Being in lockdown and not working means a lot of spuddling goes on.
In fact even my friends who are still working, albeit part-time, also find time to spuddle. I have mentioned the word spuddle in a previous blog, when Karen sent me ‘spuddle’ as Susie Dent’s word of the day. This time Karen was spuddling on Twitter and shared a fact she had come across.
Oh hold on, I just want to apologise in advance to our American friends before I continue, (I needed to do that a few blogs back actually, what with my Trump comments) anyway here goes with Karen’s fact that she found on Twitter…..
Sorry, but this just about sums America up! Owning six guns ‘fire arms’ are fine but six sex toys!? Oh no, whatever next! 🙄
As you might realise I’m desperately trying to avoid everything Covid-19! It’s very difficult though, seeing as on the second day of February we learnt that Captain Sir Tom Moore had died having been treated for pneumonia for some time and testing positive for Covid-19 last week. RIP Sir Tom.
On 3rd February Boris hailed the milestone reached by the UK of vaccinating 10 million people – and thanked health workers and vaccination staff (a big thank you to people like Karen who are volunteering to herd people through the vaccine centre in Downend, and the like, in the most safe and effective way.)
Trump’s supporters got in to the Capital building easier than I got in to Southmead hospital when I took Dad for his annual cancer check up on the 9th! In fact I didn’t get in! Mum got in but got told off once she got to the desk in the department where Dad had his appointment. They both said how different it was than before Covid. Dad has been shielding and Mum hasn’t been to a shop since the beginning of last March last year. Hospitals, as everywhere, have changed a lot in the last 12 months.
Tributes have been paid on social media in China commemorating Doctor Li Wenliang (who raised the alarm about the country’s coronavirus outbreak). He was an eye doctor at the hospital in Wuhan where the first case was detected at the end of 2019. We are now one year on after he died, having contracted Covid-19 while treating patients. Dr Li had tried to warn fellow medics of a disease that looked like Sars, but he was told by police to “stop making false comments” and was investigated for “spreading rumours”.
As hospitals filled up in Wuhan, the government was accused of downplaying the severity of the virus and concealing the extent of its spread. Only when anger reached fever pitch was Dr Li exonerated and honoured as a hero by the Chinese government.
Since then, more than 105 million people have been infected with coronavirus and 2.3 million have died with Covid-19 worldwide.
As if we didn’t have enough drama causing anxiety in the news already, the announcement on 12th February of the newly emerging ‘Bristol variant’ that contains the E484K mutation also found in the South African and Brazilian variants meant that Bristol City and South Gloucester carried out surge testing across 24 postcodes in the city and parts of South Gloucestershire. Who the heck came up with the name of this initiative…. Operation Eagle! It’s not an undercover operation, on the contrary 🙄 I’m, not belittling it, the coronavirus variant found in Bristol may be able to infect people who have already had Covid-19 or who have been vaccinated. It’s potentially serious but…
Covid-19 is beginning to feel more like ‘COVID-21 and the variants’, which sounds like a Rock band from the 70’s. It also feels that long since bands could actually play live!
Because of lockdown and the bitterly cold weather we’ve not seen Meryl and Dennis face to face on the doorstep, so thank goodness for video chat.
I have seen Lauren and her pod but only on their doorstep when I have delivered bits of shopping and the children’s books most weeks as they live near the shops I go to.
Sadly Covid restrictions and rules have meant that we have not been able to go on any walks with Lauren, Jack and the grandchildren in 2021 so far. However we’ve had a letter from Miles, with the help of Eloise. It was actually addressed to Peter Rabbit at our address. We then had to try to find Peter in and around the Marshfield countryside.
Glen and I set out to indulge in our gorgeous little grandson’s expectations of receiving a letter from his current favourite furry fictional character. We videoed ourselves talking to animals asking if they had seen Peter Rabbit and sent them to Miles.
We also left the letter in various places and went back to see if it had been taken, but each time we did it was still there so we went around and talked to more animals to ask them if they had seen him. Each time we sent the photos to Miles.
And then one day we left the letter by this hole in the hedgerow and Peter Rabbit must have been there because when we came back along the road the letter had gone! Miles was delighted when we told him that when we walked that way another day we noticed a letter that Peter Rabbit had written to him!
‘Peter’ made the mistake of saying in his reply that he would be visiting Miles (and Eloise) soon…… probably not the best thing to tell an impatient four year old 🙈. It was so magical when I handed the letter to Miles, he was so excited, it was a joy to see. We assumed Peter made the paper out of crushed brown leaves.
Later in the month, a simple one line message from Karen wishing us a “Happy Pancake Day” set my mind going just like it did when we were sat on long train journeys during our travels.
