Surprises

I had two surprises today, one pleasant and one unpleasant. The pleasant surprise was finding that the few small Swiss chard plants I had not pulled up last autumn have over wintered and grown this spring to provide very welcome greens for us during quarantine and beyond. The unpleasant surprise followed a visit from a tradesman to quote on boards and new felt for the leaking garage roof and some rotten wood replacement. Once I had shown him into the garage, I tried to close the up and over door and it fell off as the fixings pulled out of the rotten wood. I then had to pull the whole thing off so it could at least lean against the opening. I also had a second go at cleaning the carpets with the machine I have on two day hire. 

My gripe of the day is with the dispensary at the village doctors. Mrs TT put in a request for repeat prescriptions but, when I explained she could not collect them due to quarantine, they refused to put them on the delivery van even though we are only 200 metres from the surgery. I was told that she needed a Track and Trace number but these are only issued for self isolation. I said self isolation and quarantine are the same principle. Even me pointing out that these are heart pills and should not be missed did not seem to make any impression. Eventually the dispensary assistant said she would ask the driver but would offer no guarantees. I thought all this was rather poor. One of us will phone one of the local volunteering groups tomorrow if the pills do not arrive.