Lockdown easing, pubs opening, we can go on holiday at home and abroad, is some sort of normality returning or are we going to have another spike? It remains to be seen!
Fri 3rd July - last night Michelle Donelan our MP put on Facebook that she was going to have an online surgery for key workers. Obviously I wasn't going to be allowed to attend but I used the opportunity to highlight to her that I had sent 4 emails to her without the courtesy of one reply! A couple of others also joined in then with similar experiences.
Friday again, looking forward to my Stealth Brew Co delivery later to enjoy a few pints over the weekend, I have tried to cut down to not drink during the week as in the early days of lockdown it was too easy to have a few in the afternoon sat in the garden in the nice weather!
I was just about to write my moan that we hadn't received our refund from Virgin Atlantic, I checked my credit card online and lo and behold it was there this morning!! It only took 4 months to get it back but at least we now have it!
Had our usual Friday ‘ploughmans’, Grunters did her usual rush back for lunch, think she could give Usain Bolt a run for his money as soon as the clock strikes 1pm!
Had instructions to sort out my shoes that were supposedly ‘all over the place’. I just rammed as many as I could in the shoe cupboard and quickly tidied around the rest, hopefully that will keep her happy for 5 minutes! Also had instructions to clean the mirrors in the hall and dining room, I was moaned at for the initial smears so had to revisit with a bit of kitchen roll to clean to a sparkle.
Russ popped round for a couple of cups of tea and a chat in the afternoon.
Beer delivery from Dan, 10ltrs of Doublecrosser v3, 5ltrs of Key lime spy & 5ltrs of Locked In. Watched Oxford v Pompey then Fleetwood v Wycombe while having a few beers.
Sat 4th July - had Josh’s spicy twist on a sausage muffin with egg for breakfast, very nice I must say! A dull looking day ahead, at least it's not supposed to rain!
Nigel Farage is the target of my latest rant, apart from being a complete knob, he has today put a picture of himself on social media sat in the pub boasting that he was the first customer in at 12. The only problem being that 14 days ago he was in the States being a Trump puppet, and anybody returning from the States has to quarantine for 14 days on return. Apparently the earliest he could have got back was 13 days ago! Knowing him though he probably knew what he was doing and just wanted to stir thing up and get himself more free publicity. The only way he can gain any interest whatsoever is by being controversial!
Josh has found that Iceland do quite large bags of cheese savouries for £1 a bag. This is much to Grunters delight. She had the grace of Rod Stewart picking balls from a bag in the FA Cup draw.
We had ‘russian roulette’ dinner, it was a very nice turkey meatball recipe with Grunters homemade focaccia bread. All tasted great however unfortunately Grunters mislaid the band tying up her hair, it was a toss up whether it would reappear in the bread or meatballs! Fortunately nobody came across it!
I had the fortune of catching Grunters photographing half a pint of beer on the garden table, but not an empty can in sight this time. Obviously I had to take a few pictures of this spectacle and just happened to post one on Twitter. Luckily this was quickly spotted by Nath and Matti who joined in with appropriate comments of encouragement. At this time I was facing threats of death or castration from Grunters trying to force me to remove the photo. She had then co-opted her sidekick, Anna, and in a 2 pronged attack they made me remove it. Luckily Matti had copied it and was able to post a replacement. Funnily enough just before I took the photo we were talking about wedding photography and Grunters said that she wouldn't want ‘posed’ photos and would like ‘natural’ photos of people acting normally. Well her idea of natural is to do your hair and makeup, put on your best clothes then act ‘naturally’. I just thought that it was a pleasant, natural, non posed relaxed weekend photo!
Sun 5th July - starting off a bit more sunny but very windy. Preparing for Saints v Man City later, Josh has donned his lucky shirt already but I think we will need a bit of divine intervention to win this one! Looks like we have got football on much of the day, a perfect Sunday!
Grunters elastic hair band has reappeared, Josh found it on the floor in the kitchen even though it had been searched yesterday. I did tell Grunters that I had found it in between my teeth yesterday and threw it on the floor this morning as I didn't want to hurt her feelings that it had landed in the dinner!
Watched a couple of games in the Shed before the mighty Saints. We had dinner between games that Josh and Sophie had prepared earlier of pork belly and chorizo stew. My lack of optimism was unfounded with a great first goal of the season from Che Adams and a mighty defensive display to keep City out and win 1-0. It was almighty tense watching the rest of the game after we scored!
Grunters decided to take more pictures of empty cans, this time in my olive tree, unfortunately Josh confiscated my phone so I couldn't record this strange event, I did try to get hold of Anna’s phone but Josh confiscated that as well! I was only trying to take yet another ‘natural’ picture!
