No man is an island – January 2021

“Human beings necessarily depend on one another, as in You can’t manage this all by yourself; no man is an island.” This expression is a quotation from John Donne’s Devotions (1624): “No man is an Island, entire of it self; every man is a piece of the Continent, a part of the main.”

Well as of today the UK is an island, literally and metaphorically speaking. We are no longer part of the EU. However, human beings do not do well when isolated from others and they need to be part of a community to survive. Which is unfortunate because we are heading for another ‘community’ lockdown in the near future, seeing as Covid cases of the latest new mutation rip through the country. Happy New Year to you all.

The Government does not want to call them mutations, that would be playing straight into the hands of the people who dream up newspaper headlines! Actually I think it is because it sounds less scary to call it a variant. No turtles or ninjas involved.

Anyway, back to the here and now. The UK is about to roll out the largest vaccine programme in history. That’s a lot of needles! That’s a lot of vaccine! Will there be enough in time to save us all? Well I have read that they haven’t got enough glass vials! 🙄 If it‘s not one thing is another. Never mind it will all be OK in the end.

On January 3rd last year, as we sat by the pool in Chiang Mai, Glen read something on the BBC website about a new virus in China. Little did we know how it would affect us, and the whole world in the subsequent months and probably years.

A year on from that small news item, and we are in lockdown 3, and this time, like lockdown 1, schools are closed to all but the most vulnerable children and those children of our wonderful key workers. Since the first lockdown the government have realised just how many key workers, or should I say key ‘essential’ professions there are out there, and the schools are about half full anyway. What can they do about it? Nothing. Life has to go on, alongside trying to keep people ‘going on’ if they catch the virus. Who wants to be a politician, not me.

As if there wasn’t enough trouble in the world, America still has President Trump in office until 20th of this month. It’s only three weeks, what could possibly go wrong? Well on the 7th we woke to read what did go wrong. Now, Trump is no Storming Norman but he incited a mass gathering of his supporters to storm Capitol Hill! It beggars belief and I’m going to leave it there because Donald has not been helping my anger issues of late.

In addition to the anger with D.T. there is “a fraudster” claiming to work for the NHS who, on the 30th December injected a 92-year-old woman with a fake Covid-19 vaccine and charged her £160 for doing so. He then had the audacity to return on 4th January to claim another £100! I said last month how there are kind people in this world…… and then there are people like this! If the world was a star sign it would be Libra! A balance of good and bad. But it’s a load of tosh anyway, on looking up the Libra sign I read that one of the least compatible signs with Libra, is Cancer. Well its worked out well so far for Glen and me.

For the record I can report that there are two new drugs to treat Covid-19 and a third Covid-19 vaccine (Moderna) has been approved for use in the UK. So for balance, it’s just as well because the new UK variant is spreading 50-70% faster and there appears to be some new South African variant on the ‘block’…. and we’ve only just started 2021.

And breathe……. the weather this year so far has been glorious. Icy cold but bright and sunny. It has made for some lovely walks and photos of the Marsh covered in ice particles.

There was a time when I would have acted very differently if I came across this scene (below) during our travels through Asia. The other day, as I took a short cut through the churchyard on my way to collect something from Mark and Carla, I saw a lady step away from the bench where she was sat with a group of other ladies and she proceeded to take a photo. Now when I was in Asia I would have jumped in to the photo waving and smiling, but seeing as we are in the middle of a pandemic and I recognised several of them from my childhood I just asked whether they would like me to take a photo of all of them together. When I took the photo on their mobiles the sun was shining on both benches and it was a perfect shot. I then proceeded to talk for a while and by the time I asked if I could take a photo for myself to prove why I was going to be late (and for the blog) the perfect moment had passed. Anyway, during our natter I learnt that the Red House, where one of the ladies lives, was once a ‘travellers rest’ or some such phrase she used. I asked her what she meant and one of the more forward ladies said “prostitutes!” Well that was the first time we had a suggested reason why the house was named the Red House. Now whether it’s actually true I don’t know but I like the idea.

Meryl and Dennis had their Pfizer jabs on the 8th and Mum and Dad have theirs booked in for 22nd January. Karen is volunteering at the Downend surgery, helping with the vaccine appointments, and was given a jab out of the blue at the end of her shift. When I say out of the blue, I don’t mean they came at her with the needle without warning! They offered it to her as they had a dose left. So, the family are slowly becoming (50%) protected.

On 11th January, as I continue to spuddle at home in lockdown and Glen plays his guitar, Lauren and Jack juggle working from home and home-schooling Eloise and Miles, like millions of other parents around the country. We are powerless to help them out, but the BBC has stepped up and launched the biggest ever education programme in its history. I do my bit when I can, with the odd Reading with Nanny Mandy ‘FaceTime’ session. It’s as much as I can hope for right now, seeing as our country walks are now, sadly, against the rules.

