APPS

OK so here I am. The 'Ranting Middle Aged Spinster' back 3 months after I last posted on this Blog. When I posted my last Blog on 31^st May 2020 I had no idea that life 3 months on still wouldn't be back to normal. But it's not and to be honest I'm not sure whether it ever will be again.

On the 4^th July when hospitality opened up in England, it actually seemed like life was getting back to normal. People could go into pubs and restaurants and book holidays in the UK.

Mmmmmmmmmmmm...........................

It was at this point that 'APPS' became the new normal. Grrrrrrr....................

So one has to book a time slot to go into a pub or a restaurant and one cannot stand at the bar. Everything has to be 'waitress service'. And when one goes to one of these establishments one has either to get one's temperature checked or has to provide 'track & trace' details. To be honest I'm not sure how the 'track & trace' detail thing works, because I know for a fact that a restaurant that I went into a week ago, had a staff member test positive yesterday and I still haven't been contacted. Anyway I will RANT about the 'track & trace' thing at a later date.

APPS...................................

APPS are the new way of ordering food and drink. Apparently Weatherspoons have been doing this for ages. Well before Covid struck. Now it appears that everywhere wants one to order via an APP.

I am 61 years old. I do not want to order via an APP. Part of the experience of going out for a meal involves pursuing the menu and actually having a real life person to serve you. Looking at the options, choosing what one wants to eat. Not scrolling through some APP that actually doesn't even have half the options on it.

For example a couple of weeks ago myself and a friend went to a very well know cocktail bar. I ordered an Aperol Spritz via the APP. My friend wanted a strawberry daiquiri, that she'd had numerous times before, but it wasn't on the APP. That resulted in her having to go up to the bar and actually ask a real life person if they still served them. They did but for some reason it wasn't on the APP.

And a couple of weeks ago myself and friends booked into a restaurant and were told we had to use the APP to order, but we were seated in an area which had no wifi or 4G network. Seriously??? Nobody came near us for half an hour so eventually we had to go looking for a real live person who could actually come and take our order. #whatiswrongwithgoodoldfashionedpenandpaper

And continuing on with this RANT....................... Went into a Weatherspoons pub with some friends a couple of weeks ago. One of my very techie friends managed to order our drinks via the APP. Mmmmmmm.................... how do you say on an APP that you only want one lump of ice or that you don't want half a pint of lemonade poured into one whisky???????

…...............But the worst APP experience was.............................

Waitress rocked up at our table with a trayful of drinks that she said we'd ordered and paid for. Errr................. no we hadn't. Obviously we would have drunk them given half the chance. Turns out they had been ordered via an APP at another Weatherspoons pub down the road.

APPS – I HATE THEM!!!!!!!

LIFE IN LOCK DOWN - 10 WEEKS IN LOCK DOWN

By tomorrow we will have spent 10 weeks in lock down and even though the lock down restrictions are gradually being lifted, life is no where near getting back to normal. At least for me it isn't. Because I'm 61 years old, self employed in the hospitality industry as a 'meeter & greeter' for visitors to my city who are staying in short term lets, and my main source of income comes from a property that I let out in a so called 'tourist hotspot', I have had no income coming in for the last 10 weeks. I haven't been able to claim any of these so called Government handouts. The property I own in a holiday hotspot is listed as a 'second home' so throughout this whole lock down thing I haven't been able to claim anything. However, if I'd registered it as a 'business' I wouldn't have had to pay council tax and I also would have been able to claim government grants of up to £10,000. But I didn't. So I can't. I'm paying more than £180 every month in council tax and water rates. And for what? I'm not putting any rubbish out in the bins, I'm not using any water, nobody should be going out at night so we shouldn't need to be paying for street lighting, the public toilets aren't open, etc. etc. etc. Are any of us going to get a refund on our council tax? I very much doubt it.

Anyway I must stop ranting. The only thing that has kept me sane during this whole lock down thing is........................... the fact that I am very grateful for the life that I have. Ie, I'm not a single unemployed mother, living on the breadline, with six kids in a high rise flat.

