Pandemic personal consequences

[existentialist]

I wake up in the morning with a headache due to all the screen time. It's been 10 months of non stop teaching on Zoom/Teams/Blackboard and I am close to the limit.

I find that it helps if I can consciously "de-focus". The lack of sufficient feedback (non-verbal, body language) stuff tends to make us project much more (a bit like how we talk louder on the phone if the person we're talking to is hard to hear), and exert a lot more effort than we need to in our communications.

I remind myself to lean back (metaphorically), slow things down, and keep the focus somewhere between me and the screen. When I remember and stick to it, I am less strained afterwards. But it's not easy.

 

[SheilaNaGig]

I want to cook for someone else, not just myself.

!!!!!!!

 

[LDC]

I want to cook for someone else, not just myself.

!!!!!!!

Oh god I am so fucking bored of cooking.

 

[SheilaNaGig]

Oh god I am so fucking bored of cooking.

I hear you x

I’m basically eating the same thing every day.

Met a friend for a socially distanced walk yesterday (felt super unsafe as we chugged around the Park with a billion other people in the mud) and she gave me a new recipe! Something simple for which I had th ingredients. I was ridiculously excited.

 

[existentialist]

Oh god I am so fucking bored of cooking.

I batch cook and freeze it in portions, so if I'm having a lazy day it's just a case of shoving a few frozen bricks of something in the microwave, and voila! Instant food.

But yes, it's an effort when you're only cooking for yourself...

 

[nagapie]

I want to cook for someone else, not just myself.

!!!!!!!

Cook for meeeeeee! I've given up real food.

 

[maomao]

I wish I could cook for just me sometimes. Or even just adults.

 

[FridgeMagnet]

I find I need to constantly try new things and order weird components to maintain any level of interest, but that's such a pain when you can't physically shop for things beyond the local Tescos.

Part of the process of cooking for me has always been the "gathering" stage, where you go around shops looking for the best ingredients, judge them, make your selection, maybe find something unexpected to add, then come back and start work. I've done this since I was a student. It is just not the same online - there's no feedback from ticking boxes on a shopping site, no reward, no sense that you're contributing to the process at all, plus it's more expensive and you're more likely to end up with shit you don't want.

 

[LDC]

I batch cook and freeze it in portions, so if I'm having a lazy day it's just a case of shoving a few frozen bricks of something in the microwave, and voila! Instant food.

But yes, it's an effort when you're only cooking for yourself...

Yeah, I cook for couple of others though, one very fussy. I don't do all the cooking, maybe 80%, but when you're at home for nearly all your meals and even when you're not you have to cook to take meals in to work, it does get boring!

 

[nagapie]

I wish I could cook for just me sometimes. Or even just adults.

Oh yes, I cook every day, but for kids. Two different meals too. But I don't want to cook for adults, I don't want to cook any more, just want people to cook for me.

 

[maomao]

Oh yes, I cook every day, but for kids. Two different meals too. But I don't want to cook for adults, I don't want to cook any more, just want people to cook for me.

I mean adults including myself obviously. Had to give up some of my favourite dishes for the last few years. Going to be a decade or so before either of them will eat my spicy chorizo, spinach and potato stew.

 

[Clair De Lune]

I mean adults including myself obviously. Had to give up some of my favourite dishes for the last few years. Going to be a decade or so before either of them will eat my spicy chorizo, spinach and potato stew.

I had to bite the bullet and make two ...or three different dinners a day eventually as I couldn't miss out on curry or chili or indeed anything spicy any longer. Its always a relief when I find a meal we can all eat though.

 

[miss direct]

I went into M&S today and they have some amazing yellow sticker deals in the food hall. Got a big pack of organic steak for 90p, 3 kiwis for 30p and all sorts of other goodies. Not quite sure how long the food halls will survive at this rate.

 

[Orang Utan]

I love cooking for one as I can experiment!

 

[Artaxerxes]

Christ I hate not being able to go the shops.

 

[muscovyduck]

Anyone else beginning to struggle with how lopsided shopping has been for like 10 months now? As in, anything you can easily order online, great, anything else has been problematic. And also that it's still quite easy to buy stuff but not easy to get stuff fixed so I got a lot of junk hanging about

 

[prunus]

Anyone else beginning to struggle with how lopsided shopping has been for like 10 months now? As in, anything you can easily order online, great, anything else has been problematic. And also that it's still quite easy to buy stuff but not easy to get stuff fixed so I got a lot of junk hanging about

I seem to be the yin to your yang (or the other way around)! I’ve been pleasantly surprised that there doesn’t seem to be anything I can’t get online, and in finding things to do to fill all the time I’d usually be outdoors I’ve fixed up most of the broken junk that’s been cluttering up the place (I mean, all I’ve done is turn it into functional junk cluttering up the place, but somehow that feels better :-D).

I might never visit a shop again.

