How’s everyone coping with the current crisis and lockdowns?
I work in health so it’s 200% my life right now as we prepare the country for the incoming surge.
There are implications not only for health, but the economy.
And of course, Apple.
Thoughts?
It’s not impacting my life as bad as someone in health, but because of one of our clients, my employer is considered essential. They’ve sent home who they can.
They’ve directed anyone who feels sick to stay home. We have to clean our work area at shift change and have our temp taken in reception before being allowed in.
At the moment only emergency contractors are allowed on site. A lot of our clients have stopped their on site works. All non essential travel for work has been stopped. All other meetings by phone or Skype. Day to day for me it’s pretty much business as usual.
I’ve been caught by all this in the middle of selling a house and moving to a new house which makes it difficult. The contract has gone unconditional and the buyers finance has been approved but I’m still not sure if I’m going to get paid. If a further stage of business restrictions comes in before the settlemant date will there be anyone working to process the settlement? At the moment the solicitor and the bank are intending to work from home so I’ve some hope that will continue.
It is causing me stress though… not being able to do anything except wait and see what happens watching the little bit of cash I’ve got in the bank drain a bit further each day and waiting for a sale that might not finalize.
Good job selling. The price of houses are likely to fall so you may have sold at the current peak.
I’m in that vulnerable group… heart issues, diabetes, asthma, and over 70. I am not going anywhere unless I absolutely have to. So far so good but sooner or later I will run out of supplies. Just hoping the online supermarkets will have stock of what I need before I have to use them.
I work in a major hospital, my dept are staggering shifts and alternating days or weeks between being at work or working from home. I am rarely in contact with anyone, I live alone and have an office to myself at work. We get daily updates about the number of tests and cases. Things will soon get really bad and that scares me, not for me personally, just how bad it will be, the physical, emotional and mental health of ED and ICU staff, and how many people will die.
As bad as things are in Europe and the US, I’m concerned about Australia because we are heading into Winter. I don’t see how things will improve before September at the earliest. I wish we had live sport to keep us entertained through this.
I will no doubt watch everything on Netflix and Stan. I will probably sign up for Prime for a couple months too. I plan to get lots of sleep, try to start eating more fruit and veggies, do some exercise at home and lose some weight.
One of my biggest concerns is my superannuation, it WAS going so well. The economy will be obliterated, this will take the world many years to recover from. But I consider myself relatively lucky, I feel for so many people that have a lot of uncertainty and anxiety right now due to their personal circumstances.
I’m recovering from a bone marrow transplant and have diabetes so I’m also at risk. My new immune system seems good, it’s just very young and inexperienced. I’m also largely unvaccinated as you lose all that when they nuke the old bone marrow and they’ve had to delay them a few times because of complications. Was due for more in Melbourne today but they cancelled the appointment yesterday. I feel for the poor buggers who have started the process but are now struggling to get their donor stem cells delivered from overseas, which is where they often come from. So many people suffering in different ways.
I’m also an employer, so my business partner and I have some potential worries there. We don’t know yet how things will affect our business in the medium term and how we will keep paying people, but we’ll do whatever we can. Our admin assistant started holidays today.
On the upside, I live a small town 3 hours from Melbs, so the risk here is generally low and I will not starve or become homeless due to lack of money. Pretty lucky really.
I do wish all the vomit brained dunderheads would stop hoarding things though. It is deeply frustrating and I can go to the supermarket every day if I have to. Much harder for others. And it keeps spreading to new things; like medication.
I hope no-one here is experiencing undue hardship and I hope they pipe up if so. There are plenty of good people here who would be happy to do what they can I’m sure. Definitely one of those situations where the more we look out for each other, the better off we will all be.
Further to my previous post, I was able to get a delivery of food and cat food from Woolies tomorrow morning. No tP though :). Not that I need any. Lots of stuff simply not available at the moment.
Where are you located? If you’re near Melbourne, I have TP and more than happy to share if you really need some in the future 
I’m in banking, so been working from home this week and potentially next few weeks/months. I also live alone, so the isolation is slowly creeping up, but thank goodness for FaceTime with friends and family! Work wise, nothing much has changed except a lot of delays here and there, more hours being put in since connection is patchy. I just got back from overseas about 4 weeks ago too, self quarantined and worked from home then - it’s tough.
