This is Planet Earth. The Sleath household currently occupying a little plot of land in the United Kingdom and Day 233 of our battle, as a nation, to oust the dreaded lurgy by staying at home, washing our hands, wearing masks and keeping our distance to keep safe. Two days before the next ‘stay at home’ session.
I was keen this morning. Got out of bed relatively early and got myself up to the church hall for a yoga class. Thoroughly enjoyed it – even found a few core muscles which I’d mislaid during lockdown. As before, I wore my mask throughout and stationed myself by the open doors, to keep any stray bugs at bay. Nobody laughed at me.
This was the first yoga session of the new half-term. Sadly, it’s also probably the last. Sports activities are denied in the next ‘keep yourselves safe’ month, so no more physical, face-to-face classes. We are going to have a go at Zooming the classes instead, which will be fun. I am expecting to be able to motivate myself to do those. Couldn’t self-motivate at all when they were on YouTube, even though the ones I did download were very good.
While I was out, John took himself down to the local surgery for a blood test. He walked down because I had the car. I took pity on him though and, after my class had finished, I drove down to the surgery to meet him. He didn’t know I was going and he was very relieved to see me. He was just weighing his options up as to which route to take – the hill-climb, or the round-the-Wrekin route; he wasn’t sure which would be the easier, but neither seemed tempting.
I am not really sure what either of us did this afternoon. I know I did a lot of faffing about. In my head, I was going to tackle all sorts of things, but I felt tired and couldn’t get going. John did some sorting in the garage, some computer work and some tidying of ‘stuff’. Having disposed of the spare desk in the soon-to-be library area just off the lounge, there is an excess of all sorts.
Just before lunch, Danielle called in to collect some bubble wrap that I’ve been hoarding for years. She has designed some lovely gifts for Christmas and is selling them on her newly set up Etsy shop. She has had quite a few orders and is starting to parcel items up to send off. Thank God for a hoarder, is all I can say…… plenty of packaging material here, folks.
For all my faffing about I did do one or two things: I made the final touches to the front door – the paint, having dried, wasn’t going to be spoiled if I cleaned the windows. So I got on and did that and then re-hung the curtain. I prepped lunch and our evening meal – which goes without saying, I suppose, but takes time and effort and thought. I also sifted through a very fat folder that I had brought home from Mum’s to see if there was anything in there that she needed, or whether I could chuck it all out. It was, of course, the latter, so that’s all ready to go in the recycling bin (which is currently full, so I shall hopefully sneak it all into the neighbour’s bin when it’s been put out onto the pavement on Thursday night! Tee-hee!! Did a bit of pot-washing and pot-putting away too, as well as washing clothes. So, although I say I faffed, most of it was useful faffing.
We had thought we might have a pre-lockdown family get-together tomorrow with fireworks, since Bonfire Night is now cancelled on Thursday. So I sped round to the shops to buy sausages and finger rolls and toffee apples in readiness. However, it transpires that one of Paul’s colleagues has been in contact with a positive case of COVID, so we thought it best not to risk it in the end. I am bitterly, bitterly disappointed, but know it’s the right thing to do. The food has now been shoved into the freezer awaiting a defrosting of the restrictions in a month’s time, and hopefully we can do it then.
It was Bake-Off this evening, and I was so disappointed to see Lottie go. She was my favourite and I was hoping she might even win. Ah, well, got to pick another winner now! Afterwards, John decided he’d have an early night, but I stayed up a bit to watch some of the USA election discussions. With the results even more unpredictable than the UK ones, I decided to give up not long into it. What a lot of hot air there is about it all. Whatever happens though, Trump will be the headline, I have no doubt.
Talking of hot air, there’s a lot of it in relation to whether or not the COVID infection rates really are going up or whether it’s all lies. With 20,018 people infected today, 397 dead in the community and 139 dead in hospitals in the last couple of days, I suspect the rate really is continuing to rise and the decision to keep us all close to our homes is probably the right one.
So, take care everyone – it feels like the lurgy is lapping at our feet. God bless.