Wednesday 23rd January 2020 Day 274
9.15 I woke up twice in the night because I had left the radio on. While it helps to get me to sleep in the first place, it then wakes me up again later because it hasn’t been switched off. I have a new little radio and I know it has a setting where you can set it to switch off after a selected amount of time. I know this because in the little book of instructions, in such tiny print that I am having to use a magnifying glass to read it, it tells me there is a sleep button. So far so good, except that the translation from, perhaps, Taiwanese has possibly been performed by a first year student of the English language. The sleep instructions begin ‘After put into the battery on the clock state select the Zzzz sleep symbol display by long press 3’. No sign in the little diagram of any 3 to press. The instructions get even more convoluted as we go along, finishing triumphantly with: After choose the sleep time, 1 second, the radio turn on. I think I will leave it for now and come back to it.
I haven’t put a tree up this year but the now elderly fairy is propped up on the shelf above the fireplace, giving me a bit of a look when I sit down in the evening, I don’t think she is impressed. The only problem with no tree is where do I put my presents? Perhaps on the low table with a bit of greenery around them. Usually just before Christmas I am flat out, last minute making beds, polishing brass, cooking ham etc. This year has been a very peaceful lead up, with lots of time for reflection, obviously the reason for it is not good but actually I have to confess I am quite enjoying it.
11.45 This morning on our lone walk we actually bump into (not literally of course, bump into as in two or three metres distance ) a friend from the village with her young dog who is going through a bit of an adolescent patch and inclined to run off, so we chat for a while and go our separate ways as it’s not fair to have one dog on a lead and one running free. All chat at present is back to Covid talk as it was last March, now that we have the variant of the virus, it almost feels as if we are back to square one and starting over. Half way into the walk Audrey loses the ball and will not believe me when I tell her I don’t have it, so she spends most of the rest of the walk dancing around me expectantly.
14.30 There is going to be a news update from Mat Hancock and colleagues, we knew the rules were going to be more stringent but it is still not nice hearing that after Boxing day we will be in Tier 4 which is going to be much like another lock down.
16.00 Everything is looking fresh and sparkling for Christmas and if it was a little later I would be sitting down with a g and t but I can wait and satisfy myself with a warm mince pie and a cup of tea.