I don’t know about you folk but I keep thinking I have a cold coming — oh oh I go — and then it vanishes. I can only conclude that the panic that musters your anti Covid19 troops to readiness, is sufficiently overwhelming that the common cold virus has no chance and it’s just ‘fey knights.’ (Look that one up assuming I spelt it correctly) in south London slang we used it as kids to mean – “I give up” or “get off its hurting” . My dad who grew up in Catford taught it to me – like “quits” only more Chaucerish.

We got our shipment of surgical masks today. Stupid exploitative price but so what. Ain’t capitalism marvellous! I wrote Chris on mine in marker and then got stoned on the fumes when I wore it. My ears are so big and flappy that the elastic just drags them forward into a sort of Jodrell Bank pose and then rather appropriately, the mask flys off into space. I am going to need a dainty bow at the back. They are to give to anyone that attends to Nonna – namely Maria – who now does hair washing, bathing and other critical services and Denise who cleans the house for her.

We are very lucky where we are as self isolation is so easy and really not unpleasant. I feel so sorry for people stuck in tiny flats or having to commute or working in a vital occupation it must be really really awful. Talking of vital occupations I spoke to my cancer nurse Helen this morning just to check I was doing the right things. She is so good humoured, so level headed it was like chatting with a friendly owl. She admitted things were pretty busy in haematology but she clarified that if I get ill I get in touch with them not 111 and they will decide if I need to stay at home and see how things go, or see someone at the hospital. So that’s clear.

I apologise if I keep going on about hospital stuff and whatever. I use the blog to sort out my own thoughts, to expel concerns and to prioritise. I really don’t mind if no one reads it, it’s the act of writing that I find deeply therapeutic in troubled times. It’s my equivalent to a country walk or a hot bath. Knowing that someone someday might read it ( highly unlikely) makes it a very different act to keeping a personal diary where the supposed intention is only for you yourself to read it at some later date.

Highlight of the day was putting up some hangers for coats at the bottom of the stairs. My DIY skills are not terrible but drilling holes has always been a weak spot. They always go a bit wonky and then the holes in the thing to be hung don’t align with thing to be hung on. Not so wrong as to demand a new set of holes but wrong enough that however much wiggling you apply to the screw it just won’t line up. The end result is a hole and screw big enough to support a small ocean liner supporting nowt but a coat hanger and so it came to pass today.

Here everybody seems to stick with the 2 metre rule. It’s great on walks because we don’t have to stop and talk we just glide past each other tossing pleasantries. it reminds me of Pina Bausch (contemporary dance stuff). Our loggia has come into its own as an inside outside space. People talk to us behind the fence it’s a bit like a long distance confessional.

It would be great to hear more about how you are all coping. I like the written form of communication rather than telephone or video in a funny way it’s more revealing. So send me your prose if you feel like it.