Blast looks at his can of SlimFast, rereads Ironraven's post, looks at can of SlimFast again...

Checks ticket prices to Vermont...

-Blast the Hungry

Fuse packed. Let's hit the road!

-Blast

Geez, you guys -- get a room!!!

(I recommend a kitchen by the sound of it...)

I'm pretty sure that MRE's would be ok for a summer just about anywhere in the USA, even Death Valley. According to this chart: MRE longevity , they would be good for 5 months at 110*F. I'm betting that it is the average temperature that matters, not the extreme. Same with canned foods like Dinty Moore (one of my favorites) or Spam. What worries me are repeated freeze/thaw cycles. I've noticed that both taste and texture become seriously degraded after a hard freeze.

Oh, oh my. If I'd known that you were on that stuff, I wouldn't have said a thing. I'm so sorry, that was so mean of me.

Job stress/insane hours has added 15 pounds to me in the last two years. If it weren't for SlimFast I would have added double that.

-Blast

I feel for you. I gained 35 pounds in law school and it took forever to get it back off.

We cycled our MREs about every three months in Iraq. KBR must've done the same at the Army Chow hall with their food too.

They had what they called milk in little cardboard containers like individual juice servings come in. I saw a pallet of them out back of the chow hall sitting in the summer sun all day long. Whatever they make that stuff out of, it doesn't taste a whole lot like milk, but it doesn't spoil easily either. I think it had a shelf life of 6 months or more at ambient temps.

I was damned glad the wife kept sending me a regular supply of milkman powdered milk mix. It is better than carnation, and a lot better than what was in those cartons. I bet you could use that carton milk stuff to whitewash a picket fence and it'd keep it in good shape for a decade.

Don't worry Blast, I gained 20 pound in 5 years of college (math kinda kicked me around the block a few times), and about 40 pounds after the bone and joint specialist suggested that if I want to have a shoulder at 60 I should stop lifting. Only lifting and hiking have ever been able to take the weight off of me, and I not allowed to have time for the latter any more it seems.

Probably used irradiation to preserve it. Back at the 1982 Worlds Fair they were giving away boxes of it about the size of AquaBlox. I don't remember how it tasted or what the shelf life was but you were supposed to be able to store it unrefrigerated.