Friday 30th July - Falling asleep

 I regularly have what I call 'non-sleeping' nights. Generally I put on my 'cozy-phones'

and listen to a talking book, or the radio. This hasn't been working recently - I blame my choice of books. I set the sleep timer for 30 minutes, and then, because the story is holding my attention, set it for another 30, and maybe even another 30... I was listening to 'The October Man', a Rivers of London book by Ben Aaronvitch, and now I'm three-quarters of the was through 'The Lighthouse' by P D James.

I need to choose something more soporific...

I have tried various breathing methods; in for a count of four, hold for a count of 4, out for a count of four, wait for a count of four... I manage one, maybe two 'circuits' and then I need to do some ordinary breathing again. Or in for four, hold for seven, out for eight and repeat... nope. I can't keep this going without running out of breath.

Last night I tried the US Airforce pilot training method and it worked! I read about it on the internet, and managed to find it in this article along with a whole load of other ideas.

Summarised;

1 relax your face, mouth, eyes

2 relax your chest, arms, hands

3 relax your legs, feet

4 Clear your mind, and imagine a relaxing scene. A couple of suggestions are 'lying in a canoe, looking up at a completely clear blue sky', or lying in a black velvet hammock in a pitch back room'

5 If this doesn't work, say 'don't think, don't think' over and over to yourself.

This should work within 10 seconds (or so!)

https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/
File:Blue_sky_with_wisps_of_cloud_on_a_clear_summer_morning.jpg

Whether it will work two nights in a row is another matter.

Tuesday 27th July - Nearly everything on the list...

 I'm back to playing my Roland digital harpsichord again - it's probably been gathering dust for nearly a year, but what with one thing and another I haven't been playing the piano or anything much. Until I drastically cut down on the teaching back in March last year, I was hardly doing any playing in the evenings and weekends, although I usually did a ' piano project' over the Summer holidays.

this isn't me!

This Summer's project is to try and play some Bach - starting with the Partita in B flat and the Goldberg Variations. I'm not aiming for any great mastery of the Variations - but if I manage get hack my way through each one I shall be very pleased. I'm making more of an effort with the Partita. 

The drawing book - 'Learn to Draw in 30 Days or Less' - continues to astonish me! The last two lessons were on single point perspective - not something I've ever bothered too much about before.

Yesterday's was on how to draw a room;

and today's was drawing a street;

I'm up to lesson 23. Tomorrow I tackle 2-point perspective....

I just follow the instructions, and out pops a picture - how does that work?

Also  a painting - I saw some leaves against an evening sky for just a couple of second on television the other evening, so I did the background one day, the leaves the next, and today added some lines using a pen that has brown sparkly ink.

 The sparkles don't show up much...

The two knitted pot-holders went through the washing machine at 40 degrees as instructed at the end of the knitting pattern, and came out completely felted. The larger one is using the pattern, but I suspect that somewhere along the way things went astray because it is meant to be flat. I made a simplified version for the smaller one. They do look amazing - I shall make some more!

Finally, I am gradually typing up poems written by my grandmother when she was young - they are from around 1910 - 1920. The idea is to collect them into a booklet so that anyone in the family who is interested can have them. (I knew there was some purpose to learning to type at the beginning of this year!). There is a whole box full of her poems, memories, talks to the Mothers Union, stories...

At the moment I am working through an envelope labelled 'Youthful Poems'. At first I found the writing quite tricky, but I am beginning to 'get my eye in'.

Nearly everything on the list, I said - no hoovering, cleaning, tidying, you notice...

Sunday 25th July - Cowering? Per-lease.

 I don't normally go off on a rant, at least, not on this blog, but our latest Health Minister, Sajid Javid, tweeted this yesterday evening;

 I have been tipped over the edge by the use of the word 'cower'. 

I can only assume that in his euphoria about recovering so quickly (in a week - wow!) he has forgotten about all the people - 'his people' - in the sense that he is the one who is supposed to be working to ensure provision of health facilities for everyone - who are still remaining at home for very good reasons.

It is not fear that stops me from socialising, going on holiday or to cafes, shops, theatres. It is the knowledge that I, and many, many others, will almost certainly not be able to 'live' with the virus. 

I bitterly resent the idea that I am 'cowering' from this virus. Like others taking immune suppressant medicines, I am aware that the 'amazing vaccines' probably won't be effective. Like the many, many others with respiratory conditions, I am fairly certain that I do not have the capacity to survive a virus which has such a devastating effect one's ability to breathe.

To describe people who cannot 'live with' this virus as cowards is thoughtless in the extreme.

Ok. Deep breath and see if I can raise my oxygen sats to about 92% - they always drop to about 86% when I get into a strop (normal for healthy people is about 97% or more).

Let's just put this tweet down to careless choice of words, and he's trying to be encouraging and a bit robust - wanting everyone to get out there and back to 'normal' and start rebuilding the economy. 

Sure, but when you have risen to the dizzy heights of the most senior positions in the government of what's left of this country, you should know that you have to think carefully about your choice of words before tweeting to the world. Maybe he still has some Covid brain-fog.

Or, maybe, just maybe, he really did think long and hard and then deliberately chose to tweet those words.

I've just added a new tag to the list - 'furious'.

Saturday 24th July - Water

Woke up to thunder and rain. What a relief after the last few days. We had taken a gamble on not watering the garden last night, and this time it paid off.

