No longer leukaemia…..but isolation, Day 13

Well, I can recommend a ‘Brazen Hussy’ to anyone!! Slept like a log after a couple of those lovely cocktails last night and woke up with more of a spring in my step this morning. The going forward of the hour was a blessing as I was able to catch up with our church service on-line at the appointed time, in the knowledge that others from the congregation were doing the same. Struggled a bit to concentrate though, with all sorts of distractions here at home.

John also got up in good time and he, too, felt a bit better this morning. Still coughing well, of course, but that’s to be expected without his inhaler. Otherwise, he’s still pottering about and doing jobs, for which I am very grateful. Today’s job was to lay the brass threshold strips joining the new kitchen floor to existing floors into the hall, the store room and the utility room. And they look fab! Dead pleased with them, I am!

Mum took her time getting up and coming downstairs, with a few ‘oohs’ and ‘aahs’, and absolutely no memory of having refused paracetamol yesterday to ease the pain of her fall at all. Quite willing to take some this morning though, which reduced the possibility of more fuss than necessary! Ooooh, she does love a drama!

Had a lovely text from Tracey, who does Mum’s cleaning and general looking-after of her on a Wednesday, and so I got little notelets out for Mum to write something in return, as she’d expressed a wish to do that last week. But, no… didn’t feel like it today, so we posted a video instead, and Mum felt like a film star. She was like the Queen on Friday, Humpty Dumpty yesterday, and a film star today…. I wonder what tomorrow will bring for her?

No ‘big stuff’ for John today, just a snooze this afternoon while I pottered about upstairs vacuuming all the bloomin’ cat hairs up. The cats aren’t allowed in the bedrooms, but they do love to prowl the landing, where they seem to shed hair by the bucketload, which then gets walked into every room….

John may not have done ‘big stuff’ today but he has excelled himself in the kitchen with high cuisine. Steak and chips for tea, and a luxury ‘paleo’ chocolate mousse, and then to baking a ‘paleo’ loaf this evening. Mmmmm…. the house is heady with its scent as I write – delicious!!

Disappointing news today though is that Oakes’, the farm shop, has suspended its delivery service now. We were doing very well on the grocery front with support from dear friends and the delivery from Oakes’. Despite the fact that John is in the ‘shielded’ group, it has been impossible so far to get any on-line deliveries from any of the major supermarkets, either because we’re queuing to get onto the website, or there are no delivery slots available.

Our difficulty is that John is following a specific diet, and many of the products aren’t sold locally. But no matter, meat and two veg works very well – we don’t have to be fancy! And we are still able to eat – there are some who are not, and who are relying ever more heavily on food banks daily.

For these people, for those who are sick or dying from the virus (the toll in the UK today: those infected nearly 20,000; those who have died, over 1,200), all the carers and front-line workers, we lit a Candle of Hope in our window, along with many other residents in the village and churches together as a symbol of love, faith, hope and prayer during this crisis.

And now, after our day of ‘busy doing nothing…..trying to find lots of things not to do‘, I am going to take the most delightful memory of the day and treasure it: little William, on a video call, showering kiss after kiss on me – mwah, mwah, mwah, mwah! Oh, boy! How my heart overflows!