Lockdown Diary - Friday 31st July 2020

Too many early starts this week, considering I'm on holiday, so decided to lie in until 7 a.m. today - maniac!!

Got up and dressed in a reasonably leisurely fashion after the first carer call of the day, so by around 9 I had breakfast made and I was in my office eating it.  One advantage of this is that everyone else could get up and use the facilities with me out of the way.

Yesterday was so hectic at times I am planning to take today really easy. I was going to cut the grass, but it's way too hot.  I'll do that tomorrow, same with the washing apart from the things I had to do today for my wife. Unfortunately the antibiotics she's on have a rather devastating effect and so there'll probably be washing every day until the course is over.

My objectives for the day are to read a chunk of 'Machines Like Us', read a bit more of 'Ulysses', sit down and do a bit of life planning, re-watch last night's 'Good Omens' and listen to some music. Anything else is a bonus.

My younger sister called today, as a catch up after her birthday yesterday.  She has the next couple of weeks off and we are planning to meet up at some point, all being well. Her son got her a really unusual present, a custom birthday video message from actor Mark Heap, in character as Jim Bell the neighbour from hell in the series 'Friday Night Dinner'.  

I managed to find time to read 'Machines Like Me' and watch episode 3 of 'Good Omens' (again), but no time for 'Ulysses'.

Today was the last day of son #1's girlfriend's visit.  I think she had a good time, in spite of the chaos of Thursday.  In the early evening I took her and son #1 into town for a wander before she headed back home on the train.

Over dinner we watched the next episode of 'Good Omens', though again I missed the end of it.  I have been so tired this week, not helped by not sleeping well, being plagued by strange dreams and heat.

I'm not a big fan of nostalgia: it's too easy to see the past through rose-tinted glasses and is often a regressive viewpoint that things were somehow better in the past, often for people can't handle change. In saying that, I'm also conscious that the future for mankind looks the bleakest it's been in my lifetime. All this being a preamble to Lynyrd Skynyrd, believe it or not. There's one, maybe two, really well-known songs by them (you know which they are!!!) that I really can't listen to anymore, mainly because of the old 'familiarity breeds contempt' angle - in the same way I can't really listen to much by the Beatles for the same reason. Nevertheless, I still have time for this - 'Saturday Night Special', an anti-gun song - from the album 'Nuthin' Fancy' 


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