However, when I set out on the 1^st May 2020, to record my thoughts on this blog (every day for 31 days) about random things during the coronavirus lock down, I never actually realised how easy it would be. I like to have little challenges to work towards every month but I actually thought that posting something everyday about my thoughts and feelings, as a 61 year old single female, in lock down for one month might not actually happen because I didn't think that I would have enough to write about. Writing every day has actually made me realise that I have loads to write about. It doesn't matter to me if one person reads what I write or a million people read what I write. I write for ME. I write because that's what I like doing. And if it's online then I'm guessing it's out there forever. A little bit of history in the making.

I'd really love to be 'techy' enough to add photos and links etc etc etc into my writing but at the moment I can't. Perhaps I should use this lock down phase to learn how to do it. But actually, I'm pretty lazy and the weather has been fab recently so I'm quite happy to sit in the sun with trashy magazines.

Anyway I've just found this bit of blurb that I wrote on the 9^th March 2020. (See below). It's not even 3 months later. Who would have thought our lives would have changed so much in such a short space of time? And who would have thought that only two weeks before we went into lock down that I would have thought that Coronavirus wasn't a threat?

Written on the 9^th March 2020

Coronavirus

I seriously have to have a RANT!

This Coronavirus thing is driving me nuts. What is it about everyone that is making them 'panic buy'? What's the toilet roll thing all about? The Coronavirus doesn't affect the bowels. Or the pasta thing? If people are stock piling pasta are they also stockpiling jars of pasta sauce or are they thinking they'll still be able to go out to the shops to buy fresh stuff to go with their pasta. ….........After all who on earth wants to eat plain pasta??!!

I can understand the anti-bacterial hand-wash thing. ….............Actually I don't really understand that either. What's wrong with good old fashioned soap and water?

The media has hyped up this so much it's driving me crazy. Would everyone have gone so mad if we didn't have Facebook and Twitter and Instagram and all the other social media outlets that are encouraging people to go into 'scared mode'?

The world has gone mad!

We live in a very mobile society. Fact! I live in a big city where people from all over the world visit. I work as a 'Meet & Greeter'. Ie, I meet people at short term lets, shake hands with them, give them the keys to the property, show them how stuff works and then off I go. I'm very rarely with them for more than about 5 mins.

However, 0n the 13^th January 2020 I met a very nice Chinese girl. I don't think I'd actually heard about the Coronavirus then. But if I had, I certainly wasn't too bothered about it. Anyway, I helped 'very nice young Chinese girl' up 86 stairs to a top floor flat, because she had the biggest, heaviest, suitcase in the world and I am a very nice meet & greeter there was no way she would have been able to take it up that many stairs by herself. So we huffed and puffed our way up all the stairs. Obviously my hands were all over her suitcase and I also shook hands with her and I was probably in contact with her for more than 15 mins. And did I use the anti-bacterial hand-wash that had been rolling around in the bottom of my handbag for more than a year, after I left? I did not!

Fast forward almost 2 months...................... She could have had Coronavirus and I could now have it. Because 2 months ago no special measures were in place.

To be honest, I don't read a lot of stuff. And I absolutely HATE politics. And for a 60 year old, I'm very fit & healthy so am not in a 'high risk' group. Well I am because apparently anyone 60+ is high risk?? BUT, what I have read and what I have heard is........................ FLU has killed more people than the Coronavirus.

I personally think its the fact that everyone these days has access to 'media scaremongering' and that is what is responsible for blowing this whole thing out of proportion. Yes the Coronavirus is scary, but that's because it's an unknown virus which as yet doesn't have a cure. And yes, it probably will kill a lot of people before a cure is found. But there again so did measles and chicken pox and mumps and scarlet fever and numerous other diseases. And did all this panic buying and stock piling of stuff go on in the first half of the 20^th century, when people were dying of the above diseases? It did not! Because it was just accepted as a way of life and actually there was no way of knowing how much of an epidemic the country was facing. Until one read a newspaper. We might be in the 21^st century but 'natural' disasters will still win every time.

