Isolation Journal 104

We woke up quite late around 10.30am and then debated what to do and considered going to Spurn Point, but as the weather looked a bit dodgy and my toe was still sore and Alan's back was bad.  My Covid test result arrived and was negative and I was feeling less poorly today and didn't have a sore throat.  

Alan made delicious apple pancakes and we watched Friends and then I went and fed Fudge and Smudge and did the recyling and took the rubbish out and then hoovered the house and did a couple of loads of laundry and put away the washing.  I tidied and cleaned the kitchen.  I listened to more of the Wind Up Bird Chronicles and I'm now less than 8 hours away from the end - it's really felt like a marathon to get through this book!  Today was a 2 coffee day and Alan also made a pistachio tea from the Coffee at the Crescent order.  

Alan watched the Formula 1 and then I tidied out a drawer and cupboard in the Welsh Dresser and we now have a covid drawer with facemasks, wipes and hand sanitiser as well as binning a load of old diet coke with black lumps in that was 3 - 4 years out of date.

I ideally wanted to go for a run, but my feet were too sore and I could tell Alan would benefit from some fresh air so we decided to go for a walk around Pontefract racecourse and we've not been there since March when we did our last parkrun.  Both of us had high anxiety today.

There were lots of new wooden carvings "Peter and the Perrigrine" and we noticed lots of things we haven't before as we're usually running.  There were some beautiful sky scenes, we walked across a model aeroplane flying area and also saw a rainbow and then a double rainbow.  My feet got really wet.

We got home and Alan cooked a butternut Squash curry for Hello Fresh and I fed Fudge and Smudge and then mopped the floors.

We ate dinner and then Alan really wanted pudding so I finally had a go at making Sticky Lemon Pudding that I'd seen Jack Monroe tweet and it didn't take long to prep, but takes 30 mins in the oven and then 20 mins to let the lemon sauce all sink in.  

In the meantime I made chickpea, carrot and coriander patties and some rice.

Not so Isolation Journal 103

I'd not got to bed at a very good time and so I was quite tired when I woke up at 9am and needed to be out the house for around 9.30am to get to my writing class at 10.30am.  I didn't end up eating breakfast, but I made a couple of coffees and drank one before I left and took one for the journey.  I packed the last rice and beans and a couple of slices of pizza from the night before.

The traffic was good and so it only took me around 35 minutes to get there and I tried to park behind The Bowery, but it was a bit tricky and tight in the car park, so I drove down to where the art deco houses are and walked around 5 minutes to get to the class, I was just on time fortunately.

I wore my mask to enter the class and then the whole way through other than to drink my water bottle and then to eat lunch outside.  The course I was doing was How to Write that Novel and it was the first writing workshop that I'd booked this year for my 20 things in 2020 and was due to be the weekend after I'd got back from honeymoon in March, but it got delayed to June and then September so it feels like I've been waiting a while and have done a lot of online zoom in the meantime.  It was definitely worth the wait.  

The Bowery made me feel comfortable as there were only 10 of us in the room and we all wore masks apart from the tutor Mark Connors who work a visor so that we could hear and see him speaking properly.  There were masks available, but I'd brought my own and they had lovely lavendar hand santiser available around the tutor room.  

I really enjoyed the course, we started off by reading aloud the first page and the blurb of a selection of books including one by the tutor because he'd run out of books Tom Tit and the Maniacs.  We noticed various things about both especially the hook and intrigue and then we all had a go at writing our own as well as coming up with titles.  I've now got a lot more books on my "I want to read list".  We read aloud our blurbs and also our first pages and there were some really interesting outlines for novels and starting points within the class, some were fantasy, one was a romance, one about a lady's grandmothers journey from India to Africa to England and one about an aging rockstar getting together with someone who looked like his younger self, one about a Dunkirk Solider and one about dragons and another about a fantasy dream world.  I later felt sad for the fantasy dreamworld guy as he didn't get a chance to read out one of the exercises.  We also discussed how to always try and avoid cliches.

We had a break for lunch and I sat outside in the little garden area.  

After lunch we did work around scene setting and wrote and read aloud some descriptive scenes and then talked about character before having a question and answer session with Mark.  Finishing at 4.30pm I bought a copy of Tom Tit and the Maniacs and then some of the hand santiser spray, but they only had a peppermint flavour, but I bought a couple for £5.50 each.

After I'd walked back to the car I texted my friend Jenny as I've not seen her for months and she's been being very cautious.  I popped into the house briefly and she signed off a guide planning zoom call with my old guide group and I waved to Fran and some of the other leaders which was lovely.  She then showed me her homemade kombucha which was delicious!  I had some of the plain kombucha as well as some strawberry flavoured stuff with actual strawberries.  And told me about how to make it and asked me if I wanted some of her scoby to make my own and I said yes please! 

We then took Luna the King Charles Spaniel for a walk around the Meanwood woods and she was very excited and running around and it was really good to have a good chat.  When we got back to her house she boxed up the scoby and gave me some instructions and then I headed back to find Alan in the bath after a run and so I went out for a quick run too to get my (not) parkrun fix in.  I'd noticed a pain in my left big toe joint yesterday and I could run, but I could definitely still notice it today.  I listended to With Me Now podcast as I ran and they read out my Facebook comment about doing Temple Newsam parkrun with Alex last weekend.

I fed Fudge and Smudge and Fudge ran out as soon as I opened the door and they had been sick 3 times and I had to clean the litter trays, but they were more friendly than usual which was cute.

The coffee beans, chai tea and pistachio tea I'd ordered from Coffee on the Crescent had arrived as well as the Vitality free and discounted coffee from Cafe Nerro.  My mum had also texted me to tell me that the big tub of marmite I'd ordered months ago had finally arrived.

I had a soak in the bath for far too long when I got back and Alan wasn't sure what we should do for tea and eventually I made some wraps with the left over kebab meat from last night and reheated the curly fries and cut up some lettuce.  

We watched a variety of random comedy from Dave and I started to make Kombucha and ran a load of washing through.  

To make kombucha you make 2 litres of tea with 6 - 8 teabags and 160 - 200g of sugar, let it cool to a warm tepid temperature.  You then pour into a plastic jar and add the scoby to it and the scoby juices and cover with cotton and leave for 7 - 30 days - fingers crossed that it works well!

