Diary of a self-isolator – week 48

A lighthearted look at a few memories and the situation over the last seven days in our house.

Sunday 08/02/2021 – Day 330

Got up this morning to put last weeks ramblings on Facebook and it felt really cold in the Harvey Mansions, so I threw caution to the wind and put a pullover on, (bet you thought I was going to say I turned the heating up didn’t you).

I’ve had some wonderful feedback on the new canopy, but it isn’t really completed yet, the lovely Mrs H has got to cast her magic wand over it – if she can find out where I’ve hidden my wallet!

On this day in 1812 my biggest hero Charles Dickens, English journalist and novelist was born. He is considered the greatest novelist of the Victorian period. He created characters such as Oliver Twist, Nicholas Nickleby and David Copperfield and amongst his other works were The Old Curiosity Shop, A Christmas Carol, Great Expectations, Bleak House and many, many more. If I had ten per cent of that man’s writing talent, I would be a very happy writer.

Also on this day in 1974 Prime Minister Edward Heath announced a general election and appealed to the miners to suspend their planned strike, anyone remember when to reduce electricity consumption, and thus conserve coal stocks, Conservative Prime Minister, Edward Heath, announced a number of measures on 13 December 1973, including the Three-Day Work Order, which came into force at midnight on 31 December. Commercial consumption of electricity would be limited to three consecutive days each week. Heath’s objectives were business continuity and survival and to avoid further inflation and a crisis. Rather than risk a total shutdown, working time was reduced to prolong the life of available fuel stocks. Television broadcasts were to shut down at 22:30 each evening, and most pubs were closed; due to the power surges generated at 22:30, the Central Electricity Generating Board argued for a staggered shutdown on BBC and ITV alternating nightly, and this was eventually introduced. The television broadcasting restrictions were introduced on 17 December 1973, suspended for the Christmas and New Year period, and lifted on 8 February 1974. My Mum had a pub at the time and it was complete chaos when all the beer was brought up from the cellar by electric. There is nothing worse than drinking beer from a bucket which has been filled and brought up from the cellar, it was a good job the rooms were all candlelit, if the stalwarts in the lounge could see what they were drinking they would have taken it back to the bar!

Our Winter Sundays as youngsters were often spent around the 14 inch TV screen watching Old Mother Riley, George Formby or Tommy Trinder in films that you just don’t see now, all we seem to get is sport!, But there would be at least seven of us sat there, if the old man was in a generous mood we would have had  sixpence pocket money, so inevitably we’d all be sat there chomping on Pineapple chunks, pear drops or the quieter Dolly Mixtures and Wine gums. At Teatime mum would open a tin of Carnation milk and a couple of tins of pears or peaches and we’d happily tuck into that for our tea, mopping up with a slice of Mother’s Pride or a ‘piece’ as we called it back then. Sometimes mum would make some of her lovely custard and it would be poured over either apple pie (homemade of course) or she would open a tin of prunes, it was always strange to see half a dozen bowls – the ones with those rims on them – on the drainer with half a dozen stones around the rim, another favourite of course was Jelly and custard, even from an early age we were encouraged to drink tea, so that would have been our beverage, it was either that or council pop (water). But they were happy days and I remember them with great fondness, every time I write about them another big chunk of information comes to mind, so the story keeps unfolding as I get older.

Sunday night of course was always bath night, this would be the reason we were all sat in the ‘best room’ on a Sunday afternoon, the fire had to be lit to heat the water for bath time, the youngest always went first, and by the time the eldest got their bath it was quite cold and very scummy, there was no emersion heater back then and the boiler would take hours to heat the boiler again.

There were 15845 new cases today, the registered deaths were thankfully quite low at 373 almost 200 down on last Sunday.

Monday 08/02/2021 – Day 331

I was lay in bed this morning remembering something that always makes me wince, apparently a snail can move across the edge of a razor blade without hurting itself, it produces so much slime that it can glide with ease, I lay there thinking that I know a few people like that!

The plan today was to go outside and paint the decking, but the ‘Beast from the East two‘  has put a stop to that, although we are only having snow flurries it is bitterly cold out there, I know this for a fact because I had to go down to the fridge in the shed to get more milk at 6.30 am this morning, why don’t I check on a night? – I have no idea!

Mrs H has woken up and the poor thing doesn’t feel very well, she is aching all over and looks poorly, so she’s gone back to bed after taking a couple of paracetamol. I will keep checking on her during the day, but it is a little worrying as to how quick it has come on.

