Sweater Recap

Today is our last full day of work before our holiday break. We work a half-day tomorrow and then we're done until after New Year's, when this whole 2020 nightmare will be over. Woo hoo!

(Although, as a columnist in The New York Times asked, "What makes you think 2021 will be any better?")

I have no idea what I'm going to do over the holidays, aside from hanging out at home. I may try to take a little trip or two, as I've said before, and I have plenty of reading to do. You should see my magazine stack. It's ridiculous.

Olga's dog walker will also stop coming for much of that time, so I'll have the opportunity to get out and about more with her.

Reading Jennifer's blog yesterday, I was reminded that I completely ignored mentioning our own ugly Christmas sweater day! It was last Friday, and yes, I wore The Sweater. I've gotten six years of use out of that thing, which I think is pretty good for a sweater that cost £9. The lights don't work anymore, and in fact I removed the wiring last year to wash it, but it's still pretty cool. I think I might wear it again today.

(Photo: Fortune Green, last weekend.)

A Very Camp Post

This sign is in the window of our local ceramics shop, reminding people to get their art done early for Christmas. I wonder if this place will even stay open now that we're in a Tier 3 lockdown. I'm guessing painting ceramics is not deemed an essential activity.

The image of George Michael isn't the most flattering. It looks more like Jeane Kirkpatrick. (Spell check keeps trying to change that to "Jeans Kirkpatrick," which would be a good drag name for someone really into denim.) Michael lived in nearby Highgate, so he's kind of a local hero – hence the halo, which surely overstates his purity of nature.

I remember when I first saw him in a music video, back in the summer of 1984, when I was on a long weekend with some friends in Daytona Beach. It was the video for "Wake Me Up Before You Go-Go," and like every other teenage gay boy I was smitten. I loved his hoop earrings most of all -- one in each ear, which was not the way guys wore earrings in those days. A single stud in the left ear was the only permissible way, at least in suburban Florida, and even that was pretty daring. So George seemed brave and beautiful and although it seems hilarious now -- because that video is the gayest thing ever -- none of us knew he was actually gay.

Speaking of gay, remember how I donated to the ultimately successful effort to save director Derek Jarman's former oceanfront home, Prospect Cottage, for public use? Well, this is one of my rewards for donating -- an art print of the house by Michael Craig-Martin. It arrived just the other day, in its own little portfolio. I had planned to get it framed, but I like the portfolio so much I may just keep it in that. (You may remember that I visited Prospect Cottage myself a couple of summers ago.)

I'm also supposed to get a photograph of the gardens, but that hasn't come yet. Supposedly everything has been slowed down by Covid.

Otherwise, not a lot of news around here. Time to walk the dog!

Supermarket of Dreams

I see that the Electoral College has made Joe Biden's win official, as expected, and with no drama. Thank goodness. Now we move on to Congressional certification of the results in early January, which will no doubt be a circus sideshow that won't change anything. We're getting closer and closer to restoring sanity to American politics.

Meanwhile, here in London, we're moving to Tier 3 of our Coronavirus restrictions, which means a tighter lockdown. As I've said, I don't think that will change our lives much, but it's going to make things much harder for restaurants and shop owners who had hoped to make some money off the Christmas season. And have you seen that there's apparently a new strain of the virus out there? That's an extra little bit of excitement in the mix.

Crazy days!

On our walk to work yesterday, we passed the swallow dresser, still sitting out on the sidewalk. I made a pitch to Dave to help me rescue it -- I said we could put it in the foyer and use it to store towels and stuff. But he held firm against it and said it would make the space look like "a baby's diaper-changing room." Whatever that means.

And then, on the walk home, I saw that the dresser was gone. I think the trash guys collected it. Oh well.

I made an appointment to see a doctor on Thursday. As expected, I was unable to make an appointment with our own GP, so I'm paying to go straight to a specialist. My Christmas present to myself! So festive!

Some of you suggested I get a Covid test, but my malaise definitely isn't due to Covid. It's lasted far too long and I don't have any Covid symptoms except a recurrent cough -- and that's been around for literally years. No, if this is anything at all, it's something physiological, not infectious.

(Photo: St. John's Wood, the weekend before last.)

Fox and Bone

Well, yesterday turned out to be the worst possible day to get motivated to have an adventure. It rained all day and even the dog was hesitant to go outside. I did finally get her to accompany me to the cemetery, where we found Mary and Jesus enjoying a good soak.