Not so Isolation Journal 100

Another earlier start back into the office today.  I didn't sleep very well, it took me a while to drift off and I woke up about 25 minutes afterwards.  My alarm went off at 6.50am and woke me up in the midst of a dream.  I was a bit slower to get up and get moving, but I got downstairs, fed the cats, unloaded and reloaded the dishwasher, had some of the badly executed banana bread and yoghurt for breakfast and then got dressed left about the same time as yesterday around 7.55am, but as I got down the end of Whitecote Lane there was a load of farm equipment completely blocking the road and so I had to do a million point turn to go back on myself through Newthorpe, so it was probably around 8.40am by the time I walked into the office.

The morning was relatively productive, lots of trying to get on top of how the system works and I'm getting there slowly.  I managed to send some CVs eventually, but it seems a bit clunky getting eveything as I used to.

At lunch I ate at my desk and had rice and bean and also a naked bar as well as 2 apples and a satsuam for snacks.  I then went for a walk around the block along the canal with Nic again.  She noticed that there were a lot of people walking around the back of my desk and suggested that I move to a more corner area with less people around me so I'll swap with Rachel when I'm back in the office again on Friday.

I worked out that I still had 15.5 days of leave to take and so I took off a week in October with a plan of booking onto an online writing course with Arvon.  

The afternoon was fairly productive other than the frustration of having a meeting that lasted for 40 minutes which could have been an email about a client transfering over some temps.  I finished up around 6.30pm and then went to the toilet before heading to the car in pouring rain.  It was so wet that it took me a long time to drive back in the rain more slowly.

When I arrived back home Alan was cleaning the cooker which was impressive!

I cooked Hello Fresh when I got in - Toulouse Sausage and potatoes with a tomato and bean sauce and listened to PMQs as I cooked.  I also ate 30g portion of cheese, marmite and skips whilst I cooked as I was way too hungry.  I had thought about going for a run, but it got late after I'd let my dinner go down and so I decided to email the vouchers we'd not yet been able to book for our wedding as they are due to expire very soon.  I asked the Alfresco Adventures and the Yorkshire Heart Wine Tasting people to ask about how to book.

I also checked my course on Saturday and messaged my friend Jenny to see if she might be interested in meeting for a walk and she seemed interested.

We watched Friends, Taskmaster and generally stuff on Dave whilst Alan waited for an Amazon order to arrive and we ate feasts and then wine gums after the delivery had arrived and I had a beer as well.  I meant to go for a run, but it was too wet and I didn't fancy it, will need to do 10K tomorrow!

Not so Isolation Journal 99

I woke up this morning before my alarm to a horrible bad dream, someone was attempting suicide in a most horribly graphic way, it was like something out of a film, but not a film that I've ever seen.

I then got up with my alarm at 6.50am and quietly went downstairs, emptied the and refilled the dishwasher, collected up all my food for the day and drank a coffee, ate some cornflakes and fed the cats (letting them out the back door as they were confused by me being up so early).  I then made another coffee and put it in a mug to take on the journey and put make up on and got dressed - I'd laid out my clothes the night before to make it less stressful this morning.

Alan was confused as I'd planned to get to the office for 8.30am and so I planned to leave at 7.30 and ended up leaving about 7.50am as I dropped my eyebrow shadow on the floor and had to clear it up as it was all black and manky.  The traffic was super quiet and so I ended up getting in for 8.20am and it was really quiet in the car park as well.

I put my mask on and walked across to the office carrying my run club stuff as well as my hand bag, Alan's Macbook and Rachel's bag of stuff that I'd been looking after for her.

The office smelt really clean and it did seem quite spacious, but it was weird walking back in and not chatting in close proximity to everyone.

We logged on and started to fire up the new Salesforce system and had a kick off call as normal and then I cracked on with trying to work out how to use the new system.  I had a new job to match as well as CVs to send (the system wouldn't let me do this) and I think it will be good, but will take me a while to get back to the normal speed of doing things.

At lunch the team went out for a meal, but I'd brought my wild rice and black bean salad so I ate that instead with left over cucumber salad and Nic was too busy as well so we went out for a walk at lunch.  I wore my mask to go to the bathroom and the rest of the time I was at my desk.  The one thing that threw me was when my boss threw my mobile at me to answer which I was super uncomfortable doing.  I held it at a distance and then sanitised my hands.

Today was definitely more productive that it has been, even though I was cross at the system and constantly on the phone to work out what to do.

I finished my last call at around 7pm and then went to get changed into my run kit and drove over to Woodhouse Moor for run club at 7.30pm.  I was nearly late and had to run fast across to meet at the end of parkrun (Queen Victoria Statute) and it was really nice that I knew everyone in the group - Zeni leading, Clare E, Lizzie and Emily.  We had a lovely chatty run and some effort on my intervals and my "peaking" on garmin went down to "recovery"  I ran around 6K in about 35 minutes including running back to my car at the end and I drove home which took around 40 minutes in total.

I called Alan on the way and then spoke to my parents briefly and got in and put on a load of washing and had a shower whilst Alan finished off the Hello Fresh for tea which was Pork burgers with wedges and coleslaw.

We watched an episode of Spooks and he went up for a bath and had been for a run earlier.  I then I tidied the kitchen, loaded the dishwasher and made banana bread which finished cooking at midnight and turned out terribly, the edges were burnt and the insides uncooked and fell out.  I'm a total idiot and should leave these baking things to Alan sometimes!

Isolation Journal 98

We ended up not going to bed properly until around 3am so we woke up about 10am, and just had a lazy morning in bed and got up around 11am, mostly prompted by Maya bringing up a mouse that she'd eaten like an apple with the just a "core" remaining.  I put some washing on and Alan started to make some lunch.  We had a delicious aubergine and okra taco recipe that we'd previously had from Hello Fresh and it was really lovely.   I also hoovered and mopped most of the floors.

We watched Friends and then more Storage Hunters whilst we ate and then we went out for a cycle up to Fairburn Ings and back home via Ledsham.  Annoyingly as my heart rate was low for the 52 mins of cycling it didn't even register as points on my Vitality!  It did change my garmin training status to "peaking" that was positive.

