Our Blog - Coronavirus Lockdown 2020
I had started just putting these entries on the main page, but it was getting a bit large, so I split it out onto a separate page.
March 17, 2020
Lockdown, Day 1. After a couple of days where restaurants and cafe's were closed, we are now on full lockdown. So I thought I would tell you what our day was like. As a summary, we are only allowed out of our homes for a few things ... going to a pharmacy/doctor/hospital, shopping for essential items, individual exercise near our homes, walking dogs, taking care of family (elderly, as an example), and going to work for businesses that are not closed and that we can't telecommute. This morning, we got up and went to the market for shopping. We ate breakfast at home instead of our local boulangerie since, while they were open, we are not allowed to sit there. There are both "open" markets (not within a building, literally on the road) and covered markets. We started at the Victor Hugo covered market because our fish-truck was not at the open market today. We picked up a few things there, then went through the open market. It was, well, open ... but only about 1/2 of the merchants were there today.
We did a little cleaning this morning, and had lunch. The official lockdown started at mid-day. In the afternoon, we took Lucy out for a walk. Since the lockdown had started, we had to ensure that we had printed, filled out, and signed a paper that says what valid reason we were out (in this case, walking the dog). We have to have the form with us at all times that we are out, along with our French ID card. We stopped at our first boulangerie, but they didn't have any more bread left. We got a couple coffee's to go, and went on our way. At the end of our walk, we stopped by another boulangerie and got a baguette. Back at the house for more cleaning, and then canceling of a few reservations for a short vacation in a few weeks, since most things will remain closed.
We had a "virtual" happy hour with the Americans in Toulouse group while we cooked dinner and then sat around watching TV until time to take the puppy out for her last walk of the evening.
I anticipate about the same tomorrow ... we are thinking of going to the market every morning with Lucy. We can get fresh strawberries (it is strawberry season) and get Lucy her morning walk at the same time. We have a few DIY projects in the apartment to take care of, and of course, intensive Spring Cleaning. Vive la France!!
March 26, 2020
Lockdown, Day 10. We were lucky enough to have our local open-air market for the first week of the lock-down, but then on Tuesday night, they decided that all open-air markets would be closed (covered markets are still allowed to be open). We did shopping Tuesday morning but then, bam, our favorite vendors were gone for the foreseen future. We have a few options ... tomorrow we will go to the Victor Hugo covered market to see how the fruits and veggies are. They have plenty of meat and fish options inside, but most of the fruits and veggies are outside along the outer wall and those are supposedly also banned. Personally, we think this is quite silly since in the open-air market, there is more room to spread out than in the covered market, which is an enclosed building. We also have several different supermarkets within a short radius, as well as several organic markets and ethnic supermarkets. Our closest supermarket was pretty sparse this afternoon when we went, so tomorrow we will need to go a little further to pick up the items that we need. We finally were successful in finding some anti-bacterial wipes although, go figure, all of the greek yogurt was gone. Lucy gets several walks per day and we have started throwing the ball to her in our courtyard so that she can run at least a little bit without the leash. Our favorite bakery is still open although shorter hours, and most of the time, I can get a latte from them in the morning. We never quite know when some of the smaller stores will be open or closed ... a couple of the ethnic markets are supposed to be open daily until 2pm but they haven't been for the last couple days and no signs on the door to indicate if they will continue to be open or not. They are allowed (by law) but perhaps they aren't getting enough business? Anyway ... we are thinking of ordering something next week from a nearby Italian restaurant (delivery or pick-up) just to get a break from cooking ... we are on our 9th day of cooking lunch and dinner every day! We try to check with our friends every few days to be sure everyone is doing okay ... so far we are only aware of one couple of friends that have the virus so far, and they seem to be on the mend.
April 5, 2020
Lockdown, Day 20. We still have at least 10 more to go, as there is talk that it will be extended again. At this point, we are just taking a day at a time and not worrying about what will happen in 2 weeks.
