FYI, it's not the giving or receiving, I am very glad to be thought of.
But if you had a food allergy and you received that food, you would be a bit miffed that the distributors only give you junk food that would definitely make you ill.
What I mean as junk food is that everything had been packaged and processed.
There was no fresh vegetables, no fresh meat, no fresh fruit, not even vegan alternatives. No salad.
There was boxed carbs, tinned carbs, carbs in packets, in plastic, in plastic bags, and the yoghurt pot was fat free and a lot of sugar. I even got pot noodles and porridge.
Because of my diet and lifestyle, this was rubbish I couldn't eat, not one thing!
And, my bank account is nearly empty because of my diet of fresh food, and living costs.
And don't patronise the post, especially if you have never lived in outright poverty.
I have and my parents struggled to bring up four boys in a two bedroom rented slum.
I have worked and made my family's poverty disappear, I brought up my four kids, working six or seven days a week on a production line, that just about covered our debts, I climbed the pay scale and by the time I left the job, I was in overall charge of a small sub assembly line and teaching lean manufacturing process to new team leader.
When I was little, we never celebrated Christmas because we couldn't afford it, we had a chicken for Christmas dinner only because the local butcher had saved for us.
We had no bread winner, my mother worked all day for little and my father was constantly ill, he was in Burma, and was hospitalized with malaria (twice).
He died young, but luckily (ha) we had all started working, so we could look after my mum.
I don't want sympathy or empathy, I still have trouble believing since 2010, food banks have become the norm, even two parents working struggle to put food on the table.
Do we want to return to normal? The politicians keep saying it, what happens to all the three million in outright poverty, what happens to the unemployed, what happens to the disabled, what happens to single parents, what happens to the old with no company pension. Having to live on £150 a week. what happens to all those who can't help themselves.
The normal is so bad. Do we cut back on the NHS when covid is done or before another wave. Do we cut back on social care again, do we cut back on helping all those that are struggling with normality. We are nearly a year into this pandemic and there is still children who don't have access to a computer lesson, and it has taken a phone company to offer schools up to a certain amount of free equipment.
I have one child working in a school, and it's in an area that has a lot of inner city poverty, and the school has been open ever since the first lockdown, totally under equipped, the reason is that the children in that area have been offered a place in the school if they don't have access to the internet. Even children from other schools are welcome for any reason.
If we returned to normal, they will have to pay for this government's total lack of understanding the situation and bumbling through to keep Britain in business.
With brexit causing 'teething problems' with exports down to 50% to the continent and then there is northern Ireland. What a shambles.
I have no doubt that the vaccine rollout is really good and it is important that we try and get all the people of the world has access, like we do, the forecast is that everyone can be vaccinated by the middle of 2024. So going back to normal would mean that everyone will be able to travel abroad on holidays or business, and actually meeting people in areas of the world where there has been no vaccinations done.
The borders should have had strict restrictions from day one. It's funny that those who repatriated from Wuhan and quarantined at Arrows Park, none had covid and now say that they should never have come back to Britain.
This country's social and health care provisions are Victorian in its way it deals with people, there is now a huge divide, not since pre world war two, has the divide been greater.
Denying children food in lockdown and in school holidays has caught the attention of the media because a professional footballer has caused such a ruckus within the power brokers that another u turn, was done and once again, the state of these food parcels were called disgraceful.
That is where I'm coming from.
Normal is not normal, it is not good for the middle to lower classes. Working class have no rights, unemployed, disabled and more, do not have access to justice.
The balance of law is not on the side of the impoverished.
There is nearly fifteen million people who are living on 70% of their minimum wage, it is not and never has been a living wage,
I once heard a chairman of a youth charity advise one of the volunteers say, that if there was any food over after the deliveries were done, just give them to the poor. Because that is what they eat!
I read the other day, that one of the worst foods for diabetics is rice crispies because of the amount of sugars and carbs and starch.
This tells you everything that is wrong with dietary recommendations.
I have a NHS sheet, describing the cereal as diabetic safe.
I was offered rice crispies when I was in hospital, more than once. Along with concentrated orange juice. And that was on a diabetic ward.
Normal isn't acceptable after what we have had to put up with and probably it is far from over. We need a Britain that looks after the whole population, we are citizens of a democracy, not subjects of the British empire, of a law making parliament, not kowtow to a privileged family who are, our rulers in a monarchy.
Living in a country where the normal is putting its population in poverty is unacceptable in the 21st century.
We have to change the way we live and prioritize living standards and feeding our children as a right.
Healthcare should be universal not on how much you can pay to get decent care.
Covid has changed the world, can we go back to normal or do we want to endorse what is called normal.
For my grandkids and my great grandkids, I am hoping for a major changes in our society, but I think it won't happen, and that is really sad.
Sorry about the rant, but I'm not in a very good place at the moment, and the continuous knocks on my family, is something that you you will understand.
Stay safe
If I have offended anyone, I apologise fully, free of charge and i bow to my betters and the aristocracy!