Middle-aged, Free and Single

No Furlough

I fall into the ‘not furloughed’ category – found out on Monday. The boss had asked us for our preferences a few days ago, but with no guarantee that we’d all get what we wanted. They were still making decisions about how the furloughing would actually work – maybe they would pick individual stores to…

Be Nice. Stay Home.

I wrote this just seven weeks ago – or what feels like a lifetime ago. Back in a time when corona virus was unheard of, social distancing hadn’t been invented, and furlough wasn’t even a verb. But I thought it was important to write it then, and I think it’s even more important to re-post…

Known Unknowns

It’s the not knowing that’s the worst part of all of this. ‘There are known knowns. There are things we know that we know. There are known unknowns. That is to say, there are things that we now know we don’t know. But there are also unknown unknowns. There are things we do not know…

Signs of Spring

Many things are very different now – but some things can’t be changed by any pesky virus. I like this time of the year – the signs of Spring are now unmistakable. You can feel the world around us starting to limber up. My daffodils are coming through, the clematis is in full swing. I…

When Life Seems Jolly Rotten

I’m not going to say that life will never be the same again – life WILL be the same again. But for the moment, and for as long as it has to be, our lives are going to be different. So here are a few positive thoughts about this strange situation that we all find…

No More Days Off

I had a day off from work yesterday. Turns out I’m a key worker. Didn’t see that coming. So – first thing I did was sleep for nine hours – from 10pm until 7am. For someone who normally only feels the need for about 5 hours’ sleep, I think that shows I’m quite tired with…

The Accidental Key Worker

Can I admit to having Lockdown Envy? The thought of being able to stay home, maybe read a book, go for a nice walk as long as I stay away from people – that sounds lovely. My reality is very different. I’m a kitchen designer – but because I work for a major DIY store…

Lockdown

Yesterday was the first day of ‘lockdown’ in the UK. I work as a kitchen designer for a major DIY chain. As a ‘hardware store’ we are counted as providing an essential service, so we’ll be staying open one way or another. We sell items that people will need in order to keep their homes…

Supernumerary in the States

Hope you’re feeling well and coping well with it all. After a flurry of Covid-19-related posts, I’ve decided that actually, sometimes, we might just want to think about something completely different. So – unless there’s something that I feel I really need to post, relating to Covid-19, I’m going to simply continue to post ‘normal’…

Self (isolating) Help

I’m setting up a group for the road I live on, to help people who are no longer able to go out due to Covid-19. If you’ve got something similar going on where you are, how did you go about setting it up? So far, I’ve dropped a note round to all the neighbours (it’s…