After a rather fraught night I poured away the last of the
skanky milk and opened a fresh bottle for this morning’s brekkie. I watched an
episode of “The Good Place” before having my morning’s root around
Facebook. Quite a few people were posting brain-teasers on Facebook (which
is more than many usually do), but there was a worrying undercurrent of
resentment aimed at the NHS workers. A week ago the sun was shining out of the
bum of the NHS workers; this morning there were quite a few other key workers
who were rather envious of all the free coffee, half-price pizza and special
shopping hours supposedly being offered to NHS staff.
There is something of a misunderstanding here. The free
coffee and half-price pizza are very limited in numbers (maybe fifty to one
hundred when there are about a thousand or so eligible for the offer), and
these offers are issued on a first-come first-served basis. Advertised by internal email, they are snapped
up by those who have time to be constantly reading internal emails.
As for the special shopping hours, speaking for myself the
special shopping hours coincide with when I’m working, and from what I’ve heard
any “key worker” can turn up; the criteria for being a “key worker”
being to declare yourself as such.
I got dressed taking care to let
sleeping dogs lie. Now that we are in British Summer Time I put on a thinner
summer shirt (I have winter shirts and summer shirts – it came as something
of a surprise to find that most people don’t) and set off work-wards. As I
walked to my car I was very conscious that I wasn't wearing a winter shirt. The
summer ones are much thinner and it was rather cold this morning.
Last week the roads in the morning had
been much the same as ever, this morning the roads were noticeably quieter.
Lock-down is starting to really take effect. As I drove there was talk of the
virus on the morning news. It would seem that this lock-down will realistically
be in place for at least three more months.
Looking back over the last few weeks I was rather sceptical about the
whole coronageddon pandemic when it first kicked off.
It would seem that I was wrong.
However the whole thing is a classic
example of "the boy who cried wolf" isn't it? With the media
having been declaring the end of the world so many times over the years, when
something serious happens (like this current pandemic), no one takes it
seriously. I certainly didn't. I would suggest this is why so many people are
still flaunting the advice to stay at home and are still staging parties and
barbecues.
And talking of serious, the pundits on
the radio were saying that the virus has now taken a hold in Africa (a
little behind the rest of the world). If there was ever any doubt, my
Moroccan jolly planned for July is now definitely out of the window. I just
hope that the week away planned for August can still go ahead. At this rate I
can see my holiday this year being downscaled to a weekend in a tent in the
back garden.
I got to work for the early shift. Some
early shifts are straight-forward. This one wasn't.
My plan was to go to Aldi after work. I went to Aldi, took
one look at the queue and came home. I got the odds and sods we needed from the
corner shop, then took the dogs round the park for a walk.
One of the many disadvantages of coronageddon is that what
with many people off work and not allowed to drive and are only allowed out
once a day, Viccie Park is getting more than its fair share of “The Great
Unwashed” who until last week would never set foot in the place from one
year to the next.
We met a young family. Mum and dad had three young children
with bikes. They had clearly never ridden their bikes before; all were going
full-pelt in straight lines and could only stop by jamming on the brakes and
falling off. Mother or father would then run up, stop the crying, and watch
helplessly as each child then sped off again only to be in tears thirty seconds
later.
We met a musclebound chap doing his sit-ups. Pogo thought
it was a great game and started licking his face.
And then we saw a father and young child both on a scooter
being towed by a dog the size of a cart-horse. It was going rather well up to
the point when a squirrel ran across the path in front of the dog…
It was with a sense of relief that we left the park, but
just as we were passing the shop up the road from home I overheard some “delightful
young lady” bellowing into her phone that she’d gone right through the park
and was at the shops by Singleton. I wondered if I should tell her that the
shops by Singleton were about two miles away, but I thought it best not to
interfere in other people’s balls-ups.
I
phoned my mum and dad to wish them a happy wedding anniversary. Ideally we
would have visited, but visiting isn’t something that happens at the moment.
And having phoned them we had an experimental video game with "My Boy TM"
and his tribe. “House Party” is a
rather good app in which you can see people with the video camera whilst playing
silly games.
If
only I could get my mum to do this sort of thing…
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