The pre-Coronavirus Diaries, continued
Sunday
Life continued as normal today. Was at church morning and evening, where we sang songs about God’s goodness and love. Nobody sounded fearful, but it felt like there was an air of resignation that this would be our last ‘normal’ Sunday for a while.
My fellow tech team member tonight was George, whose self-isolation game is strong all year round. I hope he starts blogging with self-isolation tips for the masses.
Phoned mum in the evening. She stayed away from church tonight, on social-distancing grounds. On the upside, her forthcoming 80th birthday will see her receive an additional 25p per week in her pension. She is understandably over the moon about this and unsure of how to invest her new-found affluence.
Tomorrow I am theoretically up for jury service. But a phone-call this evening confirmed that I am not required to attend tomorrow. 24hrs stay of execution, at least.
Monday
In the whirl of coronavirus-related uncertainty I put on a clean pair of trousers this morning, but forgot to add a belt. However, it’s ok – it turns out that my trousers are self-tightening. Should be ok so long as I don’t stash too many tins of tuna in the pockets.
My trousers’ new-found self-tightening status may or may not be a result of me powering through the 90kg weight barrier recently. Smashed it, I did. Left it choking on my dust. I look forward to renewing acquaintances with 90kg on the way back down sometime in the future.
Just after I’d sent an email to my work teams saying largely “business as usual this Sunday” the PM, without checking with me first, holds a press conference and instructs us to avoid “non-essential” social gatherings.
So we’re into the next phase.
My Sister gets in touch on WhatsApp:
“Y’all ok? Enough turmeric?”
Then she sends me a link to where I can buy a 25kg bag of it online. I am grateful.
Not required for jury duty tomorrow either. On reading the “Coronavirus Update” page on the Scottish Courts website, I am fairly sure that they consider the judicial system to be “essential” social contact. So I don’t think Coronavirus is going to help me here.
Tuesday
On reading my previous post (I originally wrote “last post”, but a slow trumpet sounded in my head and I realised that has other connotations), some pointed out to me that I visit the supermarket a LOT.
I confess I hadn’t thought about this. But, perhaps because I live very close to Morrison’s, and not that far from Sainsbury’s either, perhaps because I have very little freezer capacity, and perhaps also because I don’t plan very far ahead, I am probably in a supermarket at least every other day. So my regular supermarket visits are not a result of coronavirus-related panic, but rather just the outcome of a permanent state of semi-disorganised food planning.
Is this a single-person thing? Or just me? It may be just me.
Today is my usual day off. I am accustomed to spending Tuesdays without much in the way of social contact, and some Tuesdays I don’t really leave the house anyway(!) so today probably won’t feel all that different.