I started reading Brendan Cox’ book about his wife, the murdered MP Jo Cox. It is not a good book to read at bedtime, not just as I weep buckets over every chapter, but it also stirs up all those feelings around the referendum again as we lurch towards a no deal Brexit with no safety net, and while we are still dealing with the pandemic. However, Dominic Cummings has now resigned, so cause for a glass of red wine this evening, and I got all my washing dry on the line yesterday.
As relief from tearful reading I picked out an unread novel from my shelves, How to Measure a Cow by Margaret Forster. The title’s great, but if this were the first novel I’d read by her it would almost certainly be the last. Clunky, unsatisfying, but I shall finish it and it can go into the bag with other offerings for Oxfam Books when the charity shops reopen. I also have a bag of objects, two bags now for the charity shops near home. In my on/off moving mood actually looking at objects, particularly things I have been given and would not have chosen for myself, leads me to thinking that I do not want to take them with me if/when I do finally move. So that has made me decide they can leave me now. Except they can’t yet, so the bags are sitting on the bedroom floor. I may weaken.
We are only a week into this second lockdown but it feels much longer. I don’t know why I am finding it so difficult. I wonder if it’s because in many ways it seems very much like when we had eased out of lockdown1. Most businesses are open, the streets are busy, there’s lots of traffic. But we can’t socialise. Numbers of deaths have risen and numbers of confirmed cases.
We don’t have the quiet of the first lockdown. Planes are flying overhead. Instead of lengthening days we face shorter ones, colder ones, wetter ones. People are wondering how Christmas will play out. More than ever I am grateful for MasterB who is just pleased to be with me. I am also grateful that I can get out and walk, that I have my independence and friends locally who also are happy to walk. To be shut inside, alone, isolated, dependent on others right now must be so very hard.
But Gogglebox is about to start, so I know I shall be richly entertained. One of the things I love most about this programme (which I ignored for years thinking it sounded ridiculous) is the way the participants do not self-censor what they say. It’s refreshing, and often hilarious. I love the Siddiquis in particular. their wit and dry humour just makes my day. the Malones are so mean to Julie, the lone woman in the house, I want her to pack her bags and leave them. Lee takes the mick out of Jenny all the time, and Pete and Little Sister Sophie are great. I could go on, but then I’d miss the beginning.
Stay safe. Keep well Pay your TV licence.
Isobel (and Cat)'s Blog 
I would like to read Brendan Cox” book.
I have to believe after the first of the year when Biden is in we will have some kind of shutdown. Possibly restaurants and bars. But our Governor is a copy of Trump, so maybe not. We are homebodies anyway and we do wear masks when we run errands. I have high hopes for the vaccine. Enjoy your evening and glass of wine. We are just getting ready to have our wine time out on the lanai. We are taking the calendar out for another look 🙂
If you read the book about Jo Cox do have your hankies ready. Her murder deprived us of a wonderful person, MP, I’d say future Prime Minister, a leader with empathy, curiosity and a strong moral compass.
A copy of Trump? Oh no!!!!!
I hope the calendar offers solace.
You are so right about the encroaching darkness making this lockdown worse. Spring was the thing that kept the walks enticing. The Pacific Coast states have raised a virtual barrier and kindly asked everyone to please stay away. That’s a very “old school” in our new world request.
Today after a white grey sky at breakfast and then some drizzle it is raining in earnest. A day for domestic chores and reading.
Across the country beauty spots are asking people to stay away. If it’s like this everywhere I’d say they’ll have no problems with excess visitors today.