[Growster...]

Unfortunately, the police in Kent have to run 'Operation Stack', and can't be in two places at once, Aunty!

Actually, as we have a local problem with speeding, we spotted two policemen in a new unmarked radar car just this morning, and had a great chat with them! There's been so much complaint going on, our Crime Commissioner and a few MPs have started to do something at last! Great news for us, but of course, the parties will still go on; I mean, tomorrow is 'Poets Day', and everyone likes to wring out the last sunny evenings before the clocks change! We regularly hear the kids and not so kiddish, making a racket around closing time, as we used to in the old days! This time it's more serious.

Most people I know are still very wary, and it almost seems second nature to avoid everyone in the shops, unlike a few weeks ago, when there was a 'quadrille' going on outside the tins of beans, and a bit of Irish Dancing near the Jameson bottles! I fully expected Michael Flatley to leap over the cases of Guinness and start hammering the tiles!

[snowdrops]

Oh come unto the North East. Looks like we are in for some form of lock down again.

Being in the rural end of the North East, heaven knows what we shall have left if things ever quieten down. At the moment the village I live in is suffering from road closures which cut us off from - well almost everywhere. These look like a novel way of lock down for the next couple of months before any other restrictions.

Well you were right Christine, just when I was looking at calling round your way (Alnwick at least) on our way home from Aberdeenshire! So now we’re booked in the same hotel we stayed in on the way up just outside of Glasgow.

[jezza]

Hello I went to cut a man's lawn yesterday I knew he'd been away ,said he was going to Scotland, he informed me that he'd returned from the South of France on  Sunday and was isolating for 14 days ,only went to France to his other house to make sure his vegetable garden was ok   jezza

[John]

At least he is isolating, Jezza. It's the rule breakers who really put us all at risk.

[Aunt Sally]

One for Mrs B. 

[mrs bouquet]

Oh Aunty, as if I would    Mrs B.    You never know I might really be that actress.   

[grinling]

I took my son to Birm uni and he wore a mask as always, he has about 14 plain ones I made. Uni has said that they cannot go into another flat, he shares with 4 others, 1 other arrived today, 2 Sat,1 Sun. Unluckily his girlfriend his 2 minutes walk away, but they can meet outside.
His course is online and I do not know how freshers week will work including  the bars, so included cider as well as cans of fizzy drinks and brownies for the flatmates.
We have had 1 case in the village and she got that in hospital, whereas Edgbaston is high, ours have been 25 last week in a 20 square mile radius. 1 year in a secondary are now isolating as 1 is positive.
We keep our distance, but people meet and do not keep a meter away.

[Aunt Sally]

My youngest son went to Birmingham University and lived in a 5 share flat near the cricket ground in Edgbaston. It’s a very good university. 

It must be a worry for you at present but you have done a great job setting him up; it’s down to him now.

[grinling]

I worry about him getting it and I cannot go to him
It appears that the year 8 child was unwell a week earlier, but her parents only contacted the school when heard she was positive a week later!!!!

[jezza]

Hello I've just been chatting to a  neighbour whose middle son has to self isolate because a teacher had tested positive for covid 19 ,yetthe neighbours wife has gone to work at the local pub hes gone for sunday lunch at his mother's the rest of the family apparently dont need to isolate because they're showing no symptoms    I thought one in the family whe had been in contact with someone who had covid  meant the whole family isolated   jezza

[Aunt Sally]

You must self-isolate immediately if:

you have any symptoms of coronavirus (a high temperature, a new, continuous cough or a loss or change to your sense of smell or taste)
you've tested positive for coronavirus – this means you have coronavirus
you live with someone who has symptoms or tested positive
someone in your support bubble has symptoms or tested positive
you're told to self-isolate by NHS Test and Trace
you arrive in the UK from a country with a high coronavirus risk – see GOV.UK: how to self-isolate when you travel to the UK

[John]

Fact is, Jezza, some people think they're above the law and it's all a fuss about nothing.  I can't print what I think of them...
So, be careful and keep your distance from everyone is the safest way whatever the rules, however healthy they seem.

[basketcase]

My great nephew's family's in the same position as your neighbours, jezza.  His eldest son has been told to self-isolate because a teacher tested positive.  G-Nephew, his wife and their 4 other children are to go to work/school etc as normal - including visiting his parents, who are both in the shielded category. 

On top of this, the teacher was tested on Wednesday, but notification of the results didn't take place until Saturday.  By which time the whole family had been round to my niece & nephew's to help with some household repairs.  Oh - and they won't give great-great-nephew a test unless he has symptoms.  When, of course, the other 6 - who've been wandering around for up to a fortnight potentially infecting everyone - will have to self-isolate!  (Which they may be doing anyway, if he's asymptomatic.

What a shambles.  Fortunately, great-nephew has taken the 'blow that for a game of soliders' approach and is isolating anyway.  He's just worried now in case they unwittingly infected one or both of his parents...

Totally agree that word fail me in describing the numpties who seem to think it's their God-given right to wander round infecting everybody else!

[Aunt Sally]

£1,000 fine for breaking self isolation soon.  Not a great risk of getting found out though but it might concentrate some people’s minds.

[JayG]

Trying to balance the need to keep the economy going, kids and students educated, 'at risk' people relatively safe was always going to be an almost impossible challenge after the first phase of total lockdown if the infection rate went back up.
Not sure 'numpties' understand or are even interested in the implications of the subtle variations in the rules imposed in different regions - worrying times.