Week 7

Mon 4th May

Decided I need to get a few hills in so decided to head up towards the Bob Smithy and have a trundle round the golf course.

Tues 5th May

I arrive early at the Crematorium for my friends mum's funeral. Not much social distancing going on with the first one I observe with 6 pall Bearers. Funerals are limited to 10 mourners inside the Chapel of Rest, so stay outside with a couple of other friends. It's good to catch-up, but wish it could have been in different circumstances.

Weds 6th May & 7th May

Back on swabbing duties. However, have had a recall back to the Dental World to cover Colleagues Annual Leave. We've all been asked to take a week of our annual leave allocation by the end of June. So from the 25th of May I'll be back doing teeth in a fashion.

Lots of new protocols to read up on. We've go onto video conferencing, but only offering very limited amount of treatment.

Fri 8th May

I'm edging closer to Winter Hill with my runs. A couple of abortive attempts on some paths due to a few cows.

But a pleasant run all the same.

Sat 9th & Sun 10th

Swabbing numbers are dropping, to the point that our working hours are reduced at the weekends now. Good that there less staff off sick, but it's hard keeping everyone motivated.

Having Watched Boris on the Telly, decide that I'm going to get some use out of my bike given the weather is so nice and plan to start using it to get to and from work. Also start to plan my first run that doesn't begin from the House. What route shall I try first!?

TF

Week 6

Mon 27th April

Looking for a bit of variation I take the path along the side of the Hulton Estate. Peel Holdings had big plans to transform this area into a championship golf course ready for the Ryder Cup in 2030/2034 here's the glossy website https://www.hultonpark.co.uk/ . Lots of local opposition, and here's the website https://www.hearthulton.com/ . All things on hold for now.

There isn't ROW access across the park, but the woods at the SE corner were a nice run on a warm day.

Tues 28th April

News from Tenerife that Dad has had another wander. Search party sent out again, but this time he arrived back by himself in a taxi. The care team have been onto Doctor who has agreed to try him with some 'drops' to help calm any agitation, normally would require a 'face to face' consultation. What may help is some of the dementia drugs, but these can't be prescribed without a diagnosis, diagnosis requires a scan among other things. That would have been due to be done last week, but cancelled due to Coronavirus.

Friend confirms that funeral for her Mother to go ahead on 5th May. 10 Mourners allowed in Crematorium for Service. Have a long chat about Dad and compare, much of the things I had managed to get in place to help Mum and Dad have been down to the advice received. Really appreciate the support.

Weds 29th April

Government deadline for their 100000 swabs a day is fast approaching. Our team at the Etihad now has competition from a larger 'drivethru'  pop-up site, located on one of the larger carparks. Cars are using the same entrance causing confusion for drivers. Reports of new site 'pinching' customers. All sounds a bit Fred Karno's, glad to be located where I am.

Thurs 30th April

100000. Won't last! Getting to really know our team swabbing, we have a laugh and joke so it's not all serious stuff. Getting used to sharing lots of good stuff via WhatsApp, which is new to me, but apparently used a lot among the other community teams.

Had someone turn up in a minibus to have a swab, nearly demolished the porch structure. Luckily the security guard spotted that it'd be to high to go underneath. Send a message to Property Services to have some height restriction notices put up. Entering a new month tomorrow, things starting to feel a little permanent now, the 'new normal'.

Friday 1st May

Decide to head out West today, along Lock Lane to explore a few footpaths around Lostock.

Thankfully no cows to negotiate in the fields just North of the Motorway. Just over 10K

Sat 2nd May

We're getting requests from the Health and Well Being Team, to see if we can accommodate daily home visits. Suggest a max of 8, to start with and lists prepared the day before so that appropriate order can be chosen to make effective use of time. First list comes through for Sunday and I set about planning my route. Probably the closest I'm going to get to orienteering for a while.

Sun 3rd May

Devise a plan for the visits with my partner for the day. We want to spend as little time in each property as possible, so suggest a chair in the hallway so we can just step inside the house/flat briefly, complete the swabs and then depart. There's no getting away from the fact that we need to done our PPE outside the property, so all the neighbours will be watching. Do feel a bit like something out of a Sci-Fi film.

