Topping up on supplies, testing, coffee, suntan!

This morning I ventured into the village to top up some essential supplies, protected by my trusty homemade mask. It may not be prefect but it’s better than nothing.

At the chemist’s, where I was collecting some eyedrops on prescription for Phil, the chemist seemed not to understand that we had found out via the internet that the prescription was waiting for us. She insisted on taking a mobile number so that she can text me on future occasions and prevent my going in on spec. Except that I wasn’t going in on spec. Quite likely we both thought the other was some kind of technology refusenik who didn’t understand how things work.

From the chemist’s I progressed to the co-op, where they still have no lettuce, no flour, no paracetamol. Does all our lettuce come from Spain? It is supposed to be the biggest provider of salad stuff in Europe. Is there a problem with distribution? Is that why there continues to be a shortage? Or maybe it’s just a co-op problem. I hear that flour is in short supply everywhere. It’s all the people who have just discovered the joy of baking cakes and making their own bread. As for paracetamol, surely people have stockpiled enough by now. On balance, of course, I should have thought about it while ai was in the pharmacy. That would have been more logical! So it goes.

I note that the government has failed to meet its target for coronavirus testing. I wondered how they were going to keep it up. Maybe a bit of openness, telling us in the first place that they had not quite made it, instead of spinning the numbers, would have been better.

Here is an article about the BBC responding to criticism of the Panorama programme about the failure to provide adequate PPE.

This I think is my favourite bit of criticism:-

 “Since the programme aired, a number of NHS workers who were interviewed for it were reported to be either longstanding members or supporters of the Labour party.”

And suddenly the BBC is not impartial but has a definite left-wing bias!

Mind you, there appears to be an unspoken agreement that we must not criticise the government in this time of crisis. Even the new leader of the Labour party has been praising them for doing a good job. Really?

On the unlocking of the lockdown front I read that Costa has started to re-open some of its drive-through branches. Consequently coffee fans spent hours queueing in their cars, incidentally creating traffic chaos, in parts of Yorkshire and Scotland, Watford and Nottingham. Does going to a drive-through coffee shop count as an essential journey? In some countries the drivers would need a certificate of some kind saying why they were out and about.

Costa makes fine coffee in my humble opinion but surely those people in the queues would do better to buy themselves a nice little coffee maker, the kind every Italian household has as a standard item of kitchen equipment. Then they could make a really fine cup of coffee whenever they chose to do so. But maybe for some normality means getting your coffee in a throw-away cup, drinking it in your car and chucking the cup out of the car window! The Costa baristas, by the way, were reportedly wearing gloves and masks!

The sun is shining again. So the sunbathers are back in the neighbouring garden. So it seems are their visiting grandchildren - busily social-distancing in the garden.

On the menu today is a mushroom and ham omelette with a variety of vegetables. The salad of baby spinach leaves and tomatoes might be supplemented again with fresh dandelion leaves from the garden. So the dandelions are useful for us as well as for the bees.

Life goes on. Stay safe and well, everyone.