What feels 'normal' to you now that 18 months ago would've seemed unthinkable?

[GoldFrankensteinAndGrrr]

Life feels very much back to normal in many ways now, but I was just thinking about the little (and some not so little) things which, if you could go back two years and tell yourself about, would've seemed unthinkable. Stuff we all now take for granted almost.

Mine would be

Buses with their destination and 'via vaccination centre' and a picture of a syringe/cartoon virus on their LED displays

The idea that if you test positive for an illness you have to stay at home for ten days, you'll be checked on to make sure you are and if you don't you'll be fined (all with good reason of course)

The way that lockdowns/when the next one might be or if there'll be one at all/memories of the first three are discussed - pre pandemic I'd only heard of lockdowns in relation to American school shootings/terror attacks/on disaster films. When I heard that northern Italy went into lockdown my stomach fell through the floor it felt so unreal. Now it's just something else we all talk about

Masks. The first time I saw someone wearing one in Sainsbury's in March last year it was so jarring

What are yours?

Oh yes, spontaneity

Just being at home so much. We used to be out the whole time. I remember Feb 2020 there was a big storm (Bertha? maybe) and we sat at home all day doing nothing but watching telly and playing board games. It was an unusual day - we would usually have been out and about at weekends. Within 4 weeks that's all we were doing.

Not quite back in the groove due to lack of spontaneous options, but also not sure if I want to be back in that groove. I was always skint, now I have money in the bank and so on.

Agree with PPs - spotaneity is really lacking now and I feel it badly.

Hand sanitiser. I despised the stuff pre-covid, it was and still is so sticky & horrible. But now I use it without a second thought really. Although not as much as I used too thank god! It’s given me horrible eczema on my hands 😭

And just generally thinking about illness so much. I never have a second thought to if I’d get ill from going out to lunch or softplay. Illness was just part of life, annoying, inconvenient but something you just got & cracked on with! Now it’s alllll anyone talks about or thinks about. And I hate it. I hate sitting in a cafe & someone inevitably talking about someone over there who cleared their throat .. ‘hope it’s not covid’ 😩

“Is This a Line?” threads on MN now being about pregnancy tests and LFTs.

Agree with a PP about coughing. I sort of flinch at the sound theses days, which isn’t ideal as one of my children has cough-variant asthma and the other child and DH have chronic hay fever. My nerves are shredded!

Working from home.

Zoom calls.

Feeling ill at some point every day (long covid).

Giving up my job. i was so career driven.

My DS1 became very mentally ill during lockdown and was suicidal. So i chucked it all in, and bought a place in the country where I now take in paying guests.

never would have imagined it.

Going to festivals with 'Covid passports'
Gigs being cancelled

Disruption at school (one DC has seven almost successive isolations)

Local restaurants used to do lunchtime specials, but that's stopped since Covid

Not offering people to take a handful of my crisps/nuts or when eating out not sharing a starter that you'd eat with your fingers like chicken wings or nachos.

I wonder is sharing gold fish bowls of cocktails still a thing?

2m distance when queueing, I quite like that.

Not giving two kisses when you meet friends or strangers (Spain), I do NOT miss that!

Had to show vaccine passports last week at a French swimming pool, that was weird.

I'm used to masks, but thank goodness they stopped the rule of wearing them in the street at the beginning of July.

Zoom I will never get used to as long as I live, it's awful working via zoom (or teams, hangout whatever). Teaching a class of 8-9 year olds 3 hours, then high-level-exam 16 year olds, then adults who've done a full day at work or on their own zoom calls. Bleurgh. Not used to that at all.

I feel like I've been stretched to the very edge of my technophobic comfort zone at work and I'm close to the edge! I keep telling myself 'at least I have a job...at least I have a job..." But it's wearing thin.

3GreenPullups that's admirable, good for you. I hope your son is better

I went from spending an average of six nights a month in hotels to spending zero nights in fifteen months. I also went an entire year without leaving the country, for the first time in my adult life. I still can’t believe my passport hasn’t been used in 18 months. These things seem normal now, but it’s still astonishing how much life has changed.

Checking in into a restaurant via the NHS App, driving into a major city centre with lots of funny roads to avoid using the train, checking restrictions before going on holiday.

Mask wearing wasn’t so unusual for me. I go to the Far East quite a lot and would wear one there as the air quality was so poor! Couldn’t stop coughing one day.

We always went on at least two foreign holidays a year and had many destinations in the pipeline for the future.

Now I'd be perfectly happy to never leave the country again. Not worth the risk, and I've come to realise that we have everything we could ever ask for right here in the UK.

The "old normal" is the reason we've been in the shit for the past 18 months.

@NannyAndJohn

We always went on at least two foreign holidays a year and had many destinations in the pipeline for the future.

Now I'd be perfectly happy to never leave the country again. Not worth the risk, and I've come to realise that we have everything we could ever ask for right here in the UK.

The "old normal" is the reason we've been in the shit for the past 18 months.

But you can catch covid just as easily in the UK as anywhere else?

Unfortunately covid is the reason we've been in the shit for the past 18 months, not the 'old normal'.

Having my partner work from home for 16 months rather than going away to do so regularly!

Delivery men leaving shopping or parcels outside and backing off if you open the door, plus no signing for parcels!

Only being allowed into the dentist wearing a mask, sanitising my hands and being the only person in the waiting room!

Trying to talk through a bloody mask.

Went for a meal at a place where you normally go up to the till to order and pay before you eat.

We were given a QR code to scan, had to order thru the stupid app. Shoddy signal so took ages and there was no physical menu to read so I had to do the verbal relay of menu options to each child or hand them my phone to look, neither an appealing choice.

Oh and paying with cash was banned.

It was frustrating.

That I think all politicians are liars. That people cannot see the truth.

Skyping my parents for 30 mins every evening.
Not going inside some friends' houses, so constantly having to check the forecast before visiting them.
Carrying a mask everywhere, just in case.
Ironing masks!

The utter lack of spontaneity

Making more of an effort to keep out the way of people when out in public.
I quite liked people leaping out the way to avoid me, instead of just bumping into me and giving me shitty looks afterwards.

That nearly everyone at work wears a mask ,am in retail

Not knowing what new colleagues actually look like and despite working with them for 12 hour shifts I would pass them in the street without their masks on.

@NannyAndJohn you will go abroad one day, the reason you feel the way you do is because the government didn't take a phased approach to returning to normal. But it will be over one day. Even the most cautious of countries i.e. Singapore say they want to return to normal but they are doing it slowly. They just allowed quarantine free travel for 8 countries, but UK predictably isn't one of them.

Wondering daily about case numbers and whether the Schengen borders will close again, making regular medical treatment for other conditions difficult.