Monastery and chapel at Prinknash Abbey

A day off turned out to be quite full-on! Fortunately I didn't switch on my phone till after 10 so didn't see the message asking me if I could come in and work at nursery. Another colleague has CoVid. Just when we thought it was safe. (Of course, no one is safe with new, improved Omicron Variant).

Ran down to Stroud to catch the bus to Cranham with my friend AP. We walked down the drive to Prinknash Abbey, where I once worked (in the gift shop), and walked around the Monastery Garden, which is tended by volunteers because the monks are too old to look after it now. Some of the volunteers were toiling away in the sunshine as we walked through the garden. We also took in the monastery chapel, as seen above, the oolitic limestone building attached to the Tudor building where the monks live. AP had not been there before. In the monks' graveyard, I was sad to see that Brother Anthony had died, in April last year. He was a residenr in a care home, during the first wave of the pandemic, April 2020. I wonder ..

After walking back down the drive to the shop/cafe, we sampled the drinks in the cafe, then legged it back up the hill to catch the 1.07 bus back to Stroud. I was early for my next appointment, so I went to the cop shop to report my missing purse, which I lost on Monday evening. Eventually met friend J at the cinema, in time to see
House of Gucci. What a film! Go and see it of you get the chance. You don't have to be interested in fashion to enjoy it, the storytelling is compelling. The Tuscan villas are easy on the eye, too.

We had a quick discussion over a cup of tea after the film, then I raced home to join an online WEA class, on the theme of A Christmas Carol by Charles Dickens. After the class ended, I still had to do something else, but I now can't even remember (this is a backblip, written for days later).

I will never again schedule so many activities into a day-off in December. Far too much running around. Fourteen thousand steps on the pedometer.