26 March - Lock Down but Look Up!
How’s things with you?
Everyone I know is OK but then everyone I know has been scrupulously observing
the rules, we may all go insane but the longer we can put off picking up the
virus the better we shall all probably be.
Unlike at the weekend Lesnes Abbey Park
viewed from my bedroom window has been very quiet if not deserted. I’ve not seen anyone there.
I have had two offers of help from younger people and one has bought a couple of
packets of gluten free biscuits to be dropped in at the weekend. (Bloody Coeliac Disease!)
With two people close to me with more serious health issues I have had two
disparate households to keep supplied with things I have picked up in a small
shop a mile and a half away. I have
not been to a supermarket for a whole week and
it was a big waste of time because they had nothing I wanted. The looters
had latched on to the fact that Gluten Free food is not actually poisonous and
there was almost none there.
I think one of the two households I’ve helped has now got more local help so I am not planning
on going there again but the one across the river is more of a problem. I have
been driving there every couple of days late at night, dumping the supplies in the kitchen
without seeing anyone, checking what might be needed next and buying it if I
can for the next visit. Milk and bread and paper handkerchiefs for tomorrow night.
Last night I took proof of the old lady’s age, my carer papers from the
Department of Work and Pensions and the Do Not Resuscitate certificate from the
Doctor in case I get stopped en-route.
I think I shall be personally OK for a couple of weeks on what may very well be a
monotonous diet; probably little by the way of vegetables. Up until now my only
problem is sore hands, my childhood eczema appears to have made a renewed bid for skin supremacy due to the extra washing.
With luck I won’t need to call for help from Bexley
Voluntary Service Council for myself, there is sure to be many far worse off than I am, but I do
not rule out a call to Newham Council eventually. The poor carer there has not had a
day off since 8th March and she has to travel around town on a bus which is
getting to be a rare commodity. I think she deserves a little bonus. The regular carer has been away nursing a sick mother and lost her last weekend -
but not from Covid-19.
I don’t suppose I would be accepted as a volunteer to Bexley Council on the
grounds of age although it looks like it might be an interesting thing to do,
but those who are fit, well and realise that taking risks with health, theirs
and other people’s, is not an option should think about volunteering.
Click image if you need help or can offer help.