Mon 6th July - loads of assigned jobs lined up this week. First of all is for me and Josh to tidy out the mess that is his side of the garage. It contains mostly his work marketing material which has been just thrown in there in a haphazard manner. Did a good job over a couple of hours, we now have 2 full wheelie bins full of recycling, cardboard, plastic etc. Much more room to manoeuvre now!
After lunch I decided to cut the grass, it has been growing like mad this last couple of weeks as we have a spell of rain followed by sunshine, bring on constant sun and totally dry grass.
Jerk chicken kebabs, rice and peas and a mango salad for dinner, very fresh and healthy.
My mother has had a leak in the lead around her chimney and it also needs repointing, I arranged for Wayne, the builder who did a lot of my work in Owermoigne to start on it in April but obviously we had to cancel because of the virus. We rearranged for him to start again today after my mother had been going on about it. He text me last night to say that he was ill and couldn't start, he said today at he thinks it's bad hayfever but I told him he’d better self isolate as symptoms are similar and also try to get a test done, especially as my mother is shielding. So that means my mother is going to constantly go on about it again every time I ring her! Joy of joys!
Oh what joy it was to see Pompey lose on penalties after extra time to Oxford and leave them languishing in Div 1, hopefully it will keep those Skates quiet for a while, especially sweet after our win yesterday!
Tues 7th July - we had planned to re-felt the small Shed roof tomorrow but the weather has changed, it is now supposed to rain tomorrow so we will have a go at it today. It is Sophie’s Dad’s birthday tomorrow and Josh kindly suggested that I might want to make him a cake! So I end up making 2 lemon drizzle cakes this morning, one for his birthday and one for us.
Shed successfully re-felted, that's 3 done now, including the one on Owermoigne last week.
I had a response from Michelle Donelan, unfortunately it was just a ‘standard’ response to my query about why she had voted against NHS weekly testing, she has still not responded to my original email of 23rd May regarding Dominic Cummings, I replied reminding her of this for now the 5th attempt. Also her ‘standard’ response just accused Labour of raising this motion as a political stunt, hence their vote against. I have replied to her that the latest figures suggest that only 22% of those tested positive had reported symptoms at the time of their test, with health and social care workers being more likely to test positive. Surely this demonstrates the need for all NHS and care workers to be testers weekly. I used my 91 year old mother as an example, she has been shielding to the best of her ability but has a nurse call in to do her warfarin test. That nurse could have the virus without her knowledge and be the one to pass it on to my mother at the potential cost of her life. Weekly testing would obviously cut down the likelihood of this happening and should this happen to hundreds or thousands more then Michelle Donelan and her colleagues would have it on their conscience just because they wish to play political games.
Following this I had another reply but not addressing my point raised about NHS testing. No, she said that she always replies to her emails but has been delayed if late due to volumes and dealing with more urgent replies to those shielding! She said that if I was referring to my email regarding Dominic Cummings of 23rd May apparently she had replied on 3rd June and that I should check my junk mail and if not received to contact her to request another copy. I had recently been through my outstanding junk and it wasn't in there and it wasn't in my inbox. I therefore confirmed this with her and requested a copy. Also if she had replied on 3rd June why didn't she respond to tell me this when I sent her reminders on 11th June and 26th June???
Wed 8th July - Just a few little jobs today, mainly to prepare things to take down to Owermoigne at the weekend. I took the tv off the conservatory wall, we never use it and it's better and more modern than the one in the spare room down there. Also I have written out a COVID risk assessment to email to guests coming to stay plus printed off some to leave down there.
Kier Starmer had a go at Boris during PM questions about their latest ludicrous decision to start charging NHS workers to park again. Boris obviously refused to back down but how can he clap them, heap them with praise for saving his life then turn his back on them by making them pay for parking to go to work to save lives! There are petitions going around and hopefully these will result in yet another Tory U-turn.
Thurs 9th July - drizzly overcast day, not a lot going on but sorted out some stuff to take down to Dorset tomorrow. The mighty Saints are on TV later against Everton, can we make it 3 wins in a row?
Still not received the copy of my Dominic Cummings reply from Michelle Donelan which she said that she originally sent 3rd June and also no response to my reply to her following her standard NHS testing letter.
Hung on before posting my blog to see what the football result was, we were all over them in the first half and JWP missed a penalty but then Danny Ings scored yet another. A bit of a lapse in concentration let Everton back in just before half time. The second half was more even and to be honest I would have taken a draw before the game but overall I think we were the better team.
Had a good chilli pasta bake then watched Villa v Man Utd, there was no way that the Utd first goal should have been a penalty, if anything it was a foul against Villa and a potential sending off. How VAR could concur with that decision I do not know! However I agree with Roy Keane’s assessment at half time when he said that he had no sympathy for Villa, they did themselves no favours. I even gave up watching the game in the Shed 20 minutes before the end of the game to finish off this blog!
Well next week should be a bit different as I’m on holiday in Dorset, it may be the last blog next week, we will see!
No comments:
Post a Comment