Lockdown Diary - Wednesday 16th December 2020

Usual early morning yoga breathing session with 12-rounds of 'sun salutation/Surya Namaskar' in preparation for the winter solstice: the plan is to do 108-rounds this Saturday morning at 7:30, but sadly this year I'll not be able to make it. Shame it's not on the Sunday.

I need to make a quick trip to the shops so I can get back in time for a work call at 11:30 a.m.  The trip is required to find cards for my mother-in-law; to post the second tranche of Christmas cards; to pick up some refuse sacks from the library; and to buy some presents for my wife's carers.  Over time her carers become part of the family: they spend so much time here and get so involved in day-to-day life that it's hardly surprising.  

Shopping takes longer than planned - there's a queue for the card shop (and an even bigger queue inside to pay), a queue for the supermarket and a queue for coffee.  Luckily, I get home with about 7 minutes to spare! Sounds good, but I still need to set up my laptop and connect to the VPN etc.

The work call lasts a bit less than an hour, then back to freedom.  As son #2 has work calls over lunch time, we all eat lunch separately and don't watch anything together. 

Time to write cards to my mother-in-law and wrap some presents - primarily something for our cleaner who'll come tomorrow probably for the last time before Christmas, but also a present for one of my sons that arrived today and is too large to hide.  Mind you I'm sure he knows what I've got him, but we can try and maintain the illusion.

I have another meditation session with the NHS at 6, for an hour, and just finish the Christmas-related fun (apart from finishing a letter that needs to go in with a present) in time to set up the room and laptop for the Teams session. 

Next stop, dinner and the final episode of 'The Haunting of Hill House'. For me, the darker nights of autumn and winter are the perfect time for ghost / supernatural stories, with two peaks for best enjoyment - Halloween and, for me most especially Christmas Eve.  I notice that BBC 2 have revived the tradition of ghost stories on Christmas Eve, culminating with the film 'Ghost Stories', based on the excellent stage play of the same name, at quarter past midnight. Disappointingly, everything being shown is a repeat.

Sticking with the supernatural theme, something very new from Gazelle Twin & Nyx from an album that won't be released until March next year, but sounds like it will be well worth listening to. This is 'Fire Leap' - if it sounds vaguely familiar, it appears on the soundtrack to the film 'The Wicker Man' (original) 


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