Category: middle aged menopausal musings

COVID 19 Diary

Local wildlife sightings this morning:

On my way to the beach for my morning walk when a young roe buck leapt over the stone wall from the village play park on to the road just behind me, scaring the bejesus out of himself. And me.

‘Im indoors came across a family of wren fledglings fluttering about befuddledly on the mat in the hall having found their way in through the open back door. He gently ushered them outside again to their mum, who was chattering and scolding them from the garden wall.

Lunching in the garden and reading my paper when I was softly head butted by an inattentive and clumsy bumble bee who dropped briefly into my salad, sampled the vinaigrette dressing and then lazily lumbered off again with a tiny bit of rocket attached to its back leg.

Driving to town today whilst listening to Radio 4.
They were playing a 2005 episode of “I’m sorry I haven’t a clue” with the irreplaceable and sadly departed Tim Brook-Taylor and Jeremy Hardy.
Jeremy’s lustily sung version of “Roxanne”, voiced exactly like Sting but with a thick Geordie accent was comedy brilliance, reducing me to helpless laughter so that I actually had to pull over to the side of the road briefly.
A portly young lad zipped past me, cycling at speed along the cycle way.
From the back, I could see that his coat sleeves were flapping emptily at his sides.
I pulled out and drove on, looking back in curiosity as I passed him, just to confirm that he had his coat open and his hands on the handlebars.
I was intrigued to see that he actually had his arms crossed across his front inside his coat, which was zipped up, and he was pedalling “hands free”.

Hmmm.

Forward planning, risk assessment and insurance are obviously not concepts he is familiar with.

COVID 19 Diary.

UK situation at present:

Significant proportion of population really want to be told what to do.

Similar proportion of population really DO NOT want to be told what to do

Significant minority of population don’t give a toss either way.

Some people actively enjoy the whole lockdown scenario.

Some people actively damaged by the whole lockdown scenario.

Some people glory in ignoring/rebelling against the whole lockdown scenario.

Scientists bicker about everything.

Government don’t know the right thing to do but won’t admit they’re really just winging it.

Opposition and press leap on whatever they say and vehemently and immediately disagree.

Economy in free fall.

Vast numbers of people have lost jobs/income/direction/the plot.

Nature blossoming and breathing the fresh air.

Virus just carries on doing what it’s doing when it does it.

All in hand then.

COVID 19 Diary

Things I have learned today.

Whilst decorating, it is not wise to place your mid morning beverage close to the paint pot, otherwise one ends up applying an arresting shade of frothy cappuccino instead of “soft stone” and the said beverage has to be poured down the sink.

🙄

COVID 19 Diary

Halfway round Tesco this morning when I realised I had forgotten something on the list.
I was immediately frowned and tutted at by the other, socially distancing, customers when I tried to double back the wrong way round the new one way system and I ended up surreptitiously abandoning my trolley whist I zig zagged like someone trying to shake a trail, back to the frozen goods aisle, peering around corners and darting between sections to ensure I wasn’t rumbled.

COVID 19 Diary.

I now know what I will be occupying myself with for my non-working days this weekend….

Picking up the vast mountains of horticultural crap that is widely distributed around the entire garden since ‘im outdoors broke loose from the shed with the hedge clippers and chainsaw.
Lockdown has forced him to do something energetic to alleviate the boredom.
He’s now in a messy, perspiring heap in a corner of the kitchen and I think may be about to go on strike…..

Not that I’m complaining – the place has never looked more neat and tidy – however I think the chance of getting him back into the garden in the next 10 years is precisely zero.

COVID 19 Diary.

‘Im outdoors has become averse to home-based jobs over the years and can always find something better or more fun to be doing to prevent him from having either the time or inclination.
After 1 week of lockdown, the alpha male in him has exhausted its military “just cope in the circumstances” reserves and having read a number of books, taken on the responsibility of the evening meals and walked the dogs to exhaustion he is looking for a new activity.
The serious tools came out of the shed and he got started on one of the big, destructive garden jobs I’ve been gently hinting (aka seriously nagging) about for years.
After a couple of hours of sawing, bashing and wrecking, the old, unused dilapidating and unsightly henhouses have been demolished and there is a towering bonfire of debris waiting to be ignited.
I have reconstructed the section of hen run where the shed came down and the hens are orgasmically clucking, scratching and pecking at the fresh area of uncovered ground which is rich in lazy and unsuspecting worms and beetles.
Rather liking this enforced quarantine.

COVID 19 Diary

My empty nest is now unexpectedly full and feathered for the foreseeable future, although ground rules have had to be drawn for the sanity of the occupants (two adult offspring who were expecting to live independently and are now stuck in the company of two tedious middle aged parents).
A bit of rearrangement of the house to optimise their bedrooms as functioning workspaces for their (for now, exclusively) online study.
A husband who is delighted that everyone now sees the benefit of self isolation and social distancing (skills which he basically invented and pioneered) and thinks that it should be made permanently compulsory, but increasing from 2m to 1km.
Opportunity to empty the freezer and sample all those unlabelled mystery pots and containers as surprise suppers.
Dogs which are delirious at the sudden increase in attention and fussing.
Hens which are laying amazingly well for no obvious reason.
Hospital car park almost empty for the first time ever.
Quiet, calm, apprehension at the front line, waiting for the feared tsunami of cases to reach us here and watching with alarm at the developments in Italy, Spain and London.

An unforeseen consequence of corona virus.

Senior daughter will not be returning to Newcastle for her final appointment and physio due to suspension of face to face teaching at uni.
Hospital follow up successfully undergoing transfer to our local orthopaedic team.
Cast off hopefully on Monday.
She has brought some shoes home.
Right shoes.
Her left shoes, are still scattered around her Uni house.