I know there are spazillions of articles being written about this, but the doctor who wrote the article below raises an obvious-when-you-see-it point that I hadn’t considered in this way: Frontline medical professionals can only save civilians while they have PPE.
We seriously can’t afford to be losing doctors and/or nurses. Especially not like they’ve been doing in Italy. Medical professionals are the ones we need to protect above all else and in every way possible.
What scares me is the blatant disregard of good sense in staying away from other people. Going to the beach in droves? Insanity.
Times like this I’m glad to have been something of a hermit for the past number of years, social distancing isnt a problem for me, its just situation normal.
@julee I’m in Newcastle, thanks for the offer. I have enough TP, it was just an observation that TP wasnt available (if I wanted it). It still isnt
I hear ya, it’s the one thing that the Army and PTSD have trained me really well for 
My wife is a nurse and it’s been touch and go for her for about 3-weeks now. Luckily I’ve relocated to my parents in the country for the next few weeks, so there isn’t much of a problem apart from a couple of cases at the town school, but there’s enough room around here that the distancing stuff doesn’t really have the same impact.
I have seen TP in the shops once in the last month (and I do look everytime I am at the shops). I grabbed one extra so we were one package ahead (some would say a wise move even during normal time!).
We are due to open the last pack now which makes the hunt less “if you happen to see one” and more “need to actually find some”. That said, we probably have two weeks or so with what we have so it’s not a real issue just yet.
I have noticed meat and most other things slowly filling the shelves again. Pasta is still 99% empty, although there has usually been one type of pasta everytime I have been. Flour is still a wasteland like TP. There has also been a couple of times that milk seemed very empty as does frozen foods, but not so much that I haven’t been able to get something.
Woolworth’s priority service online shopping is proving to be quite fraught. As I mentioned, there is stuff simply n/a. Re the TP, there hasnt been any available on my last two shops, and I expect that today, there will be yet another refund. The cauliflower I received was old, limp, and rubbery. It was tolerable when steamed. Just. I can get cream for my coffee sometimes (I use it instead of milk, less sugars). Cat food is variable. I wanted some hot cross buns last week, they were available at the time I ordered, but not at the time my order was packed. Refund. Its frustrating.
I ended up just doing my veg shopping at an independent F&V shop (they went online too, but the price difference was fairly stark… probably to cover the “free” shipping). Its taking a chance just going shopping, for me, but doing it online is such a pain, I doubt I will persist with it much longer. I have a delivery coming later today but there will be something I have forgotten, and its just not worth doing another shop for whatever it was, so I’ll go in person to a supermarket… Sighhhh…
Our local’s toilet paper stocks appeared to have some stock again yesterday. Lots of 8 packs of iCare and some Quilton. Enough that they made the isle look almost well stocked. I’m still living in hope that the panic buyers are done and the stocks can return to a more normal level, sadly I don’t know that we are quite there yet.
I’m also in Newcastle, and haven’t seen TP at Marketown for about 5 weeks (go there 3 x pw)!
Scored a pack at the local corner store, crn Hunter and Bolton. Went past a few days later and they still had heaps, if that helps.
Suspect the smaller stores are a better bet, and everyone goes to the bigger stores.
I’ve been getting “priority assistance” deliveries via Woolies (which is a bit of a joke, because when time comes to pack your order, half the stuff you want has already been sold.) They periodically have quilton TP which I dont like. Cant get my long roll Kleenex for love nor money. I’m out in the burbs at Maryland, Coles out here does get overnight orders but not much, and then theres a bunrush… madness. A friend goes to IGA at Elermore Vale and has been able to acquire what she needs.
I don’t understand why there isn’t an option for these orders to get priority access to stock, even if it’s in limited quantities to stop people rorting the system. Surely that’s part of the point of priority assistance after all.
I think the issue is that Woolies online orders are picked ‘in store’ by store staff. They don’t come from warehouse.