Day Seventy-Three - Jasmine, Window Cleaners and Suspicious Emails

One of the gardens in the road I walk down on my route to the cliffs in the morning has some jasmine in abundance and the fragrance is absolutely wonderful. It hits me as soon as I turn into the street, lifts me, and encourages me onwards. My own honeysuckle is coming into bloom now and I could catch the faintest aroma this morning. That's another summer smell that brings me cheer.

In spite of my lack of gardener I'm relatively satisfied with the garden this year. I get very excited as things come into bloom. I have to resign myself to the fact that I can only do so much. I'm thinking I might just drop my gardener  a text just to keep me in the loop. I do worry that he will end up saying sorry I've got no more room now and I won't have anyone. He really comes into his own towards the end of the growing season when he can chop the stuff down. I can't do that I know. In fact after my efforts yesterday I'm having to rest my hands today. It is so unbelievably frustrating.

The window cleaner is coming today. This is giving me a twofold anxiety. He is new to us. My old window cleaner lived such a long way away and he was so infrequent that he has given his round over to a more local chap. The first time this guy turned up he missed me out. And I thought that maybe my details hadn't been passed across. So I contacted Jamie, the old window cleaner, and he assured me he had given him the details but he'd get in touch just to sort things out. So this guy, Ryan, turns up at the end of the day and "cleans" my windows in whistle stop time. Appalling job. When I compared notes with my next door neighbours they were equally underwhelmed by his efforts. "But what can you do?" was my neighbours reaction. Bloody well tell him, is my reaction! However I see no point in being unpleasant about it so I'm going to say something along the lines of, 'I know it was a bit rushed last time due to the circumstances but can you give them a good old thorough brushing today?'  My other anxiety of course is the fact that we're still in lockdown. Will he practise social distancing? And is he happy to accept cash? I've no intention of going out to the bank to pay him a tenner. And I don't do Internet banking. So the only thing I can do is pay by cash or if he has PayPal I could do it that way. But I have to say the windows do need cleaning. Apart from the spare room. Which I managed to do inside and out apart from the lead lights.

Local lockdowns might be the next thing where there are flare ups.  At the moment there are more cases in the north of England than there are down south. But of course those figures are so relative because it depends on who's been tested et cetera. I've become so sceptical of both the government and the statistic.

The window cleaner has been. And I said to him the windows need a jolly good thorough brushing. And he said they'll get one. I watched him very carefully. He didn't miss a single window this time and he did brush them all. So I have to say it was a better job than last time. He was very grateful for the cold drink I gave him. I asked him if many people had declined his services because of the lockdown. And he said out of 50 customers only 4 told him they didn't want him for at least the next couple of months. He said he's only just returned to work. He felt it was safer not to. So I kind of had a new respect for him because he wasn't being gung ho about the situation. He observed the social distance more or less and he was happy to take cash. So all in all it was a successful enterprise.

I've read a lot lately about the number of cyber scams going on. So many people are buying things online as they obey instructions to stay home. The cyber criminals are out in force. I had an email today purporting to be from Amazon and DPD couriers. Telling me they will deliver my parcel tomorrow. And I do have something on order from Amazon. But when I check in my orders it's not due to be delivered till next week because it's coming from Europe. So I am slightly concerned that this might be a scam email. I don't know what to do. I've changed my Amazon password. But it will be interesting to see if anything is delivered tomorrow. If it doesn't I shall be very worried. It may simply be that they want my card details from Amazon. I shall have to keep a careful check on things.