LIFE IN LOCK DOWN - HOME SCHOOLING

I cannot begin to imagine how difficult it must be for families with young children, or even teenagers for that matter, to be cooped up at home all day, every day for more than 8 weeks. With all schools closed it is now up to parents to home school their youngsters.

Apparently teachers are setting work on line and according to the teachers that I've spoken to, about half the kids are completing this work. However, it has to be said that the home environment must have a huge impact on how children learn at home.

I have two friends that to my mind are perfect examples of how home schooling should be done in the ideal world. Both are happily married and live in a house with a garden. One of my friends has a little girl who is 7 years old. The other has two children aged 3 & 5 years old. Both of my friends have husbands who have continued to work through the lock down process. That leaves my friends' to deal with the home schooling by themselves. And what a fantastic job they are doing.

Both of my friends' have devised a very structured outline to the Monday – Friday week that they do not deviate from. It goes something like this: Keep fit with Joe Wicks, arts & crafts, baking, working on a topic that interests them, (ie the 7 year old chooses a different country each week and uses the internet to find out different facts. My other friend seems to constantly be searching her garden for slugs & snails for a mini-beast project!), Reading, doing the on line work set by the school, going out for a daily walk or bike ride, etc, etc. And then at the weekends when 'daddy' is at home they camp out overnight in the garden or have family picnics in the garden.

To my mind these children are young enough to enjoy all these activities and I'm sure in years to come they will remember 2020 as the year when they spent happy times at home doing exciting activities with their families.

But what of the children that don't live in a house with a garden or have parents that are financially secure to spend their days creating memories for their offspring?

If you are a single parent that lives in a high rise flat with a large family cooped into a very small space how on earth is it even possible to live in any type of comfort, let alone even begin to teach your children at home. If say a single parent is trapped in a small flat with three or four children and has no idea where they are going to get the money for the next meal do you really think that 'home schooling' will feature high on their list of priorities? For these parents life is just a matter of trying to get through each day by whatever means are possible.

I personally think that by the time the children do return to school there's going to be a massive difference in their abilities. This in turn will result in teacher's having a much harder job than normal as they struggle to teach a class full of children who have all experienced lock down differently. How are the teachers even going to begin to assess what the children have learned. For example, some parents may have spent the whole of lock down pushing their kids academically, so much so, that these children will return to school, months if not even years academically ahead of their peer group. And then there will be the kids who, like my friends kids, have experienced a wide range of activities and learnt things about the environment that they would never have had the time to do under normal life. And of course there will also be the kids who have pretty much just sat in front of a TV for the whole of lock down.

It would seem that there are now a lot of adverts popping up on the TV telling parents just to take each day one day at a time. In these days of social media it must be awful for the parents who aren't coping, or who can't afford to keep going on line to buy stuff to keep their kids amused, to see what they perceive to be the 'perfect parent with the perfect children' popping up constantly on their Facebook or Instagram pages.

Life in lock down is hard for all of us but I have to say I am very grateful that I just have myself to think about. Constantly worrying about about your child's education must add so much pressure onto some families, especially if they never did very well at school themselves.

And to end this post, I'll just say, in the words of the latest TV advert: 'Don't be too hard on yourselves; being there for your kids is all that matters right now.'

See you all tomorrow.

Toodles.

LIFE IN LOCK DOWN - FREE ON-LINE COURSES

Has anyone else noticed that in these times of lock down all the on-line study centres are cashing in on the bored people at home? I've lost count of the number of different companies who have adverts popping up on my FaceBook or Instagram page advertising 'free courses'. There is nothing 'free' about any of these courses.

They reel people in with advertising slogans such as, 'Learn a new skill for free' or 'Free courses during lock down'. What a complete farce!! I have tried to sign up with at least four different companies to 'learn a new skill for free'.

I thought that as I was stuck at home with nothing to do all day I would do a 'free' online pet first aid course. Loads of on-line study centres seemed to be offering this. I'm not particularly interested in getting a professional qualification but all of the courses that I looked at, had blurb on their websites to say that their courses were accredited to this, that and the next professional body. As a 61 year old who hasn't taken an exam in years, non of this interested me, so I didn't pursue what exactly the type of further education one could go on to do after completing one of these courses was. I just wanted to do an on-line course because I was bored. And let's face it; if someone is offering 'free' courses why wouldn't you sign up to do something that interests you? It's not like any of us have got anything else to do.

