Put Your Hands Together

Another lovely sunny day. After work we went had our now regular daily walk. A few more clouds in the sky than the last couple of days but it's warm enough to be out as the sun goes down. 

We were back at home and on our doorstep to join the 8pm round of applause for the NHS. It was wonderful to hear so many on our estate clapping and whooping, a real sense of a community coming together to recognise the vital work being done by everyone in the NHS. Lovely.

Afterwards we joined a virtual pub quiz run live through Facebook and YouTube along with over 100,000 others. We did ok, scoring 34 out of 50. 

Edit (July 2020): The NHS Clap carried on for 10 weeks. We all became very aware of the fact that we owed a great debt to the hospital staff.

The police’s new enforcement powers come into effect today.

People are no longer allowed to leave their home without reasonable excuse. This is, in effect, a form of house arrest. It means that we are only supposed to leave our homes for limited reasons. The four most common reasons are:

- Shopping for necessities like food and medicine
- Taking exercise – but only once a day
- For medical reasons, to provide care or help to vulnerable persons
- For essential work (list here), and non-essential work where working from home is not possible.

Also banned are public gatherings of more than two people – with those found in breach facing a fine of £30 in the first instance. There are even fewer permitted reasons to gather than there are to leave your house.

The supermarket shelves have been stripped bare of essentials, and many memes about the value of toilet rolls begin!