The shopping ninja COVID Tales 4

Shopping at a supermarket has never really floated my boat. I find the lighting, music and ambience grindingly annoying. Everything is strategically placed to tempt you to buy lollies and cola. If you are a long-term shopping sufferer like me, you know that the biggest lie is that prices are going ‘down’. Many times, my intelligence feels assaulted when sneakily another product has 250g missing. A case of down-sized, but for the same price - why would you want to buy an empty bag of nuts? 

Shopping in 2020 has an added dimension – mental hoops to jump through like an insane American ninja course. 

How to deal with COVID 19 at a shopping centre? 

Now all the viciously-fighting nut jobs are wallowing in their toilet paper at home, normal people like you and I are trying to do their best to shop as safely as possible. This is how I do it:

First of all, there is the matter of who does the shopping in your household. To decrease the risk of contamination, our household has decided that only one person will do it. Make it the youngest, fittest (and better looking) person without any respiratory issues.

The time you choose to go to the shops is absolutely crucial. I can’t fathom the amount of people I’ve seen streaming out of the shopping centre during the day – like a massive QLD bat exodus! May I remind you, we are squarely amidst a pandemic! The supermarkets are open early and until 9pm. Dinner time is when it is ‘graveyard’ dead. In fact, it is so quiet any accidental fart would echo around the shelves unnoticed – the odd, lone customer would hopefully wear a mask anyway.

Bat Exodus in the Atherton Tablelands

Your next problem is choosing the trolley. At the beginning of the pandemic we were told they were cleaned by a friendly person at the entrance of the store. Now you can tell whether they have been disinfected by the sticky substance that is dripping off the handle. It's hard to release your grip. I choose the trolley with the wonkiest wheel in the hope that nobody else has used it. Another wipe never does any harm.

Everything in the shop, I pretend has been sneezed and snotted on all over by an infected carrier of this current, dreaded lurgy. Therefore, one wet-wipe of the disinfected variety is safely in my fist for wet keeping (the alcohol on the wipe dries very quickly). Every time – yes it takes discipline – a new item is touched the little baby towel pops out of its hidey-hole and wipes the hands that touched the snot-soaked item. If you haven't been able to fight off the crazy, hoarding herd and secured yourself some wipes, keep a bottle of water in your car, soap and a towel. Washing your hands in a carpark is a novel idea and it prevents you from entering the germ palace of doom - the public toilet. 

I can never stop touching my face. I tried - I failed - I gave up, but other than tying my hands behind my back, I have found no solution other than washing my hands or using hand-sanitiser  -  it seems like forever.

Before I go to the shop, I know exactly what I want and need. A large list and a pen travel along with me on my wonky trolley. The less time I spend in this brightly lit chook incubator looking for stuff the better! I only go to the shops once a week. Every two weeks would be better, but found that my carrot(s) would not stay erect for that long.

I no longer rummage - touch it and it's sold.

Negotiating a path through an aisle is an experience these days – the 1.5m rule wreaking havoc with my plans to make it to the end of the aisle. I often find my way blocked by a lurking zombie. Like Smiegle, desiring a ring, I creep through the empty shelves whispering

 ‘where issss my precioussss ssssani for me handsssseeessss’. 

I don’t wear a mask – maybe there aren’t any on the shelves to buy – maybe I vaguely remember the government telling me that masks are not necessary unless you have caught the super bug. Maybe this is my last ‘red-neck’ stand against the virus. 

My once a week shop is of huge proportions and I need help! The checkout person, however, no longer helps out. They still touch your goodies, but are no longer able to bag it for you even though you have hung up the recycled bag I so often forget to bring. Strange viral policy don’t you think? So, I put a couple of items on the belt, then jog past them to the other side of the till, catch them, place them in the bag and run back to the trolley and repeat until mission accomplished. I tell the youngster behind the counter that I run 5km every day so I’m fit enough to go shopping. 

Exhausted, I return to the car late at night. I tell every imaginary mugger in this deserted, dimly lit car park, that I have Corona (not really). Come and get it!

Close to my bed time, I come home and clean my steering wheel, doorknobs and anything else I've touched and wash my hands yet again. I face up to the task of disinfecting every bunch of spring onions, scrubbing the skin off my mushrooms with soapy water and sanitising every darn banana just purchased. The same with all the cold items. They will get a late-night bath, then are placed into the fridge immediately.

I chuck the clothes I was wearing in the wash and hop straight into the shower where my hands are the priority and then my face.

And finally, all non-perishables will sit around in a naughty quarantine corner of my place for 24 hours. Having run out of the yummy chocolate biscuits, I find myself gravitating towards the forbidden bags that stand there 'in iso' and stare. It’s torture. 

Shall I risk it?  

‘Unprecedented’: COVID Tales 2

Sunday the 22 March was an important date for Australians. Our slightly disheveled looking Prime Minister Scott Morrison (he probably had a tough day at the office) faced the aggressively questioning journo David Speers on the ABC. Without getting into politics, I must say that Scott stood up to the challenge and sounded prime ministerial. This was the interview that changed Australia forever – changed everything we were planning with our lives, “these are ‘unprecedented’ times” we were told. Covid 19, the shutdown of our nation.

After taking off from Alice Springs in September 2019 our journey wasn’t what we had hoped for. We left in the middle of a drought in full swing. The red desert was dry and the grass was dead. Decomposing cows a regular, but upsetting, sight in paddocks. A pile of empty white skin all that was left of the Brahmin cows that stood once proudly in our land of plenty. Scorching ‘unprecedented’ temperatures, well over forty degrees. Climate change on the forefront of our minds.

Queensland wasn’t much better in the heat. Creeks dried up; whole forests looked brown, just dead.  Our Australian mammals stopped reproducing; birds fighting over scraps battling to survive.

A kookaburra checking out our campsite for food

Then the fires started. We found ‘unprecedented’ fires throughout the east coast right on our path - on our way South. Houses were burned to the ground, Whole species of animals we don’t know anything about were wiped out. Who can forget the images of the Koalas? Many people lost their homes. Even rainforest started to burn. We lost firefighters in unbelievably tragic circumstances.

We were in Airlie Beach, in heaven that wasn’t, stuck and undecided. Go and help or stay out of everyone’s way. It became a frustrating sometimes difficult conversation. One doesn’t travel well when the world collapses. To just galivant through peoples scorched backyards doesn’t seem respectful and is a guilt laden experience.

The fires made way for intense flooding when the heavens finally opened. You guessed it - we had ‘unprecedented’ floods. Nature, letting us all know who is boss.

So here I am in my caravan – travel no longer allowed or wanted - locked down by Covid 19 - trying to make sense of it all.  Our elderly people dying in nursing homes – the economy in tatters – unemployment booming!

I can tell you it hurts to read back through this. I can tell you I want my time again. I can tell you that I really hate the word ‘‘unprecedented’’.

So, I call on you to ban the word ‘unprecedented’; erase it from our vocabulary - take it out of the dictionary - destroy it once and for all.

Please, no more ‘unprecedented’ anything!

The Mary Kathleen disbanded uranium mine site - near Mount Isa

Burned Bits:  

The opening photo was taken during a prescribed burn in Alice Springs where I volunteered for the bush fire brigade.

If you need to chat about any of the subjects covered, I would encourage you to contact one of the following links:

www.blackdoginstitute.org.au

headspace.org.au