Last night’s sunset was sublime. Not many people at the moment have the gift of a clear view of the sky. We feel extraordinarily grateful to be where we are during this uncertain and anxiety-producing period in history.

An Interesting Viewpoint Worth Sharing

After yesterday’s post, I received a rather interesting comment. From ‘someone’ called ‘not a pleb like Barry and Sandra‘. They’ve even made up a Gmail address which portrays them as ‘a decent human being’. Fascinating that anyone would go to such lengths. Trolling becomes no-one. Barry suspects he knows who this originates from, and I’m pretty confident it wouldn’t be too difficult to find the source. But I shan’t be wasting my precious time. Just writing this is sufficient. Their comment, which won’t be ‘officially’ published in the comments, is appropriately marked ‘spam’. They won’t be able to comment again on this site. It says in full ( nothing held back!):

“pity you put all your crap and shit on the towpath like all the gypsy boaters, not nice for the walkers to have to look at all your crap in the countryside, you own the boat not the bank to store your junk.”

From an ‘anonymous source’ who call themselves ‘not a pleb like Barry and Sandra’

Not Offended to be ‘Common People’

Their choice of language, I think you’ll agree, is curious and not terribly intelligently constructed. Looking at the name of their new ‘group’, or whatever it is they’ve invented with the intention of insulting us, ‘pleb‘ (it seems we are just one, gelled cosily together) puzzles us too.

Pleb. n. informally, derogation, a member of the lower social classes.

ORIGIN from plebion n. 1/ a member of the lower social classes. 2/ (in ancient Rome) a commoner *adj. lower-class or unsophisticated

ORIGIN Latin plebs ‘the common people’

Source: Paperback Oxford English Dictionary Seventh edition 2012.

It seems they don’t know us very well. Maybe they haven’t read my post saying how happy I am to be a water gypsy? It’s sadly disappointing during this anxiety-producing period of history, that certain elements of society feel it’s okay to seek to destroy, judge, demean and pretend to be better than others.

We realise it’s stressful living in lockdown anywhere, but like everyone, we’re doing our best to stay healthy and sane. The patch of grassland adjacent to our boat, where we freely admit to spending time off the boat, is similar to a small garden. No harm can come to anyone by us sitting there, or having a few chairs and umbrellas erected. Many passers-by have in fact commented – enviously but positively – what a lovely set-up we have.

Barry has, however, been magnanimous and taken on board your viewpoint oh ‘decent human being’, from an aesthetic angle, and tidied up his UK version of the NZ Embassy. You see Kim and I continue to work. Her space is at the back of the boat. Mine is in our lounge. Poor Barry feels a little lost without his Home Brew Boat business. Having an area to sit for him is helpful. So please, be a little more thoughtful next time you go on a tirade criticising people you don’t know.

Thank you though, for taking the time and trouble to attempt to offend us, and others living similar lives. You’ll see we did constructively reflect on your ‘intended to be cruel’ words. Whether you realise it or not, like a TV has an on/off switch, it’s your choice to read my words and see our photos. Or not 😉

COVID-19 Research Call

Having signed up for the COVID-19 Symptom Tracker updates, I had one about yesterday’s webinar. Sadly our bandwidth wasn’t happy, and by the time I’d managed to log in and ‘register’ (I hadn’t realised this was a requirement till the webinar had begun), there was already the maximum capacity of 3,000 people on the call. Wow! That’s impressive. Today I’ve received an email apologising that they had an ‘unprecedented number of people’ on the call. They’re hoping in future they’ll find a way to enable more people to join.

I watched it following the event and found it fascinating. Is it just me? I did love research in my previous life as a midwife, project manager, educator, and quality co-ordinator (not so pleb-ish aye?). It intrigues me intensely to listen to Professor Spector and the Kings College team as they divulge more statistics about this COVID-19 phenomenon.

Points of Note

The points I heard that were important were:

• Smokers don’t fare so well
• People who are obese may also be at increased risk
• Those in the lower socio-economic groups (see above!!) have a higher risk for a variety of reasons
• Black and ethnic minority groups are under-represented
• Women are more likely to sign up for research than men – but less likely to be affected by COVID-19
• People who sign up to and report on the App (this is a very important point folks!), may find they have an increased chance of being tested for COVID-19 and antibodies in future.
• They need a lot more people over 70 years of age to sign up – now you can sign up and log in for relatives, there’s no excuse. Or, they suggest, buy your relative over 70 a device which means they can sign-up and login to report themselves.
• Skin rashes are a new presentation for COVID-19, especially in children.
• A unique rash below the nails has also emerged, not previously seen by dermatologists.
• Puffy eyes are also a symptom they suspect
• Get outside daily if you can. It’s far better to get your Vitamin D intake via sunlight and food than supplements. Mushrooms, oily fish, tinned tuna, many vegetables are all sources. Tim has vast experience in this area, having studied for 20 years. Keep your gut microbes happy he says!
• If you live rurally, your risk is understandably lower than if you live in urban areas. I guess there’s a variety of logical reasons behind this. Lucky we’re crazy water gypsies aye?
• Even if you don’t have any COVID-19 symptoms, please report frequently. Preferably daily, but every few days would suffice.
• Tim is hopeful NHS England may come on board and is having daily conversations with them.

I’m joyful to report those on board Areandare are symptom free again today. Keep safe and well everyone, even those of you who have chosen to dislike us and the way we live 🙂

Here’s a piece of peace from our day to help us all calm down and be kind to each other …