Big mistake............................

I've tried signing up for at least four of these so-called 'free' on-line courses. There is absolutely nothing 'free' about them at all.

What they do is........................ they ask you to complete a really long application form for your so called 'free' course and then, when you get to the very last part of the application form, all of a sudden you are told that the 'free' course isn't actually 'free'. It's only 'free' for the first month. But they tell you this in such a way that most people probably wouldn't even realise that they are being told this. Thank goodness I'm such a savy 61 year old. Lol. So when they're asked to add their credit card details with a big message saying that they are free to cancel at anytime, most people will. And then before they know it they're tied into a 24/36 month contract of paying at least £30 per month to an online course that they didn't even want to do in the first place. Yes they have signed up to a 'free' course for a month but these unscrupulous companies work on the assumption that no-one will read the 'small print'.

And...................... if one is savvy enough to actually abandon the application form at this point, for weeks and weeks afterwards one is inundated with emails (because giving one's email address is at the start of the application form) saying, 'You have not completed your application. Please click here to claim your FREE course'.

Fortunately I have had enough sense not to sign up to one of these courses.

However, in these times of lock-down we're all bored, so learning a new skill or learning more about something that one is interested in is very tempting. And when one sees an advert on their social media pages offering a 'free' course, obviously people are going to sign up to it.

My advice to you would be.............................. If it's free, it's free. If you have to add your credit/debit card details to a 'free' course then it's obviously NOT free!!!

See you all tomorrow.

Toodles.

LIFE IN LOCK DOWN - DOMESTIC ABUSE

So as the news is filled with nothing but Covid-19 information it is very easy to forget what is going on in the rest of the world. I wonder what would be in the news if we didn't have this deadly disease to keep us occupied. After all it wasn't that long along ago that all anyone could talk about was Brexit?!! And now all anyone seems to want to talk about is Covid-19. No one seems to care about anything else. Certainly nothing else seems to be getting reported.

And one of the main things that is on the increase in these times of lock down is domestic abuse. It may not be reported every day but I've just read an article(I think it popped up on my google news feed) that said that the calls to domestic abuse help lines have risen by 25% in the last few weeks. Also I have a friend who works with the police and apparently most of their work at the moment is dealing with domestic incidents.

As a single female living alone in a 2 bedroom flat with a balcony, it's easy to forget how hard life is for others. I absolutely hate not being able to see friends and family. However I am not cooped up in a 2 bedroom flat with children or even a partner. I can do what I want. Well, obviously I can't because none of us can just now. My balcony is small. There's only room for a couple of people on it but as there's only me, that's fine. Fortunately for the last few weeks the weather has been lovely so I've resigned myself to sitting out there with a magazine.

However, just imagine living in a 2 bedroom flat (without even a balcony/outdoor space) with children and an abusive partner. Being cooped up for almost 8 weeks is enough to drive anyone to breaking point. How on earth do these people cope?

Domestic abuse victims lose their own self worth and confidence in normal times because their so called loving partners gradually eat away at any source of self belief that they may have. Can you imagine what it must be like if they're now with their abusive partner 24/7?

A 25% rise in call to Domestic Abuse help lines is a massive increase. And the worrying thing is; that's probably only the tip of the ice berg. I bet there are loads of people not reporting this type of thing through fear of worrying that it is not essential in these times of Covid-19. And as the UK now reports the highest related deaths from Covid-19 in Europe, nothing seems to be reported about the number of deaths that have occurred during lock down because of domestic abuse.

It's very, very, easy in these difficult times to live in one's own little bubble. I remember a couple of weeks into lock down and 'Dr Hilary' on the 'Good Morning Britain' Show said, 'We're now at the stage where everyone will know someone who has Coronavirus or will know someone who has died from it'. I didn't. And I still don't. I've spoken to people who think they might have had it, but to be honest these particular people are hypochondriacs anyway so they might have, they might not. As we're not being tested, how on earth do we know whether a common cold is Coronavaris or not?

