Cherry takes the reins

Cherryfudge

I should be careful of missing a couple of days of diary because it's hard to remember what went on. I caught up somewhat on the course I started last month, I had my regular Covid tests (negative), I made HoneysuckleLou2's marzipan cake (scrummy), I had a walk with my daughter and today I've been to work.

Nothing spent. DH has had his Covid jab. I've made a bit more progress in the garden on Tuesday but this morning was lowering and dark so I huddled indoors. Tomorrow is my short shift at work then I have the weekend off.

This evening I'm thankful for time with DD, a smooth and easy shift, various messages from friends and family just keeping in touch, and three viewings for the old house.

Sun_Addict

Fingers crossed the viewings result in a sale 🤞

Cherryfudge

Thanks SA. No news as yet but it's early days (of second time around).

I seem to have spent quite a bit in the last couple of days. I did the supermarket shopping yesterday before work. I came to £84.90 but £21 of that was printer ink. Today has been very grey and dreary and I was fed up as DH was working and I wasn't, so I worked through the five wellness things and did some non-supermarket shopping as a way of being active. We are repainting the bedroom and are going to try midnight blue and pale grey but I couldn't get the grey tester pot anywhere. I did see a couple of unmasked adults in shops - one with the mask over his mouth but not his nose, and wearing the shop's uniform, which enraged me and was quite scary. He wasn't social distancing either: it appeared his family was with him as I was waiting to get past the group and heard him say he'd be ready soon and late saw him carrying goods to checkout. I bit my tongue to stop myself having a go at him but I'm still half thinking of contacting the shop as that's both illegal and dangerous (our area has had a spike of infections recently). I ended up leaving the shop empty-handed, too, as they didn't have the paint I went for.

Spending
Housekeeping £63.90 yesterday, £3.98 today
Stationery (printer ink) £21.00
Household £11.78
Garden £1 (pot of daffodils)
Pets £1 (wild bird food)
Hobbies £1.75 (yarn)
Gifts £13.94
DH got us fish and chips this evening which is about £6 and went to the greengrocer's yesterday but I don't know what that came to.

This evening I've dozed off on the sofa: I'm trying to get to bed earlier so when I woke up at seven I decided to get up so I could have time to myself but it backfired as I'm not used to being so tired nowadays. I'm also not eating healthily at the moment so I need to reign that one in. It took a while but the lockdown, H's illness, house sale and DD moving away are all adding up and the grey weather may be mild but it's not conducive to going out. However a friend texted to arrange a walk on Monday, I've messaged various of the family today and DH and I both have the day off tomorrow, so there are good things going on. I've also started another small bit of knitting, as much to give me something to do as anything.

I have a couple of admin things I need to get done, one of which is paying off my credit card. I accidentally locked myself out of the account the other week. I shouldn't incur charges as I have a minimum payment set up but I don't like the fact the amount owed is mounting up. I also need to get my timesheet put in at work but the website was faulty the other day, and similar happened when I tried to put the meter readings for Mum's old house into the company's app. The helpful person on chat could get into the account but couldn't get me in and finally concluded there were issues at their end. So those three will probably have to wait till Monday or Tuesday.

I've just arranged a walk with another friend during the week, so that will help my mood. If the sun shines I hope to get some running done too - I could have gone today but just got swamped by the greyness. I have yet to become an all-weather runner!

So tonight, what am I thankful for? Messaging various people. Fish and chips for tea. Something else to knit. Sunshine forecast for next week. Coloured pens so my bullet journal looks cheerful. Buying a pot of tete a tete daffodils - and buds on the tete a tetes outside the kitchen door.

greenbee

It's not surprising you're feeling a bit down with everything going on. And I do think it's worth contacting the shop to let them know that they need to do a better job of educating their staff on mask wearing and distancing. It's hugely frustrating when people don't appear to be able to grasp the basics of infection control, and you and your colleagues - like many others - are in the frontline and shouldn't be compromised by people who don't have to take the risks you do. 

charlies_tribe

Enjoy your day off tomorrow. It makes me so stressed and upset when I see others that can't stick to the rules to try and get back to normal. I haven't seen DD1 (19) since Christmas day and miss her so much but then see others with relatives in and out all the time or refuseto wear masks just because 'its not law' I haven'tleft the housebut DH says it's one of the biggest reasons they get given where he works. I'm really hoping for a summer of some normality.

