Day One Hundred and Three - Thunder, Lightning and Video Calls

Life is a funny old thing isn't it? It was a very noisy evening, yesterday. My rear neighbours appeared to be having some kind of party which was quite disturbing, particularly so, as I go to bed so early now. Sleep was elusive. And although it's more by luck than design I seem to have one day a week when I don't go for my walk. When I was a gym junkie and fitness freak I did a fitness instructor's course. One of the things I learnt was that you do have to give the body time to rest. I always thought that related more to intensive workouts and overdoing it with certain muscle groups but, you know, maybe it's the same for this ageing body, maybe it  needs a day off. Well, it certainly got one! I fell asleep again at a time normally I'd get out of bed to get ready for walking. When I next woke it was thunder, lightning and torrential rain. I'd been saved a very wet and perilous expedition.

I don't like thunderstorms.They never used to bother me for years until my house got struck by lightning. I can tell you exactly when it was, it was June 19, 2003. The date that etched on my mind. I remember waiting at the bus stop to come home from work and witnessing the storm in the rain. By the time I'd got home it was brilliant sunshine again. And all I could think about was that it wasn't long until Wimbledon. When I got in the house there was a stillness that I couldn't put my finger on. And my cat was nowhere to be seen.I went to open the fridge and the light wasn't on so I thought the bulb had blown. It was only when I went into the lounge and I saw that the display on both the hi-fi and the VHS recorder were blank. As I looked around the house I thought we had a power cut. Radio displays had gone out, couldn't switch lights on, and then my next door neighbours knocked. They said we had a lightning strike. Their son, who was a trainee electrician at that time, came and had a quick look at my fuse box and found that it had practically melted! He managed to get me some power. The strike had gone into all the houses served by one of the BT poles in the street. So I wasn't the only one. But I was the only one who also got struck down the TV aerial. So mine was a double whammy. It blew my boiler, my hi-fi, my TV, my video, my computer, my lights, my fridge, my phone. And I also saw that the lightning had come down through the spare aerial, hit the cats wire cage and singed the carpet. I know that I was very, very, very lucky that the house didn't go up in flames. Nevertheless it took months to sort everything out. The cat was unimpressed as well.

Today I had a video call from my friend and her daughter. Don't actually like video calls. I don't like how I look on the screen. It seems to highlight every blemish and wrinkle and I'm no oil painting to begin with but this seems to make it even worse. But it was good to see them both. And have an actual chat with my friends daughter who I haven't seen since last September. She was very grateful for the meals that I cooked. So we chatted mostly about lockdown and the virus and social distancing. But my friend had some more dreadful news. A friend of hers, who I know vaguely as well, has been diagnosed with lung cancer. Not a smoker. Fitness enthusiast. Healthy eater. It's just so alarming. How do you protect yourself? It's almost as if cancer is more of a problem than coronavirus right now.

You just thought the thunderstorm might have cleared the air a bit. No such luck it's still very heavy and humid and very hot outside. I don't believe it's as hot as yesterday but the buildup of the heat makes it seem so. I haven't done a great deal. I do domestic stuff as early as possible before it gets too hot. Today I cleaned the kitchen floor And used the last of the window cleaner on some picture frames to smarten things up a bit. I did a little bit in the garden. Can't really call it gardening, I was not there for long enough. There was some socially distanced conversations. In actual fact there is no social distance now, people just shout.

The fallout from yesterday's beach fiascoes continue. And there seems to be an increase in violence across the country . I think really it's about social unrest. Confine people for a certain amount of time and they start to lash out when you set them free This is what happened. Another reason to remain cautious and remain in lockdown.