The point of the above paragraph is to emphasise that just because your life is progressing, albeit probably not how you would want it to be................. there are thousands, if not millions, of people in this country that are silently suffering every single day. There are people who may even be dying.

I can't even begin to imagine how hard it must be for the victims of domestic abuse. For these vile abusers to now actually have a valid reason for keeping their partners trapped indoors must be like a living hell. And the other thing.......................... because all the kids are at home now as well, they're probably being subjected to seeing things that no kids ever should.

Lock down is hard. We all have our own story to tell. Fortunately my story is not very interesting. Unfortunately I fear that a lot of victims of domestic abuse may not even live to tell their story.

See you all tomorrow.

Toodles.

LIFE IN LOCK DOWN - ESSENTIAL SHOPPING

This morning on the dog walk I walked past Waitrose at 7.40am and there were 17 'old people' in the queue waiting for the shop to open at 8am. Now whilst I totally agree with the rules that stores should have a designated time for the old & vulnerable to shop, I'm not quite sure if I agree that they should all be in a queue on a Saturday morning before the shop is even open. I know for a fact that most of the people in this queue are also in the queue every other day of the week. I walk past Waitrose at pretty much the same time every morning. These so called 'old' people don't actually seem to have got the fact that they're only supposed to go out for essential shopping and essential doesn't mean every single day. I have absolutely no idea what they are buying every day. One of my neighbours, who is in her late 70s (or possibly even in her 80s) treks off to Waitrose every single day at 8am and always returns with two bags of shopping. What on earth is she buying every day? It obviously can't be all fresh food because no way would her and her husband be able to eat 2 bagfuls of fresh food in 24 hours. So I can only guess that she is stock-piling toilet rolls & tinned food. Or maybe her spare room is full of pasta. Lol!

I totally understand that 'old' people like to stick to their normal routine. Though I must admit I've always wondered why they actually need to shop on a Saturday morning, but I'm guessing it's a throwback to when they worked and only had the weekends to shop.

I'm very lucky that in my local area I have a lot of shops that I can walk to. Waitrose, M&S, Tesco Express, Sainsbury's Local, plus a couple of bakers and zillions of coffee shops that are open for takeaway coffees.

When lock down was first announced my intention was to 'shop local' and not use the car at all because I was trying to be a law abiding citizen. But then I offered to do shopping for 'old' people so now I shop weekly for an old lady who lives 2-3 miles away from me. She lives equal distances away from a biggish Tesco, Morrisons and Aldi so because Tesco was the supermarket I was most familiar with I thought I would do her weekly shop there and also do mine at the same time. Famous last words.

I do a shop for her on a Wednesday morning because it was a Wednesday that I started shopping for her and as I said earlier old people like to have a routine. I don't do the shop at Tesco. Tesco always has a queue right up the side of the building and around the car park. Morrisons isn't quite as bad but there's always a queue there too. Aldi never has a queue at the time that I go. And whereas pre-lock down, Aldi was just a supermarket that I popped into if they had a special offer on for say plants; now it has become my favourite shop. I LOVE Aldi.

I know a lot of people say you can't actually do a 'proper' shop in Aldi and they don't have many branded items, but I'm not a snob, and because I live by myself I can cope with not having branded goods in lock down and adapt my shop accordingly. And the old lady that I shop for mainly just wants fruit & yogurts & bread & milk & stuff like that (because her daughter orders all her main meals on line for her) so it works for me.

I actually manage to do a whole weeks shop at Aldi so hardly ever need to pop to the local shops to do a 'top up' shop unless I run out of wine. Lol!

However after talking to friends and family, essential shopping actually has me confused about a couple of things.......................

