latex gloves a day. It's necessary. The incidence of HIV and hepatitis and other potentially irritating diseases is alot higher in our house than anywhere else on camp.

We have been out of paper towels for over two weeks now. Not just us, the whole camp. There are a few places that have a carefully hoarded supply, but not many. My boss has paper towels in her bathroom. But her supply is running low, too. The Major has paper towels. The Warden has paper towels. They may be running out too. I don't know. I don't talk to those people unless I can't avoid it. We've been reduced to using old state issue t-shirts left over from the inmate laundry to dry our hands. And that's hardly sanitary. Our supply of liquid soap and hand sanitizer is running low as well. Soon we'll be forced to use the state issue soap which is about as useful as washing your hands with used linoleum.

And to top it all off, we heard the other day that our supply or latex gloves was rapidly running out. This is not good. Not good at all. What the hell are these people thinking? I'd like to stand up on my hind legs and make the state comptroller or whoever it is that controls the budget come down and see how many inmates he'll put his hands on with his bare skin. "You got any cuts or open sores or even torn cuticles on your hands? Any openings for infection? Well, this guy has got full-blown HIV and possibly scabies. And you have to strip search him and go through every piece of his clothing and property with your bare hands. Sucks to be you, buddy."

Between work and home, I tend to do alot of things with my hands and end up with alot of cuts and scrapes. I work alot with wood and metal and sharp objects and always have little cuts and nicks and dings on my hands. I try very hard not to catch anything. I even keep a bucket and some bleach handy for my boots when I come home. When we had babies in our house the little ones loved to play with daddys work boots. I made sure they were clean. And more than once I've come home and stripped off and thrown my uniform straight into the wash with extra soap and a touch of bleach when things got messy. I'm not bringing a case of the awful never get overs home.

If we run out of enough stuff then things are going to come to a sudden halt. This is not a threat or work stoppage, or anything. This is a statement of facts. And if they start running out of food they better spend some money on ammunition because things are going to get ugly.