Muggins and His Wife Mrs Muggins Venture into Town During the Third Pandemic Lockdown of January 2021 (to drop her son off at the Blood Donation centre (and walk the dog!) : Part 3 : The Venture Is Spoiled By An Unforeseen Emergency

Setting : cold January 2021 (section written 26/7/21)

     Anyway no sooner had they walked into the pedestrianised street and taken pleasure in being there than Mrs Muggins declared that she needed the toilet. Well that surely couldn’t be too difficult to find here in the streets of their hometown. Seeing the familiar store Boots the Chemist Mrs Muggins made a beeline for it, while Alfred hung on to their little dog’s lead. Surely they would have toilets, they always did, even if they were only half open, for essentials. She came back chastened within minutes, “They won’t let me in without a facemask!” she said.

    “Well that’s no surprise,” said Alfred. “We all know the rules!”

    “But I haven’t got one.”

     “Surely you brought your facemask?” queried Alfred. “How silly! You should have brought it. How will you get into any shops or toilets without that?”  He despaired of his wife, momentarily!”

    “And that’s not all. The member of staff on the door said the toilets were not open to the public at the moment, because of the pandemic lockdown!”

     “You mean even Boots won’t let the public use the toilets?”

     “That’s about right,” said his wife, despairingly, “staff only.”

     “Oh dear. You’re going to regret this ‘shopping trip’! This is a lockdown, essential activity only. They don’t want to encourage people into town.” (He felt like joking ‘Perhaps you could find a lamppost or something,’ but decided his wife might not find that very funny at this moment in time, and did not wish to risk her annoyance.)

    She declared, “Have you got a spare facemask?”

    “No I haven’t, not on me anyway. I have got my own, and a used one which I haven’t thrown away yet, but you won’t want to use that one will you? Surely that would defeat the object of using facemasks? We shouldn’t share them.” (It did occur to Alfred that at least they were in the same household, but chose wisely not to say it.)

     Proving that he knew his wife only too well, she protested vigorously, that such a used mask would definitely not be suitable. She decided to go back to the Boots entrance and ask if she could purchase a mask, she would probably need it if she managed to find somewhere to go to the toilet. “Have you got some money honey?” she said, revealing that she had no cash, but he knew she must have her bank card with her. Anyway, to expedite matters he gave her some cash. She went to the entrance, and they let her go in to buy some masks near the entrance. She came back with two plasticky/rubbery kind of masks, not the usual medical looking type, but it would be good enough to provide the obligatory face covering to stop sneezes and coughs (and any other types of exhalations) from spreading the virus. (Alfred thought they looked quite fashionable in a new wavy science fiction sort of way.)

    “As you paid for them you have one and I will have the other,” said Mrs Muggins.

    “Well okay,” agreed Alfred, seeing as he had paid for them (he might as well get his money’s worth!) Even though he had been sensible and had brought his own mask (from his work stock) he decided if they went into any buildings he would wear this new one, as he had now acquired it.

(written 4/8/21)

     Mrs Muggins tried to get into Marks and Spencers next, to use their toilets, only to find they too were not open to the public. Boris had indeed found a good way to dissuade people from going on pleasure or non essential trips to town. Perhaps it should be more widely publicised that if you went to town there would be no toilets for you. Then surely less people would go to town! (Problem solved!) But no one had told Mrs Muggins before her arrival in town. They had both assumed that if Boots and Marks and Spencers were open, even in a reduced state, there would surely be toilets open for the much reduced numbers of customers.

     Surely it remained a Human Right? The Right to a toilet when shopping! Probably, thought Alfred, no one had thought to enshrine it as a right in the Human Rights Act, or maybe it had been conveniently nudged aside by the covid crisis, like so many other certainties and rights of the past. In the name of Public Health the desperate needs of the people had been superceded! Surely there must be somewhere in this godforsaken and getting more miserable by the minute hometown, to go to the toilet. He was starting to feel the first stirrings of wanting to go himself. Isn’t it strange how when you don’t think about it you don’t want to go. And once you do start thinking about it you do suddenly want to go, and it only gets worse!

      Mrs Muggins noticed a suitably available council employee cleaning the pedestrianised street, maybe picking up rubbish, as far as Alfred could see, in the street. She asked him where there might be some public toilets still open, in this crisis, in which no one was really supposed to be going into town unless they were on essential business. (Surely going to the toilet should be considered essential business, as the alternatives would be an affront to Public Health and normal decency? But these were evidently not normal times!) He suggested the market would definitely have their toilets open as they were open for business, food and groceries in particular being essential business, even in the middle of a lockdown, but that was possibly as much as a mile away through the largely pedestrianised streets of town. Mrs Muggins really wasn’t sure whether she could hold it for that long or that far. Oh what could she do?

    “We had better get a move on and get there fast,” said Alfred decisively. He could see she was beginning to wonder whether she could position herself casually near some potted plants or suitable drains, without her real purpose being understood by anyone else, but it being cold winter, she wasn’t even wearing a dress, with expendable nickers, only tight trousers, which could be all too easily saturated, if the worst was actually to happen.

(written 11/10/21 / 16/10/21)

     They walked as swiftly as they could up the pedestrian precinct, past the closed shops and the ones which were open for ‘essentials’, taking care not to get too close to the other people in the streets, who had returned, much like the zombies, to their habitual stomping grounds, even if they were supposed to be working from home, walking only in local parks, and only venturing out otherwise for essential shopping. They went past the deserted looking town hall, the closed up city hall, and along the long shopping street towards the indoor market at the other end. Alfred accompanied his wife to the market and she went inside while he looked after their little dog in the street. she found the toilet and was happily able to relieve herself of the discomfort of having to hold back the floods, without having had any mishap. Alleluia!

     She came back out and took care of their little dog in the cold pedestrianised street while Alfred was able to take his turn and attend the public toilet inside while wearing his mask. Then it was Mrs Muggins’ chance to go back in and actually do some shopping, mainly for essential groceries. She bought some fish and chips for them, and true to form her son arrived from the Blood Donation Centre just in time to get his share, a truly warm and appropriate meal to eat in the street as a takeaway, at a time when restaurants and cafes were all otherwise shut! Strangely he had a habit of always arriving just in time for meals, or indeed quite often well in advance of them, as he was always ready for food, and spent a great deal of his time thinking about food, and what his next meal would be!

     So all came right in the end. From the greatest adversity, the challenge of finding public amenities in a modern locked down city, stripped to its essentials, their City had been able to deliver not only the essentials of life, but the simple pleasure of being able to walk freely in its streets!