Staying Home Part 2: Day 19

Today got off to a great start with the news that the Oxford University / AstraZeneca Covid vaccine has been successful in Phase 3 trials - at least 70% effective and up to 90% depending on how it is administered. Although the effectiveness may be a bit less than the Pfizer and Moderna vaccines already announced, the most important thing is that the Oxford vaccine is cheap to produce and easy to handle, stable at much higher temperatures than the other two. It means it is affordable (£3 a dose) and practical for widespread distribution in even the poorest countries. This one is truly a vaccine for the world, not just for rich western countries. I know it will be a while before the corner is turned, but there is now real hope that the end of this pandemic is in sight. 

A much more minor good thing was that I managed to order matching Christmas presents for H and her BF - at the weekend there was only one in stock, but I looked again this morning and it had miraculously gone up to two. I grabbed them while I could!  After the cheering start to the day I suffered a minor disappointment when I went to take TG to school. There had been a frost last night and instead of going out to a nice pre-warmed, defrosted car it was cold and I had to scrape ice off it. On Friday I had carefully set the climate control timer for school days, so something had clearly gone wrong. When I got home I checked the settings to see if I could find the problem and realised I had set the timer for 8.20pm instead of 8.20am. Oops! All sorted now, I hope. 

My archive time this morning went quickly, with a staff "Teams" meeting, sourcing photographs for social media, writing a couple of emails, and doing research for a short article on a 19th century court case. I had a very productive lunch break, fitting in a half hour walk, mixing up batter for toad in the hole tonight, and managing to reattach the kitchen cupboard door that fell off a few weeks ago. If you ever need to try to fix a cupboard door where the holes have got too big for the screws, the answer (thank you Google!) is to glue a few cocktail sticks into the hole with wood glue (not too many); then cut off the ends of the sticks once the glue is dry, leaving a much smaller hole which will allow the screws to grip again.  

In the afternoon I worked on the latest batch of questions, then spent a bit of time on a cross-stitch picture of a badger I am making for a friend for Christmas. It feels as though it has been a very productive day. H cooked the toad-in-the-hole for dinner with veggie sausages in the batter, mashed sweet potatoes and sautéed cabbage. 

I didn't take any photos today, so I am posting some more from our walk in town yesterday. Unfortunately the sun was low and in the wrong direction, so the lighting isn't great.

One last thing to record - I woke during the night and realised an owl was hooting nearby. In fact, I think there were two, "talking" to each other. Oddly I don't ever recall hearing one from here before - I have no idea if that is just because I am unobservant (especially when half-asleep!) or whether they are moving into more built-up areas.