[Mezla PigDog]

They are making UK holiday makers quarantine on return from more countries now. I can't say I am surprised. There are calls that people should be compensated for lost earnings etc if they can't work during quarantine. I'm quite pissed off about this since I'm not dumb enough to have booked a foreign holiday this summer. Or any holiday at all for that matter. On the other hand it is a problem of the governments making since they created this list of safe countries you could travel to and therefore encouraged people to go. People who were stupid enough to believe that everything would be fine and put having a holiday above public health I guess do deserve compensation since the governments actions implied it would be fine. And as a taxpayer I guess I get to pay for it, along with everything else.

There needs to be a reality check. People will be more miserable in the short term but we really all need to stop moving en masse unless it is absolutely essential. Living a small life for at worst a few years isn't really that bad for most people.

[Gorefest]

My parents live in the Netherlands and I'd love to go and see them, but I just cannot risk getting quarantined at this stage for work. So we are holidaying in the UK.

To be fair though, you cannot just shift the blame to the people who have booked a foreign holiday. Both government and holiday makers have heavily stimulated people to take up foreign holidays again, seeing the risk to the travel industry if there is no return to this. I see no problem with people taking a foreign holiday, as long as they are aware that this is a risk and they have calculated it in. Really what should have already happened long ago is drastically improved testing and contact tracing at airports, which would largely remove the need for 14-day self quarantines. Blaming the general public for government failings and mixed messages doesn't seem very fair. Plus: try and arrange a holiday in the UK on short notice, it is nigh-on impossible as I've found myself. Everything is already booked up and prices are stupid.

[Imperial Historian]

Gorefest, on 14 August 2020 - 11:45 AM, said:

My parents live in the Netherlands and I'd love to go and see them, but I just cannot risk getting quarantined at this stage for work. So we are holidaying in the UK.

To be fair though, you cannot just shift the blame to the people who have booked a foreign holiday. Both government and holiday makers have heavily stimulated people to take up foreign holidays again, seeing the risk to the travel industry if there is no return to this. I see no problem with people taking a foreign holiday, as long as they are aware that this is a risk and they have calculated it in. Really what should have already happened long ago is drastically improved testing and contact tracing at airports, which would largely remove the need for 14-day self quarantines. Blaming the general public for government failings and mixed messages doesn't seem very fair. Plus: try and arrange a holiday in the UK on short notice, it is nigh-on impossible as I've found myself. Everything is already booked up and prices are stupid.

Is there any reason why people returning from foreign countries can't automatically have a COVID test done? Then my understanding is it's a 24 hour turnaround on testing so quarantine shouldn't be for a very long period at all.

Or is the risk related to people coming in contact with the virus on the plane, so early enough in the infection stage that they wouldn't fail the test?

I don't know this seems like something that could easily be dealt with by more testing, and seems especially odd as many of the countries we are quarantining people from are doing better than us in terms of cases.

[Mezla PigDog]

Yes because our government still haven't got a handle on testing. It still isn't dynamic enough to go where it is needed in large enough numbers. It's all too centralised. The same with contact tracing. They need to get numbers down and then focus it all on healthcare workers, schools and outbreaks. We needed 2 more weeks in lockdown really.

Our government are too busy focusing on big announcements of (faux) good news to take heat off the real issues and giving knee jerk contracts to cronies. They deserve to swing.

[Macros]

I'm of the opinion if people want to go on a holiday they can foot the quarantine bill themselves.

Have we really come to a stage of fucking entitlement where people can't go without something that was a massive massive luxury for most only 30 odd years ago?


My mind genuinely boggles, like just fucking suck it up.

[TheRetiredBridgeburner]

I take the point about being actively encouraged by the government to use the travel industry (irresponsible and about turnover and turnover only) but I agree with Mez and Macros. EVERYONE could do with a break right now, after this year - if people want to take the risk because the holiday is more important to them, that's their choice - but don't whinge when something very easily predicted happens and you have to quarantine.

Being able to go abroad on holiday every year isn't a right, but people are acting like it is. Sometimes you have to do without - and some people have to do without far more important things than a holiday, pandemic or not.

I think the reopening of things in the UK has given the less intelligent amongst us that the virus has upped and disappeared and all is well now - so sorry that reality has other ideas.

This post has been edited by TheRetiredBridgeburner: 14 August 2020 - 04:23 PM

[QuickTidal]

The biggest strip club in Toronto has had a worker test positive with COVID and thus over the course of about 4 days, something in the neighbourhood of 550 ppl might have been exposed...

Because I live in a hellscape of a city where the peelers apparently needed to open up as soon as they could and ram to capacity...

[Tsundoku]

QuickTidal, on 14 August 2020 - 05:06 PM, said:

something in the neighbourhood of 550 ppl might have been exposed...

Quite literally.

[Macros]

People need to see them naked ladies.

