Now before I get into rant or flippant mode I wish to make it quite clear that I am not dismissing the Corona-virus as a passing matter of no import. No, it is very serious indeed and we have to be sensible and take precautions. BUT I refuse to panic. I really do even though my daughter telephoned this week to see if I was ok as "you are in the danger category mum". Well ta very much daughter dear. She wanted to check if I had enough groceries and was my freezer full etc and could I manage. I asked her when in her entire life has she known her mother have no food in the house and no meals in the freezer and why did she now assume I was in my dotage and living off baked beans?
OK she meant it kindly I know.
So what to do? As far as I am concerned I am Keeping Calm and Carrying On. I am meeting friends, I am going out, I went into town to Fenwicks for a facial the other day and lovely Linda who looks after me said Sod it gave me a kiss as I was leaving and also shook hands.
The Premier League over here has banned players from shaking hands in the tunnel before they run on the pitch to play which is without doubt the daftest thing I have heard in a long time. As one writer in a paper said this morning:
"In a bid to slow the spread of coronavirus, the Premier League authorities have forbidden footballers from shaking hands before a match. Obviously the players will still be tackling each other, rolling around in the mud together, spitting on the pitch, kissing and hugging after they score a goal, and spending 90 minutes in close proximity to a tightly packed crowd of 60,000 people. But as long as the players don’t shake hands, everyone should be fine."
Mad.
Now before we left the EU (gosh that sounds wonderful - you know how I feel about the EU so forgive me) we had Project Fear. Planes would be grounded, there would be lorries queued for miles as they tried to get through the Channel Tunnel, there would be no medicines, the seas would run dry, there would be a plague of frogs blah blah and lo and behold Nothing Happened. We had people stockpiling food and dried goods in their cellers and stocking up on loo rolls. If they still have this stuff squirrelled away they will be feeling very superior now as panic buying has set in.
The two main staples that seem to be vanishing at the speed of light are loo rolls and pasta. Pasta? I can understand loo rolls vanishing as it is something that we need and use all the time, but pasta? I cannot think if you are ill having twenty bags of fusilli in your cupboard is going to help you. And yes I know it is in case you have to isolate yourself and need to have food in the cupboard but even so...
I promised Helen I would be sensible and not do anything daft (not that I ever do at least I don't think so) so I have decided to Get Ready. I did a supermarket shop this morning but bought my usual stuff though with extra ingredients this weekend as tomorrow is my monthly batch cook day where I load up the freezer with casseroles etc. The only thing I did buy was, yes you have guessed it, toilet rolls. This is pure common sense and I will work my way through them though as I live on my own I reckon it will take a while. (A Face Book friend told me this morning that she knows a guy who works at Tesco and the cunning swine are putting out all the expensive loo rolls for sale first. Every little helps is their catch phrase and they are living up to it).
But the most important thing of all - if I am in self isolation have I Enough Books to Read? Buggar pasta I dare not run out of books. No need to panic Elaine take a gander at your Kindle wherein reside some 300 books half of which are waiting to be read. Look at your To Be Read pile in the corner of your living room, there are at least another 50 there and then should desperation really set in and you have to re-read you have shelves full of Dickens, Austen, Trollope, Wharton, von Arnim and enough Agatha Christie, Sayers and Ngaio Marsh to last you for all eternity (I should not use that phrase really I could be tempting fate)
And then of course there are all those progs on Amazon Prime and Netflix which you really really need to catch up on. Then I have the entire Fred and Ginger oeuvre on DVD which will keep me happy and make me dance round the living room...Heaven I'm in Heaven...
Then all my MGM musicals on Dvd - Carousel, Oklahoma, Seven Brides for Seven Brothers, Calamity Jane, Singing in the Rain (I have the entire Gene Kelly oeuvre as well).
Finally, I have taken delivery of these this week and so I think I can safely say that I am Prepared for All Eventualities
OK Bring it on
Stay well everybody because joking apart I would not wish this horrid virus on me or anybody else.
Au reservoir.