All this 'lock down' stuff and 'self isolating' stuff is not going to work. Coronavirus has spread too much for any of this to be effective. The whole world is in the grip of a contagious disease which, as yet, we don't seem to have a cure for. FACT!

Soooooo........................ in my opinion we should just STOP all this stock piling of toilet rolls and pasta and paracetamol and hand sanitizer and whatever else people seem to think they should be stocking up on.

In my opinion, the people who are doing this are being really selfish. The people who are 'stock piling' aren't the ones who are at risk. The one's who are at risk are the elderly and ill and they don't have the privilege to go out and buy 72 toilet rolls at one time. Only quoting 72 toilet rolls because it popped up on my FB feed that a woman had been spotted coming out of Pound-stretcher with 4 x 18 packs of toilet rolls. WHY?????

I personally, will carry on with my daily life. I will continue working as a 'Meet & Greeter' and I will continue to shake hands with people. Though I have to say I used my hand sanitzer after I shook hands with an Italian the other day. Media hype is driving everyone crazy.

Coronavirus is worrying. Of course it is. But seriously.................. Let's just all get on with our lives.........................

#Lifeisnotadressrehearsal

And now we've almost completed 10 weeks of lock down and the death rate in the UK is the highest in Europe. More than 40,000 DEATHS. That is seriously scary. When this whole thing started we were told that the UK could be facing up to 20,000 deaths??!!  BUT that was more than 3 months ago and  I obviously didn't have a clue how serious this deadly virus was. That's why I love writing things down and looking back to see how I actually felt at the time of writing.

My challenge for the month of May was to write something about my life during the Coronavirus pandemic. I've done that but I actually still have quite a lot to say so I may continue to post my views and opinions whenever I feel I've got something worth saying. Who knows. Watch this space!

LIFE IN LOCK DOWN - WEATHER

One of the major positives about being in lock down for 68 days has been the weather. Apart from the odd few days here & there the weather in the UK has been absolutely fabulous for the last couple of months. And this has definitely been a huge 'positive' in the way we have all lived our lives since we went into lock down.

As you all know, I have a dog, so I have to go out whatever the weather. However as the weather has mostly been really good, I have been walking for miles and miles and miles.

I don't feel guilty about this because I live in a 4^th floor flat and my dog needs to go out for toileting purposes. She obviously doesn't need to go out for a 14 mile walk but actually on my 14 mile walks I very rarely pass anyone closer than 2m (which I would do in a supermarket or in a takeaway queue) and we always start the walk from our front door and end up at our front door.

However, this fabulous weather has good and bad points from the point of view of the nation being in lock down.

The good points are............................. we've all been able to get out in the sunshine for our daily walks. The good weather has encouraged everyone to go out and walk or cycle or jog or do whatever.

The bad points are.......................... people want to sit outside and disregard all the rules. We've all seen the photos of crowded beaches or countryside beauty hotspots that have been filled with picnicking people long before we even moved into the first stage of lock down.

Personally I think that we're all really, really lucky that Coronavirus struck the UK when it did. Can you imagine what it would have been like if we'd entered this lock down phase at the beginning of November. Can you imagine 6 months of lock down pretty much in the dark? At least we entered it at the start of summer and the weather from first thing in the morning until last thing at night has been fab.

Looking back to when we did the first clap at the end of March, it was dark. I remember standing out on my balcony, in the dark, and hearing everyone clapping but not being able to see anyone because it was so dark. And yet by the following week the clocks had gone forward and ever since it's just got lighter and lighter. However, it's less than a month until the 21^st June when we will experience the longest day of the year and then the nights will start getting darker again.

Even though the weather is absolutely fabulous at the moment its almost like the seasons are passing us by. I haven't a clue what happened to April and now we're at the end of May. Will June pass us by in the same way. Who knows.

The weather forecast for the next few days is superb. However this good weather seems to be encouraging everyone to leave their brains at home. When I walked my dog through the park today there were zillions of people sitting around having picnics with zillions of kids who were most definitely not social distancing.

