Green Girl Gardener

Well, what a surreal situation we find ourselves in. Completely unprecedented. A little over three months ago, few of us had heard of Corona Virus and the term COVID-19 hadn’t even been coined, yet now it’s all we can talk about!

Yesterday I was told that everyone in my office would be working from home as of today, end date unknown! It felt quite emotional as people started to leave at the close of play, almost like I was never going to see them again. It’s also quite disconcerting leaving somewhere not knowing when you’ll be back. I couldn’t take everything, but I needed to make sure I took everything I could possibly need to do my job for however long this lasts.

This was me leaving! I couldn’t decide whether it felt like Christmas or like I’d been given my P45!

My desk plants are succulents so need minimal watering, but they do need a drink every couple of weeks, and this will most likely last longer than that, so they had to come home with me. The one on the right is highly poisonous to cats so that’s had to go on a high up shelf for the fur babies’ safety. The money plant has joined it up there for its own safety given that Tinkerbell has a penchant for chewing plants!

I’ve brought my mouse and headphones home, but not my keyboard, and after a day of home working today, I think that may have been an error. The problem is though, I don’t have enough USB slots! I may have to arrange to pop into the office to get my docking station. I’ve even brought my chair home because, if this ends up being months of working at home, my back will not take sitting on a hard wooden chair.

This morning I took advantage of being home and having access to an oven to make banana pancakes for breakfast so I could save my healthy extra B for lunchtime.

Yummy! A great start to the day.

This was me all set up and ready. I’ve never been able to hang my headphones on the hoover before!

My new colleagues were furrier than the usual lot!

All things considered, it wasn’t too bad an experience, but I may feel differently in a couple of weeks when I’m going stir crazy. I managed to get most of the systems that I need to function, and managed to motivate myself to get things done. The fact that I’ve only been in the job a few weeks will work for me and against me. It’s hard because I don’t know the job very well yet and now I’m having to do what I can on my own, albeit with remote support. Incidentally, the main reason I moved jobs was because I felt isolated and now look what’s happened! Can’t be helped though. There are definitely positives too. I’m going to have time now to go over some of the processes and make notes to really learn the job. We don’t have any choice about any of this, so we’ll all just have to make the most of it.

Speaking of making the most of it, I’ve been very amused today by various memes and jokes doing the rounds, and I thought I’d share the best of them with you.

I think we’ve seen some of the worst of human nature over the last few days – I’ve heard of toilet roll being snatched out of a child’s hands, supermarket staff being abused and,possibly worst of all, unscrupulous people offering to help out vulnerable people while they’re social distancing and then ripping them off.

There have also been many examples of positive behaviour, for example leaflets being posted through doors offering genuine help if needed and dog walking companies slashing their prices for those in self isolation. What struck me about all these memes, was that even in this worrying situation, we’re retaining out sense of humour. Clearly, given the state of the supermarkets and pharmacies, we’re not all keeping calm and carrying on, but these little funnies give me hope that we will.

For my part, I plan on continuing with life as normally (and sensibly) as possible, whilst washing my hands multiple times a day (all the while singing happy birthday to myself twice!) and I plan to make the most of the extra time I have at home because of my new thirty second commute and evenings and weekends in. Tonight I took part in an online quiz run on Facebook by Hashtag quizzes which was fun. It’s running every night at 8.30 on their Facebook page if anyone fancies it. I’ve written a list of all the things I can do to occupy myself. There’s blogging, gardening, crocheting, knitting, cross stitching, mosaic art, colouring, reading my Kindle, reading magazines (which I’ve stocked up on), stripping woodchip, jigsaw puzzles, word puzzles, Les Mills on demand, walking (whilst keeping two metres distance from anyone) and, of course, Netflix. It will be fine for the vast majority of us.

On that note, I’m off to watch episode three of The Stranger. Keep safe folks and I’ll see you on the other side!