Liquid musing

 

 

 

 

 

 

The pool water has returned to its crystalline clarity in our local pool, but one does wonder just what “product” we have been swimming in that has been used to banish yesterday’s murkiness.  But that way madness lies, and life is too short etc etc to worry (overmuch) about such things.

     In a sign of technological spitefulness because of my forced missed swim yesterday, my smartwatch refused to record accurately my latest swim, only giving about half the meters of each length, but my internal length counter guided me to a satisfactory completion where, in spite of the evidence of the resentful watch, I think that I more than exceeded my usual lengths.

     The local pool is one of the only places in Castelldefels that can supply me with a decent cup of tea (a mixture of Earl Grey and English Breakfast) which is my reward for completing my swim.  Today, they had run out! 

     I had been prepared for this awful eventuality and took an orange juice as an alternative, but an orange juice topped up with ice cold Cava.  I have now entered that select grouping of ageing men who have alcohol first thing in the morning!  Well, not really, the orange juice was the major partner in the drink and freshly pressed too, so the Cava was more of jeu d’esprit than anything else.  Though one I could easily get used to!

    

 

I am beginning to understand that the cost of living I going to be a major problem.  Even casual shops are now costing over 100 euros.  I can still recall my parents have a serious discussion about finance after the weekly shop had exceeded five quid for the first time!  That truly was another age.

     It is difficult to think about winter when all available fans are on full strength to make the heat bearable, but with the rising cost of electricity and gas, coupled with the rise in general prices means that our minds are going to be concentrated.  Given the situations in our respective countries, I feel more secure in my adopted home of Catalonia than I would in the Conservative ridden dystopia that Britain has become.  Let us see how the future works out!

Gusty times ahead!

 

 

High winds meant that I declined to use my bike and took the car instead – and everyone else appeared to have made the same decision and so the car park was relatively full within a couple of minutes of the opening of the centre.

     As the pool is enclosed with a retractable roof (I am not insane!) we are fairly well protected from the surrounding weather, but I noted as I gained the end of my first length that a door to the outside world had been opened and one could experience the cool gusts of a thoroughly unpleasant wind.

     It was only at the end of the swim when you have to go from the pool area via a short flight of steps and a linking corridor to the changing rooms that you see the weather clearly.  Not pleasant, and I was grateful to have a hot cup of tea and sturdy plate glass to give me an acceptable climate.

     But, by the time I came to leave, the wind had dropped and the sky was showing a little more blue.  In the afternoon we had sunshine, but not enough sunshine to tempt me to go on the bike ride that is the usual end of my morning of exercise.

     As ever, another cup of tea and my mobile phone with The Guardian were enough to keep me stationary in my armchair until it was time for lunch.

     From my reading of the actions of what one might laughingly refer to as ‘my government’ in the UK, it really does look as though, after four years of the bloody Conservatives saying that a deal was easy and oven-ready and all the other lying descriptions given, we are headed for a no-deal Brexit.

 

      

 

     The latest piece of ill-judged, crass, idiocy by Johnson is to flaunt four Royal Navy gunboats to patrol our fishing waters in the event of a no-deal Brexit and foreigners attempting to do what they have been doing for the past umpteen years.  Four ships for the entire coastal waters of Britain, that’s about 11,000 miles, divided by four, that means that each of the Royal Navy ships will have to patrol about 2,700 miles of coast each.  And what is the speed of these ships?

     So, the threat of these ships is purely, but not entirely, cosmetic, harking back to Britannia Rules the Waves and all that.  In other words, an empty gesture, that the EU must have been expecting from the empty vessel that they have had to deal with.  For years.  And years.

     I am still hoping that Johnson is going to have some appreciation of what he is about to do and realize that he will have to take a hit (however he spins it) in the interest of the nation.  As the seconds tick away, my hope is getting more and more hysterical, especially when I remember that no matter how cataclysmically stupid a decision appears to be, people still make it.  Brexit did win the referendum and the USA elected Trump.  However stupid and unthinkable, it could happen.

     But I will relax into the remaining hours of the weekend, yea! even unto the last minute to midnight on Sunday in the weary hope of sanity (at least partial) governing our 'government'.