I guess it's hard. I'm a single person. I live by myself. I go shopping once a week. I'm very self sufficient and don't feel the need to go around hugging people at the best of times. I'm not a 'huggy' person. However, today I went to see a friend in her garden. We had a 'social distancing' chat and it was lovely. And I am so grateful that the weather was lovely enough for us to do that.

As I've said above.............................. we are all sooooo, soooooo lucky that the weather has been this fabulous during lock down.

See you all tomorrow.

Toodles.

LIFE IN LOCK DOWN - SOCIAL MEDIA & THE INTERNET

About a week into lock down I had conversation with my sister, who lives about 300 miles away from me and has three kids in their early 20s, all back at home with their mummy & daddy for one reason or another. I said that we were really lucky to have the internet and social media to keep in touch with each other. She said that it was a very negative medium because people/teenagers/children would view the 'so called positive posts' as the norm and would feel that they weren't living up to them.

My sister was concerned that because the internet and social media were posting all these positive posts of mummies doing spectacular things with their kids and making the rest of the world feel inferior, it would impact on the rest of the world who didn't have the same privileges. My reaction was; 'that's life'. There's always going to be people in the world that are richer, happier, live in bigger houses, have a more so called perfect life than you.

However, although social media and the internet may highlight these issues more, they've always been there. There's always been bullying and people who feel they're more important than others. Its just that the internet and social media can do it in a more 'anonymous' way. 'Keyboard warriors'?? Don't you just hate them?

Personally I think that the positives of social media and the internet outweigh the negatives.

In 1987 when I lived in Canada for a year, I had absolutely no form of communication with any friends or family back home, apart from writing letters. The only time that my parents phoned me was on Christmas Day. And to be honest I haven't a clue how much that cost. International phone calls were really, really expensive at that time so to make a phone call to somewhere abroad was only ever used in an emergency or for a special occasion.  

Fast forward to 2020.  My 20 year old neice did one of these 'camp America' placements last year for 3 months.  3 months?!  It's hardly a life time is it? In fact it wasn't even three months because my sister paid about £300 for her to change her flight and come home a couple of weeks early.  Another 3 weeks and we'll have been in lock down for 3 months.  My sister & neice were communicating almost on a daily basis, via whatsapp & Face Book etc, and when my neice told her mummy she wanted a 'care package' (apparently that's a box containing all the stuff from home that she was missing like chocolate) my sister obliged and sent one out.  FFS?!  Kids these days just haven't a clue.  I can just imagine if I'd written a letter to my parents back in 1987 and asked for a 'care package'...............  Firstly, the letter wouldn't have got to them for about 10 days.  And secondly, my parents would have told me not to be so stupid.  There is absolutely no way that they would have 'wasted money' and sent me a 'care box'  containing bars of chocolate.  I was in my 20s and I'd made the decision to live in Canada for a year so once I'd said goodbye to them, that was pretty much it for a year.  Not so today.  And I'm certainly not blaming the kids of today.  They don't know any different.  I got my first mobile phone and email address in 1999 which was the year my neice was born so she's obviously grown up with modern day technology.  But, it does annoy me that kids in their 20s (& even their 30s) don't seem to be able to exsist these days without consulting mummy & daddy on every aspect of their life.  And looking further back in history 14/15 year olds left school and got jobs and were responsible human beings.  Not so today.  Everyone seems to think they're a victim of one thing or the other.  Oh dear, I'm going a bit off topic here.  Sorry.

These days, whatever you think of social media, the ability to easily keep in touch with friends and family all around the world couldn't be simpler. Can you imagine what the last couple of months would have been like for single people if they hadn't had wifi as a form of communication. We can talk to one person online or a group of people. We can instantly see photos and videos of our friends and family. We know immediately what everyone is up to.

However the ability to connect to wifi does not come without it's problems. Over the last couple of months, keyboard warriors as mentioned above, seem to have become a lot more prevalent on certain Face Book pages. I don't know what makes some people behave in such a nasty way when commenting on various posts. I follow a few pages that have been set up in tourist hot spots both at the beach and in the countryside and to be honest some of the comments on these pages are disgusting. Would people really behave in that way if they were faced with making comments to people in real life. I suspect not. We've all read the posts from locals who live in these tourist hot spots telling tourists to stay home and not to visit their areas due to the hospitals not being able to cope with an influx of ill people. And then we get the visitors responding by saying that these communities wouldn't survive without the tourists and because the locals have been so horrible, once this is all over then they won't be visiting ever again. And so it goes on and on and on.

