Mumsnet during the beginning of the Pandemic - please tell me your stories of the maddest comments you saw

Yep. The contract between the government and people was ripped up, and spat on. I will never believe, respect or trust any politician or government again, in my life. And I won't forget that the party which is now in government had NOTHING to say about the damage lockdowns caused, and completely failed to provide a shred of opposition to the madness: the only thing they opposed was any notion of easing restrictions at all.

London. It was miserable and cold I remember texting dh about the end of days.

We also remember being in a surreal empty ish park in the snow a fair few times.

My regular supplier refused to sell us hand sanitiser because he said we weren’t essential workers. We’re a food manufacturer. I told him if he thought the panic buying was bad then, try announcing all the food manufacturers have closed down and put their staff on furlough. The army would be on the streets by teatime.

His response was that our staff don’t touch the product, so there was no danger of us passing Covid to our customers. I dont think he’s ever quite recovered from the ear bashing he got. I’m still furious now, how dare he say our staff don’t matter. I haven’t bought so much as paper towel from him since. He lost a massive account that day and he’s never once dared to ask why (very wise)

You can still see the remains of the 2 metre and other signs around the place.
I found a pack of the horrible face masks the other day. Clearing out a cupboard , was going to put them in the bin, but I have some sanding to do so. They are finally coming in handy.
Also found some out of date Covid tests, not nhs ones! Ones we had bought when we had Covid and were testing to see when we would be free.

The arrows,oh god the arrows

I work at the golden arches and the bosses where mental for the rules

We could walk 'down' the kitchen but not 'up' again-we had to walk around

I remember walking 'around' rather than 'down' the kitchen and getting screamed at by the manager

Walking 'around' meant I walked past nobody but if I'd walked 'down' I would have passed about 10 people

We could work arse to arse but god help you if you turned around

We where forced to wear masks-we could take them off on our breaks but had to put the same one back on to work (we'd walk in,have our temp taken,handed a mask and then we'd head upstairs,unmasked but had to put them on as we came down into the kitchen)

I remember the ear strap snapped and I was shouted at for asking for another one

They only stopped making us wear them when it got too expensive to buy them

I remember getting bollocked by some bloke for walking the 'wrong' way in tesco-he soon pissed off when (bigger than him) dp came around the corner to see what the shouting was about

It was a mental time-it really brought out the worst in people

I am sure that would have been in the news. People partying in Tesco car park, spreading Covid about.

Reminds me of the local press taking pictures of queues for places like B&M. They thought it was worthy of a news article.

I spent a lovely hour in the sun with my kindle while queuing to get into sainsburys.
I used to WFH so it was always just me and the dog and cats but suddenly there were 3 more people in my house all day every day so I was happy to spend any time on my own. Even if it was in a queue.

They're lucky that didn't turn into an impromptu disco!

I remember the First Minister of Wales (Mark Drakeford) causing utter mayhem when he decreed that sanitary towels and tampons weren't essential items, and he had the relevant aisles in shops roped off.

I think his wife must have had a word with him because he fairly quickly backed down.
🤣

Link

The sunny days were the worst. I can't handle sun or heat at all. And an attendant in my local tesco set up a sound system and played some sort of noise music to entertain the masses.

Where are you? None of that where I was.

My funniest memory - staying in a Spanish island resort hotel as a lockdown was declared.
The hotel had a designated spa and outdoor naturist area…
60 vacant sun loungers, circular swimming pool, jacuzzi, blue sky…one solitary gorgeous lady with an enviable hourglass figure, lovely hair and makeup - lying alone, naked wearing nothing but a clinical face mask.
The amusing memory will remain with me forever.

The police were simultaneously clearing the beaches of people.

I remember queuing in the snow other lockdown the queue went right around the Sainsbury’s carpark

It was certainly something! A lot of shops still have the stickers on the floor.

