Lockdown

I was woken in the middle of the night by a loud bang. I couldn't work out what it was but when it was repeated in the company of a flash, I realised it was thunder and lightning. It absolutely poured down and continued to do so all morning. This was taken as we set up for our Skype Spanish lesson. As before, the video and sound quality was terrible. It makes it much more tiring because you have to strain to hear what people are saying.

That was about it as far as intellectual activity was concerned. As we waved goodbye to each other, the sun suddenly sprang out from behind a cloud, so we went outside for a 15-minute break in the sunshine before the clouds rolled in again. 

Lunch: S made a salad with lettuce, shallot, diced red pepper, and loquats (see yesterday's blip). It may sound strange, but it was nice. I made tagliatelle with tomato sauce, adding the other half of the red pepper, red onion, mushrooms, bacon, and thyme from the garden. There was a punnet of giant and very unpromising strawberries in the fridge. I improved them by quartering them and pouring PX sherry over them (PX improves everything) and leaving them to marinate. "If you closed your eyes you wouldn't know they were strawberries," said S. "It's only the PX that tastes good."

After that I finished my Tessa Hadley book and baked the sourdough loaf. The fact that I'm not blipping it suggests it didn't look great. But it's a start -- I haven't made any for months.

This evening we are looking for a lightweight comedy to watch, and eating pâté on toast (end of a Lidl loaf) with a glass of wine. If you feel like some entertainment:


How creativity can go badly wrong (you may have seen it already, but this story made me cry with laughter).
Ravel's Bolero played by locked in musicians.