And it's not only these sort of posts that create bad feeling. Because everything these days is done on line it's very, very, easy just to post something in the heat of the moment without actually thinking it through. Indeed I know of one elderly couple who had a visit from the police because one of their neighbours had reported them for having a family member to visit. As it happened, the family member was just dropping shopping off on the doorstep because 'elderly couple' are in the vulnerable group and not allowed out. If the so called nosey neighbour had actually bothered to watch the whole interaction they would have seen this. But no, they see a car drive up, the couples daughter gets out and goes up the path to the house so nosey neighbours just assumed she was going in. And immediately goes on line to report them. And the upsetting thing about all this is that the police are not allowed to tell the couple who it was that reported them, so after living for more than 20 years in what they thought was a friendly neighbourhood, they now don't know who they can trust. If people hadn't had wifi, perhaps they might have taken a step back and actually asked these people why their daughter was visiting.

However I personally see social media and the internet as a positive addition to my life. I for one, would be lost without it, and for me it has been in godsend in these days of social isolation. I guess it all comes down to how you use it. After all, if you're on a social media site and you don't like what's been written, then you don't have to read it.

See you all tomorrow.

Toodles.

LIFE IN LOCK DOWN - CYCLISTS

So how many of you have been for a walk in a park or along a canal path or on a shared walkway with cyclists? I would hazard a guess that a lot of you have.

What is it with cyclists? Why do they think that they can creep up behind you, crash into you and then zoom off without so much as a sorry? And yes I am talking from personal experience. 3 months ago, I really, really wish I had taken a photo of the bruise on my arm made by a cyclists handlebars crashing into me because she hadn't bothered to ring a bell to warn me of the fact that she was about to overtake me on a bike in very close proximity to me.

There I was, walking on a path in the park with my dog. My dog was running around on the grass but I was walking on a path (that was probably wide enough for 3 walkers) when a cyclist just whizzed past me, clipping my arm and leaving a HUGE bruise. ….......And was miles away before I even had time to react?!

Seriously??!! What is wrong with these people?

And since lock down this problem has become much, much worse. It seems like the minute that lock down was announced, the whole world decided to take up cycling and go riding about in places that cyclists in normal times wouldn't even have considered cycling on. Ie, golf courses. Are cyclists even allowed to cycle on golf courses.

This is only my opinion, but as far as I am concerned the majority of cyclists that I come into contact with are very inconsiderate and show absolutely no regard for the other people who may be using the same path. Joggers are a similar. I might rant about them at a later date! If someone is out walking, one has absolutely no idea who is behind you. Bikes on the whole are silent modes of transport so one doesn't know that a bike is behind one unless the cyclist has the decency to ring a bell to warn a pedestrian of their imminent approach.

Apparently during these times of Coronavirus, social distancing should be 5m apart for joggers and 10m for cyclists because of the amount of sweat they generate and the fact that they have a cloud of virus around them and in their slipstream?! Hmmmmmm................. I don't think any jogger or cyclist that has passed me is aware of this information.

I just wish that they would show a bit of consideration and put a bell on their bike. Bells are not expensive. You can buy one on Amazon for less than £1. The bikes these people are riding probably cost thousands of pounds. And if not thousands, definitely hundreds. And yet they don't think it's worth spending £1 on a bell for their bike?

To be honest, I have spoken to 'cyclist friends' about this problem. Their view about 'bells on bikes' is completely different from mine. My 'cyclist friends' say that it is rude to ring a bell on a bike. They say that ringing a bell on a bike is like saying, 'I'm more important than you so get out of my way.' My reply to that would be............................. 'You're going to zoom past me anyway so it would be nice if I could have a bit of warning that you're actually behind me. After all, bikes are pretty silent. They don't make a noise. And also I don't always walk in a straight line (and my dog certainly doesn't). So far all I've had is a bruised arm. If a bike is 'overtaking' me on a narrow path, ie the canal path, it's only a matter of time before either I fall in the canal, the cyclist falls in the canal, or my dog falls in the canal.