On this day in 1952 when I was just 12 days old Princess Elizabeth formally proclaimed herself Queen and Head of the Commonwealth and Defender of the Faith. Lords of the Council, numbering 150, representatives from the Commonwealth and officials from the City of London, including the Lord Mayor and other dignitaries witnessed the accession of the deceased king’s eldest daughter

Also on this day in 1983 Shergar, the Aga Khan’s Derby winner, was kidnapped from a stable in County Kildare, Ireland. The kidnappers demanded a ransom of £2 million, which was never paid. The horse was never seen again. I’ve backed a few horses like that!

Some of you ask how Mrs H and I get on so well during lockdown, well, I’m here to tell you that it’s because we are both so loving toward one another, for example – over Christmas she helped me look for my chocolate bar that she had eaten the day before- now that is sheer love!

New cases today were 14104 four and a half thousand down on last Monday, deaths were once again very low at 333, that is still too many grieving families.

Tuesday 09/02/2021 – Day 332

I was lay in bed this morning thinking, isn’t it strange that as you get older your eyesight gets weaker, yet your ability to see through people becomes a lot stronger!

Report on Mrs H who is feeling and looking a bit better today but still feeling drained – beginning to wonder if she’s turned into an empty wine bottle poor thing. But I looked after her yesterday, I took her umpteen cups of coffee, made her some soup and toast, but most importantly, I let her sleep and rest, but on the evening she remarked that I had neglected her and left her on her own, I put it down to the lack of human contact all day!

This got me thinking about when we were young and became ill, unlike todays mum’s ours didn’t have to go to work (mostly) so most of the time it didn’t raise any problems, but there was always the chance that you were ‘swinging the lead’ (skiving) because you had PE or maths that day. However, if your mum was like mine, she could take just one look and know without fail whether you were ill or not, the ‘look’ was usually followed by a hand to the brow, a slight warmth to the forehead would ensure a day off, I personally always found a hot cup of tea to the forehead while she wasn’t looking did the trick alright. Then out would come the mixture usually a dose of Castor oil or some similar item held in the medicine cupboard, then it would be back to bed, mum would bring the inevitable bottle of Lucozade up the stairs, this was promised to cure any ailment in a child, it would be a small miracle when you would jump out of bed like a spring chicken the very next day. Of course, childhood illnesses in my day weren’t a thing to be sneezed at (sorry), doing PE outside in freezing cold weather in pants and vest – while your teacher stood there all wrapped up sucking on a woodbine – didn’t help of course. All those star jumps, press ups, and touching of the toes designed to keep you warm – didn’t! Then you would be taken inside shivering and forced to drink a third of a pint of milk that had arrived frozen earlier that morning, so was put by the radiators to thaw out and was now luke warm. I always wanted to be a milk monitor, no-one ever noticed if they drank theirs or not.  Schooling to me was very boring, same old thing day after day. Visits from the school nurse would break up the daily routine.  But of course, all that came to a halt in 1971 when Thatcher the Milk snatcher stopped the free milk, then a few years later, all those kids that were robbed of their daily nourishment voted her in as Prime Minister, do we Brits never learn? Back then there was also Nora the nit nurse who used to make regular visits to check for headlice and all the children in each class would line up to be examined in turn, their hair being combed nay scraped with a shiny metal nit comb to see if there was any infestation, of course, what we didn’t know as we carried our purple liquid on the ‘walk of shame’ past the long line of children waiting to go in,  was that nits were only found in clean hair. There were also routine eye and hearing tests, and visits from that sadistic butcher laughingly known as the school dentist. No wonder so many of my generation have false teeth those dentists put us off for life, I have since learned that they got paid for each extraction and each filling, but they had to provide their own anaesthetic, explains a lot of the pain I suffered at their hands.

There was also the polio vaccine, given at school to every child on a sugar lump. Measles, German Measles and Mumps were not vaccinated against; most children contracted these diseases in regular childhood, so, if like me, you came from a large family it would spread like wildfire throughout the household.  German Measles, or Rubella, could also affect unborn babies in the womb if contracted in pregnancy, and so if a girl in the class caught German Measles, it was not uncommon for her mother to throw a tea party for the rest of the girls so they could also catch the disease.

I could go on about this forever, I may have to revisit childhood health again.

Talking of school, I am so glad I was taught to play the recorder whilst there, I’ve lost count of the times I’ve solved a problem with a quick blast of Three Blind Mice!

It’s no wonder that I was forever feigning illness!

New cases continue to fall, there were 12364 new cases today, registered deaths however were 1052 the highest in almost a week.

Wednesday 10/02/2021 – Day 333

Woke up this morning and thought I’d try my luck on our talking scales, I got on and they said I should be aware of social distancing, could the other person please get off!

Turned on the TV, which is a rarity for me as I can’t stand Piers Morgan, and there he was staring out at me, eating his breakfast, he left Susanna Reid looking on in horror as he gave the viral Weetabix and baked beans combination a taste test live on Good Morning Britain.