We had hot cross buns and a cup of tea and watched some more Storage Hunters.

When we got back I did some more tidying up and Alan went up for a bath and I went to take the compost out, remembered that I'd not planted my pansies that arrived earlier in the week and so I quickly planted them out in any place I could fit them after doing some weeding, hacking back the artichokes (I needed to saw the stems with a bread knife!) and then removing the old tent greenhouse frame that had gone rusty.

I then cooked the Hello Fresh BBQ and had to swap the chicken as it went out of date on the 28th, the beef was the 29th, but was ok and I made the 2 salads and chicken korma and koftes.  I also made some rice with beans for my lunch so that I'm all safe tomorrow with my own food.  Alan made us a JD and ginger. 

We ate and started to watch Zoolander, but Qubit turned it off by accident and so we watched some John Oliver and Modern Life is Goodish and then I finished off cleaning up the kitchen and changed both sheets on the bed.  I listened to more of "The Wind Up Bird Chronicles" as I was doing the chores.

It's now nearly midnight and I'm feeling pretty anxious aboutt getting enough sleep for work tomorrow, hopefully it should all be ok.

Isolation 96 & 97

I set the alarm on Saturday for 9am to make sure that I was up in time to go for a run and do "adult" parkrun with Alex at around 10am at Temple Newsam.  I woke up a bit before and then woke Alan up to see if he fancied doing it too and he did join me.  We drove over and saw Han's house for the first time since the fire damage repairs had been completed. It was looking really good and we had a coffee and then took Alex to run a "not" parkrun.  There was a socially distanced race going on and so we ended up being cheered on by the marshals!  

Alex hasn't run much and so there was a good amount of walking and we got around in about 51.51 and had a good chat about a lot of things.  We had an ice lolly at the end and Alan finally got to enjoy a feast - I had a cider refresher and Alex had a screwball.

We spent a bit more time at Han's and went for a walk with her as James was desperate to ride his little car around the block.  His behaviour was quite challenging and we think in part because he'd not seen us for a few weeks.

We headed home and then I made some pizza for lunch on tortilla bases and some salad.  We watched some tv and then Alan went up for a bath and a nap and I cleaned the cat litter trays at last and did the recycling as well as loading the dishwasher and cleaning the kitchen and doing a load of washing.  I then had a bath and got ready for Cyberfest 3 by Beer 52 an online beer festival which had a 4 hour live stream with commentary on the beers provided, comedians, music and interviews with the brewers.  There were 12 beers and a special glass, but we only managed to get through 6 during the time we were drinking.  They were the ones in bold:

• Northern Monk **England** - Patrons Project 18.03 TDH Pale Ale 5% **440ml**
• De Leite **Belgium** - Cuvee Uncle Pol Flanders Red 7% - very weird, but interesting blended concept, very strong lambic flavour.
• Vocation x Brew York **England** - Sweet Temptation Stout 6% **440ml** - I had this at the end, I perhaps shouldn't have done as I was quite full, but it was a really tasty sweet stout.
• By the River (Wylam Tap) **England** - Heedhunter DDH Pale Ale 4.5% **440ml** - Our first beer, really hoppy and fresh to start off with.
• Ale Browar **Poland** - Hazy Rooster DIPA 8.9%
• Mothership **UK** - Hazy Peach Pale 5.5%
• Funky Fluid **Poland** - Gelato Pastry Sour 5.6% **500ml** - A crazy combination of flavours, but delicious, as the presenters suggested, you'd likely only have one as it's quite sweet.
• Round Corner **England** - Drovers Hazy Session IPA 4.3% - Alan loved this one, I thought it was good, but didn't stand out as much as the others did for me - the challenge of having lots of strong flavours together.
• Glen Affric **England** - Rutting Stag American Red 5% - Another very drinkable and nice beer.
• Heaney Farmhouse **NI** - Pale Ale 5%
• Sori Brewing **Estonia** - Madonna of Sori 5.3%

The rest we get to look forward to trying later!  I think we'd have been really smashed if we'd attempted all 12 let alone getting 2 boxes so we had one beer each!  The comedy, quizzes and music helped the evening along and I concluded that it was a lovely day.  Qubit was a big fan of hiding in the Beer 52 box!

We'd ordered a takeaway from a new place Fire it up! for tea as Alan was craving a kebab and I had one too, but it was INSANELY spicey I think they basically coated it in just red chilli sauce, I had 2 attempts at eating it, but couldn't complete it.  I had chips and some strawberry cheesecake as well.

We went to bed and I was ridiculously full and fortunately fell asleep quite quickly.  

We woke up quite late and I don't think that Alan had a great night of sleep so we dozed and napped and I snuck downstairs to feed the cats and put a loaf of bread on in the breadmaker.  I felt very full of anxiety, which I'm assuming will be the drinking as it tends to affect me if I've had a few drinks the morning after.   Eventually I got up and made scrambled eggs, sausages, toast (with marmite for me) and coffee and orange juice.  The bread was a bit too doughy, but everything else was ok.  We watched the end of the Addams Family movie and then I watched some Storage Hunters whilst Alan went up to watch Formula 1.  

I did a load of washing and then got ready to go for a run and did 8K fairly steadily as I woke up with a sore stomach which is likely a combination of beer and far too spicey food.  It took around 45 minutes and then I got back home later than I'd thought as it was 6.30pm and we were booked for our first post covid meal out at Pizza Express at 7pm.  I managed to get showered and changed and to Pizza Express by 7pm. 

We got to the entrance wearing our masks and waited for about 10 minutes before anyone came to show us in, but once we'd sat down we looked at the online menu, but ordered from a waiter.  We sat in the middle of 3 x 2 seater tables and there was one table allocated for social distancing and to put used dishes on for collection.  I had an elderflower drink and Alan had still lemonade and I shared olives and I had some calamari and Alan had dough balls.  For my main I had a vegan Giardiniera and a side salad and Alan had a Calabrese.  The food was much as I remembered and tasted nice, although it was disappointing that some of our favourites like the Dolcetti desserts and the arancini starters were not on the menu, but I completely understand how restaurants have had to change the way they work.  

