CoronaVirus Diaries – Data & News Sources & subtle art of not giving a F*ck

It’s official. I need to give less F*cks.

I am watching too much news ! It is like a car crash on the motorway. You know you should not slow down to look but you just can’t help yourself. It’s like a really really really bad movie that is somehow so bad you can’t stop watching it. (I was thinking Mamma Mia 2 here – though you could argue that is so kitsch it’s actually great). The Coronavirus is not great !! But I still can’t stop watching it.

I can tell I watch it too much and generally consume too much because my top search on google which almost auto-fills in every day is ‘latest Coronavirus news uk’ followed by ‘latest Coronaviris numbers’. My top google search should be something more healthy like a recipe for oat cookies.

Why am I doing it? I suppose I just want to see the graph start to go down really. I want to see evidence that we have this virus on the run and it will be safe for me to go out for coffee with a friend. I want to book that haircut and see my friend’s and visit those places I want to go to. I want to restart my bucket list adventures. Covid19 has put the skids on this years adventures !

BTW If you want to check some of these news sources or sites I will list the links at the bottom.

I also want to know that my Dad is safe when he is out there. I want to know if my local friends are going to be ok. I have an urgent need to know what is happening.

Is it good for us – all this news?

Some people will find they really cannot watch or read the news. Each and every one of us has a right to decide how much news from the world outside we can cope with or need.

Some people will find that for their own well being & #mentalhealth they need to stay away from the news.

Maybe it is the scientist in me, though I would argue that it is the mother in me that means I have a need to know. Before I became mum I think I was guilty of living in my own little bubble. Big world event’s would pass me by and politics was my most hated topic of discussion. Truthfully I was woefully ill informed and blinkered to the world at large. I regret this now though perhaps the ignorance of youth is not a bad thing. I grew up in a happy bubble not worried by the woes of the adult world. Today’s children are more ‘woke’ than I think we were and I do wonder if the strain of that knowledge is entirely good for them.

The point is when I became a mum suddenly I realised that I should know about politics and world news. This world that my children would grow up in was something I needed to know about. I wanted to understand the state of the education system, what the job market was like, what we had done to our environment & economy. I still did not watch the news on TV but I did start buying a paper or reading news online.

During the 2020 Coronavirus pandemic I have become obsessed with the news though – to a rather unhealthy level. To the point where I have actively banned myself from the morning news and bedtime news and afternoon new and…. ok you get the point. I really new more tea & cake – or Gin !

It was starting to affect me. Too much news is probably just as bad as not enough. Can you have too much knowledge ??

This week I am actively keeping my news intake to a quick morning catch up and the afternoon Govt briefing. The rest of the day I plan to do nice things like argue home schooling strategy with the kids. That has to be way less stressful.

I am also whilst actively curbing my news intake also reading this fabulous book called ‘The Subtle Art of Not Giving a F*ck. It is a pretty explosive title. I will confess to using this word way too much. My grandfather found it very amusing in his later years that my generation threw words into our every day speech that his generation would have received boxed ears for using. He would he said watch for me to pause & apologise for swearing after using this word in a sentence but I hardly ever did. This gave him to believe that swear words in general had lost some of their power and become general language. I find this one in particular very versatile & though I try not to use it in front of the kids I can’t swear that I don’t.

The book though is not about swearing. It is about learning to care less about things that don’t matter or that we can’t control and more about things that are good for us. In essence it’s a self help book! That is a swear word in itself in our house. Anyway it is all about mental health, finding positive mindset, having a grateful mindset and I would recommend it to anyone who struggles with negativity or anxiety.

I was kidding about home school arguments by the way. We are not arguing about home schooling. We are doing what we want when we want. I don’t need the stress or anxiety of wether we are achieving the right level or grade of work and quite frankly neither do the kids. Feet up in the sunshine with a book seems like the very best plan !

In fact I think I need to take lessons in chilling out from the Cat. Cat’s are surely the masters of being completely chilled out and uncaring about very much at all apart from finding a comfy place to snooze, food and just occasionally what all the small potential prey outside are up to. They are the epitome of cool & chilled out. Maybe we all need to be more Cat !!