It's good fun driving the van though.

TF

Week 5

Monday 20th April

A slight extension to my new route, this time just over 11K

Tuesday 21st April

News from my mum and dad's carers in Tenerife to say he'd gone walkabout. Apparently left the house at about 8am. A couple of the carers had set out in their cars to go look for him and by chance one of them had found him sat at the Bus Stop in San Isidro some 3 miles away. The bus stop is located on the roundabout with access to the motorway. There is no direct bus link to where he was found (would involve 2 separate buses) so agree with carers that he must have walked all the way.

It's a route that he would have driven in the car. Relieved that found safe and well.

Set out on run today and vary the far end part of the loop.

Return home to the news that my best friends mum had passed away. Her mum had been living in a care home and had a couple of falls, she'd had a brief stay in hospital and was diagnosed with an undisplaced fracture to pelvis. She'd returned to the care home, but deteriorated (not Covid19 related). I think the most distressing thing for my friend was not being able to be with her at the end. Adding to the distress was that the fracture was not mentioned as a contributing factor on the death certificate.

Wednesday 22nd April

The swab team at the Etihad have had a slow start, but the staff sent to form the team over there are determined to make the best of it.

Thursday 23rd April

We've trained up a few more staff, again from services that do 'face to face' contacts whose appointments have been stood down.

Friday 24th April

Moment of truth for the rats. Pest Control Man returns to inspect the traps. I'd left well alone as he'd said it can take up to 2-3 days for the rats to perish. He opens the first one, no rat but promising signs that something has had a nibble from the pink block. Nothing in the 2nd, 3rd or 4th one. As part of the plan, the traps will be left in situ for a further week. He suspects that they have moved on and found other sources of food and my fears of being over-run are now receeding.

Getting a little more adventurous with the run through Cutacre and extend the far loop and manage 13k today

It does make a difference being out in the sunshine, one or two people out in the park but able to keep my distance.

Saturday 25th April

A bit of a giggle. Someone arrives to be swabbed and parks themselves up whilst the security guard was inside getting a brew. We go outside to find this situation.

The timber shelter has been constructed over 2 disabled bays, with the intention that vehicles drive into the spaces as would normally occur, with the front of the vehicle near to the blue bars. Driver is asked if they can do this. Go back outside, to find that driver has managed to manoeuvre into near enough exactly same position, but this time with drivers side closest and parallel with the blue bars.We all take a moment to compose ourselves from the fits of laughter. Clearly the driver has decide we're operating a bit like a Macdonalds Drivethru. Driver departs after swab, thankfully without demolishing the shelter.

Sunday 26th April

Check my bank balance and consider myself one of the lucky ones still being paid. 

Another fall in the number of people being swabbed over the weekend. I do wonder if it's going to be worth having 2 sites operating at the same time. 

Check in with the parents. All appears well, mum under strict instructions to call the carers as soon as she realises dad has gone for a wander. Do worry in case he gets found by the police again. Spain seems to be a lot stricter about this than us.

TF

Week 4

Monday 13th April (Bank Holiday)

Sit at the computer and plan my run route. Looking for something off-road.

Red dot in middle is my House. Heading south on the farm tracks towards the bridge over the motorway is my initial thoughts. The bit past the Mobile Mast, although not ROW is frequently used.

Once over the motorway it's a short tarmac section to join the footpath past Umberton's Farm to access Cutacre Country Park on it's western edge. A bit more info can be found here https://www.logisticsnorth.com/country-park/ . I had felt that the park could be a potential site for a cross-country course so it would be interesting to see how the grassy bits had progressed since my last visit.

So here's my route

I kept to the paths, 10k distance, a little too much 'out-n-back' for my liking but pleasant enough. The park is coming along. As seen in the satellite view it's still has a fair amount of bare earth on the eastern edge. Water areas have filled in nicely with an abundance of reeds etc. On my return I see a 'keep out' sign has been erected to stop access to the paths heading North and Southwest of the farm buildings. Curtails plans for exploring the the path heading Southwest. I have some degree of sympathy for the farmer, the potential traffic across the land has probably increased 10-fold with the nice weather and everyone out for walks.

