I went to the shop today. This was my second attempt. Last time I tried there was a queue the length of the outside of the supermarket. Today I avoided the queue by going at stupid o'clock at night.
I've hardly left the house at all since getting sick, so a trip to the shops was a big deal for me. I've lost lots of leg muscle sitting around all day, and I need to start using it before my health starts suffering from plain old neglect. I wore a hoodie, a hat (I got a terrible haircut just before the lockdown), and a mask with a handful of reusable bags. I'd been told many things about supermarkets in this new world, and I was very curious to see it myself.
It was 20:30 and very few people were in the shop. So the one-way shopping I was warned about wasn't in place. Here were my main take aways
- It was pretty easy to stay 2m+ from everyone else at this hour. Only twice did I have to adjust my path to get around or make room for someone walking nearby.
- No eggs. At all. Why eggs, though?
- No vanilla
- There was flour. Bread flour only, though. Not sure what that means besides everyone must be making cookies or something
- there was plenty of dishwasher stuff except rinse aid. Which is the one thing I'm out of. I can't imagine everyone else is out of it at the same time. But evidence shows otherwise.
- The shop finally stocks the brand of decaf espresso that L likes. And it's on sale!
- I left uncomfortable picking up items to decide if I wanted them. So everything I picked up I bought. It meant for a bit more impulse buying than I normally do
- All the tellers were in the same queue. You'd just queue up and go to the first free teller. Just like passport control. No more getting bitter seeing the queue next to you going faster than yours. I do so hope they keep this.
- Big clear plastic barrier between the tellers and the buyers. Which is good to see they're trying to keep their staff safe. That said, only one of the tellers had a mask. So I guess they felt safe. I do so hope I'm not longer contagious.
The walk back was kind of hard, as I'm not used to the exercise. The mask actually made it notably harder to breathe, and I was kind of dizzy when I took it off.
I keep my outside clothes quite separate from anything I wear in the house but I suspect it'll be impractical to wash them after every time I leave the house. I wonder if, over time, we'll start having disinfectant closets for outsidewear, so it can be made safe from viruses. Something like UV-C lights or some kind of spray. It would make me more comfortable about contamination.
