I felt as if I was in Provence on ‘me holidays’ today. The weather was so beautiful, the garden so lush and the trees so green that as I sat on the patio eating my French-style salad and a lemon tart lunch, I was transported back to holidays long gone. It was lovely. The only thing missing, of course, was the company…….oh, and the swimming pool. Happy memories.
The happy memories saw me through the day, because it stayed nice all day and I was able to enjoy the beauty of it. And, with those memories humming in the background, it’s been a fabulous day of surprises, too.
As you know, Mum stays in bed forever, so I thought I’d read my book in bed for a little while this morning, which I was just doing, when my phone rang…….and to my great astonishment, it was Graham on a video call!! Could have knocked me down with a feather! “Hellooooo” I said cautiously, “You OK?” Yes, they were fine, just phoning to see how John is and how Mum is getting on. We chatted for a bit, then I offered to take the phone through to Mum, who was also in bed. For once, she was awake and very keen to take the call. She had a fine chat with Graham and was actually on top form, remembering all the stuff that I’d just told Graham she couldn’t remember at all….. sod’s law that, isn’t it? Anyway, it was wonderful to see him, and he was lovely to talk to.
As the video call finished, Mum was quite perky at the point, so I suggested that she might like to get up. However, she snoozed some more until lunch time, which meant, in the end, that she had a bit of a late start to the day – again.
Having promised myself for a while that I’d sort them out, I was determined to clean some garden chairs today, so I knuckled down to it. It was a warm day, which meant that I stopped occasionally for refreshments. On one occasion when I’d stopped for a breather, I heard the postman plop the post through the letterbox. Ah-ha! A set of plants I had been waiting for had arrived. Excited, I put the rest of the post to one side and sorted out my plants, which were looking very sorry for themselves, having been dispatched last Friday and then languished in a warehouse somewhere over the Bank Holiday.
When I went back in for more water later, I decided to open the rest of the post. Ah…. how very nice… a lovely card from my goddaughter, Liz, thanking us for the plants we’d donated to her garden a year ago, showing us how they’d come on in the last year. Unexpected. Wonderful.
A wander in the garden with Mum before more scrubbing of the garden chairs, and she did the ‘Princess and the Pea’ thing again; finding every chair or position or atmosphere just ‘not quite right’, until we settled on the bench outside the patio doors where it was warm, breeze-less, sun-less and comfortable.
We came indoors after a while to organise something to eat. I saw Mum moseying towards the porch and wondered what she’d found. It was another parcel!! Addressed to me from Amazon, I thought, “Oh, no… what have I been ordering now that I can’t remember??” Anyway, it wasn’t me…. it was my dearest friend, Lizzie, who sent me some Green & Blacks chocolates. Boy! Does that girl know me well??!! I had quite a lump in my throat, to be honest.
All this, and no John?? Well, in between times, I did talk to the ol’ man, although I have to confess that when he phoned this afternoon, I missed his call as I was too engrossed in planting plants and chair-scrubbing.
He’s feeling better. The medics have taken him off the oxygen to see how his oxygen levels are without support, and his neutrophils are up. The doctor told him that they’ll stop the antibiotics now (which suggests that they’ll probably send him home tomorrow) and set him up on the nebulised ones at home. In fact, as we were chatting this evening, surprise, surprise, nurses came in and unceremoniously transported him into a different room. The room he was in, apparently, is for people with ‘bad chest infections’. All looking good, then.
And looking better, too, are the figures from the government with regards to COVID-19: 2,004 people infected; 135 deaths in hospitals; 134 deaths in all settings. NHS figures, yesterday up to 5 p.m. are: 23 deaths and 59 confirmed deaths for the day before (24 May 2020).
So, do I feel better? Well, more hopeful, anyway, and….. grateful that my brother phoned – it cheers Mum up for a couple of days at least, which offers me some respite; but……
I’m still feeling impotent over the Cummings/Johnson stuff – what have we got ourselves into? I’m anxious over the COVID-19 situation, because where does it leave us? But yet, I’m uplifted by friends’ and goddaughter’s thoughtfulness and excited that the ol’ man might be home tomorrow (or Thursday).
In the meantime, God bless you all. May tomorrow offer us all new hope.
Don’t be concerned by the Johnson/Cummings thing, Anne. It’s a concerted media attempt to displace Cummings just weeks before the go/no-go decision has to be taken about a Brexit transition extension, with a view that without Cummings, Johnson would be less able to hold off those arguing that we need two more years to arrive at the same point. It’s meant to unsettle people.
Otherwise, why else not hound the four Labour MPs who have admitted breaking the lockdown rules, like Stephen Kinnock et al??
There are people dying out there and all they can do is play Westminster politics. Shameful.
Well, it’s unsettling me!!!
Don’t forget to look out for the Space Station flying overhead at 21:33 tonight being chased by SpaceX at 21:50. If nothing else, it will give you chance to hurl abuse at Musk when SpaceX flies over. He won’t hear it but it will make you feel better.
Ha! Ha! Yes – that would be good!!!
Like you, I was reminded yesterday of our holidays in France because the weather was so typical of the bright, clear, sunny days with nothing more taxing than walking down to the lake for a spot of fishing. Your entry today further reminded me of sharing the fun of lying on the grassy bank with all the kids, watching the Pleiades streaking across the inky-Black heavens. Also the dappled path where we had millions of little partial eclipses on the ground as the sun shone through the trees. I checked: 11th August 1999.
Oh, I so enjoyed that time together!