The journalist, 55, didn’t hesitate to sample the dish on air after social media was sent into meltdown earlier this week when Weetabix tweeted out their bizarre new recipe – to a decidedly divided response.

Never one to shy away from controversial matters, Piers Morgan happily tucked in to the pile of loaded cereal, while rationalising the recipe. Rest assured dear reader, I won’t be trying it, Mrs H says I spend far too much time in the loo as it is.

I have spent the majority of today indoors in the warmth, however, there is no rest for the wicked as most of my readers know, so I began to change three of Mrs H’s large candle lit lanterns into more permanent electric ones. Remember in the seventies when you’d had a romantic meal and shared a bottle of Mateus Rose wine, the idea was that you kept the empty and turned it into a table lamp, there are dozens of them at car boots after acrimonious break ups etc. Well Mrs H had a couple of those huge glass and metal lanterns that were designed to hold a candle but were costing a small ransom in batteries, so I sent off for the correct lamp fittings and set about changing them to electric. I always have my music on whilst I work and I was just about to test the first lamp when ‘Come on Baby Light My Fire’ by the Dors started to play, so, just to be on the safe side I waited a few minutes. The result is that Mrs H has now got three brand new table lamps and they have cost less than a fiver each.

I hate mobile phones so I always tend to leave mine in the kitchen, I was in the lounge next to Mrs h last night, she was enjoying a quick snack and texting on her phone (don’t you just love multi-taskers?)  as we watched TV, then I heard my phone ring in the kitchen, I went in and read the message, it was from Mrs H and read “On your way back bring the salt with you” can you believe the cheek of the woman.

There were 13013 new cases today, 6000 less than last week, deaths were still hovering around the 1000 mark.

Thursday 11/02/2021 – Day – 334

I was lay awake this morning thinking and wondering, do you realise that your good health and future is linked to the common sense of others? Frightening isn’t it!

I had to finally brave this freezing cold weather and go out into the repair shop to tidy the place up, I vowed when it was completed that I would never let it become like the old garage used to be – a dump! But over the past few weeks whilst I was doing her highness’s canopy, I let it get into a bit of a state, in fact, it looks like a council estate rummage sale five minutes after the doors were opened, and believe me, I know that’s true, I’ve been to enough of them myself. But dear Mrs H was right behind me as usual, suggesting that I go in and put the heater on for an hour before I started! Anyway, the upshot is that I now have a nice clean work area once again, everything is back where it should be and I am ready for Mrs H’s next command – when it gets warmer of course.

On this day in 1975 Margaret Thatcher won the Conservative Party Leadership and became the first woman leader of a British political party. And also in 1976 John Curry became the first Briton to win a gold medal for men’s figure skating. The result of these two historic events is that we have all been skating on thin ice ever since.

Confucius say If you see a man holding the car door open for his wife, you can be sure of one thing, his car is brand new or his wife is!

Isn’t it strange how, in these days of uncertainty you just can’t trust anyone, I read this in the paper yesterday. A bride, on her wedding night turned to her new husband and whispered;

“I have to confess darling, I was once a hooker.”

“Mmm’ he said unperturbed by the revelation, “That sounds interesting, quite erotic actually, tell me more.”

“Well” she replied, “My name was Nigel and I played for Wigan.”

There were 13494 new cases today, the highest since Monday, there was also a further 678 registered deaths.

Friday 12/02/2021 – Day 335

The trouble with living in a semi-detached is the thin walls, my neighbours are complaining about the loud moans and groans accompanied with lots of puffing and panting coming from our bedroom every morning – if only they knew that I was just trying to put my socks on.

On this day in 1809 Charles Darwin, English naturalist and author of The Origin of Species, was born, in Shrewsbury. He established that all species of life have descended over time from common ancestry, and proposed that this branching pattern of evolution resulted from a process that he called natural selection. He published his theory with compelling evidence for evolution in his 1859 book On the Origin of Species. By the 1870s the scientific community and much of the general public accepted evolution as a fact.  George reckons that if there are any of you out there that don’t believe we came from apes, then you should nip down to his local any Saturday night after lockdown.

Also on this day in 1993 A 2 year old boy, James Bulger, was abducted from the Strand Shopping Centre, Bootle, and later killed by two 10 year old boys, Jon Venables and Robert Thompson. They were the youngest people to be charged with murder in England and Wales during the 20th century. A mere eight years later, in June 2001, the parole board ruled that the boys were no longer a threat to public safety and could be released. They were given new identities and moved to secret residence locations but on 2nd March 2010 Jon Venables was returned to prison, short term, for a violation of the terms of his licence of release.

