Friday 8th January 2021 Day 290

9,15   Well the new routine has been a complete failure so far, I was going to go to bed at ten but somehow I just couldn’t and in the end it was half eleven, pretty much when I usually go.  Unfortunately it was one of those very unsettled nights and I ended up getting up late as well.  I shall tell myself ‘Needs to make more effort’ which is what it said quite often on my school reports.

14.30  I decided that as I need to see to the pond, take Audrey for a walk and try to work out how to use my new steam floor cleaner, I would put on my old clothes and have my shower later.  It is now half past two and I am only just going to have the shower.  The steam cleaner took quite a while to decipher how to connect the parts and how to actually use the thing, the instructions as so often, were a direct translation from Chinese and really

quite difficult to follow, such as ‘When the water tank full, fill with water’.  Once put together and switched on, it was pretty good.

After that it was sort out the pond to find out why it is tripping the electricity.  First thing is to clean the filter but the hosepipe is solid ice inside so that has gone into the boiler room to thaw for twenty four hours. The pond will have to wait another day but then I notice that another fish has been spiked by the heron.  No one stands to gain when this happens, the heron can mortally wound the fish but has no way to remove it from the pond because of the netting and the fish if left, dies a slow death, I decide that I have got to ‘man up’ and deal with the fish myself, just get the poor thing out of the water and knock it on the head to put it out of its misery.  After half an hour of trying to talk myself into it, I realise it is never going to happen and call on Richard who is always kind enough to come and do the deed for me when necessary.

The morning seems to be running away fast and I am not really achieving much, so we will go for our walk now.  It’s a really beautiful morning and standing in full sunshine, there is a little heat.  We are going up to the fields today.  I have been talking to my friend in France who says that everyone is wearing masks when they are outside as well as in the shops or other buildings and now I am wondering whether I should be wearing mine just to walk up the road, which, incidentally, seems to be as busy as ever, where are all those cars going to and coming from? 

In the furthest field there are some very large vehicle and implement sheds and as I walk by a small flock of white doves plus one dark one in their centre, fly out from the roof area and circle around us and the shed roofs over and over again, their wings sparkling in the sunshine

Today we hear that London is critically nearing the point of absolute capacity where they won’t be able to take in any more patients and Londoners are being implored not to meet up in groups. 

I wonder how they are coping in Buckingham Palace? Do all the staff live in rather than return home?  What would happen if amongst the huge amount of staff there were Covid cases?  Would the Royal family have to roll up their sleeves and cook their own meals while the staff were isolated? And who would feed the Corgis?