...
All week I've been trying to work up to writing an update after last weekend's wee meltdown, and I might as well do it through the medium of meme.
1. Are you an essential worker?
I work in a care home.
Bit of an update after my last post: I wasn't the only one badly shaken by the nearby care home outbreak as well as the news that a Scottish care worker had passed away, but we're really lucky in that we've got no cases, the residents still need looking after, and you can't maintain that level of anxiety for long. So now we're in this weird sort of state of pseudo-normalcy, where sometimes you almost forget because you're so busy, or because something really nice has just happened (we've got a couple of residents whose families walk past at the same time every day so they can wave in the windows) and then you go to get something out of a cupboard and someone's in there crying, and that's fine, because they caught you crying in the loo earlier.
So. That's work.
2. How many drinks have you had since the quarantine started?
Work is a blessing and a curse here. I'm drinking because of work, but I'm not getting drunk because I have to go to work.
And I'd been doing so well these last couple of years at practicing mindful drinking and not using alcohol as a crutch. Thanks, pandemic.
3. If you have kids... Are they driving you nuts?
I don't have any kids. I miss my friends kids though.
4. What new hobby have you taken up during this?
Nothing new, although I have been pecking away at the first fic I've written in seven months to give myself something to do in the evenings to help turn my brain off rather than just drink.
5. How many grocery runs have you done?
I do 2.5 a week. One for me, one for my parents, and sometimes a little one if I've forgotten something or anyone needs a top up.
My parents aren't officially in a high risk group, but sixty-seven and overweight and sixty-eight and a lifelong smoker are high risk enough from the perspective of a worried daughter. Although, after forty years, the death of her own mother from smoking related illness, and the vocal disapproval of her children, this is what has finally convinced my mum to quit smoking cold turkey. So, I guess...thanks, pandemic?
6. What are you spending your stimulus check on?
..You guys are getting stimulus checks?
In all seriousness, every time I see one of those Tory fuckwits talking about grateful they are to key workers I want to go: Any chance I could have my gratitude in the form of a small raise? No? Wait! Where are you going?
7. Do you have any special occasions that you will miss during this quarantine?
My best friend's birthday was at the start of March, and the weekend we were meant to go out his wife had food poisoning and he postponed it till the next weekend so he could stay home and look after her, and the next weekend they shut the pubs. My birthday is the first week in May and our other best friend's is in early June.
We're going to have one hell of a triple birthday blowout when all this is over.
8. Are you keeping your housework done?
Sort of. My surfaces are immaculate and anything that I might touch is disinfected to within an inch of its life, but I haven't hoovered since the lockdown started, and ironing has lost all meaning to me.
9. What movie have you watched during this quarantine?
I am mostly watching Star Trek, which is about all my brain can take. If Netflix could add in a shuffle feature where it would just play me random episodes of 90s Star Trek so I don't have to decide what episodes to watch then that would be perfect right now.
10. What are you streaming with?
I have access to Netflix, Prime, and Disney+ (we have a little password sharing lockdown cabal) but mostly I'm just flicking through through menus with glazed eyes for roughly thirty-five minutes before ending up watching more TNG or Voyager.
11. Nine months from now is there any chance of you having a baby?
These are indeed strange times, but I don't think we're quite at the immaculate conception yet.
12. What's your go-to quarantine meal?
Right now, anything I can make by adding boiling water and stirring. Or cereal. My next day off - Tuesday, fingers crossed - I've decided I'm going to cook a meal, put on a shirt that I've ironed, and watch a film that I haven't seen before.
13. Is this whole situation making you paranoid?
Surprisingly, no.
I mean, work is obviously A Lot, and I am having to work really hard to just be grateful that we've had no cases and not catastrophise about what we'll do if or when the virus gets in. And on a personal level of course I'm worried about my parents who are older, and my sister who is locked-down abroad, but the everythingness of everything hasn't been getting to me like I might have expected.
Maybe it's the anxiety? I'm the same amount of anxious, but reality has raised itself to match my established baseline of fear and worry. Stupid reality.
14. Has your internet gone out on you during this time?
Not so I've noticed.
15. What month do you predict this all ends?
Based on no actual facts?
