Coronavirus: How a butcher saved my bacon

Hayley Matthews thought her search for sausages would be in vain, until she saw a light on in a shop window...

Findlay's proved to be the answer to Hayley's sausage prayers (Picture: Alistair Linford)

I took a walk down the promenade during the week to burn off some steam.

My partner had taken our eight-year-old out for a run to burn of some testosterone so I was talking our one-year-old out for a walk as he was getting very restless.

I also had the task of finding something for the dinner, which has been a bit challenging recently. However, I’m not complaining as I’m very grateful for all we have. Aldi was bare, as was the Co-Op in Portobello, so unsuccessful in finding sausages I headed back up the road.

It was cold, damp and getting close to tea time and what I wouldn’t do for a string of sausages for tea when . . . I thought my eyes were deceiving me – was that a light on in Findlays of Portobello the butcher? At last, we’d have sausages for tea.

In delight I popped in and had a really good chat with the butcher about the current situation.

I told him I was delighted he was open and got enough sausages to last us until the autumn.

Why did I not do this before? I always advocate local! It made me think how stupid we are in amongst all the panicking and how we need to remember our locals.

Here are all the supermarkets with nothing in them yet the local butcher is full to the brim of sausages, steak and everything in between. It’s time to support local more now than ever and we might just reverse some of the damage that’s about to be done to society.