Middle of the week, end of week 2 of the second lockdown in England. Will it have made enough difference by the end? I doubt it, but I do hope it will have prevented some people from getting ill (and so inevitably prevented some avoidable deaths). I’ve been reading lots of US commentators suggesting that invitations to large family gatherings for Thanksgiving should also include invitations to the ensuing funerals further down the line. I fear the same will be true for us at Christmas. Certainly we are planning and expecting that Christmas will be small, low key, and outside whenever possible. There will be time to meet up properly when the virus is under control.
Yesterday (Tuesday, day 13) Malcolm kindly drove me over to the farm where I bought more milk, and then I walked home (between 4 and 5 miles). A pleasant walk, all along roads this time, and good exercise. Noticeably less traffic than before lockdown, though more than in the first lockdown.
Apart from that, I managed to hang out and get dry a machine load of washing. Increasingly I’m planning doing washing based on the weather forecast, and using the delay feature on the machine to run it outside hours of peak demand on National Grid: doing this helps flatten demand levels, and make it easier for the grid to make use of renewable energy. (We explored installing solar panels, including as part of a local solar generation project, but unfortunately our roof configuration and aspect made it not cost effective).
We’re fortunate to have a garden where we can air-dry our washing. I’d love to see provision for this required for all new housing. We’ve visited places overseas (Denmark, Germany) where blocks of flats have communal basement washing and drying facilities, powered by district heating systems, and they seem to work well on the whole. They also reduce the number of machines needed by individual households. We’ve noticed that most of the launderettes that used to be in Bath have now closed. I can only think of 2 remaining.
Today (Wednesday) I have a list of admin jobs to do, including reading all the papers for tonight’s zoom trustee meeting. The forecast is dull and wet, but I’ll still get out for a walk at some point. I plan to make Christmas puddings this week or next, and need to stock up on the ingredients (plus restock some essentials I’ve run out of).
I was (am) thinking about starting running again, but have had a minor problem with one of my feet, so I think I’ll wait a little to let that completely heal. Coward or sensible? I’d say a bit of both.
Anyway, today I have:
Done: quite a lot of the admin tasks, including ‘fessing up to one I had left for too long and asking for help with it (the help was graciously offered, and much appreciated);
Been to: trustee meeting on zoom. Another useful and productive meeting, and great to see everyone. Especially good to be able to celebrate the success of the press and social media campaign marking our 25th birthday – not the celebration we expected, but absolutely amazing to see coverage in both local and national TV and papers. Then on to how we’re going to manage to raise the amount of money we’ll need to survive through next year and beyond.
Walked: my daily walk, today fitted in between the showers. Planned to go just to one of our local shopping areas. In the event one shop I wanted was randomly shut for the day, and the queue at the Post Office was crazy long. So I decided to walk to one the other side of the river, and instead had a longer and very enjoyable (still local) walk
Knitted: but of course
And now that’s the day done. And breathe…..
the magic jug 