I can't see the UK lockdown in its current form going on past maybe May, but I reckon social distancing and some form of rolling don't-call-it-a-lockdown lockdowns are with us until there's either an effective treatment or a vaccine.
16. First thing you’re gonna do when you get off quarantine?
Get my dog back! When the lockdown started I figured that I might be working a lot of hours, and if she can only get one walk a day then the least I could do was send Freya to stay with my parents, where there's a bigger garden, people home all day, and my mum's dog for company.
I miss her so much.
When I had my wobble last week my mum offered to leave her in the garden one evening and I could come round and play with her outside while they stayed in the house. So I did that for a couple of hours on Wednesday and I can't tell you how much it helped.
17. Where do you wish you were right now?
I'm not going to wish myself elsewhere, because I'd just be on lockdown there, instead I wish someone was here with me.
My sister is having a miserable time on lockdown in Ireland, working from home in a box room with a landlady who hates her. Now I've lived with my sister intermittently as adults, and she can be extremely difficult to live with. But given that her landlady reportedly works in a hospital and is swiping boxes of PPE and hoarding them in her bedroom, and has already said that if she catches the virus she's not going to self isolate in her bedroom because it's her house, I'm confident in saying that my sister's not the arsehole in that situation, Typhoid Mary is.
So, yeah, when they closed the universities in Ireland I wish I'd said to her: fly home, you can stop with me and the dog, and work from here.
18. What free-from-quarantine activity are you missing the most?
I want to go to the pub. I want to talk to people my own age. I want to sit in a beer garden and read a book. I want a pint that didn't come out of a tin. I want chips. I want to walk home bumping shoulders with someone.
19. Have you run out of toilet paper and hand sanitizer?
Toilet paper is one of things I always got when it was on offer, so I actually had plenty before the panic buying. (Also, why with the toilet paper...?) Any hand sanitiser I find I take into work because we're always in danger of running out.
The thing I can't find for love nor money are eggs. At this rate I might have to buy a chicken and wait.
20. Do you have enough food to last a month?
Technically, yes. But I would very quickly be reduced to eating dry pasta.
This entry was originally posted at https://netgirl-y2k.dreamwidth.org/201658.html with
comments. Please comment wherever you prefer.
1. Are you an essential worker?
I work in a care home.
Bit of an update after my last post: I wasn't the only one badly shaken by the nearby care home outbreak as well as the news that a Scottish care worker had passed away, but we're really lucky in that we've got no cases, the residents still need looking after, and you can't maintain that level of anxiety for long. So now we're in this weird sort of state of pseudo-normalcy, where sometimes you almost forget because you're so busy, or because something really nice has just happened (we've got a couple of residents whose families walk past at the same time every day so they can wave in the windows) and then you go to get something out of a cupboard and someone's in there crying, and that's fine, because they caught you crying in the loo earlier.
So. That's work.
2. How many drinks have you had since the quarantine started?
Work is a blessing and a curse here. I'm drinking because of work, but I'm not getting drunk because I have to go to work.
And I'd been doing so well these last couple of years at practicing mindful drinking and not using alcohol as a crutch. Thanks, pandemic.
3. If you have kids... Are they driving you nuts?
I don't have any kids. I miss my friends kids though.
4. What new hobby have you taken up during this?
Nothing new, although I have been pecking away at the first fic I've written in seven months to give myself something to do in the evenings to help turn my brain off rather than just drink.
5. How many grocery runs have you done?
I do 2.5 a week. One for me, one for my parents, and sometimes a little one if I've forgotten something or anyone needs a top up.
My parents aren't officially in a high risk group, but sixty-seven and overweight and sixty-eight and a lifelong smoker are high risk enough from the perspective of a worried daughter. Although, after forty years, the death of her own mother from smoking related illness, and the vocal disapproval of her children, this is what has finally convinced my mum to quit smoking cold turkey. So, I guess...thanks, pandemic?
6. What are you spending your stimulus check on?
..You guys are getting stimulus checks?
In all seriousness, every time I see one of those Tory fuckwits talking about grateful they are to key workers I want to go: Any chance I could have my gratitude in the form of a small raise? No? Wait! Where are you going?
