Isolation Day 13

Lets start with a couple of JT's life hack's for getting through Isolation - 

• It’s a great time to explore "roundabout traffic islands" while there is virtually nil traffic.
• Its also the perfect time of the year for mushrooms, I found some on my lawn, and subsequently found several on my walk, enough for breakfast this morning with a couple of eggs. Since then I have often supplemented my lunch time wraps with some mushrooms - to give you an idea of the amount I'm finding. To be honest I have held this post back, because as much as I want to encourage others to forage, (without being an old mate/my own personal hero about it) I know that I had the benefit of a childhood on a farm, and picking mushrooms each year, so I can tell the difference between a mushroom and a toadstool. The last thing I want to do is encourage people to go out and pick something and then they have a psychoactive experience, or worse, poison themselves. Keep an eye out for a post shortly, in which I came up with a whole lot of things that look like mushrooms but aren't, while I was free-writting in a class with Neil Thornton and the NZ Comedy School.
• Once I get around to it, I will create a bit of a mini golf course around my lawn

What I've got done recently
Again, I'm writing this retrospectively (from the future lol) so I can't remember exactly where I was up to at this point in time. What I can tell you though, is it felt as time went on that I was using the time less and less productively. But to be fair, I think it was more the fact that the time seemed more precious and finite the closer we got to the date the level 4 was reviewed.

Anyway, some of the things I did were - 

• Wash car - I did this about the second day of lock down, as it was a day when it rained. I figured it was a logical time to do it, as it required less water and effort on my part as the rain naturally pre-rinsed and rinsed the car. As it was still only late March, it was relatively warm still, and I helped myself by wearing my togs and rash vest.
• Clean inside windscreen of car  
• Vacuum the car - I did this at a latter date, once the car was nice and dry. I had given it a good vacuum over the New Years' break, but since then I had had my sister's dog in the back seat.
• Vacuum shed - a logical thing to do while I had the vacuum cleaner plugged in. I got rid of cobwebs, and a lot of sawdust from when I've had my father around to help with the odd project in the past.
• Clean bathroom - I think I did this on day 1. I figured I would get it out of the road, and then any subsequent cleaning of the bathroom is my flatmate's responsibility (I have a toilet there, as well as in my laundry room, so generally I used the laundry toilet, and he uses the bathroom, so I only really go in there to shower, shave, and brush my teeth. I have been stricter on myself during lockdown to only use the one ("my") toilet.
• Vacuum house - I did this in sections over several days, as I wanted to do it properly, and in a logical manner. For example in the spare room at the same time I took the opportunity to re-arrange the bed etc, and vacuumed all of it. In my room I went as far as flipping the bed against the wall and vacuuming underneath it, and pushing out the drawers to get in behind and beneath them.
• Cull Recipe books - I went through my recipe books, I got rid of two, and have put two others in the box "for Papamoa" in other words to go to live at my parent's beach house, as they were too good to get rid of, but were essentially double-ups of books I already had. I did use this time to have a look at some recipes, namely for soup.
• Washed the house's windows - again, I decided to do this when it rained. So I waited until the second time it rained, which, as a meme circulating Facebook pointed out, was rare for once for a New Zealand April.

The Inequity of it.
I'm not complaining, much the opposite. I'm in a good position. But I feel sorry for medical professionals and other essential workers who have to put themselves at risk, and its another day at the office for them, whilst others are getting a "holiday". In my sister and brother-in-law's case, they have had to work from home, and at the same time look after my nieces. While I would love to spend some time with my nieces right now, I know that I would also soon like a break from them. So, on top of my personal ambitions, I have also been motivated to be productive as I appreciate that I have been lucky, and this is a once in a lifetime opportunity.