What was originally a ‘using up of ingredients in the pantry before Lent’ has turned in to a commercial opportunity for Jif lemon juice in plastic lemon shaped containers and bags of pre-mixed pancake ingredients on shelves in the supermarkets.
Most people get sucked in to it. I’m not a lover of pancakes so it’s easy for me to stand back and judge. But don’t get me wrong, if there was some sort of religious reason to use up oil and potatoes each year I would be all over a big plate of chips with salt and vinegar on them, believe you me.
But as for pancakes, I’m not a fan myself and Glen wasn’t bothered to have one this year. (He was the pancake maker when the girls were growing up). Maybe we can have a paratha instead as I’ve got falafel salad for lunch. Although a paratha is more Islamic or Hindu than Christian 🤔🙄 I’m over thinking it! …again 😂
When we came back from travelling in 2014 we flung ourselves whole heartedly (well artily) into the tradition at Lauren and Jack’s. Again, this is what happens when you’ve got too much time on your hands. 😋
Pancake Day, or Shrove Tuesday, is the traditional feast day before the start of Lent on Ash Wednesday. Lent – the 40 days leading up to Easter – was traditionally a time of fasting and on Shrove Tuesday, Anglo-Saxon Christians went to confession and were “shriven” (absolved from their sins). I’m not sure I’m ready to be absolved of my sins, best get shriven later on in life when I’ve done a bit more sinning.
Mild, sunny February days saw Glen, Karen and me walking the full length of Bulls Hills to Cold Ashton. The farmers seem to have the fields full of sheep and most of the cattle in sheds on the farms. This gave me the confidence to enjoy Bulls Hills like I haven’t done since I was a child.
We asked Trevor and Wendy Hope, committee members of the Marshfield History Society and childhood friends of mine, whether they had any photos of the Old Mill in use back in the day. Initially they replied saying that they didn’t. However, they are such stars because within a short time they had found photos in Trevor’s Mum’s old photo/scrap book. These amazing pictures below show Trevor and his sister Thelma back in 1963, standing at the bottom of the waterfall which controlled the flow of water to the Mill Wheel – both of which are long gone. Thank you so much, for not only taking the trouble to send these to me, but also to Trevor and Thema for allowing us to share them on our blog.
On another sunny cold day Glen and I then walked through Bulls Hills to St Catherines reservoir and back up along Beeks Lane back to the village. It’s the first time I’ve ever done that walk, or if I have I don’t remember. It was lovely, again because there was only one field of cows, and they didn’t even look at me let alone chase me.
When I think of Bulls Hills I think of how, as children, we found fossils on the slops of what was the riverbed thousands (?) of years ago. You can still see the ‘ripples’ on the slops today. I always assumed they were the ripples from the water that filled the valleys in Bulls Hills, however, I have recently read that In geomorphology, a terracette is a type of landform, a ridge on a hillside formed when saturated soil particles expand, then contract as they dry, causing them to move slowly downhill. I prefer to think of them as the lasting evidence that it was once a riverbed though. 😊
On one of our shorter, regular walks we noticed that the Kunekune pigs, Spearmint, Peppermint and Apple Mint seem to be in need of a hair cut as badly as I am. Roll on 12th April.
Before I sign off, I just want to say that I have not forgotten to talk about the Mars landing, which was a monumental achievement that seems to have gone almost unnoticed in the media amongst the more important things going on in the world like Harry and Meghan’s ‘giving up’ official Royal duties, and the not quite look-a-likey imposter posing as Sir David Attenborough. Is it me or did he look strange on the video when he was appealing to world leaders about Climate Change? …Climate Change which is of course very important too, because if we do not heed Dave’s warning we will all need to relocate to the cooler climate and covid free planet of Mars in the near future!
Footnote:
I’m no way belittling Harry and Meghan in my facetious comment above. Nor do I mean to be disrespectful to the legend that is Sir David Attenborough. I hope it also goes without saying that I am totally against racism and that I am aware of and totally supportive when it comes to mental health issues.
The Peter Rabbit letters idea was charming. Well done for going to all that trouble. And your pictures are as always very impressive.
Looking forward to hearing more from Covid-21 and The Variants.
One certainly gets one’s money’s worth out of your blog posts in terms of diversity. The Texan dildo law was quite a surprise. Purely for research purposes, I had to ‘Google it up’ and apparently it is listed under Texan prostitution laws: they reckon that if you have 6, you must be a hooker. I wonder if size is a consideration? I mean, would three large ones count as six small ones? And do you need to have them in different colours to avoid racial discrimination nowadays?
You are funny! 😂
You really should have put your name to this, but I understand… and we know who you are so that’s all that matters.
I wonder who it was?