Blog2020 ≫ Lockdown links for the day

Every day is a "good grief what will happen next day". Now we're at a level of personal lockdown, everyone stay indoors, only essential trips outside. This was announced last night in a special short TV programme1, all non essential shops and things to close now. No-one is being actually stopped from going out yet but we should not meet up with other people we do not live with. Clare is out now with the boys, in the woods, I assume not meeting anyone. She also went out shopping earlier for us and for her dad, so if anyone's about to be arrested it is her. There's still more locking down to be done I suppose, plenty more levels of madness.

The announcement is still confusing and vague, how can they keep getting these things wrong? "Don't meet up with people you do not live with, if your friend says let's meet up you say no", but then "groups of more than two will be dispersed, unless it is people you live with". This makes it sound like it is still OK to meet up, as long as it's only one friend. Boris Johnson all your communications are vague and confusing.

8077 coronavirus cases in the UK, quite a leap today. 422 people have died with it, and 135 have recovered.

Some thoughts and fun for today, DIY and bike shops staying open it says here so maybe not too late for me to get some paint and fertiliser to do some DIY and gardening next week. The main part of that story is that Sports Direct were hoping to keep open, we're different see, we're essential. I suspect the real reason for staying open is the staff are all on zero hours contracts, so not going to get the government deal so he keeps his stores open as long as possible to pay his staff. Still yet to hear how this "we will pay your staff 80% of their pay so you don't lay them off" deal might affect me at work. As far as I know we are still on 50% pay, 50% hours. A friend of Kerry's summed up how it would work, you agree to be laid off temporarily, company agrees to reinstate you when times are better, government pays 80% of your salary up to national average salary.

The boys did Joe Wicks PE workout again this morning. There were 930,000 households streaming today.

Giving this one a go for the kids2, spelling help for kids, as Susie Dent recommends it. She probably earns from it normally but it's free for the next twelve weeks.

The year sixes are all in a group Zoom3 chat again. Social media for ten year olds crept up on us here.

Kez also sent me this useful link Safe places to visit during the COVID-19 pandemic4.

I'm still on the neighbourhood Whatsapp group. Someone else just forwarded an "omg forward this to everyone" message, another stupid hoax, the third one, and someone just quit the group again. Happens every time, soon it will only be me left, though I am just lurking. It's a terrible terrible group but I'm there just in case.

I made a slow cooker vegetable tagine out of stuff we already had in, and it's looking and smelling good. Out of date stuff we already had, but still. Don't tell me it's not a tagine as the tagine is the name of the cooking vessel.

Our little raspberry pi robot needs more sensors added, specifically one to tell when a seven-year-old's foot is coming down on top of it. Luckily we can rebuild it, give us something to do in creative learning time tomorrow...

It's not a purse it's a tactical gear pouch5 - maybe useful if we ever leave the house again.

I'm trying a new automated footnote thing6, will my posts become more like the page of a Terry Pratchett or Stewart Lee book soon? Not that it will become funny, but If I make it too easy for myself to write in this style it might be more footnotes than other content.

It is a beautiful day here, I'm out on the balcony, just finished reading that Ian Rankin book7. It was OK. Next I have maybe another Ian Rankin, or maybe another Julie Wassmer. Been listening to podcasts, best thing I got from one was an appealing sounding cocktail from the newscast podcast, a "quarantini" - gin and lemsip. Chin chin8!

raspberry pi: Credit card sized super cheap computer, awesome.

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Paul Clarke's weblog - I live in A small town, Kent. Wed and father to two, I am a full-stack web developr, and I do js / Node, some ruby, other languages ect ect. I like pubs, running, eating, home-automation + other diy stuff, history, tree stuff, Television, squirrels, pirates, lego, + TIME TRAVEL.