The first thing I don't understand is why would you stand outside a supermarket in a massive queue when less than half a mile up the road there is another one with no queue at all. The only reason I can think of is that people are snobs! I was talking to my sister about this and she said that her husband really liked 'Hagen Das' ice-cream and Aldi didn't sell it so she couldn't do a full shop there. FFS, we're in the middle of a major pandemic. Is what brand of ice-cream one eats really an essential reason to be out longer than one needs to be? I compare this to the fact that I like wine and there is a particular type of wine that I buy from Tesco that I love. However, because I am now shopping at Aldi I am more than happy to buy my wine at Aldi because it saves me from going to more than one shop and by doing that I feel I am doing my bit in helping to save lives.

The second thing I don't really understand is the term 'essential shopping'. To me 'essential shopping' means buying food you need to survive on for a week. When you compare 'lock down' to rationing during the war there is no comparison. In the war everyone had 'ration books' and could only buy a certain amount of each thing. Now we have unlimited access to what I would call treats. Ie, I don't need wine and my sister's husband doesn't need Hagen Das ice-cream. But still people feel the need to go out and buy these so called essentials when they're not actually going out to buy 'real' essentials and so are risking coming into contact with more people.

I have to admit I am guilty of this. As I said above, if I run out of wine I have no qualms about popping out to the local shop to get another bottle. It's not essential and in my opinion, I shouldn't be doing it. However, unlike during the war (when 'mental health' didn't seem to be an issue), everybody just seems to be harping on about mental health these days and saying that what is 'essential' for one person may totally affect their mental health if they don't have access to it. Hmmmmm.............. I'm not sure that I agree with that. I may have to do a post about my thoughts on mental health at a later date.

Anyway those are my thoughts for today and now I'm off to have a non-essential glass of wine. Cheers.

See you all tomorrow.

Toodles.

LIFE IN LOCK DOWN - PETS

If anyone asked me what I like most about lock down I would say; my dog. I cannot even contemplate how my life would be if I didn't have my little furry friend to look after. She gives me a reason to get up and get dressed every day and she gives me a reason to go out. I know everyone in the world seemed to go a bit mad when they were told they could go out and do exercise once a day but for me; I don't think I would have bothered. I love walking with my dog but I don't really see the point of walking by myself and I certainly wouldn't have been one of these fitness fanatics that have taken up jogging and cycling. No................ if I didn't have my dog I probably wouldn't even get out of bed some days.

For a single person, owning a pet in lock down is a lifesaver. I'm a 'dog' person and I am so grateful to have an essential reason to go out. However quite a few of my friends are 'cat' people and even though they can't go out for a walk with their cat, just having another living creature in the house with them in these times of isolation is a real comfort.

I even have a couple of friends who own hens and the joy they get from the routine of feeding them and collecting the eggs is immense.

That's why I don't really understand all these reports about animal neglect and abandonment that seem to be popping up all over the internet. Apparently the RSPCA are really busy.

To me my dog is part of my family. Actually she is my family because the only other family I have are hundreds of miles away. But to get rid of a family pet? I just don't understand what makes someone do this.

I totally understand that pets are expensive. And in these hard times a lot of families don't have any money coming in. I don't have any money coming in. But if you really, really, didn't have the ability to care for your pet, through no fault of your own, surely you would look into re-homing your pet in the very best way possible. You wouldn't just open your front door and let it go out to fend for itself. Would you?

It seems like a lot of people would, and as far as I am concerned these are the people that shouldn't have pets in the first place. Would these people do the same with their children?

However it would seem that not being able to afford to keep a pet any longer is not the only reason why people are getting rid of their furry friends. It would seem (if all the posts on FB & Google News are to be believed) that some people are so scared that they are going to catch Covid-19 off their pets that they are actually abandoning them through fear. Again I would say.................... would you do this to your child?

Desperate times, means desperate measures, but to neglect and abandon a living creature (when there's so many options available should you not want it any more) is just downright cruel as far as I'm concerned.

Oh and while I'm on the subject of 'pets'........................ a lot of people seem to think that getting a pet during lock down is the way to go. They seem to think that having a dog to take out will encourage them to exercise more. Or getting a puppy or a kitten now is a good thing because they are at home all day to train it. Unfortunately most people don't seem to realise that puppies & kittens grow up to be dogs & cats and need commitment for all of their lives (approx 15 years) and not just for the time we are in lock down. What is going to happen to all these dogs and cats (who are probably going to be named Cora or Rona) when their humans go back to work and they haven't been trained to stay home alone? And also, how on earth can you socialise these animals with other animals & humans when we're all being told to stay 2m apart?