I mean in this day and age there is literally no other way to see the naked ladies

[Malankazooie]

Glory Holes. Promoted by Justin Trudeau. True, google it.

Of course, I guess that breaks things down into the absolute, very specific, dangly parts, nitty gritty of the equation. So, safe-er? safe-ish? Tim Hortons restroom stalls gonna be busy.

[Tsundoku]

Oh shit. The aerosol transmission theory getting more credence?

https://www.news.com...011d02a671abd95

This post has been edited by Tsundoku: 16 August 2020 - 12:20 PM

[Mezla PigDog]

I was chatting with a friend today and we both realised we had no firm idea what the social distancing rules in the UK are. It's partly because neither of us is doing much so we don't think we have broken them anyway but we also don't really know what we are allowed to do. I looked the rules up on the government website this evening for the first time and I still don't think I could correctly regurgitate them. We also realised that between us we barely know anyone who is sticking to the rules we do understand and they are not even shy about it as evidenced by the many non-socially distanced selfies on FB. We are all screwed people.

[Macros]

a really horrid little part of me, that I think we all have, that little gremlin in the dark recesses of your head, just wants all the tories, anti maskers, and vaxers, karens and florida men to catch it and if not die then suffer horribly

[Macros]

 IMG-20200817-WA0035.jpg (48.2K)
Number of downloads: 0

[Cause]

Mezla PigDog, on 17 August 2020 - 08:17 PM, said:

I was chatting with a friend today and we both realised we had no firm idea what the social distancing rules in the UK are. It's partly because neither of us is doing much so we don't think we have broken them anyway but we also don't really know what we are allowed to do. I looked the rules up on the government website this evening for the first time and I still don't think I could correctly regurgitate them. We also realised that between us we barely know anyone who is sticking to the rules we do understand and they are not even shy about it as evidenced by the many non-socially distanced selfies on FB. We are all screwed people.

My friend went to a pub and played darts yesterday. The rules seem pretty lax?

[Mezla PigDog]

Cause, on 17 August 2020 - 10:15 PM, said:

Mezla PigDog, on 17 August 2020 - 08:17 PM, said:

I was chatting with a friend today and we both realised we had no firm idea what the social distancing rules in the UK are. It's partly because neither of us is doing much so we don't think we have broken them anyway but we also don't really know what we are allowed to do. I looked the rules up on the government website this evening for the first time and I still don't think I could correctly regurgitate them. We also realised that between us we barely know anyone who is sticking to the rules we do understand and they are not even shy about it as evidenced by the many non-socially distanced selfies on FB. We are all screwed people.

My friend went to a pub and played darts yesterday. The rules seem pretty lax?

I think we can do more or less everything we used to do but there are rules for how many people you can do it with and it's different for different scenarios or if you live alone. I have a feeling the country is split into people who are doing a lot less than they are allowed to and people who are living like it is 2019.

[Macros]

The country is split between a bunch of wankers And a crowd of people with a conscience

[TheRetiredBridgeburner]

Mezla PigDog, on 18 August 2020 - 04:08 AM, said:

I think we can do more or less everything we used to do but there are rules for how many people you can do it with and it's different for different scenarios or if you live alone. I have a feeling the country is split into people who are doing a lot less than they are allowed to and people who are living like it is 2019.

Macros, on 18 August 2020 - 05:28 AM, said:

The country is split between a bunch of wankers And a crowd of people with a conscience

It's reassuring to hear other people voice confusion about what the rules are. Whilst there's confusion in how they are communicated and updated, I think it speaks to how nonsensical a fair whack of it is that even sensible people can't keep track.

Partner and I are still not going to pubs or restaurants and avoiding busy places, and mostly meeting people outside. I can't see that changing in the near future - my (separated) parents have both been out to a restaurant once, one found it okay as it wasn't busy, but the other has vowed not to do it again for a good long while because it was too busy and tables weren't spaced out as far as they should be.

People not even attempting to distance in shops is my bugbear at present. Have started to use a different supermarket because the spacing is better and people seem more prepared to be sensible. My usual one is horrific.

[Mezla PigDog]

We have eaten out once a week or so. Always outdoors or with a table by an open window and it has always felt ok but the places we go seem to be sensible and we are always there early to eat at small child meal times so it is quiet. We have a cottage booked by the seaside in North Wales in a couple of weeks - on Saturday we bagged the only appropriately sized booking available on Airbnb! And my son and I have been to my friends and had them to ours where we haven't really socially distanced because we kind of forget and the boys are climbing all over each other anyway. I check this update a couple of times a week:

Weekly covid cases in UK - The Guardian

Click on your county on the coloured map, pink means numbers are rising in your area and green means they are going down. I have been tracking it since the end of lockdown so kind of started at a "safe" base level in my head. If our county starts spiking then I will change my behaviour. I'm trying to do a little bit of living now before autumn kicks in because it's going to be a tough old winter.

[Macros]

It's going to be a grim winter, the layoffs and recession has stsrted