April 19th: Don't start what you can't finish...and virtual quizzes

This isn't quite the way I'd intended to spend my first spring in retirement. I was looking forward to getting out and about, and we've already lost a planned holiday and short break - but on the flip side, it could have been much worse - I'm still healthy (relatively). On the plus side, being both retired and confined to barracks means that many of the things that I'd normally file under "Oh, I'll get round to it sometime" start leering at you from every corner.

I'm already seriously procrastinating over a shedload of decorating that needs doing. But it's the small things that distract you. Yesterday the oven needed cleaning. We have one of those relatively fancy ovens that actually tells you that it needs cleaning, and a setting that's supposed to clean it. But it only cleans the back and sides. The racks and bottom have to be done manually. So I donned my marigolds and got cleaning. In my defence, I did them about a month ago so they weren't too bad but they still needed doing. And then that moment when putting them back in, I noticed the oven light. That was seriously manky. So having touched it once and got my fingers burnt (#idiot) I've now set myself a reminder to look at it once the oven's cold. Oh and there's another combo-oven next to it, so that one will have to be looked at too. And whilst I was down there looking at the oven, I noticed how dusty the bottom of the adjacent cupboards had become. My point here is, if you look long enough, there's always something that needs doing. And that leads to something else, and so on ad infinitum. In a similar vein I bleached the kitchen sink this morning. Having done that and obtained some sparkly results, it reminded me that we have several other sinks.....Oh, and the kettle by the sink needed descaling...you get my drift. The morale of the story is, I think, don't look in the first place.

Lockdown makes you yearn for many 'normal' things. My daughter has been longing for a McDonalds egg McMuffin. Strange, because she doesn't normally eat them. And she's not keen on the egg bit. Anyway, Mrs H's shopping trip yesterday resulted in all the relevant ingredients being bought, and this morning I rustled up said breakfast 'sandwich'. To be fair, it wasn't difficult. Sausage patty, what I used too call "plastic cheese", a nice egg and an English muffin, lightly toasted. The result was a well received thumbs up.

Who needs McDonalds

One of the things we've been doing as a family is the "Virtual Pub Quiz" run by a chap called Jay. I don't know how many people are watching this now, but the most recent one has been streamed almost half a million times! There are many people doing this sort of thing, but we've stuck with this one over the last four weeks and generally sit down to do it on a Saturday evening. So far the victory count is level 2-2 between my and my son 2. The best score any of us has got was this week when my son got 43/50. My wife was second with a highly respectable 35, I got 30 and my daughter 23. This quiz is pretty good - 5 rounds of 10 questions, with a break after 30 when the answers for the first three rounds are revealed. Jay has refined the quiz week on week, but we watch it after it's streamed to cut out all the pre-amble and mid-quiz break. The questions are a decent selection of history, sport and leisure, TV/Film, music and general knowledge. It's the TV/Film and music that normally lets me down.

The Government are getting an increasingly rough ride over their handling of the coronavirus pandemic. They are certainly not without fault. I don't necessarily respect them, but equally I don't envy them. Platitudes and spin don't make up for failings, and you just wish someone would say occasionally say "sorry, yes we got that wrong" or answer the question asked and not go off down another alley. It's the scientists that impress me though, with their measured and calm reflections. Chris Whitty, the Chief Medical Office I've mentioned before, and another one who's putting a very calm and measured messages on social media particularly is oncologist Professor Karol Sikora (@ProfKarolSikora on Twitter). Amidst all the accusations, blathering and headlines today, his latest tweet (as I write) sums  it up for me. Maybe the politicians could learn a thing or two from him.

Mistakes have been made - we haven't got testing, PPE, the exit strategy or treating other serious illnesses 100% right.

No country's response has been flawless.

So let's move forward together, learn from it and get it sorted as soon as possible.

The cat chalked up another kill yesterday evening. Same species. I suppose living next to a large tangled hedgerow doesn't help. That's three in two days.

Until tomorrow....

#isolationlife
#stayhomesavelives