A Better Day

I took Bella May for her long walk this morning as Frank went down to the boat early to finish the job on the chimney.
We didn't meet anyone until we were on the last stretch, when a man stopped to chat - we were on opposite sides of the road and he had a little black dog. He was so nice to chat to and I must remember his name is George in case we meet again. He told me that his Granddaughter - who works in Morrison's is just recovering from Corona virus and another member of staff has it too.
We heard today that a lady who has a narrowboat not far from ours has just come out of hospital after having Corona and is recovering well. :-D

I managed to get a delivery slot on Tesco on line earlier than the one I had with Morrison's so I did a biggish shop - however when I got to 86 items I noticed a red note at the top which said I'm only allowed 80 items so I had to go through the order and reduce it. A shame because I was going to offer some close neighbours the chance to order as well.
I do understand why they're having to do it.

When we got back I had a little rest then set to work in the kitchen. I made a bolgnese sauce with red lentils for our pasta dish tonight.
I cooked enough lentils to make two different lentil spreads from The Bean Book. These spreads are great for an alternative sandwich filling with some salad.

My brother Tony and sister-in-law Diane bought me this book about 35 years ago when I first went vegetarian and it has been a Godsend. It is so well used it's falling to bits! I've included the recipes in my extras but I will delete them at some point to make way for more extras.
Actually we had a phone call from Tony last night to let us know that Diane's mum - who has been in hospital - has been diagnosed with lymphoma and a blood clot in her lung. She had been coughing and they thought it was Corona. The awful thing is that they can't visit her. She's in her mid eighties. So sad.

I didn't spend any time in the garden today because it's still so bloomin' windy and as I said I hate the wind! However I will have to go out before bed to water everything as it is so dry out there.

I went outside once to see where Bella was as she wasn't on her day bed (posh! It's an old pallet with a rug on it!) And there she was lying curled up under the plum tree on my newly raked and seeded wild flower bed! There were already tiny seedlings coming up which are now squashed! Hopefully they'll survive. She loves lying in dry earth and gets filthy.

I spoke to Poppy and Arlo on the phone this morning and they sounded quite chirpy and said they are keeping themselves occupied. Their Dad - our son-in-law Peter - is a practice nurse but has been filling in the gaps in Dumfries Infirmary. He is worried about bringing the virus home.

Sabrina sent me videos of Amelia on her new off ice skates. They are basically wheels that attach to her normal ice skates so she can skate outside on the tarmac. They're not ordinary roller skates, they're what professional ice skaters use for practice at home. She can already do spins and jumps on them. It could be ages before the rink is open again.

I was supposed to be sewing face masks this afternoon but ended up with a migraine so took a pill and lay on the sofa. Now I don't feel like sewing. Tomorrow's another day!

Thanks for the kind words Blip friends :-) you really are a lovely bunch. Blip has become such an important part of my days now and really help to keep me grounded just now.

Stay safe all of you. ;-) X