We've just started doing midnight navy in our hall, I absolutelylove the colour. We had what I thought was an off white for the top but it looks very lilac in the light. 

Have a relaxing day tomorrow.

Honeysucklelou2

There are  holiday cottages near us that have been occupied for the last 3 weeks or so - some clearly interpret the current rules differently to the majority.

Cherryfudge

So today's been a Good Day, with no pesky anti-maskers.  

I think it's partly because I've had rather better sleep after weeks of going to bed at stupid o'clock: well, it's still stupid o'clock but not as bad as it was. We had online church this morning, DH made sausage casserole for lunch then we had a longish walk this afternoon and the weather was lovely. No 'duvet' coats for either of us, yet both of us got rather too warm. The forecast only said eleven degrees but where we had shelter from the wind I'd guess it felt like fourteen.

Part of our walk took us near where our neighbour's partner lives, and he's been there for the last few weeks (to the extent I'm not sure he's coming back). We walked past on the off-chance of seeing him, and he was gardening so we stopped for a chat. That would have been a decent bit of socialising on its own but when we got home I decided to finish clearing the concrete by the back door of bricks, flower pots and leaves, and used the jet hose to clean it up (and get me rather muddy). It was great fun but meant we had to borrow a hose off our other neighbour as I'd completely forgotten our outdoor tap is now disconnected. So there was another chat over the fence. Sadly they are very likely to be moving away too, though also within walking distance.

Anyway, the clearing up meant we had to drain the rain water barrels which need to be moved and if done now, will probably refill quite soon. Part way through this we realised it was quite likely water was getting under the house. We took turns in sweeping the flow of water towards the drain, so I really feel I've had a workout. There's still half a barrel to empty before they can be moved so there's a job for the coming week.

Later in the evening I noticed that a manhole cover on the other side of the house is very wet on the downhill side. Not sure if this is from our flooding at the far side of the house or what! For now, everything is being aired as much as possible.

Other than that I've been chatting to a colleague by text, trying out the dark blue paint (looks good), doing some language learning and knitting. Nothing spent.

I'm thankful for good weather and lots of exercise, seeing people to talk to, making progress with Portuguese (which IMO sounds nothing like the written form) and a fair amount to do tomorrow - better than boredom.

Cherryfudge

It's been an odd sort of day and a bit downbeat: a year since DFiL passed away. I was quite busy this morning: it was Flow test day (another negative, thankfully) followed by an online team meeting then got out of my pyjamas (!) and dashed to get ready to meet my friend for our coffee and walk.

It was my turn to pay and I had been going to use loyalty points but the machine wasn't working so I paid by card (£4.30ish) and ended up with yet more loyalty points. We had a nice walk and chat: I've been setting family and friends some quiz questions to identify local places I encounter when walking and she asked me a bit more about the latest one but hasn't guessed it yet. Small pleasures. . 

I'm not sure if I've overdone the walking but I felt a bit under the weather when I got home. There was a gift box of flowers from DH's sister in memory of their Dad, and a visit from a chap to measure up for a new back door. I didn't have long for either of these as I needed to get to work: another quiet shift. I did, however, get a text from the lady who looks after Mum's old house to say she had been upstairs there when she heard someone downstairs, but they scarpered when she went down. She doesn't seem to have actually seen anyone, and we rang the estate agent to ask if it as them (they deny it) so it could have been an opportunist or a cat. Goodness knows.

Family contact has been a text from A wanting his hose back (done) and messages from various family members to commemorate Grandpa. There is a trend in one side of the family to send these messages which are intended in a supportive way but actually it doesn't work for DH or me... I used just to ring my Mum on the anniversary of my brother's and Dad's deaths so she always had family contact, but I didn't mention why I was ringing. It takes all sorts I suppose.