 

[MickiQ]

Anyone else beginning to struggle with how lopsided shopping has been for like 10 months now? As in, anything you can easily order online, great, anything else has been problematic. And also that it's still quite easy to buy stuff but not easy to get stuff fixed so I got a lot of junk hanging about

We've bought almost everything online these past 10 months including groceries. I have been inside a shop only half a dozen times in that period and apart from one solitary visit to Sainsbury they've always been the local corner shop or pharmacist.
Our favourite Chinese takeaway does phone orders for delivery now and even the local chipshop is doing click and collect. Retail has changed beyond all recognition for us now.
In fact the only reason I went Sainsburys was to kill the time whilst I waited for Youngest Q to sit her theory driving test since it was too far to bother to go home.

 

[Artaxerxes]

Anyone else beginning to struggle with how lopsided shopping has been for like 10 months now? As in, anything you can easily order online, great, anything else has been problematic. And also that it's still quite easy to buy stuff but not easy to get stuff fixed so I got a lot of junk hanging about

We have a lot of bags waiting to go to charity shop hanging about.

I struggle with ordering quite enough to last two weeks, mostly for fresh veg and milk. I could probably ration snacks better to last but frankly I'm fucking bored at home so I snack.

 

[muscovyduck]

We have a lot of bags waiting to go to charity shop hanging about.

I struggle with ordering quite enough to last two weeks, mostly for fresh veg and milk. I could probably ration snacks better to last but frankly I'm fucking bored at home so I snack.

I've tried listing stuff online hoping to get rid of it quicker but not had much luck. Most of it's womens clothes which are notoriously difficult to get rid of tbf. Freecycle has been good for the big items but a bit overwhelming sometimes

 

[MickiQ]

I've tried listing stuff online hoping to get rid of it quicker but not had much luck. Most of it's womens clothes which are notoriously difficult to get rid of tbf. Freecycle has been good for the big items but a bit overwhelming sometimes

Mrs Q isn't really the major purchaser of womens clothing that she once was but as well as her own she gathers stuff from our daughters and donates them in one big load to the local charity shop. When the pandemic is over they are due for a massive delivery.

 

[Espresso]

Mrs Q isn't really the major purchaser of womens clothing that she once was but as well as her own she gathers stuff from our daughters and donates them in one big load to the local charity shop. When the pandemic is over they are due for a massive delivery.

I don't know if this is applicable to wherever you live, but where I live, the homeless charities will come and pick up clothes, if you contact them directly.
Unless your wife donates to a particular charity shop because of the charity it is, of course.

 

[MickiQ]

I don't know if this is applicable to wherever you live, but where I live, the homeless charities will come and pick up clothes, if you contact them directly.
Unless your wife donates to a particular charity shop because of the charity it is, of course.

I'm not sure some of the clothes donated by my two elder daughters would be much use to an homeless person, certainly wouldn't keep them warm thats for sure. I wouldn't have thought the charity shop would find them easy to sell either but the nice lady who took the last lot off me when I dropped them off assured me they go like hot cakes. Clearly I am more of a prude than i like to admit.
The only charity round here that does collection is Cancer Research who will come and collect second hand furniture for resale and we've fenced some stuff via them. However even they turned their noses up at my son's old mattress.

 

[Roadkill]

I want to cook for someone else, not just myself.

!!!!!!!

Yes, this. I go through phases when I can't be arsed with cooking but for most of the time I've been quite enjoying it, and the weekly dinner 'challenges' I do with my mum and sister force me to experiment a bit, but I'm really missing cooking for other people. When all this is over I've a battery of new recipes to try out on longdog!

In other news, sister in law's father was discharged from hospital today.

 

[andysays]

I've heard today that two people I know have recently been hospitalised with covid.

One is someone I work with whose Dad died last week who has rapidly come down with it himself.

The other is my step brother's wife who's a consultant anesthetist and has been very busy working with covid patients on ventilators.

Makes the whole thing seem much closer and more scary somehow, even though that's probably not entirely rational...

 

[weepiper]

Talking with a colleague of mine today (who's a sweet guy that I've known for 20+ years) about the weirdness of the situation. He's type 1 diabetic so has been basically shielding for much of the time. Lives alone, looks after his elderly parents who live in the same city as far as he can, goes out on his bike maybe with one friend, goes for walks at night to avoid too many people etc. He said he can't really remember the last time anyone touched him. It's pretty awful for single people this

 

[Puddy_Tat]

work seem to have decided that this lockdown isn't going to go away as quick as planned, so much work this week on my part to scale things back again pretty damn quick.

bugger.

 

[sideboob]

Talking with a colleague of mine today (who's a sweet guy that I've known for 20+ years) about the weirdness of the situation. He's type 1 diabetic so has been basically shielding for much of the time. Lives alone, looks after his elderly parents who live in the same city as far as he can, goes out on his bike maybe with one friend, goes for walks at night to avoid too many people etc. He said he can't really remember the last time anyone touched him. It's pretty awful for single people this

This post basicaly sums up the last year or so, for so many people. It is sad, very fucking sad.

 

[spanglechick]

August. The last hug I had was in August. Even with my support bubble friend I saw at Xmas it doesn’t feel safe.

 

[sideboob]

August. The last hug I had was in August. Even with my support bubble friend I saw at Xmas it doesn’t feel safe.

I hear you, and am sending you virtual hugs. All the hugs I`ve got, they`re yours. Hard times for everyone but wish you the best