It's a month since I posted. You'd think with this virus lockdown bizzo I'd have had plenty of time to write in this blog. Somehow not so, it seems there are always more chores and problems than there's time to do or attend to them.
Nearly a month ago I stubbed the fourth and fifth toes on my right foot badly. Rammed it into the steel rod leg of a kitchen stool. We all know the excruciating pain that comes with that. It passes after a short time, but I was left with sore toes when walking for some days. You pretend it's not there and move on. A week to ten days later it became quite painful and swollen, making working difficult. I didn't think the toe had been broken so I was alarmed thinking my Rheumatoid arthritis had flared up, either as a result of the stubbing incident or by itself in some cruel sort of vendetta to destroy me. Bearing in mind I had dropped all my medication nearly a year ago, and been so happy that I was either cured or in remission. If it came back I'd be shattered.
It became so painful to put boots on or to walk that I went to the doctor a couple of weeks ago. Infection was the verdict. The skin between the toes must have split when I stubbed them, unknown to me, so I didn't put Betadine or Dettol on it. Bacteria must have got in. I've been on antibiotics for nearly twelve days now and all seems well. I saw the doctor last Friday, she cut away a lot of dead skin and gunky stuff, she cut me doing it causing bleeding, and I go see her again next Tuesday. I'm cleaning it each day and putting Betadine on it. I pulled some more dead stuff out from between the toes tonight. It's amazing the stuff that sort of grew in the wound, thick white skin, as I guess the body was trying to repair itself. It seems fine now, no pain, but the skin peeled off the foot where the swelling went down, and the new skin is soft and sensitive, especially as it got unbelievably itchy and I scratched too much. There had been an abscess in there.
While all this was going on I had some interesting times seeking some government assistance due to the collapse of the business resulting from the lockdown. When we came back from SA I looked into it and after much frustration trying to suss out what to do I managed get a Mygov account and link it to the ATO, and register an intention to claim with Centrelink and link it to the Tax office. An SMS from Centrelink on April 2 said "You have registered your intention to claim. You don't need to do anything more now, we will phone you."
That gave me some comfort that I may get some assistance in the form of helping me pay my casual staff ongoing, as I was intending anyway till I ran out of money. I did fear there'd be some obstacle and I wouldn't qualify but I had no option other than to continue and hope they would in fact contact me. On April 28 I got an SMS saying, "Your ability to claim expires 8 May, so you need to claim before this time." This spurred me to action rather than wait to be phoned. I first had to find out how to make a claim. This involved going through a maze on line, (trying to contact by phone the tax office, Centrelink, my accountant all unsuccessful, after many hours and a couple of days frustration).
Eventually I cracked it. I enrolled for Jobkeeper, for one staff only, sister Meredith, as she works far more hours than the other two. I saw that to get any help I had to to have paid her $750 per week through April, and my turnover must have dropped by 30% (it had dropped much more). I had paid her a little less than that so I went to the bank to get more money to give to her before the end of April. When I got the money out the teller gives a little slip of paper with the transaction and a balance. When I looked at the balance there was more there than I thought given that for weeks I had payed all normal outgoings and wages but money in had dropped right off.
Baffled by this I couldn't wait for my end of April bank statement to be available so I went on online banking that night and checked transactions and blow me down there was an inter bank credit on the 23 April, $10,000, ATO. So I'd been given $10,000 without my knowledge with no notification or advice. I presume it is to enable me to keep paying people which is what I'll do. I don't know if I should have enrolled for Jobkeeper, given I had been given this money. No doubt it'll all come out in the wash.
Besides all that it has been unbelievably wet, and cold. My main wholesale customer, the only buyer we have now really, besides one other florist who has come back, has suddenly started giving big orders for mixed posies and variegated pittosporum (he won't take anything else yet) so we've been working in the rain doing our best to give him what he wants. A pain in the arse, all of it. Don't know where it will end up. It's all new territory, yes, the world has changed.
Happily, tomorrow I'll be 4 calender months AF. I had cherry juice to accompany my roast beef tonight. Lib had red wine. She must have not wanted to finish her glass after dinner and tipped the empty dregs into my empty glass. I didn't know she had done this, and thinking I hadn't finished the cherry juice, I drank it down. Strewth! What a shock! It tasted vile. Seems my taste buds have altered in these four months. Next target 6 months.
No comments:
Post a Comment