Lockdown Diary - Saturday 25th July 2020

I was up, showered and dressed when the first carer arrived.  She brought my attention to there being a lot of blood in my wife's leg bag and night bag.  This has happened once before and it just disappeared as soon as it came.  We agreed I'd call out the out of hours service, if it hadn't cleared on my return from shopping, though after putting the night bag aside, things started running clear almost immediately.

Normal life is returning, post-operation (though not in a pandemic sense), and so it was that son #2 and I headed out food shopping for the first time since the 20th June. We got there early, masked up, went straight in without queuing and got the shopping done.  After we'd taken that back to the car we then paid a visit to the wonderful Bertie's Breadstall in the market, which not only has great bread but also cakes and almond croissants that, whilst probably aren't to die for (there is nothing that would be worth that exchange, so far), they are bloody amazing. The girls there were asking me how I was doing and pleased to see me again after 5 weeks away. My eyes were also drawn to some dairy cream-filled apple turnovers, which I used to love, but can no longer eat because I've become Lactose intolerant, amongst other things.  I may just have to buy one next week and dose myself up on a shit-ton of Lactase tablets before eating it. Life's too short to live in denial. Not to mention the crocodiles.

Shortly after returning from shopping the carers arrived for the morning call and, as my wife's catheter had returned to normal, we agreed not to call the out of hours service, though I will contact the community matron on Monday, just to see if she thinks it's worth checking anything out.  There are no signs of infection or anything else untoward, so it's the most sensible thing to do, unless things change for the worse.

The excitement of shopping over, it was time to take the thrill-seeking down a notch or two.  Breakfast first. Coffee and porridge with blueberries, pomegranate and raspberries. 

The weather is rather rubbish today, rain, then more rain, interspersed with some heavy rain, which does have one benefit: I ain't doing washing today. Hopefully tomorrow will be better, and certainly not wetter.

Read the Guardian and Times sections that I wanted to and not much else, save a bit of the latest issue of Private Eye.

Lunch with the boys was accompanied by another episode of 'South Park'.

As well as being film night, Saturday night is often curry night, and so it was tonight. Rice courtesy of me and the rest courtesy of son #3. Turns out it's my turn to choose the film, and out of three candidates, I went for 'The Lighthouse'.

'The Lighthouse' is a film that gradually allows the characters (for most of the film there are only two people in it) and their relationship to develop.  You get a real sense of the hardship of being a lighthouse keeper in those days, as well as the isolation. As a storm approaches, then engulfs the lighthouse, things turn up a notch or three.  I'll not say more and spoil it, but it's a film I'd thoroughly recommend and will watch again at some point.

Perhaps inspired in part by tonight's film, I've ventured into the world of the wonderful record label Ghost Box. One of their main acts is The Advisory Circle and from their 2011 album, 'As The Crow Flies', here's the title track.

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