What does our day look like? Well, we still have to keep Lucy on her schedule, so we get up at the same time, take Lucy out, and do breakfast (all 3 of us), like normal. We try to take Lucy for a longer walk in the morning, and I always take a grocery sack with us since we invariably pick up a couple things on our walks. We go different directions and we have been trying to shop at the smaller shops, which tend to be more limited in their products. So instead of finding rice and pasta at the grocery store, we find it at a little bulk store. But they don't have everything, so then there are smaller fruit and veggie sellers here and there that we go by. We then only pick up a couple of days of fruits and veggies, but that way we don't hoard on any one day and they are fresher anyway. We are walking right by the store so we don't make a special trip out just for that.
We have a few hours before lunch and after the walk, we want Lucy to nap. Normally we will watch TV, read a book, watch a video on something on the computer, or look at future vacations and do some tentative plans (what to do, where we might stay) but without dates. Lunch at home, normally left-overs from the day before, and then another Lucy walk. If we want bread for dinner, we have to be sure we get it either on the morning walk or this walk, since most of the bakeries are closing by 2 in the afternoon, if not earlier (if they run out of the amount of bread they made for that day). We sometimes make this one a slightly shorter walk and take her into our enclosed courtyard and throw the ball with her. She chases it but really is not a retriever! Then back inside and a nap for Lucy, and we find something to do .... Cleaning, more of what we did in the morning .... It gets a bit boring needless to say. Then early evening, 5 or 6ish is another Lucy walk.
Then we eat dinner, Lucy normally eats and then naps while we make and eat our dinner. Then every night at 8pm, we go out on our balcony with our neighbors and clap. At our end of the building, where the apartments overlook the park, they also seem to play/sing an old Occitane song called 'Se canto, que canto' (which is also the new song for the Toulouse Foot Club). I did some searching and finally found the version that they seem to be playing: Se canto, que canto on YouTube. Then we tend to watch an episode of Star Trek: The Next Generation on Netflix, then we take Lucy out one last time. Last thing is we watch the news for a bit while Lucy gets tired and then we head to bed.
Then repeat the next day. Most days, there really isn't much change in the routine. Throughout the day, we check email (and respond), order a few things here and there to be delivered (we decided to replace the non-slip mats that we have lining our kitchen drawers with something a bit better and so after searching, we found what we think we want from a company in Germany), playing with Lucy, etc.
April 15, 2020
Lockdown, Day 30. President Macron spoke to the nation on Monday night, extending the lockdown another month, until May 11th. At that time, *some* things will start opening up. Schools will gradually be reopened so students and teachers will return. Some businesses will be reopened, although they didn't specify which types of businesses would reopen other than stating it would not be restaurants, bars, cafes, or movie theaters. So for us, everything will remain as it is for another month.
Has anything changed since last post? No, not really. We continue doing a few little DIY updates and cleaning, although we don't really have much of the material that we need to do some of the DIY things we want to do. We had been able to order a few things from Amazon France but I read an article today that said that they were being blocked from delivering "non-essential" items, meaning only food, health items, and medical supplies. I did drive out to a large animal superstore to pick up additional puppy food and a couple toys. I'll need to make another trip over a different direction to a different store to pick up a few other puppy-things next week probably. Garden centers are open but I head that they are not allowed to sell plants or seeds, only pet food (which they mostly all also stock). We tried ordering from the "small producer" market that is normally in a nearly square on Saturday mornings. They are not allowed to be there anymore, but you can order online and pick up on Saturday morning. I'm not sure if I see the logic in not having it if the same number of people can order online and pick up. I guess it is a bit quicker in that the order is already packaged up so it is just paying and putting your items in your bag.
The weather has turned really nice and I've noticed that a few of the roundabouts that have flowers in the middle are now nicely blooming.
April 23, 2020
Lockdown, Day 38. We've had to start doing things ourselves that we normally would go out to have done. I got to try my hand at cutting Tom's hair, and I must say, I didn't do TOO bad. Probably isn't as short as he would really have wanted it, but I figured that too long would be better than too short. I've trimmed my bangs in the past, but that is pretty simple compared to a full head of hair. I do my own manicures each week, and while I have all of the equipment to do the UV-gel polish (called "semi-permanent" here), I tend to stick with normal polish as I'm not too happy with the UV-polish colors that I have right now.
