Staying Home: Day 42

Whew! Six weeks already. On the one hand it doesn't seem that long, but then it seems an age since "normal". I remember the last weekend before we started to move into shut down mode felt surreal. We went out for a family meal at a Turkish restaurant to celebrate M and R's birthdays (both in March) knowing it was likely to be the last time eating out together would be possible for some time. The restaurant was busy, everything felt normal, yet everyone knew that it wasn't. I can't help thinking that it reflected how people must have felt before the outbreak of both the world wars - living their lives and having fun, while trying to ignore the knowledge that life as they knew it was about to end, and underneath fear and uncertainty about what was to come.

M has a cold. Nothing that looks like covid symptoms, just sneezing and stuffed up, but we have no idea how he could have caught it as we are being very careful, only going out for a daily walk, socially distancing and wiping down things that come into the house. Although the pollen count has been high he doesn't think it is likely to be allergies, as he has never suffered from them before. My post-viral thing seems to be fighting back again too, though I'm still a lot better than I was. Much more tired today though and my throat is a bit sore. I may have overdone it yesterday with the longer walk - so hard to know how far I can push myself.

TG has enjoyed her school work today as she was given tasks for her GCSE options subjects. For photography she has to take a series of still life picture in each of the colours of the rainbow. She did red and orange today and would happily have worked through all seven, but felt she ought to spread it out as the deadline is not until next Monday. For catering she has to cook anything she wants, but see how beautifully she can present it. So far her school work since the shutdown has all been reading, writing and computer based, so having some hands on tasks is a nice change. In the afternoon she had a dance class.

H is still ploughing on with her uni work and has baked more pret-style chocolate and almond cookies, though she accidentally added peanut butter instead of almond butter. Still excellent though! She was tired and decided she couldn't summon up the energy to exercise. We watched the recent, live version of Cinderella and then an episode of The Chase (quiz show), and the girls finished the jigsaw while I did cross stitch. Dinner was haddock coated in seasoned flour and shallow fried, sweet potato fries, courgette and peas.