Greetings, loyal minions. You Maximum Leader thinks he and the Villainschloss dodged a bullet last night. He’s heard that his area might have made the regional (like Mid-Atlantic region) news. His neighborhood was hard hit last night be wind, rain, and hail. It was a terrible storm. One of the worst your Maximum Leader can remember. Luckily it passed quickly, but not before knocking out power (which is not unusual in his neighborhood actually), and knocking down so many trees. At least 2 houses on the main street of the neighborhood were lightly damaged by falling trees. By light damage he means glancing blows where a competent roofer will likely be able to finish the repairs in half a day. But one house had two trees fall directly on to it. The fire department and building inspector told them they had to evacuate and stay elsewhere until the county could do a safety inspection. Your Maximum Leader feels particularly badly for the homeowners. They bought the house (which was in very very bad shape) at an estate auction. They have been working on it all through COVID and just got it finished about 2-3 months ago. They were so happy and proud of their home - as they should be. Now to have this happen is no good. Villainette #1 was good enough to get some dog food and dog treats for their 2 dogs. We also got them the number of a hotel in the area that will take them and their dogs. It is going to be a tough row to hoe for them.

Beyond the immediate neighborhood, there is a lot of damage. Lots of trees lost. Lots of cars damaged. Quite a number of homes. It is not looking very good right now. But give it a few weeks and it may be mostly back to normal. At least your Maximum Leader hopes it will be.

Carry on.

Greetings, loyal minions. Your Maximum Leader is, as anyone reading here knows, a great fan of pork. If you follow your Maximum Leader on the Twitter (@maximumleader) you would be able to follow is (nearly) annual trek to buy the Easter ham. This is his pilgrimage called Hamquest. (You can see his Hamquest here.) On Hamquest your Maximum Leader leaves his home and travels to Smithfield, VA to get the ham he will serve up at Easter. Smithfield, VA is the Pork Capital of Virginia. And the eponymous company based there, Smithfield Foods, is one of the largest pork producers in the world.

Well, there is news from Smithfield. The headline says it all: Smithfield Foods stops slaughtering pigs at U.S. hometown plant. Here is some of the piece:

Smithfield Foods, the world’s largest pork processor, has stopped slaughtering pigs in the United States’ so-called ham capital, where the company was founded 85 years ago.

The end of slaughtering in Smithfield, Virginia, is the latest reconfiguration for the company’s namesake plant and follows a months-long internal review of its East Coast operations, Smithfield Foods said in a statement.

The company, owned by Hong Kong-listed WH Group, is shifting slaughtering to some of its 47 other U.S. facilities and spending $5 million to upgrade the Virginia plant to produce more packaged bacon, ham and other pork products, said Keira Lombardo, chief administrative officer.

Smithfield, Virginia, is a tourist destination based on its history as Smithfield Foods’ hometown and boasts a museum featuring the world’s oldest ham.

This is sad news. But at least Smithfield Foods isn’t leaving Smithfield…

There is that fun line in there about Smithfield Foods being owned by a Hong Kong listed (aka: Chinese) firm. Your Maximum Leader has known a number of people who were quite bent out of shape when WH Group bought controlling interest in Smithfield Foods. There was a lot of discussion that seemed to center on how the Chinese were going to take over the pork market. Your Maximum Leader, while leery of China broadly, is quite sanguine in this matter. It is sort of like the “scare” that dominated our national consciousness in the late 80’s and early 90’s about how the Japanese were buying everything and were going to “own America.” That scare was just that, a scare. Is the situation with Chinese-owned US firms the same? No. They aren’t the same. But are they analogous? Probably. The Chinese can’t pack up Smithfield Foods and all of its pig farms and processing plants and move them to China. And shutting down the business defeats the purpose of owning the business. So if there is a nefarious plot afoot, it is quite subtle.

Anyhoo…

It is a little sad to think that Smithfield, VA may not actually be the Pork Capital of VA. But it remains Smithfield and your Maximum Leader will continue to go and get hams from there for as long as it is possible to do so.

Carry on.