We also found this curious bit of conspiratorial poetry on a lamppost. Why are people so obsessed with 5G? How is it any different from 4G, or from radio waves for that matter, or any of the other electronic noise that's buzzing through the air all around us?

Also, what's up with the random capitalization?

Otherwise, yesterday was pretty uneventful. Dave and I decided to join the rest of the Western world in watching a Christmas season favorite: "Home Alone." I remember when it came out, and it was such a cinematic phenomenon, but among all my cynical twentysomething journalist friends at the time it was the subject of much mockery and derision. So believe it or not, I'd never seen it. I enjoyed it in the way I would enjoy a marshmallow -- it was sweet and simple and then it was gone and I will probably never think about it again.

I haven't been feeling so great the past few weeks -- I've had intermittent fatigue and been generally bleah. I'm wondering if I have an ulcer. That may sound crazy, but remember how I had some abnormal results on a screening test a few years ago and wound up having to get a colonoscopy? (Which revealed nothing.) I've also had a chronic cough for years, and a couple of chest x-rays that showed nothing unusual. Well, an ulcer could explain both of those issues, plus my worsening fatigue. I think I need to see a doctor again. Getting an appointment to see our GP is always a gigantic challenge, and in this time of Covid it's even harder, so we'll see how that goes. Will I have to give up coffee and red wine? Sacre bleu!

I put the garden cam back out on Saturday, and wound up with some pretty good (but short) footage of a fox carrying what I think is a bone. Olga surprised a fox in the garden yesterday morning -- she chased it over a fence. I wonder if it was the same one? It looks pretty healthy, and it certainly moved fast when it needed to!

Get Me Out of Here

I'm feeling a little stir-crazy these days. This lockdown, or whatever we're in now -- semi-lockdown, I guess -- leaves me uncertain about what I should and shouldn't be doing. We haven't gone to any restaurants for months, have barely left our neighborhood except to walk to work, and yet I get the impression that other people are leading life almost as usual. Am I being too restrictive or are they being oblivious? Can I safely I get on the tube and go down to Soho with my camera? Can I take a train out of town and go for a walk in the woods or on the beach? I have no idea.

I guess it's a matter of gauging the risk and doing whatever I find tolerable. It's just hard to know, especially given Dave's higher levels of vulnerability, and the lack of clarity over what's dangerous and what's not. Are trains really that risky? Some of my co-workers ride them every day! How bad could they be?!

I think I have to do something, though. I can't just keep walking the dog and taking pictures of our living room (above). Dave and I were watching TV last night, and we had the what-should-we-watch conversation, and I realized that I didn't really want to watch anything -- I just wanted to get out of that freaking room!

I did take the dog to Fortune Green (above) and the cemetery. So she had her squirrel-chasing fun. I also had plenty to do around the house. I vacuumed and did two loads of laundry and took care of all the plants and even read a little, though I continue to feel zero enthusiasm for reading.

I'm just sick to death of all of this. I'm especially sick of wearing masks for eight hours every weekday, masks that make my eyes feel hot and damp and steam up my glasses and make my face sticky. I'm sick of putting on and taking off gloves a hundred times a day depending on whether I'm handling "clean" books or "dirty" books. I'm sick of thinking about infection. Sick sick sick sick and tired.

Of course I know I'm not alone in this. We're all sick of it. And yes, I know there are people suffering much worse than I am, but that doesn't make me feel any better.

I feel like I need to start taking more acceptable risks, or I'm going to lose my mind. Dave is perfectly happy to sit around the house all the time watching YouTube. It's kind of his dream, actually. I, on the other hand, need more stimulation.

We only have one more week of work and then we're off for the winter holidays. Maybe during that time I'll get out of town (or at least out of West Hampstead) a couple of times and see some sights. I sure can't just sit inside for three weeks.

The parent group at school gave all the teachers and staff festive holiday hyacinth bulbs. We each got one, and one of my co-workers didn't want hers, so Dave and I have three. They're like floral drag queens with all that glitter! Supposedly, they'll grow and bloom with no water or soil, but I planted ours yesterday -- partly as a way to contain the glitter, which gets everywhere. So ours are now in a pot with glittery compost. I'll report back when (if) they flower!

