Another little niggle is the time of delivery, definitely not early in the morning. The milk can arrive any time between 11.00am and 3.0pm, which necessitates multiple trips to the front door to check as on sunny days the milk will heat up. However, on the whole we are pleased to support our local farmer and I no longer carry 2-litre bottles of milk back from the co-op a couple of times a week.
A consequence of the milkman’s failure was that we had very little milk in the house for breakfast and so I had to go to co-op store anyway. As Storm Francis has been lashing the area with rain and blowing stuff around I decided not to run but to don my raincoat and wellies and walk my round-the-village running route. A chance to check out the state of the paths. It’s just as well I wore my wellies. There is a section of the path which has had a large puddle for a few weeks now. Some enterprising person used some broken planks from the fence to make a precarious bridge a ross the puddle. This morning the planks were floating in ankle-deep water and the puddle had extended by about two metres at each end.
The rain has paused for the time being and I have done my bit to encourage further improvement by hanging washing up to dry in the house. Had I hung it in the garden it would be sure to rain in no time. Now we might see a little sunshine.The river is very full after a night of heavy rain.
Yesterday, we did a socially distanced family along bridle paths - admittedly a bit mud-puddly - and canal towpaths - less mud-puddly - in the sunshine. The change from one day to the next is quite severe.
In the local co-op store face-mask wearing seems to stand at customers 100% and staff 0%. Cashiers are behind a screen and wear gloves but shelf stackers and sweeper-uppers have no protective gear. I would have thought that they might wear face coverings for their own protection as much as anything else.
Meanwhile schoolchildren over the age of 12 in Scotland will be required to wear masks in corridors and other places where social distancing is difficult. One of my granddaughters commented yesterday on how difficult it would have been in her old high school to keep your distance from others in corridors, even with a one-way system enforced. So far debate continues about the wearing or not of face coverings in English schools when the students return in September.
I read that the singer Van Morrison regards the idea of social distancing and other such measures to be pseudoscience. He has an understandable desire to see music venues opening up again to full capacity crowds. After all musicians, especially those who depend on performing to make a living although somehow ai doubt Van Morrison falls into that category, are really suffering at the present time. He wants to “save live music”, saying socially distanced gigs are not economically viable. “I call on my fellow singers, musicians, writers, producers, promoters and others in the industry to fight with me on this. Come forward, stand up, fight the pseudo-science and speak up,” he said.
His fans are not totally convinced though. On the singer’s Facebook page, self-professed Morrison fans gave a largely scathing response to his appeal for full-capacity audiences. “This is madness. The science is real,” said one. “We love you, Van, but calling pandemic management protocols ‘pseudo-science’ is probably the dumbest and certainly the most dangerous idea you’ve ever put your name to,” wrote another.
Maybe one day we’ll be able to stand outdoors again with thousands of people listening, singing along and dancing to music we love once again. But not yet!
Life goes on. Stay safe and well, everyone!
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