08:00 Shock horror - newsflash! Our local county council remains under Conservative control - no surprise there, to put it mildly, my god! It's just one spot in a great blue mass all right.
09:00 Today is Mothers Day in Australia, same as in the US, which is nice for Lois because she gets a second celebration on top of the British Mothers Day she got in March: Sarah, our younger daughter, lives in Perth with Francis and their 7-year-old twins, Lily and Jessie. Sarah has sent Lois a little pendant and there's a card from Sarah and Francis, and another from the twins: how cute they are !!!!
Lois showcases her Mothers Day pendant from Sarah and Francis
and the card from our 7-year-old twin granddaughters Lily and Jessie
Is it not worth all the money in the world to have two 7-year-old granddaughters like this, even if they do live 9,000 miles away haha! [You'll have to stop saying that eventually! - Ed]
10:30 Lois disappears into the dining-room to take part in the first of her sect's two worship services on zoom today.
I look at my smartphone, and I find a grouse recipe. It's our second Mothers Day, and we want to have one of the two "grice" [I don't think that's the standard plural form! - Ed] that our neighbour Bob shot a few months back. I find one on the BBC website that looks good.
our neighbour Bob in happier times - with his grandson
just back from duty in Afghanistan
the brace of grouse in happier times - before they got shot (sob sob!!!)
I also read that our county, Gloucestershire, is the most distinguished county in the world for its wealth of eminent "sons" that have changed the world. [Isn't that a bit of an exaggeration? - Ed]
1. Edward Jenner of Berkeley was the first doctor to carry out vaccinations.
2. Winchcombe scientist Christopher Merrett invented champagne in 1662, 35 years before French monk Dom Perignon.
3. Gloucester resident John Stafford Smith wrote the music for the US anthem "The Star-Spangled Banner"
4. Hubert Parry of Highnam, a composer of note, wrote among other things the music for "Jerusalem", as a setting for William Blake's famous poem.
5. Hubert Cecil Booth of Gloucester invented the vacuum-cleaner.
6. James Bradley of Sherborne discovered the aberration of light and the nutation of the Earth's axis [??? - Ed]
7. Joe Meek of Newent pioneered the modern recording studio.
8. Gustav Holst, composer of the Planet Suite and other works, was born in Cheltenham
9. Harry Potter author JK Rowling was born in Yate
10. William Tyndale of Stinchcombe was the first person to translate the Bible into English.
11. Edward Budding of Thrupp invented the rotary lawn-mower.
12. William King of Gloucester had the idea of starting Sunday Schools.
[That's enough boasting! - Ed]
15:00 Lois emerges from her sect's worship services on zoom and goes for a walk, while I do the exercises that Connor, my NHS physiotherapist, has scheduled for me today.
When Lois comes back she tells me that the young woman, a prospective candidate for sect membership, whom Lois helped to "interview" on zoom a few days ago, has come down with an all-over rash: she needed hospital treatment of some kind this week (possibly outpatient but we're not sure). Lois wonders if the rash is a nervous reaction to the prospect of her full-immersion baptism scheduled for Friday in a garden hot tub - oh dear. But I sympathise - I'm sure I'd be nervous in that situation, even though in accordance with pandemic regulations, only six people, including the young woman herself, will be present.
a typical hot tub baptism by full immersion
18:00 We have one of the grouse, split into half each, in red wine gravy, with roast potatoes, roast parsnips and broccoli - yum yum!
we have the grouse Bob shot, in red wine gravy, with roast potatoes,
roast parsnips and broccoli - yum yum!
Ali says they spent a stressful 5 hours last weekend trying to get the family's Danish ex-alley-cat, Dumbledore, down from a tree. It was only Dumbledore's second day of going out of the house. He's been kept inside for several months because of busy roads, but now that the family have moved to a house out in the countryside, they have started letting Dumbledore and his English feline companion Otto, out of doors, free at last to explore the house's massive grounds. It was a "tall thin" tree that Dumbledore chose, Ali says, so difficult to get a ladder against it - my god!
Danish ex-alley-cat Dumbledore, an inexperienced tree-climber -
it took the family 5 hours to get him down safely to the ground - my god!!!!!
Naughty Dumbledore !!!!!!
21:00 We watch a bit of TV, the latest edition of Antiques Roadshow, where members of the public bring along the treasures from their attic and have them examined and valued by the show's experts.
Tonight's programme comes from the Lake District, an area of the country which for Lois and me particularly brings to mind a childhood book we both read at about 9 years of age, Arthur Ransome's "Swallows and Amazons", about the adventures of 4 children on a sailing holiday there between the wars.
We see one of the actresses from the film, who was 12 years of age at time of filming, Sophie Neville, bring along various memorabilia from the making of the film. Sophie played Titty Walker in the film.
Sophie Neville, as Titty Walker, is 2nd from the right in this picture
Pure nostalgia for Lois and me. And you can tell quite easily that it's the Sophie Neville in the film: her face hasn't changed much in nearly 50 years - how marvellous to see her again on screen.
And what could be more comforting than the knowledge that everybody else is getting older and older, and that it's not just us haha!!!
22:00 We go to bed - zzzzzzz!!!!!
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