Westministenders: A Year of Johnson

[RedToothBrush]

So having given the benefit of the doubt...

... whats your reflections?

Good (and yes do have some thoughts on the positive - challenge yourself on this one as its important) and the bad (and yes this is the easy bit but keep it within reason)?

I've done some wacky home improvements too - gold leafed the outside of the bath have learned how to fill cement cracks in the garden, re-oiled worktops in kitchen, sealed around the loo, made a willow dome, painted my kitchen black, bathroom teal, bedroom blue, stenciled the concrete area outside...I could go on

Oh and "they" is clearly the shower headed by the Twitterer Mike Hancock, or maybe just plain twit...

Given the complete horlicks "they" made of the original Covid legislation are we even sure this is actually properly done ?

"only 6 to a lane" says HMG

Which can’t work as pools are all different lengths - we have regularly used 17m, 25m, 33.3m and 50m pools.

The guidance I read is based on square metres per person dependent on the depth of the water. Which turns out to be not very different from the standard bather load calcs anyway. Or from standard swim training space requirements.

@SabrinaThwaite

"only 6 to a lane" says HMG

Which can’t work as pools are all different lengths - we have regularly used 17m, 25m, 33.3m and 50m pools.

The guidance I read is based on square metres per person dependent on the depth of the water. Which turns out to be not very different from the standard bather load calcs anyway. Or from standard swim training space requirements.

Are there any 50m pools outside London ? (I vaguely recall Manchester had one). Birmingham University have one, but it's only open to members of the public over 90 who can bring both parents at the same time.

I must admit, it's my regular swim I'm missing most. I suspect when this is all over, public swimming pools will have gone forever.

DGR (hugs)
I had a good old sob in the bath last night. Felt suddenly utterly bereft of all hope.
I've put my job hunting on hold as I think both my dc will be home at least 50% of the time from September and ds2 will need some supervision.
Mum is planning to move from her home of 50 years so there's that going on too.
I'll be busy at foodbank that's for sure.

Yes, there are a few 50m pools - not as many as there should be though. And some aren’t very well designed (Dollan, looking at you).

jesuis
Sounds fabulous!
We've wallpapered the front room, painted ds2s room and got him a new desk and we are getting the other sitting room carpeted next month.
Dh is re-jigging the back garden and planting some nice flowers/bushes.
I bought quire a few xmassy things back in January as I thought that this December would be a clusterfuck.
I got a balsam hill tree in their sale, some lovely decorations, rolls and rolls of wrapping paper for 5p a roll...
Seems so....frivolous now :(

My mum and dn came here today.
We put the gazebo up and filled the large paddling pool and they've had a great time splashing about with water balloons.
We bought a salad lunch from the deli too.
Delicious.
Feels like "the last summer before the war"...
(If you haven't read it...do)

yoikes

(hugs) back.

The slowly sinking UK reputation - notice the sly dig at the UK being told what to do by Russia ...

Hong Kong: China says it will not recognise UK overseas passports

www.fr24news.com/a/2020/07/hong-kong-china-says-it-will-not-recognize-uk-passports-abroad-hong-kong.html

...

He said it was the UK, not China, that had changed and should take full responsibility for the current difficulties in the relationship. He blamed the Cold War warriors within the Conservative Party and said they were influenced by outside powers.

...

Emilyontmoor I do get that timing is terrible. Nonetheless, I don’t think I would be pissed off really, no because I would have enough sense to realise that we are in a global pandemic. All bets are off, for me all normal activities save for work, exercise and shopping are suspended.

I haven’t and wouldn’t have been planning any of the normal activities with family, friends or others virtually regardless of what the government guidance says. I think the realistic prospect of me reengaging with these things remains months away.

The place of worship I attend(ed) every week has been entirely shut since March, we had hoped to reopen it on a limited basis last Sunday but this proved not to be possible. If we can plan for Christmas, we will, if we can’t do anything physically in the building then we won’t.

The idea that there will be a swift return to any form of normality in such activities is IMO, absurd. That there is regilous festival on 1st August or 25th December matters not one whit to a virus who’s only task is to reproduce.

DGR Here you go.
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_long_course_swimming_pools_in_the_United_Kingdom

Interesting that your son is doing better at home - I keep hearing that with SEN kids who are getting real provisions (online teaching).

My ds has ADHD and anxiety, he has a full online teaching schedule his grades were fantastic last term.
I've still opted to send him back to school at the end of August ( if possible) because I think he needs social interaction for his emotional development and anxiety management. However academically working from home has gone well ( for his NT dsis not so much!)

