This morning I ticked off another box in the i-SPY: Coronavirus book as I awkwardly swabbed my throat and nose (it’s the same swab, but someone has already done the thinking for you about the right order), struggled to assemble the cardboard container and then placed my test sample in the fridge ready for collection by courier. This test was delivered after I was “chosen at random from the NHS list of patients registered with a GP” rather than for any specific reason, so hopefully it doesn’t show up any asymptotic surprises. But I can sympathise with parents who find it impossible to swab their children correctly – it’s not as easy as it sounds!
In a more pleasant Covid rite of passage, Randi and I finally took advantage of the ‘Eat Out To Help Out’ scheme with a half-price dinner at the slightly-too-pricey-for-us Tulse Hill Hotel. I am keeping my photo of a receipt bearing the words “Government Discount” as a memento of this strange summer. And yes, I know that we are way behind those who have been patriotically filling every August Monday to Wednesday with subsidised meals, but to be honest we’re still a little full from our burst of eating out in Church Stretton.
That said, we have been able to ramp up the socialising last week which has been really, really lovely. Last Sunday we were joined by Caroline in Matt and Laura’s beautiful (and very apocalypse-ready) garden for a very British afternoon of pretending not to notice the on-again-off-again rain showers. I had to check my blog to confirm that it’s been a year since we were all together, but it appears that we are all naturally congregating in a relatively small patch of South East London so I hope it won’t be another year. We also had fish and chips with Amy and Adam in Brockwell Park and invited Erin round on Friday night for a Mamma Mia + Prosecco + cheese slumber party. It freaked us all out to realise that this film dates back to 2008.
And finally: after putting our flat-buying ambitions on hold at the start of the pandemic, we have picked things up again and (at time of writing, fingers crossed etc. etc. etc.) things are looking promising! So at some point this blog might shift into full-on homebuying mode…