 

Meanwhile to get my mind away from events that I cannot influence, we had a decent menu del dia in our usual Saturday restaurant and even felt buoyed up enough to do a little light domestic shopping.

     On the cultural front, I have re-discovered my tidied-up notebook and am working on the structure and content.  I am reasonably confident that the concept is workable, but the rest of this weekend should give me a clearer idea of the direction and, more importantly, whether that direction is worth taking!

What a legacy!

 

What people say can live after them.  From the self-consciously orotund phrases (with a cynical ear to history) of the odious Churchill to the simple quotidian statement of General Patton, there are words that sum up a personality and proclaim that character to the ages.

     I hadn’t realised that my own deathless claim to verbal immortality had already been established.  This was made clear to me by the giving of two cellophane wrapped assemblages given to me yesterday as part of my birthday presents from The Family.

     The first illustrated my response to being asked what I would like to drink when we go out for a meal, “Una cerveza sin alcohol, gaseosa, y un vaso grande para mezclar, por favor.”  (“A non-alcoholic beer with Gaseosa and a large glass to mix them in, please.”)  Gaseosa is a sugar-free, sweetish, fizzy drink used by itself and as a mixer.  So, the first assemblage had a chunky ‘real’ looking beer glass, a can of 0% beer and a plastic bottle of Gaseosa.

     The second assemblage illustrated my end of meal instructions: “Un té negro, con dos bolsitas, 

y un poco de leche fría aparte, por favor.  (“A black tea, with two teabags and a little cold milk apart, 

please.”)  Beneath the cellophane I could see an impressive mug (with lid) at the side of which two 

teabag ends could be seen and a small jar of milk (with instruction not to drink it because it had 

not been in the fridge for some time!).

     So, that is me, summed up in two phrases.  I should have expected something like this because 

Toni’s two nephews look forward to my opening my mouth and then chorus my requests with me.

     And so, my birthday (a ‘significant’ one, if you care about such things) with only a visit to the 

Opera in the Liceu in Barcelona to see a lack-lustre production of Don Giovanni with Christopher 

Maltman in the evening to make the day even remotely significant.

     The experience was out of the ordinary of course, because of all the precautions that the theatre 

had taken to make our visit ‘safe’.  The number of audience members was restricted to 50% of the 

possible seats available and we were seated in a little island of isolation with adjacent seats vacant.  

 We had to wear masks for the duration of the performance; there were no refreshments, no 

paper programmes – and scene changes were done with the safety curtain not brought down, 

partly to encourage us not to leave our seats during the interval!

     I wish that I could say that the music transcended all the safety distractions – but it didn’t.  

 The production failed to engage with me, it seemed static and under sung.  I really wanted to enjoy 

it because it is all too likely that the increasing stringency of the measures to limit the spread of 

Covid will impact on the rest of the season – a season I might add with a late start.

     We are now under curfew (10pm to 6am) and there is talk of limiting people to their 

municipalities.  Although I live in the province of Barcelona, I do not live in the city and so 

restrictions will make it impossible to travel to the Opera House.  Still, it hasn’t happened yet 

and given the contradictory confusion of the stream of instructions that we have had so far, it 

might well be that oddities like opera-going will survive and I will have a ‘safe corridor’ to culture.

Spain has now had its ‘Callous Cummings’ moment where a dinner party for 150 people was held 

in Madrid hosted by the rich for the politicians and the corruptible.  Given that we mere mortals 

cannot go to closed restaurants and bars; cannot gather in groups of more than 6; have to be home 

by 10pm, you can take your choice of hypocrisies that the Great and The Good have illustrated by 

their ostentatious cavalier behaviour which, of course, spits in our collective faces.

     The reactions have been predictable: the government supporting press (right and left) failed to 

carry any information about this disgraceful event.  It was left to social media to spread the news 

and force the criminals to respond.  Will we get any more than platitudes?  Doubtful.  Justice in 

Spain is politicised and mere innocence will fail to get you freedom if you are perceived by the 

governing elite to be threatening their positions; glaring guilt will fail to get you convicted if you 

are part of that elite.