Luckily it didn't last for too long - now, at the end of the day, it has become hot and sunny again.

 Sometimes I imagine what I would pack if we suddenly had to deal with imminently being flooded out; what would we salvage? For a start, we'd take the computer upstairs, and any important books and papers. 

Then collect passports (I think mine is out of date), empty my drawer of medicines into a bag, along with portable oxygen concentrator. Toothbrushes, soap, towels, shampoo (I can deal with anything as long as my hair isn't getting me down!). Cats into the cat box, and all the cat food. Scoop up the loo rolls and a tube of germolene which represents my sum total of First Aid equipment. Then food - would we have time for the little storm kettle? It might be useful. Blankets. Pillows.

 

Ah yes, and all the myriad computer and phone chargers... never forget the chargers!

still sort of on the subject of water,

Here are some splodgy watercolours; I have got hold of a thin book by Hazel Sloan called 'Learn to Paint  Watercolours Quickly' and am copying her pictures. 'You can read this book in 30 minutes,' she says, but you will be painting before you reach the end.' True.

I'm looking at her flower sketches at the moment, sloshing the colours on, letting them run together and saying ' well, that'll do,' after a minute or so. I want to use up anA4 sketchbook I started as an experiment, much larger than I have used before, and I don't think I really like it. Or do I? It might be growing on me.

I divided this page into six at the beginning of July, intending to do one square per day, but the picture I painted in the top right square was so awfully awful that I cut it out and threw it in the compost bin, which is why there's a bit of a sunflower showing in that square from the next page.

I did the poppies at the beginning of the month; paint first, following a you-tube tutorial that I half remembered. Then I went over it with a pen which turned out to have sparkly brown ink in it - yes, I'll do that again!

'Try twisting your brush to make the leaf shapes more interesting' she says.

I've got to be a bit careful if I go in for splattering when painting indoors, as the white curtains are a bit close to where I work.

They aren't meant to be 'real' flowers, just 'flowerish' flowers.

Yesterday I set up outside; this end of the garden is in the shade until around lunchtime.

 I wasn't sure how useful a ceramic hot drinks container, given to me as a 'thank-you-teacher' present was going to be, but it is brilliant - there's no risk of rinsing my paintbrush in my coffee any more!  

Friday 23rd July - The Consequence of A Disturbed Night's Sleep

 Every so often I have what I call 'a non-sleeping night'. So then I listen to the World Service, or a podcast, or a talking book, or some music. I use my mp3 player, or my Kindle Fire, and have become reasonably adept at squinting at the screen to read the text without putting my glasses on, and remembering which buttons do what.

Last night was the second one of these nights in a row.

Early this morning, at about 3.15 am, a trip to the bathroom became unavoidable. Before I went back to bed, I cautiously navigated my way, in the dark, to the spare bedroom window, dodging the clothes airer, the bathroom scales and several boxes which I knew were in the way. 

I could make out the stars, and even had the idea that I might have seen a shooting star or two, so then I tiptoed back into our bedroom, managed to find my glasses, and went down stairs, all without waking my Best Beloved from his Beauty sleep.

It was hot everywhere in the house, but once I had gone out into the back garden the air was cool, but not cold. Leo the cat came out with me, looking confused, and we sat together for about quarter of an hour, staring up at the stars, and, yes, the occasional shooting star. (MacCavity was Out)

They are a bit annoying to watch for; the skies round our way are not very dark, so it is more a case of 'knowing that you have just seen one' rather than actually watching one streak across the sky as in the photographs. 

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Meteoroid#Meteors

There was one star, much bright than all the others, but tellingly it seemed to be heading directly towards the airport so I guess that was a plane pretending to be a star.

However I have spent most of today just about unable to do anything more taking than read a book, play Freecell and make cups of tea or coffee. But since the Summer Holidays have started and I won't be doing any more teaching until September, who cares! 

Thursday 22nd July - Catching up with my Commonplace Book

 I've kept a Common Place Book for a number of years. I was originally inspired by John Julius Norwich's 'Still More Christmas Crackers'

which I found in a very cheap bookshops full of 'end of run' books. I love it - full of snips and snaps, often rather intellectual, sometimes in Greek or Latin or French or Italian with the assumption that a translation was hardly necessary (google translate to the rescue). He collects all sorts of morsels; letters to country newspapers about the first cuckoo in Spring, anecdotes about various more-or-less-famous people, quotations, epitaphs from tombstones... selects the best and has them privately published as a Christmas present for his family and friends.    

Here's the sort of thing that made me laugh;

Clearly pre-dating Janet and John, Peter and Jane, Biff and Chips! All they ever did was go shopping or play in the park.

There are various published Commonplace books around. I have just downloaded a sample of Dale Carnegie's Scrapbook

Reading from a Kindle or a tablet makes it so easy to high-light a passage and email it to yourself, or to screenshot a page to copy out later. Half of me says 'why bother to copy it out? Just save it to a folder!'  But copying out is half the pleasure; a fine notebook, real fountain pen and real ink out of a bottle...

Writing the words out brings them back to life, like watering one of those strange resurrection plants that I used to by from an amazing catalogue full of  the wondrous and the weird

The wikipedia site  has a very short time lapse video of this poor brown mess reviving over three hours 

I had several weeks' worth of accumulated emails, photographs and screenshots to deal with. Here are a few pages from the current book...