Wednesday 23rd September 2020

Actual water fell from the sky. Rain they called it.

We live in the south east, which is usually very dry. And we live on chalk downland so any rain drains away.

And we have had very little rain over the summer, our lawn is brown and we have had to water the plants we fawn over.

But the weather changed overnight, clouds rolled over, the wind increased. And rain fell.

Hard.

Which will do the garden well.

We woke up with the rain hammering down in the dark outside. Of course it rained outside, unless we had had a major roof-related problem.

But we didn't.

Anyway, Jools gets up with the alarm, feeds the cats and makes coffee. She is a blessing.

Really.

Would I go for a walk with her before work?

No, apparently.

I know I should have, but I make lame excuses and sit in the house, in warm in my underwear.

I soon get dressed and make breakfast and get the second coffees ready for when Jools returns.

Jools is luncky, she went out when it wasn't raining, and returned just before there was a heavy downpour.

We have breakfast, I set up the office and get going. THer would be no trips to the cliffs to search for butterflies.

We would eat cake. Cookies, in fact.

But not till later.

We had been planning for some time our Brexit stockpile for the beginning of January, and this was the day Jools went shopping. She got three types of flour, pasta, rice, tinned tomatoes, toilet roll, washing up liquid, washing detergent and so on. If you read by Brexit blogs you will understand why.

And yes, we felt a bit flaky engaging in panic buying, but it wasn;'t for this crisis, COVID, but for the next one. And if it doesn't happen, we will have plenty of stock to fall back on.

We have the last of the stinky cheese for lunch, with no wine. We have coffee instead.

And back to work, nose to the grindstone, and mostly it was about next week's trip to Hampshire and the Isle of Wight. Frankly, after Johnson's speech it became clear that staying in hotels for four nights, eating out and travelling on the ferry was just too risky, especially with the accelerating infection rate, which for this day was the worse day for new infections all year. I have to get approval from my old boss, and my new boss, as the task was deemed business critical, but no life is worth less than a job.

Trip was off. I then had to liaise with the factory and the certifying body, writing mails, taking phone calls, smoothing things out.

It felt better not having other people's health on my shoulders to be honest.

Jools had gone to visit Jen. Betty is ill, she is in great pain and the nurcse comes twice a day to administer morphine, and the carers come four times a day to attend to her. Betty aches all over, she shouts for Jen most of the day and night.

I put on a CD to put the new speakers through their paces. I play Shawn Colvin, one of the CDs from Left of the Dial, as I wanted to hear the version of Uncertain Smile without Jools Holland going all pianoy over it. We play the rest of the CD, its a fine mix of UK and US and Australian alternative music, rounds off with The Pogues and Billy Bragg.

Two more CDS go on: 80s electropop dancey remixes.

Wonderful.

We have pork pie salad for tea.

In an ironic kind of way.

And there was music all evening, until half eight, where I went to bed to read the new David Hepworth book. Rain fell outside in gusty winds.