We headed back and I plugged in Lauren's friend Lorraine's live Instagram where she was practicing some of her comedy and then I finished watching this and Alan watched Ricky Gervais Animal and made us hot apple brandy and then I grabbed us some ice lollies and ibuprofen as we both had aches and pains.

Isolation Journal 94

I woke up a bit earlier than my alarm and I was desperate to finish off "The Midnight Library" and I did, I loved it and wanted to read it again, but I'd promised to lend it to my neighbour Kirsty.

I logged onto my teams kick off call at 9am and updated Katie who was back from Greece and seemed happy with how I'd looked after things for her whilst I was off.  I had yoghurt, apple and granola for breakfast and then another team meeting with the wider team.

I got through a decent amount of work this morning, but it's still very busy and I have plenty to do, but I did manage to do Pilates at 12pm and it was just 3 of us in the class.  We then heated the leftover pasta bake from the day before for lunch and then cracked on with the afternoon activities including writing an advert for the job I'd managed to retain which I'm really excited to be working on and also picked up another job to work on which is the first job I've had for me in a very long time.

I finished work around 6.35pm and we were due to be doing our guide planning meeting at 6.30pm in Gem's garden, but it was really rainy so we moved it to Zoom.  I ended up having my laptop crash so I then had to download Zoom onto the Mac and then it started working again so I logged back on again.

We borrowed lots of ideas and planned the whole term that will be done via Zoom as we're not sure when we'll be allowed to do things again face to face.  It took a while, but I've made a whole document of what parents need to prep ready to participate, we've got different people leading things and some fun party, cooking and crafts.  They'll also be getting through some of their skills builders which is good.

Alan made Hello Fresh Thai Prawn Curry for tea and I ate whilst finishing the meeting and then I came down and tidied the kitchen, the dining room, took out my dead flowers and arranged 2 vases of gladioli from Arena Flowers, put a load of washing on, put away the washing from the drying rack, hung out the washing and loaded and set off the dishwasher.

I had a fruit corner dessert and then a glass of wine after I'd done all the chores listening to more Wind Up Bird Chronicles and we watched some Mock the Week and Taskmaster.

Isolation Journal 93

I woke up fairly early and read some more of The Midnight Library as I really am excited by what I'm reading.

I had some cornflakes and coffee for breakfast and had a morning of sorting out of things and a few teams meetings.  I'd also prepped for a lunch and learn I was delivering with a colleague on Mental Health Awareness for managers.  

Alan made a pasta bake for lunch which was really nice and I then delivered the session with my colleague.  One of the questions asked annoyed me basically "How do you know someon has a genuine mental health problem?" it annoyed me because people assume some people claim to have mental health problems and don't and my view is that if someone is that desperate...they are likely to have a real mental health problem!

The afternoon is fairly productive, I had a bit of an issue in that our forecast for the team has gone backwards it's been quite frustrating and a fairly difficult month, although I did sign off on the final part of a retainer which is a better way to end the month.  I picked up another job for another colleague which was good.  

I finished up work around 6.45pm and then went for a walk with Alan and we spotted Qubit as we were leaving hanging out in the field near the road with cows in it, we tried to call him in, but he wouldn't come so instead we went for our walk and chatted and saw beautiful sunlight over the wheat fields and saw someone parascending and we walked back through the public footpath through the fields.  We saw Qubit again and eventually managed to encourage him into the house.  

We needed to get home before the Tesco delivery at 8pm and so we made sure we got back and Qubit went back towards the door and started to hassle Fudge and Smudge from number 5, so I had a chat to Kirsty and said that I could feed the cats when they are away on holiday and told her that I'd return "Little Fires Everywhere" and would lend her "The Midnight Library"

I made Hello Fresh for tea, a premium recipe of steak with black garlic butter and mash and a salad and I had a fruit corner cheesecake yoghurt for dessert and a Rowntrees fruit pastle lolly.

We watched storage hunters and then tried hard to feed the worming tablets to the cats, I got one into Maya with cheese, but she wouldn't take the other half and Qubit we had to team up to get it down his throat.

Isolation Journal 92

I grabbed a coffee before signing on for the call this morning and then had some cornflakes as well.  It was pelting it down with rain really heavily and so the cats were a bit cautious about going out.

The morning was reasonably productive, although there was a lot of adminy sorting out of stuff to do. I am nervous going back into the office, but I do think it will help me feel a bit more engaged.  I made lunch again and we had the same as yesterday - sausages, potato waffles and chard, but I also made some quick hassleback potatoes that were really delicious and dead easy to make.

We had a kick off for our temp BD session and I also had a D&I Unity champs session which was enjoyable. 

We had another teams meeting and then I had a request for a meeting with a client where I've hopefully successfully sold a retainer.  

I had a headache and felt pretty tired and so when Maya kept lying on my keyboard at 6.30pm I called it a day and finished up.  

I went out for a run and just about got done without getting rained on - and just before I headed out spotted a worm that had got out of Qubit's bum - I've now ordered worming tablets for him!  I ran 6.5K and was reasonably on track, but my status is now down as unproductive!  

I listened to the With Me Now podcast on the run and then had a quick shower before cooking tea which was a Hello Fresh pizza recipe with some black bean salsa.  I listened to more of the Wind Up Bird Chronicles and then we watched Jon Oliver "The Night Tonight" and then some "Storage Hunters" and had an ice lolly and then some of my birthday present dark coffee flavoured chocolate.

I also ordered a lightning cable from Amazon as my apple charger is on the way out.  I tidied up the kitchen after tea.

Isolation Journal 91

I woke up after a reasonable night of sleep, but still felt really quite poorly with my stomach.  I got logged on an Alan kindly made me a coffee.  I tried out a belvita as they were good for a poorly stomach in the past, but it was best before 2017 and really soggy.  I later on tried some Skyr and granola. 

I started with a call to catch up with everyone, but then it was a morning of mostly sorting out issues and niggly things.  I was distracted and not very focused.  

I did pilates at 12pm and I definitely needed the streching and workout.  Alan went out for a run and put on some sausages and potato waffles on and I cooked some chard with garlic and we ate lunch.  