     To my knowledge none of the trough-swillers at that event has attempted a variation on the “I 

was testing my eyesight” by trying to read the menu card in the artificial light of the crystal 

chandeliers!  But give them time and they will come up with something equally blatant and insulting.

      Meanwhile, of course, our errant ex-king is still skulking in the shadows hoping that paternity 

and corruption cases will fade into the background – much like his son-in-law who is allegedly in 

a women’s prison (sic.) for his thieving.  Every other high and mighty fallen on hard times dweller 

in pokey also has to deal with photographic evidence of the degradation showing them in prison 

fatigues playing cards or something equally banal, but not with this particular prisoner.   

Not even a hint of evidence that he actually is in prison.  Makes you think.

The latest piece of idiocy in Catalonia concerns the Guardia Civil (the police guys with funny hats and guns) where there have been 20 arrests connected with the demonstrations and the financial organization thereof in support of our president Puigdemont who is at present in exile in Belgium.  This is a serious matter, but the general appearance of this operation (given the name “Volhov” by the Guardia Civil, referring to a battle during the Second World War by the División Azul which comprised Spanish soldiers fighting for the Nazis!  Such sensitivity!) has descended into farce by the claims of involvement of Putin and the threat of Russian soldiers being made available to Puigdemont and so on, into the realms of fantasy, QAnon and the delusions of dedicated conspiracy theorists.  Twitter and the social media are awash with spoofs and derisive comments on the latest putsch against Catalonia.

     Spain is not averse to looking ridiculous in the international court of public opinion, as witness their hapless defence of police brutality over the referendum of the 1^st October 2017 and the imprisonment of the organizers, some of whom are STILL IN PRISON.  For organizing a referendum.  In which millions of Catalans participated.

 

Such is the fluidity of the situation at the moment that the restrictions that I alluded to above are no longer a full description of what we are expected to observe.  It seems as if the government is trying to get as near as possible to a full lockdown without actually having one. 

     This is the sort of thing that the mendacious Conservative government tried with the situation in Northern Ireland and the attempts to convince us that there was a way to have some sort of Brexit and not to have a land border or a border somewhere: trying to convince people about something that was an impossibility, but faffing around to try and find the right linguistic display to make a contradiction appear smooth and joined-up.

     It is yet another variation of the “Delete all and insert” approach to debate that I remember from my days in General Body Student Meetings in University.  Even when agreement on some weasel formulation was found, it invariably came to pieces when confronted with practical reality.  It was a valuable Life Lesson to see specious agreement in action and to watch it later fail.  In ordinary life, instead of saying “Delete all and insert” the ‘compromise’ is usually preceded by, “What about if we” – but the end results (agreement/failure) are the same.

     We are still not sure about the exact details but, we are now expected to say within our municipalities during the weekends, so if the coastal resort of Castelldefels is packed on Saturday and Sunday with people from god knows where – what precisely are we supposed to do?  Our 10pm to 6am curfew continues.  Large stores are to be closed, and so on tinkering around the edges of what is actually necessary.

     While encourage not to make ‘unnecessary’ journeys, we are not banned from going where we like, within our province and within our municipality.  Mostly.  My swimming pool appears to be open for the foreseeable future (about three days in Covid terms!) and I can continue to take my bike rides, though the end part of my usual route, which is technically in Sitges, may be out of bounds during the weekends.

     As usual we are presented with yet more new rules about which we have a sketchy understanding at best – at a time when mistakes can and will be deadly!

 

Still, I have a new art book, and I have an active imagination, so no lockdown is going to contain me!

LOCKDOWN CASTELLDEFELS - Day 101 . Wednesday 24th June

I continue to be frustrated by the Catalan approach to time.

     I have given up trying to work out exactly the logic behind the opening and closing of shops and the continuation of some restaurants in staying open in spite of their cavalier attitude towards economics is mystifying to say the least, but I did think that I had the opening times of my swimming pool securely in my mind.