When I was little my siblings always called me ‘spoiled brat’ because I got everything that I asked for, but it wasn’t my fault that our parents just kept having babies until they found one they liked, it is so not my issue!

Mrs H and myself have hardly sat down all day, firstly I had a delivery from B & Q, then I had some more timber delivered to make Mrs H some planters, at 11.30 Mrs H’s dozen red roses arrived with her Valentine card, she still won’t tell me who sent them, just joking, it was me of course. At 2.30 the Tesco delivery arrived and we’d only just finished and the door bell rang again, it was the blinds we’d ordered for outside which were supposed to be coming next week! Avery busy day.

Earlier on I tried to get Mrs H registered for her up and coming pension. First of all she had to be identified, Well, I wish I hadn’t bothered! We were both so stressed by the end of the attempt that we were exhausted, three times we gave them all the information and three times we ran out of time! I even had one of those virtual employees and was speaking to her online still to no avail, in the end I messaged her and told her we weren’t going to bother, we would wait for the official letter. I’ll just have to wait and see if Mrs H is worth hanging on to – moneywise.

There were 15143 new cases today, the highest since Sunday, there was also a further 758 registered deaths.

Saturday 13/02/2021 – Day

I hadn’t heard from George for ages and decided to give him a ring, Rose answered, “Oh, the silly bugger’s only gone and got Covid hasn’t he, well he hasn’t got it but he went next door to borrow one of his tools and a few days later he got a text telling him he had to isolate for ten days, he phoned the neighbour and the air was blue! It seems the neighbour caught it from his Granddaughter after she took him groceries, hang on I’ll get him for you.”

A rather pathetic sounding George came on to the phone.

“Hello, oh alright Eric, yes got a bit of the lurgy, only one more day left though, I need to get out to get Rose a Valentine’s card.” I suggested he stay inside and use Moonpig or Funky Chicken.

“Oh no”, he protested, “The last time I trusted someone to do something for me I got into all sorts of bother. It was when I was courting the first wife back in the fifties I wanted to buy a birthday present for her.

We hadn’t been seeing each other for very long and she lived in Birmingham and I lived in Kidderminster.

So I consulted with my sister and we decided, after careful consideration, that a pair of good quality gloves would strike the right note… not too romantic and not too personal, know what I mean?.

Off I went with my sister to Marks and Spencer’s and we selected a dainty pair of fur lined quality, leather gloves.

My sister bought a pair of sexy knickers for herself at the same time.

Marks and Spencer’s had a “Free Gift Wrap Offer” on as it was Valentine’s. But the shop assistant mixed up the two Items, my sister got the gloves and I – unknowingly – got the knickers.

I was quite excited that I’d found something so I sent off my gift wrapped present in a parcel with the following Letter.

Dear Gladys,

I chose these because I’ve noticed that you are not wearing any when we go out in the evenings. If it had not been for my sister, I would have chosen the long ones with the buttons, but she wears shorter ones (which are easier to remove). These are a very delicate shade, but the lady I bought them from, showed me the pair she had been wearing for the past three weeks and I hardly noticed any marks. I had her try yours on for me and she looked really smart in them even though they were a little bit tight on her.

I wish I was there to put them on for you the first time, as no doubt many other hands will touch them, before I have a chance to see you again.

When you take them off, remember to blow into them a little bit, because they will be naturally a little damp from wearing.??

Just imagine how many times my lips will kiss them during the coming year.

I hope you will wear them for me on our next date.??

All my love,

George

P.S. My mum tells me that the latest style. Is to wear them folded down, with a little bit of fur showing.

He put the phone down so now I have no idea whether or not George was telling the truth, but at least he was back to normal.

I settled down with a Guinness at 1.30 to watch England v Italy in the Six Nations (Rugby for the uninitiated) after last weeks terrible match in the Calcutta cup against Scotland when the ‘auld enemy’ were all over us like a rash, we desperately needed a win, Italy haven’t beaten us in 22 matches, what could possibly go wrong? Five minutes gone and Italy scored a try, we were on the back foot once again, fortunately we came through with a win but they need to up their game against Wales in two weeks time.

A further 13308 new cases were registered today, but the total for my week is 95,271, this is a massive 38,500 down on last week, the number of deaths – although quite high – continues to fall and were 621 today, this was a total of 4816 since last Sunday, 1700 less than last weeks total. There were 2,125,331 people recovered, a whopping 235,455 up on last weeks figure. This means that the Governments lockdown is at last beginning to bear fruit, let’s hope that the journalists and opposition don’t bully Boris into easing restrictions too early.

Well, dear reader, that’s my lot for yet another week. I’ll leave you with images of my loved one’s Valentine’s surprise – what’s that lads, you had forgotten – oh dear, never mind, the garage down the road maty still be open.

It’s been emotional …………………..