Lockdown Diary - Saturday 23rd January 2021

Shopping's done for another week, so I can return to our 'fortress' (or should that be prison?) until I have to go out again, walking aside.

I was chatting with one of our carers yesterday, as the weekend was looming, and we agreed that though we'd both spent the week looking forward to Friday (her especially as it's her weekend off), when Friday arrived we both were thinking that actually weekends don't offer that much at the moment, other than a break from work. Every Friday I think, 'Hooray! the weekend' and then I'm overtaken by sense of anti-climax as I realise it primarily means shopping, washing, and other chores with the high spot being film night today and any other fleeting pleasures I may manage to pluck from the ether.

Washing under way, it's time to read some of today's papers before hanging that 'out' to dry and starting the next load.

Lunch time arrives and son #3 and I make it after I've washed up a few left over items that the dishwasher doesn't like (he's only friendly with some of the kitchen items!)

Son #3 and I eat lunch together: he choses to watch a cartoon series on Netflix called 'Disenchanted' which is written by Matt Groening of 'The Simpsons' fame. It's interesting, quite psychedelic visually at times, and it's good to see what things my sons enjoy watching, though I don't think there's space in my life for it, despite being intriguingly odd.

In the afternoon I have a long-ish phone call with my younger sister, a continuation of a call that started on Thursday evening. She is having a tough time of things at the moment and I'm trying to point out a path forwards, which seems ironic in itself, but that is a whole different story. It is just good to talk at times.

After the call I take my own advice and immerse myself in something distracting, despite it being incredibly silly and laughable, plot-wise: the something being an episode of 'Randall & Hopkirk (Deceased)' called 'Never Trust A Ghost'.  I'm recalling that way back when my wife and I used to watch things like this together when we had an indulgent Sunday, pre-kids.

Saturday night is of course film night, as it has been since time immemorial (certainly since lockdown, which is more or less the same thing), and it's my choice tonight.  Rather than resort to a favourite I feel it's worth introducing the boys to, I choose something that's been lying around for a year or more, it being 'A Field In England'.

That was some film!  I expected it to be be a little strange as it's been described as a 'strikingly original historical thriller spiced with occult mysticism and mind-warping hallucinations' and I certainly wasn't disappointed.  Though it was made in 2013, it is shot entirely in black and white, and is notable for the way sound and vision are used to create disorienting effects.  Mushrooms feature heavily in the tale!  I have managed to keep up my record of choosing weird films for the boys. Long may this continue.

Après moi, le déluge

Hellfire and damnation! I keep on discovering more great music I missed in 2020. Becca Mancari, I love your voice!  I cannot get this out of my head at the moment - everything about it is perfection: 'Bad Feeling' from her album 'The Greatest Part' 


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