Good Friday

A quiet day and much appreciated after a short but intense work week. 

After Tim’s 500th blip, we went for a long walk to stretch our legs. We went north and west to get into some back streets rather than stay near the river, where everyone else was. It was a beautiful early summer’s day and I took much pleasure from the blossoms (thanks to Tim for the photo).

We passed a garage with a sign that said something like, ‘Due to Coronavirus, we’re closed until the end of the week’. This made me smile. There was no date on it and I’m fairly certain lockdown is going to continue passed this week. The owner came out and asked if I needed help and I said how much I liked his sign. We agreed that since no one knows when this will get better, we’re closed until the of the week. 

It reminded me of a conversation I had in a Edinburgh about a month ago, just after social distancing was introduced but before cafés, bars and restaurants were asked to close. I passed a bar called Lebowski’s, after The Dude in the film The Big Lebowski. Readers may know I’m an ordained Dudeist Priest. There was a sign on the door that read ‘This c*nt of a virus has made us close indefinitely’. Just then the doors flew open and the woman who came out seemed as surprised as me to see someone standing there. I said that I thought this was an excellent sign and she thanked me. I said that I thought she might have used more Dudeist language and she said, ‘yeah, I was in a bit of a mood when I wrote it’. Fair enough!

I’ve missed these random conversations with strangers.