It is my last night at work.
I have packed my picnic for the last time. I have filled the teabags and made a flask of tea. I have sliced tomatoes from the conservatory and put them on fresh bread with mayonnaise and pepper and cheese.
Tomorrow night we could even eat a cooked dinner, the sort that comes on a plate.
The world is about to change.
I have got gate fever very badly. I do not want to be on the taxi rank any more. If the world is going to be upside down again I would like it just to get on with it.
It will not be like the last time, because nobody is worried about it any more. The post office and the ironmonger are still open. We are not all quaking in our houses whilst the Four Horsemen stalk the deserted streets. This time we will all just grumble and try not to do anything that will land us with an exorbitant fine.
How very odd to live in a world where I might get a criminal record and a sleepless-night sized fine for hugging my children or eating dinner with my friends.
I do not think it should be allowed to catch on.
We are not the only ones having problems brought about by lockdowns. We were woken up early this morning by Roger Poopy crying.
He was awake, and lying on his cushion next to the bed, and whimpering, sadly.
Mark got up and took him outside but he did not want to go. He slunk back up the stairs and tried to suck his father’s fur until his father growled at him.
He has been doing this quite a lot lately. It is because he is missing Pepper.
Pepper is not allowed to go out at the moment because she has a sore leg, and the human Peppers think that if she runs about too much it might get worse. They once had a dog which had very expensive hips.
Roger has not seen her now for over a week, and he is utterly miserable, the way people get in our own Brave New World when they do not know how to use Zoom.
I do not use Zoom either. I like the telephone better. Also nobody wants to talk to me that much.
When Mark had gone to work the sun was shining, and so I took the dogs off up to the top of the fell, by way of trying to cheer up Roger. He liked the walk, and the sunshine, but he was not cheered up.
We think that we are going to have to do something. If Pepper has got genetically expensive hips then she will not be able to charge about with him for weeks at a time, and his life will become a horrible roller coaster of anxious happiness and lonely despair.
We have considered getting a puppy to keep him company, but a quick look at puppy-related websites has put me right off that idea. You cannot buy a puppy for less than a thousand pounds, and most of them are at least two thousand pounds. I have got no idea how anybody manages to afford to be a dog owner these days. No wonder gypsies steal them, you could buy a new television for that and have change for a box of wine and a takeaway.
We might invite Number One Daughter’s dog to come and visit for a while next time they are up here. That might cheer him up.
I will have to think about it.
I had started baking biscuits yesterday, and shoved the unfinished mix into the fridge. Today I meant to finish it off, but it did not happen. Instead I cleaned up the terrific mess left over from the firewood.
Mark had brought lots of it in and stored it in the conservatory, only he had got to rush out to drive a taxi before he had chance to sweep up and tidy up after himself.
There was a lot of sawdust.
Today I tidied the conservatory up. I cut the dead leaves off the tomatoes and swept and mopped. It took me ages, but it was a lovely job, because the conservatory is gloriously warm in the sunshine.
I had to rush in the end, because I was late for work.
It is a pleasing recollection that I will not be late for work again for simply ages.
Have a picture of Roger Poopy.
LATER NOTE: We met up with Pepper in the Library Gardens just before bedtime. Roger Poopy jumped all over her and bit her ears and knocked her to the ground, where they wrestled, muddily, for some time. He has come home and suddenly thought that he would like his dinner after all.
He is snoring contentedly beside the bed as I write.
