Sophie and I took a deep breath and went to Tesco at 7am this morning. It was not a pleasant experience.
We arrived and parked away from other cars, gathered up our shopping bags and joined a queue of people all standing a good distance away from each other. We didn't have to wait long and a security guard waved us inside. The atmosphere was eerily quiet and the lighting quite dim inside the store. I didn't like it one bit. We had to make a real effort to keep our distance and exchanged wry smiles with people we passed in the aisles.
There was hardly any bread, which annoyed me as the store had only opened an hour ago, so there was obviously a problem with the supply chain. We managed to get almost everything we needed, except baked beans, tinned tomatoes, rice (but we could get Paella rice, which was good as we needed that!), pasta and flour. We had heard the store was limiting people to three items but I thought they were for essentials, like milk, bread, bottles of water, meat, etc. I bought eight bottles of beer for Keith and we chose three bottles of wine and a small bottle to use in a recipe.
There were taped lines by the checkout that we had to stand behind and Sophie made the terrible mistake of putting one foot on the other side, which earned her a reprimand from the checkout lady. She was busy chatting to the previous customer who most definitely was not six feet away. This meant we had to wait to put our items onto the conveyor belt. Sophie then put her foot over another line, which prompted another outburst. We both felt like criminals.
The real fun began when the woman started putting our purchases through and barked that we weren't allowed all the beer and we had to get rid of one of the wine bottles. Her attitude was horrible - she made us feel terrible and I know she could have spoken to us with a bit more civility. The stupid thing is, if we'd thought about it a bit more, we could have taken two trolleys and shopped separately and used two different checkouts. Also, there was absolutely nothing stopping us from coming back later in the day or going to another branch to get our purchases! To fully implement this rule, are we going to go down the rationing route next with everyone issued a ration book, like in the war?! I agree that some foods should be limited, but I really don't think that beer and wine are classed as essentials!
We packed our bags and fled and I decided to go to Aldi where I knew I could get Keith's beer. The roads were very quiet (by now it was 8am) and the supermarket had just opened. What a difference it was! The staff were friendly and polite and said I could have four bottles of beer. There was also ample stocks of pasta, tinned tomatoes, rice and flour (but no self-raising).
We headed home to put all of our purchases away and upon looking at the Tesco receipt, we discovered that we had been charged for four bottles of beer, not three! I said to Keith that next week we'll go to Aldi at 8am and then visit Tesco afterwards to get what we couldn't buy in Aldi. Perhaps he can go in there between 9am and 10am when "older" people are allowed to shop!
After our experience at Tesco I felt really depressed, to be honest. This situation is horrible enough without people being nasty! We all need to show kindness to one another because we don't know what worries people are having. It's going to take all of us some time to get used to these new rules.
I mooched about and then decided that to make the most of this time, I need to do something constructive, so I've signed up to a short French course with the Open University. I can start to brush up on my French in readiness for our visit in September! It's completely free and there are others you can choose from.
Keith then suggested a walk so we went down the track from the village to the Nature reserve.
It was a beautiful day and the temperatures had risen to about 15c, so lovely and mild, although this weekend is set to get colder and we may even have some wintry showers! It can snow all it likes if none of us have to leave the house!
Back home we had lunch sitting in the garden and then Keith and I drove over to see Mum, but we didn't go into the house. She stood at the front door and we stood well away from her and made sure she was OK. She is very upset about my Dad being in hospital and we don't know when he'll be coming home. I really felt for her, but there's nothing we can do except phone her regularly and maybe pop over and speak to her from a distance.
Back home I put a colour on my hair as it was way overdue and then relaxed. The time today has gone very fast and it's been great to be able to catch up with my colleagues at work through our WhatsApp group. Online communication is now vital to us all and it's great to speak to neighbours in the street as long as we keep our distance.
In the evening Sophie went for a run around the estate and said there was a lovely atmosphere with people out walking and enjoying the late sunshine. We made a delicious beef pasta bake for dinner and enjoyed a glass of red wine with it. Tomorrow is Friday but there was no sense of relief like there usually is!
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