University 2020 :10: Empty nests warm vests and covid tests: uni parents 2020

[sammyjoanne]

Carry on from MilicentMartha's University 9 thead
www.mumsnet.com/Talk/higher_education/a4025020-University-2020-9-And-theyre-off-making-hay-while-the-sun-shines?msgid=101075411#101075411

I think in tier 3 you can still play university organised sport, and go to some gyms. You can still meet for a socially distanced walk too though not according to PP a chat or a picnic. Am I right there?

Uncle Vanya seems to be booking at Lancaster cinema, am I seeing it right? Would like to persuade ds2 to go. Only on for one night in ds1 tier 2 city, and that is night he gets out at midnight, 1st Nov.

Still, there is His Dark Materials to keep us chatting about TV. When ds1 was a fresher we used to talk about each Dr who episode when it was over

Letusprey. Ds2 had to make a report to uni, and while household were told when their isolation ended. It was all spelt out. Never contacted by test and trace, it was done thro uni testing, obv NHS but coordinated by uni

Whole not while household

Thank you so much everyone for the Covid and shopping stuff! He said they’ve let people know at university who need to and he’s read the information on the Covid page, so some of the lack of information may be down to DS1 not particularly paying full attention 🙄 which he’s been reminded to do,

That’s a shame re missing Uncle Vanya Nettleskeins. Looking forward to His Dark Materials too.

@LetUsPrey @Nettleskeins DD got Sainsbury deliveries to Lonsdale when flat was isolating - organised online herself and was very easy - delivered to front door of house.

@LetUsPrey, DS used a Sainsbury’s app chopchopapp.co.uk/ which delivered in a hour. Not their usual delivery service with the vans, but it had plenty of availability and delivered to his flat. It’s not available everywhere though.

Thanks for the reminder about His Dark Materials. Looking forward to that!

Haven’t seen that @KingscoteStaff, will have a look now.

@LetUsPrey, doesn’t look like it’s available in Lancaster, sorry.

@LetUsPrey Aww I was really hoping your DS flat got away with it. After speaking with DD this week, she said that the website on Lancaster uni portal reporting figures was way out, and a large amount of flats have been through it, or self isolating.
She ordered through Asda on line and delivery was 3 days later. Just said name, flat number/name, college and uni as the address. Sultans did delivery and also had a Papa johns pizza delivered. Among us became very popular choice. Hope he stays covid free :)

@Nettleskeins Nottinghams about to go into tier 3 and they said on the news tonight that cinemas are staying open, but places like beauty salons are shut.I think its down to the individual county councils and what rules they impose. Its like the pubs + meal thing is a main ruling, but others things like gyms, and tattoo parlours are debatable for each region. Centre parks will be shutting in Nottinghamshire as well. If Vue cinema is open in Lancaster and still bookable, it must be open still :)

Iceland has a (possibly surprisingly, to some) reasonably wide range of fresh and store cupboard food as well as frozen and can usually offer next day delivery slots. I hold the store fully responsible for our own household's addiction to thick-cut 'tiger' bloomer bread...

Iceland also sell frozen ready to bake Greggs sausage rolls and the like

DS going into Tier 3 from Sunday night.

Iceland also sell frozen ready to bake Greggs sausage rolls and the like

I wasn't going to mention that, in case I started a stampede.

DD (2nd year, Birmingham) sent us a photo of herself with her 'release from self isolation' celebration food, which may possibly have started off in life as a cook from frozen Greggs sausage roll.

I’d hoped they’d avoid it too but the person who’s tested positive has been going home at the weekends so that can’t really have helped. Oh well.

Thank you again for all the suggestions which I’ll take on board and also tell DS1 about. I can be quite anxious so to have straightforward, helpful advice and knowing that I’ve got somewhere to ask these questions is a huge help.

Iceland also do the Greggs steak bakes. DS2 is a big fan.

DD release from isolation photograph was two machines full of laundry and the caption 'living my best life'!! She's dealing incredibly well with the whole weird freshers experience.

And my DS is in a shared house in Wales (3rd year) where all his housemates have gone home to tier 2 and 3 areas in England to avoid the Welsh lockdown, going back after the two weeks.
And people wonder why this is going on for so long.

For the vegetarians out there, Iceland do also stock Greggs Vegetable bakes (my favourite Greggs item, after the sausage rolls and something I used to treat myself to for breakfast from their shops when I had to be somewhere near at the relevant time) and their 'No Porkies' 'sausage rolls aren't bad, either, as fake products go.

But if you order from Iceland you run the risk of their strange issue with debit cards not going through!!! But the money appears as a pending charge. Please be warned.

Maybe a good thing to come out of this is that we can drop the whole snowflake generation trope?

I know there was some grain of truth in that before, as we compare our High tech children’s expectations with our own more simpler 1970s and 80s childhood, but now Due to Covid I can see evidence that these young people are going to be more resilient and dare I say it, a little more grateful about their lives in this day and age. Maybe we all are 🤷🏻‍♀️

It really feels as if, after six months of inaction over the summer, our young people were keen to face any type of new challenge, be it finding out how to get food or creating new ways of socialising, and are enjoying doing so with people other than their parents.

Hopefully it will remind us of the fact that University is about so much more than the subject matter and lectures.

I completely agree @Oratory1.

Re Iceland - my ds discovered Iceland during his first week at university (not somewhere he has been to before). He’s a convert, and as a vegetarian particularly loves the Greggs veggie bakes!

There has been a lot of bleating on (not here) about how the poor lambikins are missing out on the whole university experience. It seems to me that they've created their own experience and, for the most part, have realised that things would be no better at home doing what they had or hadn't been doing since March. I think we should be really proud of how they are managing.

Do you reckon they can socialise indoors in a laundry whilst in Tier 2? Just asking for a friend....

Not socialise as such, but keeping 2m apart with masks I can’t see why they shouldn’t chat. It’s a bit like being at work, a necessary task. I hope your ‘friend’ is coping in tier 2.

Hoghni, I think it really does depend on your living arrangements and the course itself, why would it not?
I know that my ds2 is in an optimum setting in a household of 12, green space, humanities lots of reading to be done.
Others might be in v different circs, whether they are Freshers or third years. I know that ds1 is having a better time than at home but he has been relatively crushed by the closing down of all the social outlets that worked for him. He isn't a lamikin just a shy awkward 20 year old who things have deteriorated further for, household and socialising wise, and probably academics too as a knock-on.

And it WAS going well before lockdown, now it isn't. I'm not bleating to say that, just stating that his uni experience aka his life, is being affected. And he won't get this time back, in a city, Oxford (Brookes) where there so many opportunities which have now dried up, for him, if not for others in same city.

@MarchingFrogs and @ShaunaTheSheep Sausage bean and cheese melts at Greggs at Iceland is really nice too.

@LetUsPrey I forgot to mention there is also a service where Lancaster city Laundrette come and collect on Mondays and Thursdays for £7.00 so if he got caught short on fresh clothes by the time SI happened, they do offer that service. :)

@choirmumoftwo love that :) she has her priorities sorted when she came out of lockdown then with the washing :)

@Quarks69 @Oratory1 agreed. its amazing how resiliant they are. What with G.C.S.E Letter to number changes, then the debarcle on the AL'evels and all that time off because of lockdown, they just want to crack on with learning and face everything head on.

@Hoghgyni I would see laundry treated same as 'shops', so cant see why they wouldnt accidently meet by 'chance' at the same laundry doing their washing. Residents Handbook at the uni might give some rules as to whether they are allowed to stay in there though, or its just pick ups and drop offs only. I suppose its the same for a uni Gym....