Louise
Nonetheless, I don’t think I would be pissed off really, no because I would have enough sense to realise that we are in a global pandemic
Sorry but I think you are kidding yourself.
If you had the food in the fridge for a big meal with family and then they were barred from coming
you would be SEETHING
FFS lots of people have lost family members this year and sharing a meal with the rest would be a BIG thing to lose.
I am willing to lay money that the government will do NOTHING that would interfere with their own family celebrations

Re Masks in shops
At my big local Supermarket just now I'd say it was 90% wearing masks
including some of the young kids wearing really cheery designs

I asked the checkout lady and she confirmed what I'd already heard
not one member of their team has been sent home sick with COVID
a couple of staff are on furlough because they have health issues
but in a poor area with lots of elderly
COVID has been a non issue

which will make further knee jerk actions by Johnson and his team
harder and harder to enforce

I was table to top up more of my stockpile though

Louise I couldn't agree more. I have been in my own form of lockdown since the beginning of March and started getting my parents prepared with online shopping etc even when I was there last Christmas because social media in Asia was beginning to light up with details of a new respiratory virus in Wuhan in the way it did before SARs, and my radar was further activated by Taiwan starting to board planes from Wuhan to test everybody on 31 December. I lived in Hong Kong through SARs and nobody needs to doctor my 2003 emails that warned that it had turned out to be a lucky escape, this Coronavirus was not airbourne, but a big one was inevitable, and I didn't think the UK would have responded as well as Hong Kong had done. I really did not want to experience being proved right in quite such a traumatic way. I did not even dash 250 miles up the motorway when they (both octagenarians) got Covid at the beginning of March. There is no way Boris is enlisting me or my family in his "Save Pret and Weatherspoons" initiative even if one of them is braving the commute to Central London since early March to volunteer their skills in the Cancer Research testing initiative for North London Hospitals that was and is testing staff when the government has failed. Nobody needs to educate me on the seriousness of the pandemic. However clearly somebody needs to educate the government.

The point is that if you are going to lockdown areas with large asian populations it is completely dysfunctional, as has been the rest of the government's response to the pandemic, to do it by Twitter at 9.30 on the eve of or even during Eid (some celebrated it yesterday). There was nothing magic about yesterday evening that moved the situation to one where a lockdown was suddenly necessary unless of course it was the sudden realisation that it was the verge of Eid. Local government, the NHS and the Muslim community had been gearing up their communications in relation to Eid for weeks, and indeed quite clearly preparing for a lockdown given the speed with which they have rolled out their measures and messaging . I particularly like "If you put out your bins for Bradford Council to collect you are in lockdown". It could have been done in the days before what was clearly known to be a potential crisis for infection control......

Incidentally, I was intrigued to read in Fortean Times one possible explanation for the odd sudden value of bog roll for this pandemic ... apparently Japan started stockpiling as almost all of theirs is made in China, and they wanted to beat any shutdowns ?

And then, like lemmings the rest of the world followed. (Except chez Rossetti).

DGR
OOOh, I've not read the Fortean for years.

@ListeningQuietly

DGR OOOh, I've not read the Fortean for years.

Still going strong, and yours truly helped index the archive of 1970s scans ....

Lakesidesummer My actual home schooling experience was when my children were young and I guess getting any 6 year old to write anything is going to be like watching grass grow, literally, I used to stare out of the window at the grass outside for what seemed like hours at a time.....

However I did spend a lot of time with my DD who has severe processing and memory problems (bottom 9%) in addition to formal schooling just sharing my own coping mechanisms and thinking skills. Not doing the thinking / work for her but suggesting ways she might approach it that enabled / benefitted her different way of thinking. I am sure that bridged a gap with her formal schooling, which was good but for obvious reasons driven by NT pedagogy. I can see that home schooling when she was older would have had that benefit.

DGR Japan was the source of the last great bog roll panic (sound of conspiracy theories being stewed) priceonomics.com/the-great-toilet-paper-scare-of-1973/

In our new alternate reality if you are Boris's brother or you invite him to lavish parties and get him drunk ( and call the wolf you walk in Hampton Court home park Boris) or you are Mr May you get a peerage...

Dgr Japan was where there was a big bog roll heist. I shit you not. (Pun intended)

@yoikes well done on the wallpapering, I've not tried doing that yet (unless you count the insides of the kitchen cabinets which have a mix of colourful decopage and one is sticky back wallpaper!). I do enjoy doing home improvements, but I can't help feeling they are just a little bit shit. I stenciled the kitchen table though which got a very positive response from my friends I also have loads of jobs that need 2 people (and strong people at that) and just don't know anyone who could help, esp at the moment. Budget doesn't run to workmen atm and I wouldn't want them in the house.

Re COVID the other issue now is of course not only non-compliance over masks in some areas but that people are recognising the toothlessness of the govt in all things it "advises" [https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2020/jul/31/no-one-stops-you-coronavirus-shoppers-attitudes-to-masks-differ-across-uk]]

link fail www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2020/jul/31/no-one-stops-you-coronavirus-shoppers-attitudes-to-masks-differ-across-uk