The Return of the Lockdown

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As of Sunday night, we're on full covid-19 lockdown again for the first time since March. Today is the second full day. No one is supposed to go out except for essential groceries. People are allowed to go to work only if they can't do their jobs from home. Restaurants and cafés are allowed to operate only in a takeout capacity. For the first time in Perth, mask-wearing is mandated anytime you leave the house. This is all in addition to the closed borders and contact tracing whenever we go anywhere, both of which have been in place for months. 

We first heard about the lockdown on Sunday at our local grocery store -- that's where I took the video above. We'd had a relaxing morning at the beach and went to our neighborhood grocery for our weekly shop. And it was a madhouse. There were so many people there you could barely move. The shelves were growing bare before our eyes. The lines to check out snaked all around the store and through the aisles, such that when we finally did mange to get in line back by the meat counter, we had to traverse the entire back wall of the store and then the length of the store from back to front, as well. Everyone was crowded in cheek-by-jowl and about two people in the whole store were wearing masks. If there had been a significant risk of covid transmission, that was exactly what you did not want in terms of human behavior. I guess no one learned their lesson about panic-hoarding grocery store items last time around.

The risk was relatively small. All of this lockdown business is happening because of *one* single case of community transmission. It's bizarre to think of what's happening in the United States compared to our situation here. I'd much rather be living here than there at the moment. What would have happened if the USA had had competent leadership when the pandemic began?

We're allowed to exercise outdoors for up to one hour a day. I just got in from a somewhat ill-advised run that turned into mostly a walk, since I'm nursing shin splints. I'd have liked to swim today instead of run to give my shin a break, but, well, the lockdown. The mask is annoying while running. It gets partially pulled into my mouth on every inhale when I'm breathing hard, and it gets sweaty. Oh well. The lockdown is only scheduled to last five days. In the meantime, I've ordered some better masks in preparation against the day I have to return to the plague-ridden United States.

Oh, and to top it all off? It's fire season again. There's a huge fire in the Perth Hills, the beautiful natural area just inland from the city. The air is heavy with smoke and there's a kind of orangey glow. Good timing, nature.

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