     Obviously during the more severe stages of the lockdown the pool was not open, and in the transition period from when it was open to the relative freedom of Phase Whatever The Hell We Are In Now there was a certain ad hoc nature of the time when we were let in for our regulated swims.  But the time did settle down to 8 am – the time, in the Old Days BC (before Covid) for the weekend opening times, the normal weekday opening time being 7 am.

     When we reached the present phase the opening time reverted to 7 pm, the showers were available for use and things appeared to be shaping up to be an acceptable New Normal.  Until San Juan.  As a recognized festival, this meant that opening time would be later, delayed until the weekend opening i.e. 8 am.

     Today, therefore, I had the luxury of a lie-in, or at least I would have if my built-in clock had not demanded that I wake up at my accustomed time, and I organized myself by setting off the robots to do the cleaning, making my cup of tea and doing a few of the clues in the Guardian Quick Crossword.  I made good time on my bike and I was at the gate to the pool by just before 8 am.  Unlike everyone else.  I was alone.

    OK, I thought, I will give them a few minutes to open up on the hour by going off on a little bike ride, making sure this time that I remembered to tell my watch that I was doing part of my exercise.  Too often I set off without pressing the right buttons to inform my watch to check my progress.  A little jaunt down the road and back again.  And nobody.

     I therefore made the executive decision that the time-honoured time for festive opening had somehow been delayed by an hour and so I would do my post swim bike ride, pre.  Which I did and made good time to get back to the pool just before 9 am.

     And there was nobody there.

     But at least this time, the gate was open and there were a couple of people sitting around the outside tables of the café.  But there were no people in reception and the café was closed.

     Eventually the shutters of the café opened, and Mario emerged to inform us that the opening time was 10 am for the pool.

     As I had my phone and my notebook (and asked Mario to bring me a cup of tea) a wait of an hour was as nothing and I finished the crossword and wrote a number of pages of quotidian rubbish in my notebook.

     My swim over, I had a second cup of tea and wrote further pages in my notebook and felt well satisfied and smug.  I declined to go on a further bike ride as the battery level on my bike had progressed to the single digit red number and I had no intention of being caught far from home with only pedal power to get me back!

It has been a beautiful day with only the screaming children lessening its beauty.  I truly think that kids have become even more feral with their extended absence from the calming discipline of school to contain their vocal exuberance.  If it were possible for kids to converse in anything less than a scream and shout I think I could become inured to their existence, but as it is, their obstreperous assertion of simply being makes them something Not Wanted on the Voyage of Life.  I’m afraid.

Our communal pool has become its usual magnet for those freeloaders who are not actually people who live in the houses for whom the pool is intended.  Just as the swallows come back to Britain in the summer, so various foreign fixtures take up their positions around the pool.  Shameless!

Tomorrow Toni returns, and I wait to see if he has been able to find any mature Cheddar.  He might have forgotten that he mentioned that he might look out for some, but I most certainly have not!

There are still a few laggard explosions, but as a slept through the ‘Main Battle’ last night, a few bangs are not going to keep me awake.  So to speak.

A pair of rather fearsome black reusable masks have arrived that I ordered via the Internet oodles of time ago.  They are not entirely comfortable to wear, but they do look the business and they have a satisfying seriousness to them.  They look the sort of thing to wear during shopping jaunts.

     The everyday masks are those that are shoved into pockets, and brought out and used because they are obligatory in Reception and the Café.  I am not sure what power they still retain as they have been overused, but I maintain the force of the family wisdom of, “Anything is better than Nothing.” And so they act as a barrier, no matter how flimsy.

     Mask wearing is the only visible element in most people’s approach to the virus.  Yes, we do obey (usually) the strips placed on the floor and there is some attempt at physical distancing with people that you do not know, but the fear of the virus is very much “over there” where “there” is very definitely not anywhere near our here.

     The virus news form around the world is uniformly depressing and there are spikes of infection in all countries.  I agree with Faucci (?) who said we should not look for second spikes of infection because we are still very much in the grip of the first spike.  I also agree with the director of the WHO who said that we are not safe until everyone is safe – and that means that we should all be very worried because there are too many leaders who are acting from economic and political standpoints and not human health standpoints.

