Quiche

People often ask me why I have a tough time with work-life balance or why I can’t easily switch off. I think it was epitomised late afternoon whilst I was on the phone with a colleague and news rolled in about a fatal attack on rangers in Virunga National Park in the Democratic Republic of Congo, where she worked for a few years. People she knows have likely been affected, and she had to make some calls to check on old friends and colleagues. Although this is an extreme example, we’re often dealing with some sort of crisis or unexpected event, big or small, which pushes the less critical stuff, but that stuff still needs to be done.

Trump’s latest moronic behaviour about coronavirus and disinfectant spurred him to new heights of idiocy, which is something I’ve had to say periodically for three years. Being a Trump apologist must be the most exhausting job in the world. There is an hilarious Scottish comedienne called Janey Godley parodying clips of Nicola Sturgeon and her team doing their briefings. Trump is summed up very accurately in this one: ‘the man’s got the IQ of a rocking horse.’

Today a colleague showed me some caterpillars which he has as pets in a plastic tub on his desk. This is unusual even for conservationists. I undertook my sanity walk in shorts as I’m missing loafing around in summer gear, and it was just about acceptable enough a temperature. If we have to go through it, lockdown as summer approaches is preferable to any other time of the year. Imagine the dourness if it was November right now.

I collected a reduced quiche Lorraine for dinner. Hannah said ‘there is never an excuse to eat quiche Lorraine, even a global pandemic.’ I beg to differ in the strongest possible terms. We tried to identify the origins of quiche Lorraine. I didn’t get any further than ‘France’.