Still in Lock down, but I’m enjoying it. The store is quiet, no public allowed only trade. Mind you some of them can be pricks too. And because of this I was able to have a whole weekend off for a change; normally I work on a Saturday morning.

This Saturday morning I went in to see Simon, he’s my optician. I need new specs and I went into get my eyes tested but it seems that my right eye is a little bit inflamed still due to the eye specialist digging around in it last Monday. My left eye has improved and I think that I am finally nearing the end of this drama; however I will have to maintain this eye lid cleaning regime that I have been on for the past few months.

In lock down we are supposed to travel no more than five kilometres and only do so if it is essential. I had to travel thirty km’s or more and half expected to get pulled by the polis, I didn’t. I was surprised however by the number of cars on the road. I was surprised to see so many cars at Bunnings (Hardware). All those poor people were obviously there because they had encountered some sort of emergency, you know a faulty tap, faulty toilet or something that just had to be fixed that day or their world would have collapsed. Aye Right!

The “Good Guys”, sellers of electrical goods……….and the same again so many people going to and fro from their store, my heart goes out to all these unfortunate people that had to replace an essential item. It’s hard to believe that so many fridges could have died during lock down; I mean what other essential products do they sell?

And all the way into Brisbane was the same story and for the life of me I was struggling to come up with a list of essential items that one could buy at many stores. I think the one that really confused me was “Officeworks” a super store filled with posted notes and pens and the like.

When I was in Suzhou and we went into lock down the city became silent and empty. Eleven million people disappeared overnight. Very few cars were on the roads and people were few and far between, but not in Brisbane a city of just over 2 million it just felt like a Sunday morning.

Most of Australia has escaped the heartache of death and covid, mainly due to luck and its location on the globe; it’s definitely not down to a well managed response by the Australian Government. NSW has been under pressure the last couple of weeks, the cases are rising everyday and the virus is spreading across the state. There are few vaccines available and many are too scared to get one. Finally some young folk have caught the virus and have died from it. Sad though it may be it is the impetus that many need to realise that everyone is at risk and this is not a disease that attacks only the old and frail.

For many businesses the lock downs are deadly too. They have no income and they too might die and yet the selfishness of a few is putting the whole country at risk. It only takes one selfish bastard to spread this new Delta strain to other communities and before you know it Australia will end up overwhelmed and the only folk making money will be the funeral homes.