I have written to my MP in Britain and urged him to consider aiding a movement to get Johnson and his cabinet charged with Corporate Manslaughter.

     I watched part of PMQs and was, yet again, ashamed by the way that Johnson failed to answer questions and became agitated when his failings were highlighted.  If he had a shred of common decency and humility and admitted the disastrous failures that his government has clearly owned, then I think he would have a certain amount of sympathy from the British people, and they would encourage the government to look at what has gone wrong and prepare for the worst in a more professional way than they have so far.  The government’s concern should be the welfare of the people and not how they look.  Each failure to acknowledge mistakes leads to further deaths.

LOCKDOWN CASTELLDEFELS - DAY 52 – Wednesday, 6th May

I am not, it must be said, a fan of the Blond Buffoon, so I probably did not come to the viewing of PMQs with an open heart and a forgiving attitude.  Be that as it may, I have to say that I have rarely seen a more cringe worthy performance than that of our Prime Minister (sic.) answering questions from the Leader of the Opposition.

     Johnson’s bumbling waffle was an embarrassment, and it was all the more telling because he was bereft of the usual Tory baying to cover up his lazy emptiness.  He is an indolent man, and his shallowness was on pitiful display in this exhibition of his fatuousness.  Starmer destroyed him with the sort of questions to which there is no answer, unless the proven liar changes the habits of a wasted lifetime and actually finds a modicum of veracity and admits guilt for the catastrophe of the management of the Covid crisis.

     It seems almost redundant to say that the number of deaths in the UK is now over 30,000.  30,000 lost lives.  30,000 people dead.  And we are told that we should not jump to international comparisons, even though the government itself produces those comparisons.  We  now have more deaths from Covid-19 than Italy.  We are paramount in Europe with the number of deaths.  Are we supposed to forget that we were told that “deaths under 20k would be a good result”, so we must assume that 30k deaths is a disgusting catastrophe.

     One can go on listing the disasters that this government has ‘managed’: the non-provision of PPE; the whole question of Care Homes; the provision, number, and quality of tests; the lies we have been told; the lack of transparency; the lack of an exit strategy; the slowness of the initial response; the criminal irresponsibility of Johnson in failing to take distancing seriously; the provision of masks for the general population and on, and on.

     It is obvious that we need an independent inquiry now so that this disaster is not repeated.  The process needs to be started immediately and the evidence needs to be gathered as a matter of urgency.  Thirty thousand people have died and it is inevitable that even more will follow them if we do not learn the lessons that can prevent the growth of fatalities.

     The UK is being reported in foreign newspapers with a mixture of astonishment and sorrow and Johnson is regarded as the wrong leader in the wrong place at the wrong time – a watered down version of Trump – and with a cabinet of inadequates: a perfect storm of negatives at the time when the crisis demands the very best.

I continue to go for my bike rides and am joined each time by a whole variety of people who have broken out bikes to take part in our daily Paseo.  There is a certain determination in the exercise that we are taking and few people look as though they are enjoying the experience!

     I miss my daily swim – it gives a shape to my day and it starts it ‘properly’ as I swim at 7 am, then my cup of tea and making notes.  It’s a good start.  I could start my bike ride at 6 am, as our time slot is from 6 to 10, but I am disinclined to do that.  There are limits to my desire to exercise!

Our Catalan lessons have developed, in so far as there is another lesson this Friday in the morning and via Google Meet.  I have not found this system to be one that I get on with, but I am going to try a change of computer and hope for the best for the next attempt!

LOCKDOWN CASTELLDEFELS - DAY 24 – Wednesday in Holy Week, 8th APRIL

 

I realise that, with all my bluff optimism, I have been affected by the lockdown!  In the poem that I wrote yesterday (smrnewpoems.blogspot.com) I actually questioned, even if rhetorically, the value of sunbathing!

     It is shocking to have to confront a possible breakdown in your worldview that can contemplate something as self-loathing as a negative approach to the appreciation of the nearest star!  It is certainly a wake up call to reassess my attitude and determine to be more positive in the future.  The idea of getting to June and July and behaving like a troglodyte is entirely unacceptable.

