I went out to dinner with three friends this evening and then we went to a comedy gig afterwards. Great evening or super-spreader event? Perhaps a bit of both. I miss the old days when going out didn’t feel mildly criminal.
The Crown Season 2
So, back to the dentist to get my tooth fixed. This afternoon he did prep work which involved a fair amount of drilling. At this moment, I have a numb mouth and a temporary crown. I’m back in on December 17 to get my permanent crown. The Friday before Christmas, I rejoice.
In other news, herself appears to be improving, I base this on the reduced communication levels. She has had one of her poems published in a college magazine and is pleased.
And, finally, something else in the good news side of the ledger. I am very, very slowly making my way through a fat volume on the history of Dublin. There was a passing reference to the Worth Library which I had never heard of before. I emailed to find out about visiting hours and I got a lovely telephone call from the librarian, thanking me for my interest and pointing me towards their online exhibitions. Alas, they are closed due to Covid but hope to open up to tours again in the Spring. I am quite excited. Middle-aged thrills.
Oh No Redux
So off she went for her PCR at 11.30 this morning and at 8.15 this evening she got her positive result. Alas alack though impressively speedy work by the British testing people, I must say. I spoke briefly to her this morning and she was pretty miserable – in a bad cold kind of way – but not at death’s door.
My sister is a big fan of moonpig which does personalised cards. She went online and got the Princess a card with a personalised message and my sister’s cartoon of a corona virus on the inside. Unfortunately the site kept crashing and my sister had a lot of difficulty with it. This is why the personalised greeting card has, “Get well soon, Caroline!” on the front. The Princess’s name is not Caroline. Funnily enough when I mentioned moonpig at home, both boys said, “Uh oh, data breach,” so perhaps not where you should go for your personalised greeting cards.
In other news, we had online parent-teacher meetings for the boys this evening. This was extremely stressful. I had to be in the office and called in from there and Mr. Waffle and each boy in turn were tuning in from home. The format was five minutes per appointment. It was like academic speed dating. I turned up in other people’s meetings, they turned up in ours, I couldn’t get in to some teachers, the home team couldn’t get in to others. I mean it was better than nothing but I wouldn’t call it a triumph for new technology. On the plus side the teachers love my children. They’re both doing fine, thanks v much. My favourite nugget from the evening was the following: Michael tends to finish his in class economics exercises ahead of the other students and when he’s finished, he pulls out his book from his bag and starts reading, an activity which is apparently tolerated by the economics teacher but he is keen that Michael would stop reading promptly when class recommences. I can imagine.
Oh No!
I rang herself this morning and, startlingly, she picked up the phone. She has a nasty cold and she was miserable. While I was on the phone with her she did three lateral flow tests [swab over your tonsils or where your tonsils would be – best line from the instructions]. Two of the three tests were positive for Covid. She’s locked up in her room and she’s booked in for a PCR test and, you never know, it might be negative but I am not optimistic. My poor child, it is no fun being sick when there is no one to look after you. And she was supposed to be going to Paris at the weekend. Alas alack.
Her father has ordered a box of goodies for her to cheer her up. Poor miss.
More Covid
Two of my colleagues have Covid this week. Both fine, thankfully but not loving the general prevalence levels.
Meanwhile my brother-in-law and his family were due to go skiing in Austria for a week at the start of December. Alas, that adventure has been cancelled as Austria is in lock down.
In unrelated news, my teeth having basically caused me no problems whatsoever for the first 51 years of my life have really pulled out all the stops this year. I was sitting at my desk minding my own business when I noticed that a bit of tooth had crumbled off. This was at the site of an enormous filling and it had already been earmarked as problematic but having spent most of October in the dentist’s chair, I was holding off doing anything about it until next year. Until, of course, it fell out of my head. I’m back in for treatment on Friday afternoon. Sigh.
I met a friend for lunch and he told me how his daughter had to do research on Muhammad Ali for school, so she dutifully prepped away, she was on top of the Rumble in the Jungle. She went into school the next day and the teacher asked her, “What were some of the key events leading to Indian independence?” Mahatma Gandhi was who she was supposed to research apparently.
He also offered me this story which he believes to be true. I really hope it is. The teacher asked a child to get a guillotine, off she skips out of the class. She is gone for ages but finally comes back with 15 other children. “Sorry miss, I thought you said the Gaelic team”.
And finally, in the good news category, Emily Bell’s book is in the bestseller list. Extremely pleased by association.
Notions or Gentrification is Continuing Apace
That was quite a handy shop for fuel, I’ll have you know. And do I really want Beaujolais nouveau which Mr. Waffle says always tastes of bananas?