To be honest I do have a couple of friends who have actually acquired puppies during lock down, but these particular people had already signed up to get a dog before lock down was in place and had a normal training programme all ready for their new addition. One friend works from home and has a big garden so new puppy should adapt to his life easily. The other puppy has two owners with flexible work patterns so training him and leaving him home alone had been all worked out. Until lock down....................... and now 5 month old puppy has both his owners at home 24/7. It's going to be really hard to train him to stay home alone once his owners go back to work.

Even my dog (who is now 18 months old), has had me at home with her 24/7 for more than 7 weeks. The only time I leave her, is once a week when I go out and do a shop for an old person and even then it's only for an hour or so. I worked really hard last year training her to stay home alone. I adopted her when she was three months old (she was found in a hedge, no microchip etc) and I'm worried now that all my hard work re training last year is going to fall apart. We've not been out in the car for more than 2 months. Is she going to hate the car when we're eventually able to go out for a non-essential journey? It's all these things that people hoping to get a 'lock-down' pet should be thinking about. But sadly they're not!

Anyway those are my views on pets.

See you all tomorrow.

Toodles.

LIFE IN LOCK DOWN - PUBLIC TOILETS

Now that Boris has spoken and we're all allowed to travel how ever far we want to exercise, the latest topic of conversation that seems to be popping up on all the Facebook pages of the tourist hotspots, is the fact that public toilets are still closed. Within about an hour of someone posting the question, 'Why aren't the toilets open?', there's about 150 comments and I have to say a lot of them are very negative and aggressive towards the day visitors who want to use them. However, although I never comment on these type of posts, I feel that this is my blog and so I thought I'd put forward my point of view.

Firstly, we all know that Boris's speech on Sunday evening re the lifting of lock down was a complete shambles which threw up more questions than answers. My interpretation was..............Boris wasn't telling us all to go out for hours on end. He was telling us if we wanted to we could. Most shops/leisure facilities are still closed so why would toilets be any different? We're still in the middle of a major pandemic (Scotland & Wales are still in lock down) and we're going to have to do this social distancing thing for a long, long time yet. How on earth do you social distance in public toilets?

Secondly should public toilets re-open they would all need a permanent member of staff employed for the duration of the time the toilets were open to manage the queues and utilise extra cleaning procedures. After all, you usually only know if all the cubicles are occupied once you have actually walked into the toilet building so what are you going to do if you get in there and have to wait? Stand right outside one of the cubicles and wait for someone to come out? You're hardly going to be 2m away from another person in that situation are you? Obviously I'm talking from a female point of view here. .................It might be slightly easier to close off every second urinal in the men's toilets, a bit like closing off every alternate self check out in the supermarket. Lol.

And if all the comments on the Facebook posts are to be believed, a large percentage of the population think that public toilets are disgusting, dirty places where germs are harboured in normal times. You can just imagine all the negative comments that would be popping up on Facebook if the toilets were to re-open.

Personally I think that the toilets should remain closed. And this is only my opinion, but if you can't go out for more than an hour without needing to go to the toilet then you shouldn't be going out for longer. It's not a necessity that you go out on a little jolly to a tourist hot spot. Just stay home. Just because Boris said you can drive as far as you want (as long as you return to your home the same day), doesn't mean that you should do that if you're going to need to go to the toilet every hour. And before I get a deluge of comments that say that some people have medical issues and need to go more often........................... yes, I understand that and in normal circumstances it would be totally acceptable to expect to be able to go to the toilet while you were out. But these are not normal circumstances. We're months and months away from getting back to normal. In fact life will probably never get back to what we considered normal before Covid-19 arrived in our lives.

Today I walked for four hours with my dog. And when I say 'walked' that's what I mean. I walked continually for four hours. I didn't stop for a rest, I didn't stop to eat or drink or buy a coffee and I didn't need to use a toilet when I was out. Oh and that's another thing...................... perhaps if everyone stopped thinking that it was essential to buy a coffee or take a bottle of water with them on the dog walk; then perhaps people wouldn't need to go to the toilet quite so often. Just saying.

