Empty sky

There was some difficulty at Hollingworth Lake yesterday, where thousands of people were doing whatever is the opposite of social distancing.  Today I decided to walk my daily 6 miles on streets in my neighbourhood. A hilly lap of just about a kilometre was ideal. I noticed four things in particular: 

1. how the sky is empty of aircraft and the resultant trails of vapour; 
2. of four buses that passed me, three contained no passengers but one held about 20 who had chosen, on a 50 seater bus, to huddle as close to each other as possible;
3. a chap spent well over two hours polishing his red Ferrari (the only one in the neighbourhood, I think);
4. tyre tracks across a lawn, not necessarily left by a Ferrari.

Today's previously unheard album was by Audience, a band I saw in play at the Winter Gardens, Cleethorpes in September 1970.  The album is The House on the Hill, notable for a singer who sounds like an early version of Axl Rose and for saxophones and flutes playing the parts which would have been taken by electric guitars in other bands. My favourite track was You're Not Smiling.

This morning's painting was St Eligius by Petrus Christus (1449.) It shows the patron saint of blacksmiths, goldsmiths and moneychangers (who knew there was such a thing?) in a workshop in Bruges,  weighing gold for a wedding ring for an affluent couple.

At that time, goldsmiths were required to work at an open window, to ensure honesty but were forbidden, according to a 14th century Netherlandish document, to draw attention to themselves or canvass custom by "sneezing or sniffling."