Blimey. That sounds completely crazy
I feel like I’ve missed one of life’s experiences. 🥴

DH and I had a nightmare of a respiratory illness in Dec 2019.
I'd just been to London for a week and returned to our little Scottish village having been on trains, coaches, buses and tubes all over London, England and Scotland.

I'm pretty sure it must have been Covid.

I doubt some of that outside shop queuing would've lasted as long as it did had the first lockdown not been mostly sunny, dry and warm but not hot.

Yes, you had to follow the route at the back length of the store (and it was a Tesco Extra, so huge)... past the bread, fish, cereal, and you had to go through the booze aisle. After that, you could go anywhere but only one way in each aisle. You had to go to the end and go round the back again.... It was ridiculous.

You could only take a shortcut to the pharmacy. You could overtake people, but you would get screamed at.

You could skip the meat section, as it was just the back length of the store and the booze aisle that you were forced down... bit of a problem if you have issues with alcohol.

Oh, if it rained, the outside queue was brought indoors, so there was an Alton Towers snaking queue around the toys and homeware aisles.

A few times I had forgot to get something and didn't think it worth the ball ache to get it so went without.

Yes. You just knew that if they'd been alive in WWII they'd have eagerly reported on their Jewish friends/neighbours to the Nazis.

As I have no experience of using these arrows in shops what happened

• if all you wanted was a pint of milk. Did you have to follow everyone around the arrows, past the booze etc.

Or

• Were there shortcuts
• could you overtake others or did you literally have to wait for those in front of you to move on.

• What happened to people like me who would find it disgusting to have to walk through the meat section. Could areas be skipped past

Ps it’s not a test Xeno 🥴

I am terrible for following arbitrary rules and not questioning and being a terrible people pleaser so am really quite proud that I never clapped for the NHS and also never for one second admired a very privileged white posh old bloke walking round his huge garden. My cynicism obviously competes with the rule following.

i wasn’t on mn during covid but my real life experiences

we think my daughter had COVID in feb 2020. She had the most horrendous’flu’ which lingered for weeks and she was really ill for a fortnight until she seemed to pass the worst of it. She’s never been that ill before or since.

I work for a large DIY company and worked all through lockdown. Within three days we all had letters to carry with us in our cars or in our bags during travel to and from work in case we were stopped by the police explaining we were working for an essential retailer

I got spat at and called some vile names as we had a queue system outside and we asked customers to take a trolley to aid in social distancing

The amount of people who came up close to me and continued to get closer even when I stood back further

the amount of snarky comments I got from people as I continued to wear a mask as my oh and daughter were on the vulnerable list. I used to mouth ‘twat’ from behind my mask.

if anyone says to me ‘covid brought us together’ i always now reply with ‘no, it made it obvious who the cunts are’ The public became vile to retail workers

I did lose my shit in Asda loo roll aisle when the shelves were stripped almost bare and a bloke was stood with 3x4 packs. I very loudly said ‘and why the fuck are people stock piling loo roll? It leaves nothing for us essential workers’. He sheepishly put 2 packs back 😂

I remember being in school when we’d just gone back in June 2020.
We had very strict protocol to keep us “safe”
in particular the head and deputy carefully measured distances between the desks and taped a box on the floor for me to teach in…I was supposed to stay in there at all times apparently.
the only problem was it was a class for children with learning difficulties.
before they had finished taping my special “box” one of the children was licking to door handle, shortly after it was finished another child pulled the tape back up and ate it then later that day a third child came and sat on my knee then wee’d on me!!
We just sort of muddled through after that 🥴🤣

The arrows were madness. My local big Tesco made you walk down the back side of the store, then through the booze aisle... then you could do your shop, but only go down each aisle in one direction.
But, if you only needed the pharmacy (which I did as I get my meds weekly), you could skip the queue to get in (and they rivalled Alton Towers at times), and go straight to the pharmacy counter without the whole rigmarole of a long tour around the shop first.
It made no sense.

Omg I remember those two!!