Good news is that IKEA is back to making deliveries in France outside of the Paris area, and we were able to order a few things that we needed. We have a shelving unit from IKEA and, as we've gone through and re-organized a few things, we have found that we could use a few new shelves for within the unit. Normally we would just go pick them up, but it is delivery-only right now. So we also decided to replace some bathroom rugs that Lucy has chewed a little on, as well as getting a few more spice jars and replacing a broken bowl. Hopefully, the delivery will arrive next week. In addition, Castorama (a hardware store like Home Depot) is allowing Click-and-Collect, so we ordered some caulk and a caulking gun to do a bit more DIY around the apartment, which I was able to pick up today.
Other than those few new things, life goes on as it has for the last month .... wake up, eat breakfast, take Lucy for a walk (and pick up coffee except for Sunday morning). Then lunch, another Lucy walk, and dinner. The time in-between those specific things are filled with blogging, watching TV, doing some free University classes that interest us, sending emails and texts to friends and family to be sure everyone is okay, reading books and keeping up with the news. We are looking forward to when the lockdown ends on May 11th!
May 10th, 2020
Lockdown, coming to an end! It is official, the Prime Minister announced a few days that the lockdown (le confinement) will gradually end starting on May 11th. We aren't too concerned with the process surrounding the schools reopening, but parks should be open again, so Lucy can go play in the grass! As well, most businesses will reopen, except for bars, restaurants, cafes, gyms, and other things that are considered "social" in nature. We have a list of stores to go to starting on Monday for things that we want to purchase or have repaired, since we haven't been able to buy too many non-food items for a few months.
The golf courses are reopening on Monday as well, so hopefully we can get back to the course soon. And while our "organized" social gatherings will not restart, we can now start having people over to the house and we can go visit our friends at their house (as long as everyone feels comfortable). One of the first orders of business will be taking Lucy out to one of her favorite places so that she can run around. We are not yet sure when Lucy's puppy classes will resume, but at least we can go visit some of our friends that have puppies that Lucy likes to play with.
More and more places are opening, including the Starbucks that is nearby. We went by and happened to see Lucas there (she works there and knows us) and she said they would be open on Monday. I assume take-out only :-). Several other smaller places are looking to reopen for take-away as well starting on Monday. It makes sense, people will be returning to the office and will need to have places to get lunch, even if it has to be taken back to their desk to eat. We need to get the car inspected and we were able to make an appointment for next week and have an appointment at the pet groomer to have a nice bath for Lucy and her nails clipped (as needed). The open market that we normally shop out will reopen on Thursday or Friday, so we can get back to our normal routine. They will stretch out and take up twice as much space as they normally do, to allow for additional space between the various vendors, making sure the clients can properly "social distance". We have seen a few of the vendors out walking around town during the lockdown, and have even been able to order from them via an SMS and pick it up nearby.
We happened to hear some water dripping behind the wall in our powder room, where the sewer pipes from the top floors down to the basement. We have a column in the corner of the room to cover the area, but we could hear a drip, so we removed the small access panel and then could see the water dripping. We went and got the gardien for the building and he came and took a look. For those of you who aren't sure what a gardien is, gardiens are people who normally live on-site in an apartment building and they help "take care" of things. Not all apartment buildings have them, and if you have one, you end up paying more monthly charges than those people who live in apartment buildings without them. They first appeared as a replacement for maids and servants after World War II, when homeowners and tenants of high social standing needed someone to do their handy work, like delivering mail, handling garbage, and cleaning apartments, hallways and courtyards. We have a lovely couple who are our gardiens who take care of cleaning all of the common areas, taking the large trash and recycling bins out to the curb, and helping people like us who don't know what to do when bad things happen. Ours does not deliver the mail, although when we lived in Paris, we had a gardien who would drop our mail off on our doorstep every day. Anyway, we believe we have tracked it down to a shower on the 3rd floor, and the owner is having someone come look on Monday. It doesn't drip all the time, which makes sense that it may be a shower ... it only drips when someone is using it. I'm assuming that to get it fixed and dried out, they will end up ripping up our powder room .... good thing we put another toilet in our bathroom when we remodeled!
Sorry for such a long blog posting this time, but there was a bit to explain on how things will be opening up starting tomorrow. The weather this week looks like it will be cool and rainy most of the time, but we will still take Lucy out and let her run through the grass in the park, since she has been cooped up in the apartment for so long without being able to play much.