     If something as fundamental to my view of life is capable of mutability, then it makes me wonder what other, more subtle changes there have been in this period of self-isolation.  It would argue a self-deluding insensitivity to say that one can remain entirely stable when the world appears to be changing around you.

     The irony, of course, is that the micro world of self-isolation is unchanging and stable.  The continuing horrific catalogue of death and infection is all around us, but not part of the life that we are leading.  It is as if we are living in some sort of medieval fort with a water filled trench around us: part of our surroundings, but separated from them.

     Unlike some others, I have been entirely unable to wean myself from the news.  My addiction to the Internet radio, and more specifically Radio 4 is total.  It is at times like this that the Conservatives detestation of the BBC becomes not only partisan, but also self-defeating.  At times of National Crisis we united around the BBC as a voice of and to the Nation.  I certainly do not look towards the Conservatives and their slavish news lap dogs to give me a sense of what the Nation is thinking or feeling.

     And The Guardian.  As a life-long Guardian reader (with a brief fall from grace and adherence to The Independent) I now read it on my mobile phone with an intensity that goes beyond belief.  And may I make a specific call out for the writing of John Crace, a columnist of rare wit and perception.  His political sketches have been part of the reason that I have been able to maintain my sweetness and equilibrium during the past few years where Brexit and the bloody Conservatives have convinced me that I am living in a society where the dominant ideology is the death-wish!

My early morning routine is now becoming more and more established: set Moppy (don’t blame me, the app demands that you call your robot cleaner something) off on her hoovering circuit; make my cup of tea (English breakfast and Earl Grey) and have the World’s Most Expensive Augmented Muesli (at least I have stopped adding Smarties to it) with fat-free milk; do the Guardian Quick Crossword (with light cheating); change Moppy to her mopping sequence; go for my pool circuits.  And a chunk of the day is gone!  Which is a clear exemplification of the work expanding to match the time available!

     I do miss my daily early morning swim and I can’t wait to get back to that part of my routine, because that morning start include my first writing of the day when I sit in the café or outside having my post-swim cup of tea.  Ah!  How life used to be!

Just back from the open kitchen window where at 8.00 pm our time, we applaud the front-line workers who are keeping our society going.

     Talking of health workers and their battle against the virus: the British Prime Minister now in Intensive Care.  As I said yesterday, I wish him better health and strength to his family – and he should resign.  Now.  At once.

     The Prime Minister’s bravado a while ago where he was joking about his meeting Covid-19 positive people and shaking hands with them; his visible inability to maintain social distancing when his government was promoting it as essential, now appear to be a foolhardy, self-indulgent imposition on health services that are overstretched.   

     I might also add, that the Prime Minister’s inability to give clear indications of who actually has ultimate power in government is a dereliction of duty.   

     chocolate, retribution, judgement, ineptitude, Throughout his career he has been first and foremost a second-rate, shoddy, narcissistic, journalistic liar and, while I have sympathy for his present state of health, I have none for his political.  We deserve better than him.  Though with the cabinet of freaks that he has accumulated, god alone knows who (or in the case of Gove, what) might take his place.

     So far the Conservatives’ management of the Covid-19 crisis has been fatally inept.  How many unnecessary deaths is it going to take before the people of Britain demand the reckoning that should come sooner rather than later?

Determined not to end this post on a sour note, I can report that we were able to buy chocolate in the last shop and you can be assured that my writing has been sweetened by the confectionary. 

     So just imagine what it would have been like without!

LOCKDOWN CASTELLDEFELS - DAY 15 – 30th MARCH

A thoroughly miserable start to the two weeks of ‘extreme’ lockdown imposed by the Spanish Government. Presumably what we had before was a ‘Lockdown Lite’ and what we have now is a ‘Lockdown Intense!” – complete with exclamation mark. 

     This attempt to be more stringent is a belated response to the truly horrific figures of the dead and the infected that will haunt this government forever.

     The steady rain is a depressing backdrop to a growing realization that this period of two weeks is more than likely to be followed by another, and another, and another.  The Guardian reports one medical expert saying that the lockdown in some form or other could last as long as a year.  I resisted the need to put an exclamation mark at the end of that last sentence because, truly, it would not come as any sort of surprise.