I'm all for 'shared amenities' and I think that the cycle routes/walkways are amazing. There's so many fabulous places for me to walk with my dog. But there's got to be 'give and take'??? The cyclists don't own the parks and walkways. They' really do need to understand that a 'shared pathway' means just that??!! SHARED!!

A 'shared pathway' is for everybody. A shared pathway does not mean that cyclists can zoom along it without any regard for anyone else. On a shared pathway there will probably be dog walkers, kids, wheelchair users, mums with buggy's, teenagers not paying attention to anything because they're too busy checking their phones, old people out for an afternoon stroll. And quite a few other members of the community that I can't even think of.

But to get back to 'cyclists'.................. which was what this original post was about. For less than £1 a cyclist could just buy a bell for their bike, and give one little ring when they want to overtake a walker. And then we'd all be a lot happier.

#Whyisthatsohard

See you all tomorrow.

Toodles.

LIFE IN LOCK DOWN - MENTAL HEALTH

Just wondering how you all feel about your mental health in these days of lock down? Mental health seems to be the 'in thing' these days. And by that I mean that since the 1^st & 2^nd World Wars, (when mental health was never, ever an issue, or at least never an issue that was talked about publicly), in today's world, mental health seems to be as important, if not more so, than physical health.

And let me just be clear here. I think that one's mental health is really important. However, I can't help thinking that sometimes 'mental health' issues are just an excuse to allow people to do whatever they want.

During these times of lock down and isolation we're all experiencing feelings that I don't think any of us ever expected to experience in the whole of our lives. (Except for Dominic Cummings of course, who seems to think that he is above the whole lock down and isolation thing. I cannot believe how that slimy little snake thinks that he can do what he wants. Anyway this rant is not about him. I don't even want to give him the time of day.)

Mental health in the UK was a HUGE issue even before lock down started. But now it seems to have multiplied enormously. It's almost like the physical health of the nation has been pushed to one side and the mental health of everybody is more important. Statistics have shown that in the last couple of months the admissions to A&E and to GPs have fallen drastically. I don't know the exact statistics because I haven't bothered to research them and as this is my blog and I'm only writing from my point of view, I don't really feel I need to.

This is not a 'factual' blog. It's a, 'my blog from my point of view', type blog. I'm not looking to make a load of money out of it or attract a load of followers. I'm just trying to record stuff that I feel is worth writing about during my life in lock down. I think it helps my mental health to write stuff down or to have a rant every now and again.

I've googled, 'what is the definition of mental health' and the reply that popped up is: 'a persons condition with regard to their psychological and emotional well being'. Hmmmm............. well that covers a multiple of sins doesn't it?

I personally feel that people's mental health is somehow taking precedence over their physical health, so much so that the TV is now full of adverts urging people to go to hospital or their GP if they have a physical ailment. It would seem that people are too scared to go to their doctor or hospital through fear of catching Coronavirus or fear of being a burden on the NHS because they fear that their ailment may not be important. This lack of visiting a doctor appears to have got so bad that now the latest slogan is; 'if it's urgent, it's urgent.'

Not so with people's mental health. I don't know about you but my Face Book page is full of posts saying that just because a person seems to look OK on the outside, doesn't mean to say that they are not suffering on the inside. There's all sorts of posts popping up about why it may be 'essential' for someone to go out and buy some plants or a tin of paint. Or go out to get a takeaway or a coffee.

And there's loads of stuff popping up saying how lonely and depressed and isolated people are becoming. Apparently suicidal thoughts and self harming are on the increase. Coronavirus is being compared to life during the war. Which in one way it is, but in another it isn't. During the war, mental health (although obviously an issue) was never, ever discussed. It was just swept under the carpet and the soldiers returning from the battlefields with post traumatic stress disorder weren't really given any support. And as for the families that they left behind....................... having to cope home alone with no knowledge of what their husbands/fathers/brothers/sons were experiencing......................... well they just didn't know. They just had to maintain a stiff upper lip and get on with it.