Tuesday 14th April

Return my attention to the problem of 'roly' rat. I'd had no response to my email, so ring only to find said company dealing with existing customers only. Try another who agree to come out on Friday to take a look and put down some traps.

Try other options for the access to Cutacre Park

This heads across the fields close to the trig point. Footpath a bit bumpy, and evidence that cows have been on it. Discount this bit as a regular route. Run along Plodder Lane to join the footpath across the motorway. There's a small car park for the Country Park just off the A6. Amazed to find 5 cars parked in it. Thought the government advice was quite clear, no use of cars to get to the start of walk/run/cycle. Vary my return route and come across a group of 4 youths playing 'self-isolating football' in the play area on the edge of the housing estate. Give them a wide berth. People aren't getting it. Getting angry. Thankfully, don't come across anyone else contravening the rules by the time I get home. 7.5K completed.

Wednesday 15th April

Back in work. Informed that someone from the 'Comms' dept will be coming to film the swabbing process, so that we can inform the staff what to expect. I'm volunteered to take part. I reason that given the mask, visor and head-gear no one will recognise me. We find a willing member of staff who had an appointment anyway to play the 'patient' and prove how easy (cough,cough) it is.

Here's the link to the video, I'm hoping it'll work, see if you can spot me!!

https://vimeo.com/408548688

Thursday 16th April

The planned 2nd site for swabbing has now changed. The other clinic potentially ear-marked has been deemed not suitable due to access issues and now the Etihad complex is being offered up as a location. The only downside is that the Council is now involved and are pushing this to be a 'self-test' centre. We voice our concerns, that in it's current format no-one is realistically going to be able to achieve adequate swabs on their own. 

Apparently this is a government-led initiative, trial period of 2 weeks for frontline staff. Beginning to see this as a numbers game. A bad test is often if not worse than no test. We managed 68 staff swabbed today.

Friday 17th April

Pest control man arrives and inspects the site. Explain what I've done so far and he checks round the house. I'm reassured that they'd be unlikely to access the house. I've had no more sightings all week but am hopeful with the four 'humane' traps put in place. Essentially a black plastic box with some brightly coloured blue pellets and pink cubes for them to nibble on. The treatment will involve a further 2 visits, so he'll be back in a week.

Todays run is a further variation of Monday and Tuesdays, with an outbound leg along Plodder Lane and returning via Umberton's Farm. 10.35K on the watch.

Saturday 18th April

At the time the video was filmed we'd swabbed over 700 staff and got 250 back to work. I'm hoping by the end of my weekend shifts we may have hit the 1000 mark.

59 staff swabbed today. A good number compared to the previous Saturday. Process have now been put in place to ensure that services (such as mine) which usually operate Monday- Friday have a manager on-call to accept phone calls from staff to record their first day of sickness. Normally if you fall ill over a weekend, then you phone in on your first working day ie Monday. At the moment the guidance is to try and swab ill staff within 3 days of them developing symptoms.

Sunday 19th April

941 the total so far. So we need 59 to make it to 1000. We're off to a very slow start. I then get a message that a lady from the Council will be dropping by to see how we do things as she'll be overseeing the site at the Etihad. I'm hoping that we'll have a few for her to watch, if not it'll be names in a hat and one of us will have to pretend we've got Covid 19.

A big sigh of relief from all us swabbers as the bookings for the afternoon pick up a bit. Our guest from the council arrives, I talk her through the process and she observes a couple of swabs being undertaken, one of which proves our point that a 'self-test' could not have been undertaken sufficiently well by the individual concerned.

She gets our point, but says that she's just been tasked to set it up and shows a lot more interest in the IT set up and the paperwork side of things. They start Monday.

Despite an improvement in the afternoon bookings, we fall short of our target by 13. 

Catch-up phone call with the parents. All well at their end, carers are helping them helping with the shopping. I would have been due to go and visit them the following week but obviously that's all off for the foreseeable future.

TF