Cherry takes the reins

Seasidegal58

The vision of the moon shining on the snow is lovely Cherry. 😀
Covid levels are really scary at the moment. We're already in tier 4 - are you going up a tier due to today's Government directives?☹️

Cherryfudge

We are indeed, @Seasidegal58. Tier three for us: I checked the number per 100,000 today and we are just short of 300.

It's been rather a day of bad news, chiefly that H, who has been under the weather for a while, had an emergency hospital appointment today and another tomorrow. It's so hard to support them when we can't go and give hugs. Then when I arrived at work I heard a member of the previous shift had dashed off home, unwell. She rang during the evening and will be off 48 hours with what looks like food poisoning. Then the colleague I was with this evening had texts from both her grown daughters at almost the same time to say they were unwell. One had a raging temperature, sore throat and headache. She's a nurse and has to test herself for Covid regularly, so was able to do a test at once and amazingly it came back negative. We were relieved of course - and my colleague, who had kindly retreated behind a screen while talking to me (we wear masks all the time too) was able to relax a bit. Of course there are occasional false negatives and we don't know what her other daughter has, but for now I feel a little less beleaguered than I did three hours ago.

The Covid figures are horrendous so I'm rather relieved things are tightening up not relaxing. Nearly a thousand dead in a day, and over 50,000 new infections... like everyone else, I hoped we'd seen the worst of it in the spring, but this has to be it now... hopefully in a few weeks there will be enough people vaccinated to begin to show in the statistics.

To top it, my F!tbit gave a funny buzzing sound and died on me. I had a problem with it shutting down on me the other day but now it won't recharge at all. It doesn't owe me anything: I must have worn it day and night for over three years. I had a quick look on 3bay and the model I had is now very cheap second hand, at least compared with what I paid originally, so I will have a proper look later and maybe invest in another.

Other than these things, it's been a fairly productive day. It's been frosty but I managed a run at lunch time. It was a bit glassy underfoot in places but I took it slowly and was all right. I've also washed four jumpers by hand and they steamed enthusiastically on the line when I hung them out, even though they didn't feel warm. Lastly, I've made a big pan of turkey and red wine stock which I'm hoping will freeze into portions and enrich casseroles for months to come.

Tonight I'm thankful for another vaccine being approved (and someone other than me has noticed the country seems to have ordered more doses than we have people to vaccinate, what's that about?), for a clear bright sky and sparkly frost and for a much easier shift than I had anticipated a few days ago.

Sun_Addict

Have you tried resetting your Fitbit via the tiny hole on the back, stick a pin in it and hold for a few seconds. I’m on my third FitBit now and do find they tend to last around 3 years.

Sorry to hear about all the bad news. I hope everyone gets well soon. It’s frightening about the high COVID numbers, although now tests are freely available it’s bumped up the figures. Makes you wonder just how many people had it in the first wave and not counted in the stats.

Seasidegal58

Have a very happy New Year Cherry and I hope you and your family have a healthy prosperous 2021. 

🍾🥳🍾🥳

Cherryfudge

Thank you @Sun_Addict and @Seasidegal58.

Good news about the F!tbit: I cleaned the contacts and tried to charge it again and about half an hour later it emailed me to ask if I remembered it! I'm glad of the reminder of the reset button (Thanks Sun_Addict), which I'd completely forgotten but it's the second 'episode' I've had recently so I think I may need to use it sooner rather than later. Anyway I'm glad I have it back and working.

H spent ages being checked over at the hospital today and is now home again. She will get frequent checks for a while but it's very much a case of 'there's not much we can do but it may resolve itself'. At least she is home and will probably get another sick note to cover a few weeks, which I feel is largely the right choice (not that I'm any expert).

Other than that DH had lots of IT problems today: when I got in from work he was waiting for the IT department to sort out something weird with text size: he has a large monitor and the windows were super-magnified. At last they thought they had it fixed and asked him to log in again - and the windows were even bigger. We are talking less than a line of text filling the monitor! No idea what they did but I think it was looking better an hour later, so we wrapped up warm and went for a walk. It was nearly dark by then but clear and frosty: its been beautiful.

This evening I'm thankful for tracking down a yarn type that was eluding me, very pretty sparkly frost and a year that's given rise to some wonderful photos especially during the spring and summer. Looking back on them makes me happy: the quality of light and colour was just amazing and reminds me that all that is just a few short months away again.

Happy New Year, one and all.

ceremony

Happy new year!
Fitbits are so finnicky! I ended up giving up on mine and using a cheap Samsung watch instead since I wasn't particularly invested in any one app or ecosystem.
I hope H is doing OK. It's such a stressful time at the moment and "there's not much we can do" must be a frustrating thing to hear but it's good she's at home I guess?
Here's hoping for a better new year.

charlies_tribe

Happy New year Cherry x

Seasidegal58

Another here sending good wishes to H for a speedy recovery. 

Glad to hear OH got his IT problems resolved- how weird was that text!

Cherryfudge

Thank you for all the good wishes! Today, no news is presumed to be good news: all is quiet on the front.

The F!tbit is working but required another charge so I wonder if it's the battery going? It usually lasts about a week not a couple of days.

I have tracked down the yarn I wanted but when the postage is added on it's rather expensive so I'm hesitating. I have plenty of stashed yarns but nothing that would work with the pattern.

I've also been up in the loft to bring down a couple of jumpers, and while there found some brown cord jeans that I had completely forgotten. I was going to pass them on to the charity shop as I have more than enough clothes, but to my surprise they are a perfect fit so I'm keeping them. I recently found an app called 'Save your Wardrobe' which seems to be about recording what clothes you have, creating outfits and learning how to mend things in order to keep textiles out of landfill. I've been photographing items to add to it but it looks like a long process. I'd be interested to hear if anyone's tried it.

Our main activity today, apart from DH getting in a few days' shopping (but not bread, so he will have to go tomorrow), was a walk with friends. We went up one of our running routes and I discovered my friend runs too so we spent a while comparing notes. The lane we followed was awash but the views were spectacular and we agreed we hope going for walks with friends stays as a 'thing' when all the restrictions are over.

So today I'm thankful that 'no news is good news', for my friends suggesting the walk and for 'new' jeans for nothing.

Sun_Addict

FitBit sounds like it’s on the way out unfortunately. As I said earlier they appear to have a 3 year lifespan. Might be worth emailing their customer services as I’ve found them to be extremely helpful in the past. My first ever FitBit was purchased from an online retailer who I’d never heard of but the price was good. It conked out within a few weeks, I emailed FitBit and although I hadn’t bought it from them they replaced it. I do now suspect I’d bought a fake so it was very good of them to do this.