Today we all have to be mindful about other people's feelings and understand that mental health is as important as physical health. Whilst I appreciate all this, I can't help feeling that mental health is being used as an 'excuse' for a whole host of 'rule breaking' during lock down. As far as I'm concerned; we're in lock down. And even though we're now coming out of lock down there shouldn't really be any exceptions to the rules. People shouldn't really be breaking the rules for any reason. Mental health or do. The rules have been made for the good of the nation and as such we should all follow them to the very best of our ability. None of us should be making excuses to go out more than is absolutely essential or to visit relatives/friends because our mental health is at risk. If people can put their 'physical health' on the back burner for a while then surely one should be able to do the same with their mental health.

I have to admit all of this is very hard for me to understand. But that's probably because I grew up in an environment where one didn't talk about one's feelings. I guess that's because I grew up in the aftermath of World War 2 when everybody just had to assume a 'stiff upper lip' and 'get on with it'. As children/teenagers we were never allowed to outwardly show any signs of weakness or insecurity or anxiety, because that would reflect on the family as a whole and how we had been brought up. In the 1960/70s any form of mental health was seen as a real weakness that brought disgrace upon the family. I remember in my late teens going through a very traumatic experience. When my parents found out about it, it was almost like, if it wasn't discussed then it hadn't happened. As far as my parents were concerned it was a subject that I was banned from telling anyone about, because if it had it been openly discussed, in my fathers words, 'the police will get involved and then all the neighbours will know.' I don't blame my parents for this. It was just the way things were back then. And I have to admit this outlook on life only served to make me tougher, and in more than 40 years since this incident, I have always just got on with things by myself and learnt to deal with things by myself.

These days though, everybody seems to think that they're a victim. You get bullied at school/work/on-line; you're a victim. To me everyone's been bullied at some point in their life. Get over it.

An ex-boyfriend or someone else is stalking you; you're a victim. Get over it.

And at this point I will actually say that I had a new bathroom fitted in my house 3 years ago and one of the plumbers started 'on-line stalking' me. Yes me, a middle aged woman. Ie, he started sending me 'inappropriate' texts & messages. I just ignored them and didn't respond to any of them. Why would I? I thought he'd gone away because I hadn't had any communication from him for over a year, but then 3 days ago I received another one asking how I was??? Obviously like all the others I ignored it. I'm not interested in him so why would I even respond to any of his messages. Unfortunately I fear that had I been a teenage girl, I would have answered when he asked, 'If you want me to stop contacting you just let me know and you'll never hear from me again.' As a middle aged woman I just ignored that message as well. As far as I'm concerned if you don't want to communicate with people then don't communicate with them under any circumstances.

I don't feel traumatised by this experience. It's annoying, yes, especially as it's been going on for more than 3 years now. But do I feel like I need counselling to get over it? No I don't. I personally feel that growing up in the 1960/70s has taught me to be resilient and just look after myself. Mental Health wasn't an issue then and it's not an issue for me now.

Oh and just to finish........................ a friends car was broken into overnight a couple of weeks ago. She phoned the police to report it, mainly I think to get a crime reference number for insurance purposes; and was asked if she would like counselling. Seriously??!! Counselling because someone has smashed a window in your car?

#theworldhasgonemad

See you all tomorrow.

Toodles.

LIFE IN LOCK DOWN - THREE WEEKS TO BREAK A HABIT – REMINISCING

Apparently it takes three weeks to break a habit, an addiction, a routine?! I haven't a clue where I read that. But I did. But I don't actually think it's true.

I drink far too much wine. And the 'three week' thing just doesn't do it for me. I constantly regularly drink more than the recommended 14 units of alcohol per week and I would say that about once a year I go without alcohol for a whole month. Just to prove to myself that I can. I do it so that I can tell myself I'm not an alcoholic?!!

I'm a 61 year old single female who has been drinking alcohol pretty much every single evening since lock down began. That's more than 2 months now. But actually that is normal for me.

