09:00 I sit down at the computer and start filling in the forms
sent us by our local dental clinic, in preparation for our 6-monthly check-up
tomorrow.
Basically the forms are telling me, “You’re probably going to die, but ha ha you
won't be able to sue us – you’re putting us in the clear by sending us this form hahaha!”.
our local dental clinic
I persevere with filling in the forms, however, following my usual
stupid mantra – “I’ve started, so I’ll finish”.
However, Lois is made of sterner stuff than me, and when she comes
to start filling in her own forms she says, “No – I’m scared! Let’s cancel
tomorrow’s appointment and postpone it for a couple of months. After all we’re
not having any problems with our teeth at the moment.”
So we ring the dental clinic and cancel just inside the 24 hour
deadline for cancellations, and postpone till October, which is nice.
By coincidence, while I am lazing on the bed later in the day, fitfully
taking my gigantic afternoon nap, I read on my smartphone that the WHO has just
advised delaying routine dental appointments until COVID figures are much lower
than they are today.
We feel strangely validated by this report and it gives a bit of a
lift to our step – hurrah! For once we do something right.
12:30 One of the nurses at our doctors surgery rings me with the
results of my blood test and blood pressure check from last Wednesday.
The results are not too bad on the whole, and my liver, kidneys and blood pressure are satisfactory, but unfortunately they are urging me to start taking statins for so-called
“high” cholesterol, even though I’m still only a bit of a borderline case, at
5.5 . Lois has been taking statins for years, and the subject was first broached
as a possibility in my case by my doctor about 10 years ago.
My cholesterol hasn’t really changed in all that time, but then I
am 10 years older now, so maybe it’s worth it to start taking them – but I’m
not really sure. Oh dear, decisions, decisions!
16:00 Lois and I stop and have our usual cup of tea and a slice of bread
with Lois’s delicious home-made greengage jam. It’s really warm – 91F / 33C,
and we’re so hot and brain-dead, we can’t be bothered to talk to each other –
not a situation you want in a 2-person home in a lockdown – oh dear!
Luckily the forecast is for thundery rain starting at some point
this evening or overnight. We can’t wait for this to happen, because we’ve got
to water our neighbour Frances’s enormous garden and our own enormous garden
again tonight. She’s not going to be back till the weekend.
“Come friendly rain - fall on us now” – near-excerpt from the poem
“Slough” (1937) copyright John Betjeman (adapted).
"Slough" (1937), by John Betjeman
18:30 The thunderstorm has started – hurrah! So we only need to
water the greenhouse and our neighbour Frances’s greenhouse today, which is
nice. The storm continues till we go to bed, although the rain eases off about
9 pm.
20:00 Lois disappears into the dining-room to take part in her
sect’s weekly online Bible Class on zoom, while I relax in the sitting room.
When she emerges we hear an interesting radio programme – the
first in a new series of “More or Less”, that dissects the stats in the news,
and tell us whether we’re being deceived or not.
Much of the programme tonight is about COVID-19. The programme’s
experts say that there’s no real sign of a Second Wave as yet. Areas like
Leicester which start to have a problem also begin doing more testing, so the
number of confirmed cases in that area is bound to go up, but this rise isn’t
worrying, apparently.
It’s interesting that the stats for Coronavirus deaths in England
are calculated on a different basis from the other countries of the UK: anyone
who’s ever tested positive and later dies is counted as a Coronavirus death,
whereas in Scotland, Wales and N.Ireland you have to die within 28 days of the
test for it to count.
So England has tended to exaggerate the numbers, while the other
countries have tended to underplay them.
It seems there’s a move afoot now to reach a compromise limit of
60 days, which seems to make sense.
My god, what a crazy country we live in !!!!!
22:00 We go to bed with the lightning still flashing through the
bedroom curtains – zzzzzzzzzz!!!!
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