I then had a team meeting for work, but someone forgot to turn up, so we then rearranged for tomorrow and then I had a meeting with a client that 100% could have been an email.

I worked away until around 6.45pm and still didn't really get as much done as I'd wanted. It was a sunny day so I was really keen to run, although I'm still not feeling 100%, but I managed to do a Lumby loop of about 4 miles and then I finished off dinner which was saffron paella and monk fish and serrano ham from Hello Fresh and it was delicious, we had some fizz from Naked wines and it was sweet and delicious.  We watched a bit of Storage Hunters.

I then had another go and cutting Alan's hair and it didn't go well - I followed the same video as last night, but his hair was way longer and my shoulder was hurting so much to try and do some of the cutting.  Alan was upset and cross and we almost looked like it was going to need to be shaved off, but fortunately we managed to rescue it.

We realised Qubit had itchy ears and found some lice/fleas/bugs in there, so groomed them out and then we put some spot on drops on both him and Maya.

I hung out a load of washing and cleaned the kitchen while Alan had a bath.

Isolation Journal 89 & 90

Two in one entry today as I was away for the first time since March yesterday evening.

I woke up yesterday and checked my phone and had a negative Covid result from my test on Friday so I decided to go with my plan of visiting my parents and my brother.  I'd packed my stuff mostly the night before so I had some cornflakes, packed up the rest of the bits and pieces and set off just before 10am.

The roads weren't too bad, I had only planned to stop once for a toilet break and I always aim to get to at least Leicester Forest East Services on the way down and if I get to Watford Gap or further I'm over halfway and feel happy.  I got out at Watford Gap, tried to charge my car, but it wasn't working so I headed to the toilet.  I had no interest in stopping for food really as it was too busy and I felt uncomfortable and social distancing wasn't great.  I got back to the car, texted my brother and my parents and then carried on.  I had been listening to the Archers and then I swapped to some more of the Wind Up Bird Chronicles.

I ended up driving only for 3hrs 40 and ended up at my brothers around 2pm.  I had a protein bar and a banana for lunch on the go and he did offer me some lunch, but he'd already eaten.  When I arrived at my brothers it was just the 2 oldest girls Beatrice and Florence and they were very hyper and excited to see me.  My brother's wife came back shortly after with the two youngest boys Lenny and Winston.  They were also quite excited and Winston was doing ok after a couple of trips to hospital this week as he'd cut his hand and they weren't sure if he'd need it stitching, but fortunately he didn't.  They drew some pictures on the patio in chalk and then I headed over to see my parents in the garden.  I managed to curb my alloy wheels when I was parking the car and I really need to sort out my insurance claim to get them fixed up.

They've done a lot of gardening during lockdown including planting melons, aubergines, courgettes, tomatoes, cauliflowers, nasteriums, cucumber, lettuces and sweetcorn.   We sat outside and chatted and I gave them some malbec and some prosecco as well as a rag wreath I finished off under lockdown.

We went for a walk around the recreation field at the back of the house, it was a nice walk, but it's sad that at the back of the garages people have just dumped mattresses, fridges and other rubbish.  I used to think that the street was a really nice area, but some of it with my eyes these days just looks a bit tatty.

I texted my brother to find out what to do for food that evening and suggested I bought them a takeaway and he suggested I come back for around 7pm to read a story for the girls.  By the time I'd moved a few things around in my car it was five past seven and Beatrice told me off for being late.  

I read them Andy Pandy and Hansel and Gretel and made up a story about some cats stealing  a fish, they were very excited and out of routine and I felt a bit guilty as it took them a while to fall asleep and they tried hard to convince me that I should sleep in their room!

I went downstairs and we chatted whilst Steph fed Winston and he fell asleep and then we ordered a curry from the Raj using the Uber Eats app with a code that gave me £20 off and my brother a £15 off voucher.  By the time we'd faffed around the food was ordered around 9.30pm and I ordered some poppodoms with dips, Tom Yum seafood soup and a vegetable thalia and a portion of lemon rice which was way bigger than I'd expected so there were a lot of leftovers.  

We ended up chatting until around 1.30am discussing holidays and indeed lack of holidays as kids, something that seemed to bother my brother more than me, the fact that they still have a Range Rover in the garage and my brother worked out it was last taxed in 1995 and could be worth a lot these days - I said that when the time comes, he can deal with it.

I eventually fell asleep around 2am and woke up a few times, as I was quite warm and there were a few odd noises, but I was fairly comfortable on my sleeping bag on the sofa.  The kids initially woke up about 6.30am and came downstairs around 7.30am and I had cornflakes for breakfast and a couple of coffees as I was knackered!  The kids did some more chalk drawing in the garden and played with the bubble machine when it turned 9am and screamed a fair bit!  I had a shower which I desperately needed and then headed over to my parents for around 11am and we chatted in the garden some more and then had lunch of ham, cheese and salad sandwiches including home grown yellow tomatoes.  I went to the toilet in their house in my mask and sanitised before I went in and sprayed down the toilet after I left.  We went for another walk aound the field and I tracked it and it was just under 1K - they could make a parkrun there!  I managed to find a green parakeet feather by my parents house as they hang out there, there was also a nest in their kiwi bush and I couldn't work out what bird lived in it.

I set off home about 1.30pm and my Mum gave me fabric for some masks, some soap and some lemon drizzle cake Naked bars and an aubergine and nasterium.  The satnav gave an ETA of 6pm and it was a bit slow on the M25 and then there were some slow sections on the M1 with roadworks, but nothing stationary fortunately.  I chatted away to Alan for a big chunk of the journey and really missed him when I was away.  I then listened to more Wind Up Bird Chronicles - it's a very very long audio book!  I got to Leicester Forest East services just over half way and went to the toilet and it was a lot less busy than Watford Gap yesterday and so I braved the Waitrose and bought sushi as I'd been craving it as not had any for ages as well as some pepsi max and kefir.

I drove for another hour, but ended up stopping at Woodall as I started to feel too tired, so I went to the loo and emptied some rubbish to get a bit of a walk in and some fresh air.  Then my sat nav said an hour to do 35 miles, but it included a bit diversion through some South Yorkshire villages and so I was quite slow.

