A grey day

The news today has been full of reports marking the grim milestone of more than 100,000 deaths in the UK related to Covid.  Some reports, at least, have focused on the personal cost of the pandemic, and have tried to made room for people whose loved one have died to voice their pain.  The BBC Radio 4 'PM' programme, for instance, this afternoon included some very moving interviews. 

Otherwise... I went for a good walk this morning, with an old friend who had a hip replacement in the autumn. So she needs gentle walks each day to build up her strength again. We went along another of Sheffield's river valleys to Forge Dam, where there's a cafe doing takeaway coffees and cakes. We sat with the coffees for a while, watching ducks and seagulls on the part-frozen pond.

This evening I've got my weekly online Greek lesson. They're a bit of a rollercoaster, these lessons.  The tutor is good, and is intent on making sure that we hear as much spoken Greek as possible and get used to the sounds. We're all learning to control our panic levels now,  during the bits of the lesson when strings of incomprehensible sentences flow over our heads, before we start breaking them down into sequences that we can practise together.  There is some magic, too, in hearing a recognisable word emerge from the fog and finding that the sounds are familiar (even though the written version still looks like a mysterious code most of the time...)