Feest Isolation Days – 2 April 2020
Book group last night! Six of us sat around my house and discussed our book. Except no one left their own home. We were all on our preferred devices in our own homes using Zoom. It wasn’t near as nice as being all together in the same room and sharing a nibble and a cuppa or a glass of wine, but it beat not having book group at all. We plan to “meet” again at the end of the month. Some of the group are still working and they’re all working from home and getting quite proficient at using Zoom and other methods to do their jobs. It doesn’t take too long to adapt!
Our modern technology opens up so many possibilities! Tonight, we plan to watch a You Tube National Theatre production at 7:00. I like that they state a time, and you can’t just watch it anytime you want. Nice to have a bit of shape to the evening, and I love writing a few things in the diary again.
Another observation from Grumpy of Clifton…We listen to the daily Number Ten press briefing which is on every day at about five and often learn something from the experts. We don’t learn much from the journalists! They keep asking the same old questions and expect a different response. Yes, there needs to be more protective equipment. Yes, there needs to be more testing. They could cleverly give us all a bit more information if they asked their questions in a more considered way. They all ask the same things over and over and clearly haven’t read the information that I have about why Germany is testing more for instance. Can I please ask a question? Maybe I’ll write to Laura at the BBC or Robert Peston with a suggestion.
Food occupies our thoughts a lot more than it used to. Having to order weekly and not go into the shops ourselves has its benefits. We sit down together and plan what we will have for a week and then go and order online from Reg the Veg or via text to the butcher. Our next grocery delivery is still a few weeks away, but with Amazon to fill in the gaps, we seem to be just fine. There is plenty of fresh food in the house and the freezer is constantly getting replenished. Nothing goes to waste. We use every morsel of food we have in one way or another. Roast chicken becomes left over salad and then the carcass is boiled for stock and becomes soup. Although we’re ordering weekly, we are careful and aware that we may not have this luxury in a few months time. Who knows what the supply chain will be like in May? Not much is thrown away. It reminds me of our beloved Doris, Terry’s Mum, who lived through the war and never let anything go to waste. Finding uses for each and every drop of anything that came her way was second nature to her. I always marvelled at the plastic bag she had tied onto her slow dripping bath tap. She wanted to save the bath from the rusty streaks that the water caused. But one day I saw her, bag in hand with the few drops that had fallen watering one of her plants. Nothing wasted. Hope none of us waste food, water or the opportunity that this enforced time at home is affording us.
This may be just one tiny step too far using technology! But it made me smile, hope it does you, too!
With love,
Kathy x