Cuddly toy, deadly virus, stockpiled toiletries, terror in aisle 9, creme eggs...
I can't imagine any worse a petri dish for the poor than your local Amazon gulag. The work is exhausting which means weakened immune system. All the termites in that retail mound, enclosed space, probably crap ventilation. I hope I'm wrong about that. There are enough problems with Amazon already.
Anyway
I just went shopping, or tried to. It's a reflex, like breathing. A social spasm as we hiccough money into the system for it to feed us.Moloch grants thee one more day! I was planning to go on Friday. I do it every week. I can't stock up - besides what's the point? Panic buying is counter productive: none of us know how long this will last so all we're doing is making the situation worse for ourselves and everyone around us. Moreover, it's a vicious circle: you spy limited supply and are compelled to stock up likewise. An understandable but irrational reaction. We all have to get through this, none of us know how long it will last, you don't need anymore of any one thing than normal, maybe soap, so what is the point?
No one will listen. You can't argue rationality against emotion. The heart will win over the head every time.
The supply chains are already struggling, so the shopkeep tells me. Either we start being creative (sausage, egg, and tampon - the traditional British breakfast!) or we start starving.
Or we get a competent leader. I think we'll be eating fried tampon (the stringy bit is where the...ugh, I've gone too far) before that human wiff waff weetabix goes gently into that good night.
On the other hand I suspect Amazon are making out like bandits (when are they ever not?) as the country settles into its comfy couch groove and orders a metric ton of stupid shit through Prime. Sometimes though the stupid shit is what we need to get us through. Although it'll just end up in landfill and end up waiting for us in the climate apocalypse looming post virus.
Hopefully this situation will stabilise. It has to. In lieu of the boffins cooking up a post haste vaccine, which isn't going to happen for a variety of reasons, or a miracle, people will have to start acting responibly. There is no reason for people to panic buy, there is no reason to buy more than you need. Online deliveries are one thing, and a separate issue. But for those of us who can get to shops as we do normally: please do as we do normally!
Gosh, you write so beautifully...you really do have a talent for it..I'm loving the much more frequent posts too....maybe this virus has awakened the creative juices within you haha! :)
ReplyDeleteAnyway, i can see this pandemic bringing the whole rotten house of cards down soon (hopefully!). How on earth people like you and i, who are on the breadline are expected to cope with how things are for much longer i don't know. I'm on those pre payment gas and electricity meters that eat money like there's no tomorrow. I go to the shops and i'm forced to spend far more than i can afford because all of the smart price/value ranges that i rely on have been wiped out by these greedy swines that are buying up six months worth of stock in one go so i have to get the more expensive branded goods as and when i can find them.
It's geting horrible out there. People are really showing their true colours over this. I'm trying to limit my contact with the outside world because i have an elderly father who i want to protect from being infected but yet i'm still forced to go into town evey fortnight to the Jobcentre to sign a piece of paper even though there is a contagious virus out there that i am being put at risk of getting for no other reason whatsoever than the DWP can satisfy themselves that another scrounger has been horsewhipped into obeying their orders :( I've got to go to the hellhole again this week and i've a good mind to start loudly coughing and spluttering just to put the fear of god into them as a bit of payback. (Pathetic i know, but this is the level they reduce you to)...
Maybe you're right. Who knew all it takes to inspire regular effort was a global pandemic!
DeleteI don't know how much this can continue. Tesco remains empty. Perhaps they just haven't had their delivery and things may calm down. They'll have to.
There has been no thought given to people who can't afford cheaper prices.Now they're talking about limiting people to 2 tins, for example. Well I buy 7 tins a week of mackerel. One a day because I shop weekly, so how's that going to work. I don't see that starving everyone is the answer when it shouldn't be a problem. I have always done this and there's always been enough. Imagine travelling all the way into town and being told you can't buy enough. Do you make another trip tomorrow? This is precisely the sort of ill considered rubbish I feared. Hopefully I'm wrong.
I was under the impression the DWP had relented on people having to attend. I don't use UC so I don't have all the online bollocks associated. Maybe you could contact them and plead your case because compelling attendance at this time is desperately irresponsible.
Good luck and thank you for the kind comments. I'm glad people are enjoying what I'm writing as writing it is cathartic.
Take care.