7. Do you have any special occasions that you will miss during this quarantine?
My best friend's birthday was at the start of March, and the weekend we were meant to go out his wife had food poisoning and he postponed it till the next weekend so he could stay home and look after her, and the next weekend they shut the pubs. My birthday is the first week in May and our other best friend's is in early June.
We're going to have one hell of a triple birthday blowout when all this is over.
8. Are you keeping your housework done?
Sort of. My surfaces are immaculate and anything that I might touch is disinfected to within an inch of its life, but I haven't hoovered since the lockdown started, and ironing has lost all meaning to me.
9. What movie have you watched during this quarantine?
I am mostly watching Star Trek, which is about all my brain can take. If Netflix could add in a shuffle feature where it would just play me random episodes of 90s Star Trek so I don't have to decide what episodes to watch then that would be perfect right now.
10. What are you streaming with?
I have access to Netflix, Prime, and Disney+ (we have a little password sharing lockdown cabal) but mostly I'm just flicking through through menus with glazed eyes for roughly thirty-five minutes before ending up watching more TNG or Voyager.
11. Nine months from now is there any chance of you having a baby?
These are indeed strange times, but I don't think we're quite at the immaculate conception yet.
12. What's your go-to quarantine meal?
Right now, anything I can make by adding boiling water and stirring. Or cereal. My next day off - Tuesday, fingers crossed - I've decided I'm going to cook a meal, put on a shirt that I've ironed, and watch a film that I haven't seen before.
13. Is this whole situation making you paranoid?
Surprisingly, no.
I mean, work is obviously A Lot, and I am having to work really hard to just be grateful that we've had no cases and not catastrophise about what we'll do if or when the virus gets in. And on a personal level of course I'm worried about my parents who are older, and my sister who is locked-down abroad, but the everythingness of everything hasn't been getting to me like I might have expected.
Maybe it's the anxiety? I'm the same amount of anxious, but reality has raised itself to match my established baseline of fear and worry. Stupid reality.
14. Has your internet gone out on you during this time?
Not so I've noticed.
15. What month do you predict this all ends?
Based on no actual facts?
I can't see the UK lockdown in its current form going on past maybe May, but I reckon social distancing and some form of rolling don't-call-it-a-lockdown lockdowns are with us until there's either an effective treatment or a vaccine.
16. First thing you’re gonna do when you get off quarantine?
Get my dog back! When the lockdown started I figured that I might be working a lot of hours, and if she can only get one walk a day then the least I could do was send Freya to stay with my parents, where there's a bigger garden, people home all day, and my mum's dog for company.
I miss her so much.
When I had my wobble last week my mum offered to leave her in the garden one evening and I could come round and play with her outside while they stayed in the house. So I did that for a couple of hours on Wednesday and I can't tell you how much it helped.
17. Where do you wish you were right now?
I'm not going to wish myself elsewhere, because I'd just be on lockdown there, instead I wish someone was here with me.
My sister is having a miserable time on lockdown in Ireland, working from home in a box room with a landlady who hates her. Now I've lived with my sister intermittently as adults, and she can be extremely difficult to live with. But given that her landlady reportedly works in a hospital and is swiping boxes of PPE and hoarding them in her bedroom, and has already said that if she catches the virus she's not going to self isolate in her bedroom because it's her house, I'm confident in saying that my sister's not the arsehole in that situation, Typhoid Mary is.
So, yeah, when they closed the universities in Ireland I wish I'd said to her: fly home, you can stop with me and the dog, and work from here.
18. What free-from-quarantine activity are you missing the most?
I want to go to the pub. I want to talk to people my own age. I want to sit in a beer garden and read a book. I want a pint that didn't come out of a tin. I want chips. I want to walk home bumping shoulders with someone.
19. Have you run out of toilet paper and hand sanitizer?
Toilet paper is one of things I always got when it was on offer, so I actually had plenty before the panic buying. (Also, why with the toilet paper...?) Any hand sanitiser I find I take into work because we're always in danger of running out.
The thing I can't find for love nor money are eggs. At this rate I might have to buy a chicken and wait.
20. Do you have enough food to last a month?
Technically, yes. But I would very quickly be reduced to eating dry pasta.
This entry was originally posted at https://netgirl-y2k.dreamwidth.org/201658.html with
comments. Please comment wherever you prefer.