Monday 6^th April, 2020 1515

With a day off suddenly having become a rare commodity lately (barring one recording that kept coming up with Error 404 and which the monitor kept sending alternates today), sloth has so far ruled the day.

Having been reduced to a trickle of water from lunchtime yesterday until sometime this morning (I had set my alarm for seven to get a shower before the planned shut down at eight this morning) I woke up in the night for my elderly loo visit, checked the water and it was still a trickle. I considered cancelling the alarm but didn't and was rewarded with a nice shower when it went off. Someone else decided she knew better and that yesterday was in fact the shutdown. She won't be getting a shower now until 1800!

I was going to go shopping and afterwards get a haircut. As I said, sloth rules. I did go shopping but maybe the haircut will happen tomorrow morning – no work will arrive before the afternoon. I told Jody that tonight I will make mince and potatoes. I explained there would be plenty of vegetables in it but she insisted if she was going to eat she only wanted the vegetables! Try explaining to someone so stubborn that you can't separate things in mince and potatoes! Her choice later, if not she can toast some of the brown bread we bought for yesterdays prawn sandwiches but I simply need meat, I cannot eat vegetarian or pescatarian all the time!

I also told her tomorrow I will try to make chicken chop suey and I will keep the chicken for myself. She never said a word and that surprised me because there is no such dish in China. It's something the Mercan Chinese invented. I hope it works because for a change I have actually found bean sprouts.

I'm not going to dwell in depth on The Virus, not a lot of point now we shared it with everyone else and you all know what it has been like here for three and a half months. However, it does beggar belief when I read that because it was a warm day yesterday, many of the British public decided to ignore official requests/rulings and flocked to public parks. Do the Corona Morona (yes Keith, that's all my own work!) not realise? Can they not see that when they were asked before to be sensible and they weren't, they were responsible for more harsh measures to be taken and this will only bring even stricter rules?

It's funny. To be honest it gave me fodder for a week of assignments when I asked for essays on the students' thoughts on the difference between the people in China and the UK during the crisis. I gave them links to UK papers showing empty supermarkets, old people and paramedics standing forlornly, unable to to buy simple basics.

Many of them wrote as to how they felt so sorry for those who couldn't get supplies. More than a few labelled the British as “naughty”, which I thought kind and they were utterly mystified as to why, when their government had assured them the supply chain was fine, they still behaved differently to the stereotypical view they held previously that all British people were gentlemen/women. I have been telling them thus for a decade but they never believed me. Perhaps now they do.

But do you know, not one of them referred to them as arseholes. Had anyone done so, no matter how bad the essay, for that one they would have been awarded 10/10!

So anyway, outside it has warmed up but of course not in here. I learnt three years ago why there is no air conditioner in here! It's actually a bit disconcerting. I'm freezing and have to use the heater so go out with a big jacket on only to find that I only need my little fleece or a jumper.

At least the electricity auntie has long since stopped berating me for using so much power, no, she just tops me up with another 1,000 Kw/h each time. I may use a lot of electric but £40 of gas does me for a year so although I can, I don't bother claiming the money from the school.

Last night, which was lunchtime in the UK, my brother who sings in a band went live on Facebook, streaming his singing to anyone who tuned in. His way of livening things up on a lockdown Sunday. Sadly my internet was too slow to listen for long but plenty of comments suggested many people were enjoying it. He is also an NHS volunteer for collecting prescriptions and delivering them to people. One of my sisters is a carer for OAPs (recently spent four days visiting every supermarket in the area trying to get toilet rolls for her old people – now probably labelled as a panic buyer).

The funny thing is, nobody needed to do those things here. You wanted loo roll you bought some. You wanted medicine you went out and bought that. Can you imagine 1,400,000,000 people doing the “British” thing???!!!

Ok so I did dwell a bit, apologies but my thoughts simply flow down into my fingers and I get them out before I forget what I was going to say these days.