     At the end of World War II in Britain, it took until 1954 for rationing to end: nine years after the end of a conflict that we ‘won’.  It seems unlikely that the number of deaths from this pandemic will come anywhere near the totals of the World War, but the dislocation is perhaps more truly worldwide than that conflict.  And if it took nine years to get back to sub-normal, how long is it going to take this time?

     This time around no infrastructure has been destroyed, the networks of transportation are running albeit in a reduced form and, most importantly, there is not the international conflict that makes communal unity impossible – apart, of course from the various populists around the world who are finding fascist rhetoric is of no use in fighting a real virus.  Countries are generally sharing vital information; people are working together to find solutions.  It will be the micro political divisions that kill us, working against the macro attempts to save us.

Toni, in his hunter/gatherer mode has been venturing out into this new world of increased restrictions to get some food.  We did not indulge in the panic buying frenzy at the start of this madness, so we do routinely need to stock up. 

     We are fortunate that in Castelldefels there is one area where there are five large supermarkets within walking distance of each other, so choice is not a problem.  The only real fear is peoples’ lax social distancing habits when in the confined spaces of shops.

     We had a fairly large list of needs and most of them have been satisfied.  We have made it policy that only one supermarket will be visited and if you can’t get what you want there then it will have to wait for another time.  Our decision to have a few ‘treats’ came to nothing, as the chosen store (Aldi) had no chocolate or ice cream (overtones of “No more mushrooms!” there) but the other items on the list were obtained, more or less.

     The only things that we had actually run out of were eggs and milk; and Toni forgot the eggs (but remembered the milk) and I suspect that he simply missed the chocolate (he lacks my professionalism when it comes to shopping) and everything else he failed to find, but we do have all the essentials. 

     Being without milk, even for a number of hours rather than days, was a pain.  On the principle that it is better to be petty minded over slight inconveniences rather than freak out over major crises: I have to say that missing a late afternoon cup of my tea (50/50 English Breakfast and Earl Grey) was a real loss.      It threw my sense of new routine into chaos and unsettled me.  How, I reasoned, is civilized life to continue without a stabilizing cup of tea? 

     In spite of the horror all around us, we live in a sort of easy stasis where the day starts with the comforting rumble of the robot hoover and a cup of tea, and ends with the computer monitor going black.  During the time in between there are the little domestic things that have taken the place of engagement in the wider physical world, or at least engagement physically in the wider world.  Any disruption there is to the Important Little Things That Keep You Sane – well, the clue is in the last capitalized phrase!

     As befits the gravity of the situation that dictates our lives, I have taken to drinking only camomile tea in the late evenings: look on it as my way of saving milk, and indulging in a gentle quasi-protestant-self-denial.  I cannot really pretend that I like the taste of camomile tea, but I have rapidly got used to it, so that I am able to kid myself that the taste is at least ‘interesting’ and a ‘dis-flavoursome contrast’ to the beverages I usually drink.

     That is the sort of ‘re-branding’ that characterizes a great deal of what we are doing when locked down: a spiritual form of ‘make do and mend’, using what you have to make the most of what you want!

And talking of Protestantism, as I sort-of was in the last but one paragraph, the ‘treats’ that we had from Toni’s shopping expedition were almost perfect examples of the faith: two tone biscuits: Marie biscuit one side and a thin layer of chocolate covering (and overhanging) the other.  Marie biscuits are surely the most uninspiring biscuits in commercial production and delicious chocolate should never be thin. 

     Incidentally, when I explained to Toni the correct way to eat these biscuits: by nibbling away the overhang of chocolate round the edges, while trying to prise it away from the biscuit base to see how much of the covered biscuit you could uncover when you had nibbled away at the four sides, he had swallowed his whole.  And there you see the consumer differences between a Lapsed Catholic and an Anglican Atheist!

     And in a most un-Catalan like way, it is still raining and we have not had our customary glimpse of the sun. 

     It’s just one damn thing after another.