Lock-down Day 2

I woke at 5.07am and lay awake for 40 minutes trying to sleep again then gave up and read things on my phone for an hour and a half before getting up. I read a distressing long article about things in the US… all along that’s been the country that has concerned me most … given their incompetent leadership, lack of a public health service etc. I learned from an American friend living there that people were ignoring demands to self- isolate and keep their distance because they believe it was just a big conspiracy to do with the elections (!!!!). Lord help them.

Today I see that the US has topped the table of number of cases – not at all surprising. Italy has the highest number of deaths… and with the US having fewer hospital beds per capita than Italy, I fear it’s going to get much worse in the US before it gets better.

On to brighter things though.. I started my day with a free online Les Mills workout – today I tried Barre #07 – first time in my life I’ve done anything ballet related (aside from falling asleep at ballet performances)! I thought about my Mum who at 70 has started going to ballet lessons again, my sister and my nieces who all dance/ danced….

It was a great workout for the legs and glutes… on fire at times! I could do most of it and it was really nice to watch – as the instructors are on a platform in the water with stunning NZ landscape behind them. Better than yesterday’s class for sure. I see in an article out today that Les Mills are going to be putting on classes on TVNZ twice a day – also available on demand from next week.

As I was getting breakfast in the kitchen I noticed a little creepy crawly guy wriggling around in mid air… he was clearly attached to the ceiling somehow but I couldn’t see how… it was rather fascinating! A bit later on I looked over and he had made it almost to the ceiling… then later there was no sign of him. With all the fresh fruit and vege on our bench at the moment we do seem to have a few bugs and wee flies around. Will have to do some baking/ cooking/ preserving this weekend I think, to get rid of it all.

I didn’t really stick to my schedule today… having gone to bed late and waking early I was too tired to do much focused work. About an hour and a half of TimeBank work was a lot less than I’d imagined, but tomorrow’s another day. I had an hour long chat with Selina, a friend who I was meant to be catching up with this week and had not seen since before we went overseas. Lovely to talk with her. I did an hour of Māori study but not with optimal brain function! I made a broccoli soup for lunch and then mexican beans for dinner – with guacamole (heaven!) and my homemade zucchini salsa. Leftover fruit crumble for dessert. YUM.

Tonight we set up Ticket to Ride Europe (probably our favourite board game) and played with friends of ours in Rakaia (30km away). They enjoy board games even more than we do and are playing a board game a night in lock-down. We tried it over zoom so we could see and hear each other- we placed each others pieces down as required on our boards. It worked and actually went faster than had we all been present round one board. We had some weird issues with the sound suddenly cutting out on us several times but overall a success we will likely repeat! Yay!