The second Easter spent in quarantine and this Corona crisis thing really isn’t over yet. Yesterday we heard that someone in my daughter’s soccer team and someone in my son’s class have been tested positive for Covid 19. Both are asymptomatic and both haven’t been in close contact with my kids but with quickly spreading variant Covid strains you never know. Today we heard that someone else in my son’s handball team was also tested positive. So, we are stuck inside and around the house a little more now (especially difficult for the kids who had been happy to do their sports and go to school again from time to time) until somewhere in the coming week the kids can get tested.
We did enjoy a lovely Easter brunch this morning, prepared (as every year) by the wonderful Mr. Esther…
… and this evening the four of us will have a nice table grill dinner, making the best of having a little time off over Easter. I wish those who celebrate a…
… and may the new hope of spring also bring new hope for better days without Covid.
OK, so I’ve not been video making as I said I would be doing in my last post, but I’ve been going down another Gabriel Macht rabbit hole instead (I’ve been down one before a couple of years back). Last night I came across this video again which was shared by his wife Jacinda on Instagram about 10 months ago. I had seen it before and it had cracked me up at the time but now I just needed to share it here as well as it made me laugh all over again.
I had no idea what a VSCO girl was, had to look it up, and I think my daughter may be one as well with her large t-shirts over short shorts in the summer (but not with the backpack, headband and scrunchies). Anyway, the 48 year old VSCO man version looks like this…
His shirt is a little short but that’s because he’s wearing his wife’s clothes in this (including her shorts, apparently). For good measure, here are some shaggy Covid-bearded, brown-eyed close up screenshots of Gabriel, the VSCO man. Gotta say, the look has grown on me…
I had to include a Gabriel grinning picture above because his grins really are the best whether he’s long-haired and shaggy-bearded or not. He has such a shit-eating grin if ever I’ve seen one and it doesn’t surprise me that he seems to have a good sense of silliness…
I’d never be able to convice Mr Esther to dress up like a VSCO man, as much as I’d love to see it. For some months now I’ve been trying to convince him to let me braid his Covid beard but he won’t let me even do that… My husband can really make me laugh and he has many wonderful, extraordinary qualities that I absolutely love him for, but being silly like this isn’t one of them. I guess that’s one thing I like about actors, they can go all silly at times, or at least Gabriel Macht can, with his big grin and mirthful brown eyes, and that can always brighten my day.
This quarantine thing has quite an impact on my daily rhythm. I find it difficult to get to bed before 1 or 2 am. Last night it was 2 am, or a little after. I’m a pretty sound sleeper and usually can fall asleep quickly but last night our black cat had decided to grace our bed again. She’d been sleeping curled up near Mr. Esther but as soon as I got into bed, she first decided to lay on top of my side, but that got hot for me, so I pushed her off. I then had to battle her for space on my pillow. She likes to lie on it too, particularly half on my head, which is not comfortable for me either. In the end, after about half an hour, she settled somewhere between Mr. Esther and I and I could finally fall asleep.
Then, this morning, after barely 5.5 hours of sleep, I got up again so that I could help my daughter get some food into her and give her some moral support before she went to school for two socially distanced exams (she has an exam week this week). She does really well in all subjects, except for math, and she was nervous, despite studying really hard for that on her own and also via video calls with friends. She’ll be getting extra help with math from school from next week onwards (we had asked for extra help some 7 or 8 weeks ago as Mr Esther and I are pretty useless with math) but for this exam that help comes too late. Anyway, I figured the least I could do was give her that little bit of extra support this morning, so that meant waking up some 45 minutes before I normally do. When she left I was still tired, so I decided I could just lie down again for another 25 minutes or so before I took a quick shower and started work at 9. Of course, I fell right back asleep and didn’t wake again till 9.30! I hastily got up, threw something on that looks halfway decent infront of a webcam, did a quick brush of the hair, put on a dusting of mascara and then got to my laptop to prepare for my first meeting which was at 10 am. Luckily, there wasn’t too much to prepare.
So, here I am, unshowered and tired. Luckily no more video meetings today, just some chores to do on the computer that aren’t time sensitive, so I took a little time eat a late lunch and now to blog. I’m wearing the Pride & Prejudice green book cover earrings I got from Guylty and lunch was a slice of bread with a little butter and chocolate sprinkles. I look wrinkly, old and my hair is an unwashed mess, but I am happy with the earrings and sprinkles! They are the only things to really bring me joy so far today (and the news from mini-me just now that the exam seemed to go OK, we hope enough for a passing grade).
I really need to work on getting to bed sooner, though. Half an hour past midnight should be doable, right? And then get up at 8.30 am after 8 hours of sleep? And yet… Last night, Mr Esther went upstairs at 1 am and I said I’d be right there and before I knew it an hour had gone by! A little while ago during a video conference, my boss told me she pretends she needs to travel to work, so she gets up early and does her normal routine and that helps her be on time. I am not that disciplined, however, and I just can’t do that because in the back of my mind I keep on thinking it isn’t real anyhow so why bother?
I think it’s time these lockdowns ended and some sense of normality comes back into our lives. Only then will I be able to discipline myself for better bedtimes, I think. However, it will be a long while yet before normality returns. There are talks of possibly setting an evening and night curfew here and vaccinations don’t seem to be progressing that quickly either. I know I need to self-discipline but I’m so terrible at it… Am I alone in this or are you guys just as terrible as I am?
It was snowing this afternoon, our first snow this winter. I love a winter wonderland, even if it is only a dusting of snow, as here in our back garden…
Had some chores to do but the afternoon became good when the mail came and finally, finally my winnings from the RA Christmas auctions arrived! It took close to 6 weeks to get here but that didn’t take away from the awesome Christmas decoration (thank you Rachel!), my lovely mini Pride & Prejudice brooch and earrings and a fun Christmas card (thank you, Guylty!) and some nice reading to look forward to on Jane Austen related subjects.
At the end of the afternoon, Mr Esther and I went for a nice little walk in the little bit of snow we had…
This evening, the house looked like this, still just enough snow there to make it look wintery…
Junior now has a friend over to play videogames with him in his room, while Mr Esther and I enjoy some wine and mini me has been enjoying some hot chocolate, with our cat trying to get to the whipped cream she still had in her cup.
We’ve just been watching Michael Palin on the BBC walking through the desert with a camel caravan in his travel programme Sahara from 2002 (very different from a winter wonderland!) and now some blogging before I put my nose into a either book or a movie. Some quarantine days are quite lovely.
We’re just about ten months into Corona quarantine now. We see a handful of other people/family (socially distanced) on occasion but most of all we’re in and around our home, for work and for most of our free time as well. We go for walks, like today, with the sheerest, thinnest sheet of ice on the water. Alas, it isn’t cold enough for the ice to become thick enough to stand on.
As we’re in quite a strict lockdown now, everything’s closed and there’s nothing much else to do outside the house than that. In all that time, I’ve only had my hair cut (a bit) once, so it’s grown quite long now, the longest it’s been since my early twenties, which means I can now even braid it again…
Vaccinations have started here this past week but it will be a while yet before it’s our turn. Mr Esther has asthma, so he may be called in for a vaccination first (just checked, they say from February) before the kids and I (from April/May). Already, they aren’t sure whether this schedule can be adhered to, it all depends on enough vaccines being available. The number of hospitalizations and positive tests here aren’t falling fast enough…
… so there is every chance this stricter lockdown will be extended after January 19th. We have quite a way to go yet, so I guess it’s just best to not look too far ahead. Speaking of the short term, what would really make my week next week would be if Donald Trump were indeed impeached and kicked out of office – not likely, but I live in hope.
The Book of Esther 