I was home for 5.45pm and about 3 hours 45 driving time and 20 - 25 mins stopping and break times.

I unpacked the car and said hello to Qubit who was hiding in a box and then had a cuddle with Alan and then a quick tea and sit down watching some cricket.

I decided to go for a run around 7.30pm and do about 8K and take it steady.  I listened to more Wind Up Bird Chronicles and did my Lumby Loop circuit and then as I got towards the end my stomach felt really odd and I had to run in and go straight to the toilet.  I then had a shower and Alan finished making tea of Carribean beef and courgette rice, I quick hung some washing out and we ate and watched Storage Hunters UK.  I prepped some strawberries and cream and then cleaned up the kitchen.

Isolation Journal 88

I read some more of the Matt Haig "The Midnight Library" last night - it's such a good book.

I got up early as I needed to go to the Covid Test centre and so I was awake at 7.15am and left the house 20 mins later.  I got to the site around 8.10am and was done with a self test really quickly, it was the same as last time and I defintely gagged and so I hope I did it properly.  

I then got home and made breakfast and emptied the dishwasher and made breakfast granola, Skyr and coffee, today was a 3 coffee day.  I also had a worry message from a friend on Facebook to say that the block my flat is in was flooded, so I rang the letting agents, although they couldn't get hold of my tenant they seem to think it's ok.  

I had a quick call with Matt as everyone else was on holiday and then cracked on with work and had a reasonably productive day, arranging interviews for Rachel, sorting out a few nigglying things and hopefully picking up an exclusive process with a charity.

For lunch we cooked sausages and I made some salad with some of the kohl rabi from the veg box and I also used carrot, cabbage, coriander, red cabbage and tomato and the leftover potato wedges.  

I worked through until around 7.30pm as I had a lot of emails to shift and a proposal to write and a few linkedin searches to do.

I made tea and chatted to my brother and the kids who were getting into bed and discussed going back tomorrow.  I didn't have my test result, but I'm pretty sure I don't have Covid as my only symptoms into the app were a sore throat and my temperature is only 36.8.  I didn't feel like running though so I've only run twice this week!

We had pork and apple burgers with salad and wedges from Hello Fresh for tea, I had my gu cheesecake for pudding.

We watched Peep Show and Alan went for a bath and so I watched Catfish.

Isolation Journal 87

Today has felt hard, I woke up ok and got signed on for work and went straight into a public sector meeting.  We were also doing a BD day so lots of things to organise, calls to complete.   I had coffee and then I had skyr and granola for breakfast.  Seeing my Mum sharing an ignorant post on facebook set me up for a day of feeling frustrated basically "I don't care if you're gay, but don't rub my face in it" I pointed out that if it wasn't for suffagettes protesting quite violently we wouldn't have the vote as women - she's not replied.

I had a morning of sorting out lots of issues rather than being able to be hugely productive, but then I had a meeting with the other Mental Health Champions and discussed some of the things that we were seeing people experience and discussed concerns about going back to the office.

I made burgers and salad for lunch and Alan had ordered an Amazon Echo Dot clock to entertain us.  I then headed out shortly afterwards to have a smear test at the doctors, I ended up there 10 minutes early and so I had to wait in the car and took a call about rolling out some MH Champions stuff specifically in the North.  

I went into reception at my appointment time and had to then wait outside, the smear was a standard test, I just made sure that I'd worn my mask.  When I got back the veg box order from the Organic Pantry had arrived with carrots, kohl rabi, cabbage, potatoes, yellow courgettes, apples, potatoes, satsumas and bananas.

I had an ice lolly when I got back and then worked through until around 7.30pm and Alan made aubergine tacos from Hello Fresh for tea and we ate at the dining room table.

We went for a walk of about 2K and 30 mins and then I watered the plants and was a bit sad that the potato plants had slightly swamped the carrot seedlings and I'm not sure if they will have survived it.  The tomatoes I planted from 1 cherry tomato at the start of lockdown are now doing really well.  

I came inside and tidied the kitchen and sat down to watch some TV - South Park and Storage Hunters.  My throat is feeling sore, I feel a bit naseous and tired and so I booked myself a Covid test for 8am tomorrow.  I realised today I have 15.5 days of annual leave I need to take still, but Alan only has about 8.

Isolation Journal 86

I had a reasonable night of sleep and woke up and faffed around on my phone so only had a chance to grab a coffee before logging onto the morning call.

It feels like a bit of an unproductive day, but I did manage to book and complete 2 meetings with clients and get through some calls with people I've not spoken to for a long time.

I had the first of the client meetings at 12pm and I'd only picked up breakfast around 11am which was yoghurt, granola, lemon curd and apple and so I made a ham sandwich with salad for lunch and finally finished eating it around 2.30pm.

Maya was insistent on sitting on my keyboard an awful lot today and stole my water at one point.  I had to make sure that I'd locked her out of the room for one of the meetings with the clients.

I caught up with a friend who I'd placed previously to see how she was getting on and it was good to catch up with her.

Finished work around 7.20pm and then cooked dinner which was a really complicated Hello Fresh recipe of Chicken Katsu burgers, salad and wedges and had 3 different sauces to mix in 3 different bowls and breadcrumbs, it was really tasty, but I should have saved half for tomorrow as it had 1275 calories in!

We watched Peep Show and then I went out to run up and down the driveway at 10pm and did just over 5K in about 31 minutes and at least managed to burn some calories back.  

I'm now in a boring bit of "The Windup Bird Chronicles" the main character is talking about a story of war with the Mongols and it's very long and involved.  I cleaned the kitchen and had a bath and my heart rate went up to "high stress" in the bath. 

I also found out my youngest nephew needs stitches under general anasthetic tomorrow as he'd cut his hand on a jar of olives that he managed to break, I hope that he's ok.

Alan seemed a bit better today thankfully, so I hope he is on the mend at last.

Isolation Journal 85

12 weeks and one day of journaling every day, I wonder how long I'll keep this going for?  Today I woke up early again as we'd made it to bed at a reasonable time and had read a bit of Matt Haig's - The Midnight Library - it's really good!  I had nearly 8 hours of sleep and I went back to sleep for an hour and then got up for a quick shower.

