First up today, a shout out to an old friend Andy Pearce. I've known Andy for donkey's years firstly through playing cricket together way back in the late 80's/early 90's and more recently as we (along with our sons) sat together as Cardiff City supporters for many years. Andy also blogs occasionally and is a far better writer, and much more eloquent than I am. His blog is Better Out Than In, and he's also taking the opportunity of #isolationlife to pen his thoughts. Pop over and visit his blog.
It's been another quiet day here in Barry (as you'd expect). My wife's had a day off seeing her mum as it's her brother's turn on the rota today. Tomorrow her mum turns 94, and it's going to be a huge shame that we can't all pop over to see her and celebrate that milestone with her.
Otherwise it's the normal routine. Pottering around the house doing odd jobs, and various personal, cricket and family admin tasks. My wife and I have been out for a walk - it was lovely and warm earlier when we went, but has gone very chilly now, so we had the best of the day for our daily ambulatory allowance. One of the positives about getting out for a walk is that you see far more of your locality than you might otherwise, a point I've mentioned before. Today we went on a route we've never done in 15 years of living here. Only a couple of miles circular walk, but I saw green spaces, views and road names that I'd never have seen before today.
In the wider, but narrowly focused world, I've started to notice a subtle shift in some social media and more broadcast news. It seems to me that after a couple of weeks of general goodwill (not everyone but most), and acceptance that whatever your political leanings, the those in charge have a tough, almost impossible job on their hands, people are starting to snark, moan, blame a bit more. And to make matters worse, some of the social media posts where people are feeding and re-posting/tweeting some of the conspiracy theories around all this is patently absurd. There's also a huge amount of misinformation out there. Maybe we're all getting a bit stir crazy, but folks, we're going to have to live with this for a lot longer yet, so chill out, check facts before jumping to conclusions, and accept that this is such a hugely unprecedented situation, no-one is going to get things right all the time. Andrew Neil, BBC presenter responded to a snarky comment on Twitter today suggesting "the" commentators were
"...all determined to bring about the collapse of this government"
with what I thought was a pretty measured response;
"You are howling into the dark and into the wind. And not adding an iota to our knowledge or understanding. I do not for a second underestimate the huge challenges ministers/officials face in unprecedented circumstances. Mistakes will inevitably be made.
That sums it up for me. It is unprecedented. Mistakes will be made because nobody knows what the answer is. Those in charge are doing the best they can with the science and data available to them. Despite what many seem to think, they're not idiots. Scientists (and politicians) disagree with each other all the time, so they're not all going to (metaphorically) cuddle up and say they all agree on one way forward now.
Anyway, that's enough depressing talk for now. As you know, we should have been in the Peak District this week, so in the absence of any worthwhile photo from today, here's one of Chee Dale from our last visit in November 2018.
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| Bridge of the river Wye in Chee Dale |
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