See you all tomorrow.

Toodles.

LIFE IN LOCK DOWN - BEGGARS/HOMELESS PEOPLE

I live in a city. There are a lot of homeless people and beggars that in normal times are out and about in my local area. The beggars seem to have their own spots where they sit. They mainly sit outside the supermarkets, although some sit outside the bigger charity shops like Oxfam. They all have little cardboard signs that say they have fallen on hard times and have children to support and are just trying to raise a few pounds to pay for a hostel for the night. I've been told that there's a bit of a 'turf war going on within the begging community. Ie, they all seem to have their own little spot that they like to sit in and woe betide any one else who comes along and sits in that spot.

A few years ago every time I went to Waitrose I collected my 'free coffee' (because if you had a Waitrose card you could get a free coffee & newspaper every time you did a shop) and I gave it to the beggar who was always sitting outside the store. ….......Until one day I went out of the shop and she actually had 3 coffee's sitting there waiting to be drunk. …..........And as one now has to take one's own cup to get the free coffee the beggars no longer get a free coffee from me. BUT actually, the so called beggar, that I was providing coffee for, 4 years ago is still there. Still sitting outside Waitrose and still expecting the high class Waitrose customers to throw her a few measley scraps lot of money.

However I think there's a bit of a difference between beggars & homeless people.

In normal times in my local area there are a lot of beggars. And by beggars I mean the people who have their own patch outside the shops in my neighbourhood. They sit there day in, day out with their cardboard signs saying that they have fallen on hard times and have children to support. Some of these people have actually been here, sitting in the same spot, for 4 years or more. And if they've got the commitment to do this then why don't they just go and get a job? The only reason I can think of is because it's actually quite profitable for them not to.

I actually see these people arriving by bus at 8am, while I'm out walking the dog, every single day. I don't know where they live. But they jump off the No. 11 bus every morning and plonk themselves down in their spots.

BUT.................. the homeless people are very, very different from the beggars. The homeless people are the ones that really need help. The homeless people are the ones who wander around carrying a few plastic bags containing all their worldly belongings with them. They're not begging. They're just wandering about aimlessly because they have no where else to go. However they're all also congregating on the pavements in sunny spots to drink their cans of cheap lager. They have nothing else to do. I'd probably be doing the same if I was homeless. What else do they have to look forward to?

After one week in lock down all these homeless people and beggars had disappeared off the streets. Apparently, if the news is to be believed, they'd been re-homed in empty airbnb's and hotels?? After two weeks they'd all reappeared. Not really quite sure why because no one had any spare cash. No one in fact was actually carrying any money with them because 99% of the shops were only accepting card payments. So after three weeks they'd all gone again. And now I haven't seen any of them for about 4 weeks.

Looking at the homeless people and the beggars from the view point of me..................... a middle class single ranting spinster.................. I have a few things to say about this. I may be right. I may not. To be honest I probably don't have enough knowledge to rant about anything on this subject. But this blog is how I see things from my point of view....................

The beggars, in my area, the ones who (pre-Covid 19) arrive every morning on the No. 11 bus and sit outside their preferred shop and have obviously got the commitment to be there because the same one's have been there for 4 years to my knowledge. And I'm probably going to sound like a 'middle class' busy body here; but; if they've got the commitment to do that then why don't they just go and get a job? …...........Probably because they can make more begging than they can in a minimum wage job??!!

The so called 'homeless people' in my area are not actually homeless. I know this because I have a friend who works with them. They may all sit around during the day drinking their cans of lager in sunny spots on the street but at night they all have a room to go home to in a hostel.

Anyway the point of this blog is....................... it's very strange wandering around the streets and not seeing the beggars/homeless people. I can't help wondering where they all are and what they are all doing. I know we've all got to stay at home but if you're used to spending most of your life out on the street how on earth are these people going to cope cooped up indoors?

It will be really interesting to see if they re-appear once the lock down restrictions are lifted.

See you all tomorrow.

Toodles.