Breakfast was cornflakes and it was a two coffee day.

Kicked off at 9am and then had a meeting with some other colleagues at 9.30am and then a client meeting/interview with a really great candidate at 10am that went on for an hour and twenty minutes.  I had calls and emails from my boss whilst this was going on with "are you in today?" but obviously I couldn't respond. 

I then had to prep 2 candidates for interviews that afternoon and prep for a national meeting, I was glad I prepped as they asked for my update first and I'm not sure I did a very good job, I hope I did ok.

I realised at 3pm I'd not had lunch so quickly made a sausage sandwich with lettuce, tomato and some cucumber with mayo and sriacha.  Alan is still feeling poorly and so he just had some toast.

I finished work eventually at 7pm, it was a long day and I really wanted to try out my new trainers that arrived and they were great - I ran my first KM in 4 minutes 19 and my first mile in 7.08 and they felt so good on my feet!  I did 5k in 24.34 which is my fastest for a very long time.  I listened to more of the Wind Up Bird Chronicles.

Alan made Hello Fresh for tea and it was a pasta bake and there was enough to save a portion for tomorrow lunch.   I tidied up the kitchen, lounge and dining room and set off a load of washing.

We watched Peep Show and then I had a shower and filled the bath for Alan and then got distracted when he came into my office looking at beds as he wants a more comfy bed and so we tried to find a good storage bed that is Super King Size.

We then started to have ideas about loft beds in the spare room that would give us more storage space so we wouldn't need a bed with storage space...

Isolation Journal 84

Alan woke up at least an hour earlier than we needed to be up and so he went downstairs and I snoozed for another hour and listened to headspace to get back to sleep.  I had two slices of toast and marmite for breakfast and 2 coffees.  Alan is still feeling bad with his ear and lack of sleep, but the GPs are being really careful with who they'll see.

We had a kick off meeting and it was quite productive and then I caught up with Rachel as she was in the office today, but couldn't get logged onto the call.  Alan was on a call and Qubit brought in a mouse and put it in his shoe, so I had to rescue it for him.

I booked a good candidate meeting for tomorrow morning and then I dealt with some of the work for Katie who is off on holiday.  It was a busy day and I made a few calls for myself and then got downstairs and did pilates online.  I've still got the leg nerve issue and so I was taking it easy, but it wasn't too painful.

We had reheated Chinese leftovers from Friday evening for lunch and then I had a peach as a snack a bit later on.

I had a few more MS Teams meetings and managed to land an offer for Katie which was good news.  It got sunnier later on in the day so I opened the window and Maya got out on the flat roof and then climbed next door and tried to get in Ally's window, I managed to encourage her back with some more treats.

As I finished my last MS Teams meeting I then realised I'd picked up another 16 jobs, although none for me, it seems to be a trend.

Good news is that the government has u-turned on the A'level results and so hopefully a lot of the affected students will still be able to go to their chosen University.

I worked through until 6.30pm when I loaded up Zoom and we logged on for a team building activity of a virtual escape room.  I'd chosen one with a rogue CEO who was being investigated, I'd selected "Advanced" and it was really hard!  It took about 2 hours and I had a glass of fizz and Alan cooked dinner which was a hello fresh meanball sub.  

I then watched more Storage Hunters, cleaned the kitchen and mopped the floors and had a bit of cheese and a chocolate ice lolly.

Isolation Journal 83

Again I woke up quite late, but Alan was still asleep so I went into the other room to mess around on my phone until Qubit demanded I fed him, so I did and then he was sick onto the table so I had to clean it up.

I managed to finish Little Fires Everywhere as Alan went to sleep in the other room and it was a great book - It grabbed me through from about 100 pages in and I really wanted to keep reading on.  It now means I can start my new Matt Haig book - hooray!

I decided to get up and go for a run to get it out the way and so I steadily did 9.1K through a Lumby Loop and a few different segments.  My left leg was quite stingy with the nerve thing that I've had for the last few days, but not really whilst I was running, but I took a fairly steady pace.  It was warm, but started to drizzle as I was running.

When I got back Alan had made pancake batter and so made us some pancakes with apple sauce with maple syrup.  We watched some UK Celebrity Storage Hunters and then I tidied and hoovered a bit before having a bath.

We then went over to see Alan's brother and the kids and had pizza cooked in the BBQ oven which was delicious.  The kids were quite hyper and excited to see us and did a lot of running around.  Winston dog was also excited to see us.  I had a glass of prosecco as Alan was driving us to and from.  I also gave some of the spare bedding plants to them as I'd run out of space to plant them.  I ordered some Amazon Prime Now whilst we were chatting as I figured I needed some ibuprofen gel and ibuprofen for my leg, hopefully it will help.

We got back just before 10pm and the order arrived about 30 minutes afterwards and so we watched more UK Celebrity Storage Hunters and cuddled the cats who were being particularly loving.  

I realised I've run about 1010K in my current trainers and I've not used my Vitality half price Runners Need discount yet for this year - my last pair were bought back in November 2019.  I decided to buy some next generation Asics Nimbus 22 and also a pair of Aftershokz headphones.  

Isolation Journal 82

Alan I think had a bit of a sleepless night and moved around a lot and I ended up waking up around 7.30am and then slept a bit more until 8.30am and then woke up and went in the spare room to mess around on my phone and read and I had a message from my Mum as she was worried that the weather would be poor and as we'd be meeting in the garden we worked out that it wouldn't be as much point.  So I decided to drive down next weekend instead.  My Dad also posted a highly irritating post on facebook about basically people not working shouldn't be getting benefits and that you can't tax the poor into prosperity - he's been retired for 23 years and worked for 33, my Mum probably only worked full time for about 7/8 years and then stopped to have children and didn't really work much other than a part time role when I was about 13 and another that went full time when I was at unin, but our generation are likely to have to work until around 70 years old and I don't feel this way.  As Alan pointed out, people can work extremely hard and earn less than millionnaires or indeed billionnaires as wealth isn't a clear indication of work ethic and especially not fairness.  

I stayed in the spare room messing around on my phone and reading "Little Fires Everywhere" until he woke up when the door bell went at around 11.30am and I suggested we should have breakfast or maybe brunch instead.  The door was Royal Mail who had delivered the cool mat to us that I'd ordered for him.