22nd January, a dry cold day and only the third time in ten months that Mum and Dad have left the village. This time I drove them to Downend for their Covid vaccinations. The other two outings were to the RUH hospital in Bath. I can’t believe how well Mum and Dad have coped with being effectively locked up for nearly a year! I don’t think I could have done it. As lots of my friends confirm, a weekly outing to a supermarket is a treat, but one they have not had because Dad has had to officially shield or volunteered to shield on our advice when the government lifted it for a while. Although it wasn’t long before yet another letter arrived from the government telling him to officially shield again. In two or three weeks’ time both Glen’s and my parents will be protected more than Glen and I against the possibility of catching Covid. I’m not giving up my shopping trips though!

I need to stop talking about Covid, lockdown rules or politicians. I think Glen needs to put his guitar down and take some horse and cow photos to lighten the blog! Snow is forecast on Sunday so fingers crossed we can get our tin trays out….. I’m sure Mum still has them in her shed. Her shed (and loft) is an Aladdin’s Cave of useful items from my childhood. Last year, Mum helped make our rented house a home within an hour or two of us getting here. She had been washing rugs and mats and all sorts ready for us, before we had even thought about what we needed. Surprisingly supplying wine glasses on our arrival before we even remembered we would NEED them. What was I thinking!

Let me tell you about the pigs and the teasels. Their field was full of plants in the summer, one variety had little teasels on them and they stuck to the their skin and tail like a version of the tiny, but sharp, burrs which stuck to me in South Korea. We had been clambering up a steep hillside above the Gamcheon Culture Village. I could pull the spiky things out of my trousers of course, but these poor pigs still have them stuck to them three months later. Every time they swish their tails, presumably to get an irritating fly off, they must surely prickle themselves.

I am now thinking about the Gamcheon Culture Village which clings to the coastal mountain in Busan, earning the nickname “Machu Picchu of Busan” By now we should have visited Machu Picchu and various places in South America and be making our way back to the UK. Goodness knows if we will ever make it there now. Anyway, teasels and pigs, poor things. I’ve just Googled it up and it looks like they might be burdock plants. It seems that pigs eat burdock – they love it in fact: flowers, leaves, stalks and they also dig up the roots, so I guess they have to put up with the teasel situation.

It is very easy to keep yourself to yourself when you, and everyone around you, are wearing masks when you go shopping. Most of the time I love it and find myself chatting to myself as I go up and down the aisles, which are ‘littered’ with social distancing reminders. However, the other day, whilst in a queue I felt I wanted to make conversation with a lady in front of me. She smiled and her eyes shone, I could see from the small amount of face which wasn’t covered up that she was open and friendly. I thought about what I could say to this stranger. So I said “I have mask envy.” We laughed and started the sort of conversation which I hadn’t realised I had missed. As we are locked-down more and more and our minds are filled with Covid updates, rules, slides, charts and Trump’s lies, it was just lovely to have a natter with someone different, to forget for one minute that she could be carrying the virus, and to feel life is normal again.

We had our first snow in The Marsh on December 4th and we’ve had many days of snow since but never enough to cover the grass for long, let alone enough to make for good ‘sledging’ down the hill from St Martins Lane to Sheep Fair Lane. I remember so clearly sitting on a tin tray as a child and zipping down that steep lane and sledging down Blue Park field…. Happy carefree days. I’m hoping we also get the amount of snow that fills the lanes and levels with the stone walls and hedgerows, like it did back in my teenage years. For once I do not have to leave the village for school or work and would welcome being able to enjoy deep snow without having to make a journey up and down Tog Hill. Alas I think global warming will ensure that doesn’t happen.

However on 24th January we awoke to 3 inches of snow so we got ready quickly and we walked to Bull’s Hills and were amazed to find we were the first people to have walked down Green Lane bridle path and the virgin snow through Bull’s Hills. The early bird catches the worm as they say, and a bird had ‘caught’ and dropped a worm it seemed, and it was frozen solid, poor thing.

We had to go up George Lane and take a photo of Karen’s tree in the snow too.

You know life is different when you ring your insurance company or bank and you hear a baby or toddler crying in the background during your conversation. The staff continue to be professional but they clearly have babies or children on their lap or close by. They do so well to work from home and look after their children and their companies are good to allow them to do this. In addition they have to home school too of course. Hats off to parents across the UK who are doing this.

IN OTHER NEWS….. Could this become the new normal until we come out of this pandemic?

The Flaming Lips band staged two innovative gigs in Oklahoma this month, with both the band and their audience inside individual inflatable balls. Sounded claustrophobic to me, but maybe things like this is the only way forward for the foreseeable. Mind you, Glastonbury would be able to be seen from space like a giant piece of bubble wrap if the Eavises adopted this idea!

So, before I sign off I just want to record that I have read that China have apparently been using anal swabs to detect the coronavirus as opposed to the nose and throat type used previously. I think people here in the UK are less likely to go to a drive through test centre if they adapt that technique here! 😳