Apparently the sale of alcohol in the UK has increased by more than a third since lock down. Hmmmmm.......... I think that's only to be expected because after all, all the pubs are closed so everyone is now drinking at home. It's obvious that supermarkets and off licenses are going to be benefiting from all the home drinking that is going on.

BUT does it really only take three weeks to break a habit? Perhaps it does. Perhaps it doesn't. Where do these statistics come from?

I personally, drink far too much wine. I've drunk far too much wine for about the last 25 years of my life. I know I drink far too much wine so every now and again I go for a month without drinking any alcohol at all. As I mentioned above, I do this just so that I can prove to myself that I can. I actually like wine. It's part of my daily life. I love it. But is it an 'essential' part of my life that I should be embracing during lock down? Probably not. But still I add a lot of bottles of wine into my weekly supermarket shop.

But it's not just alcohol. It's cigarettes and gambling and people gorging on cakes and chocolate and takeaways. Apparently the on line gambling sites have seen a massive surge of people registering over the last couple of months. And I have loads of friends, who for some reason, feel the need to go out to get a takeaway coffee from Costa or a doughnut or cake from the local bakery. Is any of this really 'essential'?

Everyone has some sort of an addiction.....................

35 years ago I think I was addicted to coffee. In the early to mid 80s when the most sought after item for a 'yuppie' to have was a 'filter coffee machine'; I had one. And I wasn't even a yuppie. Lol! I was a very low paid primary teacher. I remember my grandparents coming to visit me in my very first flat in 1984 and immediately reporting back to my mother that I was addicted to coffee because I'd been showing off and had had my coffee machine switched on for the duration of their visit. Perhaps I thought it was some sort of status symbol. Perhaps I thought that they would report back to my parents that because I had a coffee machine they would maybe view me as someone who had actually reached the ranks of the professional elite that they always wanted me to aspire to. Who knows??

30 years ago I was addicted to 'aerobics'. I used to attend at least 7 classes a week, sometimes more, and I taught 3 classes a week, (after having trained as an aerobic instructor in the late 80s.) If I missed even one of these classes I was distraught. Looking back I was most definitely addicted to exercise. Obviously at the time I didn't think I was. I just thought I was keeping fit.

20 years ago I was the manager of a hotel and I couldn't wait until the latest edition of 'Hotel & Caterer' came out. I used to devour it for all things relating to my latest choice of career. I was obsessed with the 'hospitality industry' and couldn't really understand how 'my staff' (most of which were youngsters in very low paid jobs) didn't understand my passion.

15 years ago I'd just acquired my first 'rescue' dog and my obsession was 'all things dog related'. Dog magazines, dog training courses, etc. etc.

And now............................. at 61 years of age I just want a quiet life but I know that I am drinking far too much wine. …..............But I don't eat cakes or chocolate or smoke or gamble so I reckon that a few bottles glasses of wine a night isn't really going to do me that much harm is it????

Hmmmm.................... I've just read through what I've written here. Has it got anything to do with 'Life in Lockdown'? Not sure. But there again as I stated on 1^st May 2020, when I decided to post something everything for the month of May; I actually didn't have a clue where this would take me.

Tonight it's taken me on a bit of a trip down memory lane. 'Three weeks to break a habit'? ….........Perhaps today's title is wrong. Perhaps not. I thought about changing the title to 'Reminiscing' because that's what this post seems to have turned into. However even though I've gone off on a bit of a tangent here, I'm going to keep the title as, 'three weeks to break a habit' because I believe that, that is what I have talked about in this post!!!

Actually re-reading it and re-reading it and re-reading it. It has absolutely nothing to do with three weeks to break a habit so I'm going to re-name it.

'Three weeks to break a habit – Reminiscing'

I seem to have broken my 'habit' of drinking coffee and going to aerobic classes and being obsessed with a career in the hospitality industry and training rescue dogs. These 'habits' just seemed to have died a natural death when I moved onto the next obsession/habit to engulf my life.

All I need now is a new habit/obsession to focus on instead of drinking wine?!!

See you all tomorrow.

Toodles.