Of course this afternoon has been the (much leaked/speculated on) road out of lockdown announcement. It seems such a U-turn to have BJ being so cautious. Yes, it's a long slow path and that's supposing all goes well and we don't get an upsurge in Covid, but I don't think there will be another as big as January's because the vaccine seems to be taking the wind out of its sails. I have my list of things I want to learn or retain from lockdown: the value of walks with loved ones and running in the springtime, quiet time at home and how much I miss being with the children, putting thought into how to support people I can't be with... then there are the things I miss: eating out (never my favourite thing in the past!), clothes shopping (ironic as I'm trying not to buy much), travel to places I can't walk to and don't have to provide a reason for visiting, being able to go to people's houses... I'm sure there are others. The world got a lot smaller for a while and won't open up all at once, but I don't want to lose the things we found value in, like bird song and support from neighbours.

So tonight I'm thankful for my friend making the effort to get people meeting up and walking together, for DH making progress with the water barrels and for two days off about to happen.

Cherryfudge

Yesterday I didn't get much of my list done at all but I got out for a nice mood-improving walk and discovered a huge snicket (AKA gunnel or alley), which I told my friends about in our evening call. I may have mentioned we are in competition to discover more of these and try to better each other with how well we know the town! The strange things we find to entertain ourselves in lockdown.

I treated myself to a whole £2.95's worth of hobby spending: a thing called a lucet for making cords with. Apparently it was a 'thing' from the Vikings to the Victorians but it's also the sort of thing I find soothing and mildly useful.

More later - I'm still hoping to do something with today.

Cherryfudge

I've had to have a couple of swabs today - someone in work is isolating so work wanted us to test before going into: ironically I was only in for the weekly PCR, so two in one day (again). At least the new batch of PCRs have the more padded swab which I find easier to use.

It's been mild and windy so I didn't go for a run or a walk but spent a while making a new log pile from the remnants of the tree trunks, and trying to corral the sawdust that's now got grass growing through it. The garden looks a bit neater and the logs can get on with drying for the log burner. I meant to cut back brambles and fill bird feeders too but after I'd been to work I didn't feel like going back in the garden. I have, however, boxed up lots more of my Dad's old photos: one day I hope to sort them but for now they just need to be safe and separated from other things. There are three tins of photographic negatives which I'll put aside for my sister (she is more likely to use them). Unfortunately the country where she lives is one of those with limited internet at present so I've only got brief messages through in the last month or so and there's no urgency to sixty-year old negatives.

I've also signed up for a maintenance scheme backed by insurance to cover the knotweed at Mum's old house. This covers spraying for ten years and is transferable to the next owners. It's hardly likely to sell without it and the knotweed company have been very good about answering questions from buyers, but today have had enough as it's costing them a lot of time. This way they are paid for their time, we tackle an obstacle to sales and buyers will know where they stand. Still nothing from the estate agent about the damage done by the previous buyer's contractors so we need to work out how to go forward with that.

So that will be a spend of about £1,400 once the invoice comes through.

Other than that, we spent a couple of hours in a zoom meeting for church: it was really nice to see familiar faces in abundance and as it was a business meeting there was an element of chat too. We don't yet know how we'll get back to meeting face to face but it's already decided to keep up online services as so many people attend, including people who wouldn't go to a service in a building. 

Money-wise, I've picked up a sleep in at work tomorrow and another on Saturday. We seem to be living within our means at present but the shifts needed covering and the colleague who was doing Saturday ended up in A&E and has to take a few days off.

I'm not sure if I'll be on here tomorrow as I'm walking with a friend before work which doesn't leave much free time. DH and I are working opposite shifts for a few days, during which time J and L are moving house, then we are off to Mum's old house to do more work.

Tonight I'm thankful for a weather forecast full of sunshine for the next few days, for having made progress on Dad's photos and for a slightly tidier garden, a couple of extra sleep-in payments pending and meeting my friend tomorrow (and hopefully working off calories I added today).