I decided to go to Berts Barrow and I bought some milk, cream, bread, sausages, burgers, lettuce, tomatoes, strawberries, cucumber, cold brew vanilla flavoured yoghurt, broccoli and it was about £25.  There was about the right number of people in the shop, I wore my mask and there was a queue outside when I finished.  

I made scrambled eggs on toast with sausages and coffees and orange juice.  I had marmite on my toast and some sriracha sauce.

Alan introduced me to the very addictive show of Storage Hunters and I watched far too much of this today!  We discussed going for a walk and thought about going to Malham Cove, but neither of us fancied driving too far and so we went to St Aiden's where we've run a race at before, but not walked around.  As RSPB members we get to take advantage of free parking which was good.  We walked about 5K in around an hour and a half and chatted and got rained on a bit which was actually quite nice.  Alan has been really tired and lethargic and I was feeling a bit low energy today as well.

It was Jenny's birthday today and I'd ordered her some flowers and also some craft stuff, I think she's finding things a bit challenging at the moment, so hopefully it helped to cheer her up.

We drove back and then watched more TV (more Storage Hunters), and I had some toast as a snack and more storage hunters and Alan went to cook the last Hello Fresh recipe which was fish, but the fish had massively gone off so he made a couple of burgers instead.

I'm sort of glad I didn't go today as I've been feeling tired and have a bit of a sore throat, not sure where I would have caught anything from.

Isolation Journal 81

Alan was up until around 4am doing his exam, so sleep was a bit broken.  I had apple, granola, yoghurt and lemon curd for breakfast, but quite late and I also had 2 coffees.  I got the milk and orange juice in.

We had a kick off call at 9am and I also then had a handover call with Katie who is off on holiday, so I will need to work out how to recruit marketing people for the next 2 weeks.

Today was very much a sort out of admin and emails day, but I did also have some good conversations with candidates and clients and will be more organised for next week.

The game that I ordered for Alan arrived and we thought about playing it today, but we were both a bit too tired.

I made some pasta, mushrooms, garlic, onion and courgette with cream for a fairly late lunch at around 1.30pm.  I set off the dishwasher after lunch.  I chatted to my brother as I'd been debating going to see him and my parents this weekend.  It's a really long drive, but I'm not likely to see them all that easily for a while and I'd feel uncomfortable going after I'm back in the office again.  It seems easier to stay with my brother than a hotel or indeed my parents and at least I know he's had Covid, so it's less likely he'll have it.  I'm slightly worried about the flash floods forecast for down towards the south, so I'll have to check the weather warnings before I set off.  

I sorted out some purchase order issues and more admin and got my emails down to a more sensible number, re-wrote a spreadsheet and went through around 30 job applications for a remote working job that had over 139 applications.  I had to sort through them before I could delete them.  

I managed to speak to the letting agents of my flat to find out whether the key had gone missing as they had not got back to 3 emails.  Apparently the tenant had moved in ok and there was some works I'd paid out for, but now that it's been done I should receive a statement update soon.  

I finished work at around 7.30pm and we ordered a Chinese - I had hot and sour soup, chips, crispy beef in peking sauce and some waterchesnuts and bamboo shoots, Alan had a spring roll, chicken in ginger and garlic and singapore noodles and banana fritters.  I am very full now!  

I went out for a run and again was fairly fast, even though my legs ache from yesterday and I did 6K in just over 30 mins including a PR on a segment and came 7th overall.  The takeaway was delivered about 1.5 hours later, but was good, I had to ring up and make sure it was on it's way.

I spoke to my parents who seem worried about me coming, but happy to see me in the garden.  It will be a long drive, so I should really go to bed at a sensible time.

I managed to do a bit more linked in work whilst watching TV, mostly Dave and Taskmaster, 8 out of 10 cats does Countdown and QI and a bit of CSI New York.

I also stopped my anxiety, but finally booking the virtual escape room ready for Monday - we're going to try this one Out of Hours

Isolation Journal 80

 A bit groggy again this morning, quick coffee and then onto the team call briefly before a 9.15am training session on coaching with Jane who is also my mentor and she's great!  

We talked about setting SMART (Specific, Measurable, Achievable, Realistic and Time limited) goals.  Then we talked about GROW coaching model where you identifiy the goal the coachee wants to set themselves, discover the current reality, discuss options and then come up with a way forward.  It was a really useful session and left me feeling motivated.

I then had a few calls and went and did Pilates at 12pm which was a very sweaty and warm affair.  2 things arrived for me whilst I was doing the class, my copy of The Midnight Library by Matt Haig that I ordered when I booked onto the Guardian Live event this evening which was an interview and Q&A with him and also my Arena Flowers subscription which this week are lots of pink lisianthus alissa.

I dashed back upstairs to deal with some calls whilst I put some potato waffles and sausages in the oven to cook and arranged my flowers into vases.

The afternoon was a mix of meetings and admin, I hopefully will get more time for proactive calling tomorrow.  We had a good meeting with a client, although I think we'll need to dig a little deeper for candidates in terms of what they are looking for.

I finished up around 6.30pm and had to rush to cook dinner whilst listening to the Archers and I made Hello Fresh tacos with aubergine, beans and feta.  My Guardian Live event started as I finished up tea and they asked the question that I had emailed in when I booked on about what advice Matt Haig might have given to himself 20 years ago.  I love listening to him talk and wish that it was a bit longer than an hour.

I let my food go down a bit and then went out for a run, I'd not got many particular goals for this run, but I was going quite fast and my garmin gave me a +7 improvement on my fitness.  I managed to get my fastest 5K time for a while of 24.43 and ran 6K at a pace of 8.05 per mile.  

I got in and watered the plants and then had a bath and wasted a lot of time in the bath.

Alan has been busy doing his exam and is likely to be up until 4am finishing it.  Some men came to fix the oil stain on the drive, it was noisy for hours and looks no different.

Qubit managed to get 2 dinners by meowing loudly at both me and Alan.

I completed my Tania Hershman challenge last night by writing it all down by hand.  Will do some more this evening and then I need to definitely try and get back to the novel writing if I can.