Swallows

I was so relieved to wake up this morning and see Trump's latest effort to subvert the U.S. election thrown out of the Supreme Court. Thank goodness some adults are holding it together and respecting the system and the will of the people, and not joining Trump and Giuliani in their destructive, floor-pounding toddler tantrum. I will be so glad when the electors vote and inauguration day comes and goes, and their furious charade is over.

Of course, I had to check the commenters on a crazy right-wing news site to see what they had to say about it. "So it's war," was the first response -- which was unsettling until I remembered that the entire online comment stream, which seems so threatening, actually consists of a handful of extremists drinking beer in their bathrobes. Or Russian bots, as I've said before.

Meanwhile, here in the U.K., we've been unable to strike a trade deal with the E.U. It looks like we'll have what Boris Johnson euphemistically calls an "Australia-style" deal, which is his more palatable way of saying no deal at all. Even Australia says it's a bum rap.

I don't pretend to understand it all and I have no idea what it's going to mean for us, the everyday consumers who depend on goods we get from Europe. Higher prices or reduced availability, I suppose. And who knows what it will do to exports and travel.

This crazy world!

Here's the latest interesting street debris I've seen on our walks to and from work. When it was newly painted and stenciled with those swallows this must have been a nice dresser! I love those stencils. I don't understand why people throw stuff like this away. All it needs is a new coat of paint. (And some knobs.)

When I was a kid, I had a dresser that looked a lot like this, and so did my brother. Over the years both of them became worn and covered with stickers (because kids cover everything with stickers). My mom bought some bright paint and we painted them -- my brother's blue, and mine green. I used it for many years afterwards – until I was in college, in fact. Maybe even after that. I can't quite remember.

Anyway, it would be nice if someone rescued this dresser. It looks like it has a lot of life left in it.

Speaking of household design, have you seen minimalist nativity sets? Brilliant!

(Top photo: Colorful graffiti in Billy Fury Way.)

Holiday Lights

Poor Dave had to go back to the dentist yesterday afternoon for more procedures -- filling a cavity and fitting the crown for the tooth that got the root canal on Thanksgiving. As a result, his face was numb and he didn't feel much like cooking last night. We ordered out from a Japanese place on the high street.

As I went to collect my shrimp tempura bento box and Dave's sushi, I took my camera to capture some of the neighborhood holiday lights.

That's our neighbors two doors away, above -- they've got quite the holiday display going, with spangly lights and wreaths, a tree in the upstairs window and strands of white lights around the doorway and across the hedge (which you can't quite see in this photo). Is it unsurprising that they are Americans? My impression, at least from our street, is that British people go for a more subtle look. But I suppose that's probably not universally true – just as it's not always true that Americans like a lot of decorations. From the front, our house is entirely dark!

On the next street over, the entrance lights above the doorways to these flats have been changed to a type that changes color -- they go through the whole spectrum. I just happened to catch them in a blue/purple phase.

At this block of flats, they went for the elegant all-white-lights look.

Here's the tree on West End Green, also decked out in white and sponsored by The Hampstead Butcher, where Dave buys our meat.

There's also a menorah, across the street from West End Green where all the Deliveroo drivers hang out, waiting to bring restaurant take-away to customers.

The other drama yesterday evening, aside from Dave's dental woes, is that Olga didn't come home from her walk until well after 5 p.m. It had been dark for almost an hour and I was starting to get concerned -- she's usually home by the time we arrive from work around 4 p.m. I texted her walker and said, "Olga is still with you, right?" He assured me she was. He just got caught up in traffic, and indeed he showed up a few minutes later and Olga bounded indoors as usual.

The only reason I even questioned him is that we had a repairman in the flat yesterday to fix the saggy kitchen cabinet. (So that's done. Yay!) I had visions of him inadvertently letting the dog out to wander the neighborhood. But she had her collar so I pretty much knew she was with the walker. She may be smart, but she can't put on her own collar.

On a follow-up political note, I mentioned Trump's hard-core supporters in my post yesterday, and my continuing fascination with their convictions and delusions over the election. The New York Times had an interesting column by Thomas Edsall about those supporters and their motivations. Basically, according to Edsall's sources, it comes down to a fear of loss of status, and a desire to reacquire that status. For some, that simply means dominating their opponents: "Essentially, extreme political behavior reflects discontent with one’s own personal standing and a desire to actively rectify this through aggression." (Blog reader Sharon mentioned this column in the comments yesterday and it is an interesting piece, well worth reading. Thanks, Sharon!)