Right so first up I am not a coffee drinker. I just do not really like it all that much. The only time I drink it is in espresso form when on the continent and tea is hard to find –  a girl needs her morning caffeine in any form. I am however a big old tea drinker… love it!

This is probably why I am unable to understand why even in this lockdown pandemic world there are queues outside coffee shops every morning. Do people not have coffee in their own house? Most coffee loving people I know have various coffee making implements at home. I am very confused.

Of course, its great that these small independent businesses have customers but I just do not understand, if you only have one trip outside the home that stopping for coffee is the priority. I was using my one trip outside the house to maximise my hour of exercise. Do these people maybe have private gyms, pools or tracks in their houses? Is it because I do not drink coffee that I cannot understand?

My concern is that this may be undoing the good work that was done pre- lock down on people taking reusable cups to coffee shops. At the moment due to spreading Covid-19 coffee shops have to serve you in a disposable cup. There was a real effort pre- lockdown by people to take their reusable cups with them, alongside their reusable water bottles, but will people go back to this post lockdown? The lack of carbon emissions may be good for the environment but the amount of plastic being used during this pandemic I think will out weigh the good. I may need to look into this further.

What I have noticed over the last few weeks is more cafes have opened up and alongside them restaurants selling coffee as well as food supplies. I think its great that these restaurants can make some profit from selling fruit, vegetables and store cupboard staples alongside take away. On St. John’s Hill several places have opened up selling food and ingredients, alongside coffee. In the last week I have noticed a couple of other places have opened up. One of the Italian restaurants opened just before lockdown, so poor things never really got a chance to get going.

Its going to be a long time before the hospitality industry is anywhere near back to normal so I wonder if them selling fruit, vegetables etc will continue alongside a socially distanced dining scene? I keep getting emails from restaurants in the area that are saying they are opening for delivery from next week which is great.