Retirement

 Today is Ellie's last full day at Dizzy Ducklings. Tomorrow, she retires from the said institution and prepares, over the summer, to commence proper school. The Gorse Fox and Silver Vixen are not sure she quite understands the significance of this. At present, however, she is very excited by the prospect and, as we pass children from her new school on the development, she points to them and explains that they are her school friends.

The Urban-cub had a bit of a day of it yesterday. She had staff self-isolating, another (fresh back from holiday) who said she wasn't feeling up to it and was sent home, and was at, or below, 50% of her staffing numbers. By the evening, there were just two of them running the whole store. On top of this, they had the big mid-week change around to handle, an alarm going off in the toilets that turned out (once they had forced their way in) to be a woman who had collapsed and was unconscious on the floor and needed an ambulance (which turned up 90 minutes later); and a safe which had a fault in the lock mechanism and couldn't be opened for the day's takings. This last problem required a specialised engineer - who couldn't solve the problem - and eventually several levels of escalation to the head of Lidl in the UK. It was nearly 3 a.m. before Urban-cub got home.