Spring cleaning

What a flawless day this has been - not a cloud in the sky other than vapour trails the whole time.There was a chilly wee nip in the wind from the east, but at our back door, which is where the photo was taken, it was positively hot by afternoon. In a way it was annoying that we weren't perched on a hillside admiring the view, or gazing across the sunlit Firth at the Arran hills, but I had resolved that because we were getting our second dose of vaccine today we'd make an effort to take things easy ...

The vaccination itself was as pleasant and painless as the first. Forget queuing at a huge vaccination centre; I wandered down the road to the surgery, lingered a few minutes up the street a little so's not to hang around outside and block to door, approached the door with 3 minutes to spare. Almost immediately the door opened and the nurse in charge called me and another man - someone I've known for years - to come in, using our first names for she too has been part of my life for years. Two minutes sitting in the waiting room and we were off down the corridor; another five minutes and I was outside again in the sunshine and home for coffee. Brilliant.

The resolve to take things easy began all right, except that I had to make out my supermarket order; there were no glitches with the website and only three unavailable (so far) items. We had lunch in the garden, where it was so warm I was falling asleep in no time. But then we started noticing the moss on the concrete, the mess under the bird table, the green algae staining the metal garden seats ... and before we knew it we had the brush and shovel out, then the hose, then the scrubbing brush and washing-up liquid, then the hose again. There was a slight panic over a drain that seemed to be blocked, but I prevailed with my theory that it's merely a soakaway that was temporarily overwhelmed. Now it all looks ... well, clean actually. And the bird table is consigned to the foot of the garden to disintegrate further so that we can remove it.

Other than this, I had a FaceTime meeting about a possible zoom seminar on poetry and faith, and a possible actual get-together on Lewis in June, all of which is exciting and stimulating and promises the sale of a further 10 copies of my book. Later, we attended online Compline. By then I'd taken the first paracetamol of the day and Himself was merely suffering. (I don't believe in suffering if I can do something about it.)

Photo shows Himself, having successfully unkinked the garden hose, surrounded by the suds from my scrubbing down of the seats. It's not much of a garden, but it's a complete sun trap - and I'm not much of a gardener!