Bird strike

Bird strike on the patio window

We had another bird strike on the patio window last week. I saw the dead pigeon lying on the patio when I got up. It was warm, but quite lifeless. Then I noticed where it had hit the window. Feathers were sticking to the glass where its head must have hit, with wings outstretched. The imprint was still clear upon the window this morning, despite the storms and heavy rain, until I finally washed it off. With the low sun shining off the window in the early morning, birds mistake the glass reflection for open sky beyond. Not sure what I can do though, short of putting up netting. Even that would probably not help, for sometimes they hit the upstairs windows, or the front windows in the evening when the sun's gone round.

Today was a day for tradespeople. This morning, a roofer called Josh came round to see Sam's side shed, where the roofing felt has pulled back exposing the wood. This afternoon a plumber called back with a quote for the water pump which has become noisy (a new guy - not the disaster who fitted our dish washer); and this evening our fencing guy, James, came to trim back the trees where they brush against the power lines. When we first moved to Hundon, the electric company used to trim them back (they own the overhead lines up to the house), but now they refuse to, and would probably charge us for the damage if the trees bring them down!

I have been careful to use the neutral term, tradespeople, but even well into the 21st century, everyone has been male: both plumbers, the electrician, fencing person, gardener, roofing man, builders, window fitters and carpenters. Women are so keen to get into "top" professions, doctors, politicians and board members, yet they are still notably absent from traditional trades. It is hard to see where this comes from, if not innate, for all children's books now are "balanced", with an emphasis on women filling all the traditional men's roles. Yet I do not think it can be "inbuilt", for we see pictures from Russia and China where women seem to fill as many jobs as men, so perhaps in England we are still instilling some bias at a  young age? Perhaps it comes from within the family, with father's encouraging their sons to take up their family business? 

Our nutty neighbour

 I have mentioned before some of the strange beliefs held by our neighbour (5g-nutters-are-loose-in-hundon). Now she is adding to her the list of nuttiness, having attended the anti-mask wearing march and rally in Trafalgar Square this weekend. Thousands of people were crowded together, free of masks, and excited to hear the arch-nutter Piers Corbyn spout his nonsense. If her outlandishness were confined to 5G, it would be harmless except to the damaged masts. If it were just a refusal to wear masks, it could be considered anti-social and dangerous to vulnerable people she coughed on, but not to the wider community. The biggest problem though is the idea held by so many of her group that the whole thing is a conspiracy by the pharmaceutical companies, to make vast profits from a dangerous vaccine that will only cause ill-health. This group firmly believes that all vaccines cause autism in infants. The fact that the Covid vaccine will only be given to adults does not register with them; perhaps she imagines that all adults will become autistic after the injection.

Polio "survivors" in Nigeria

The thing that really disturbs though is the ignorance and denial of the good that vaccination has done throughout the world. Polio, particularly damaging to children under 5 years of age, leads to irreversible paralysis for 1 in 200 infected children, of whom up to 10% die when their breathing muscles become immobilized. Today, only Pakistan and Afghanistan still have endemic polio thanks to a world-wide vaccination programme. As long as a single child remains infected, children in all countries are at risk of contracting polio. 

Smallpox has now been eliminated from every country. Cases of diptheria and measles have declined hugely, and now cause few deaths in childhood. The fact that their incidence is rising again following the anti-inoculation propaganda of people like the Hundon fruitcake is an indictment of everyone who argues against vaccination programmes. On their heads alone are the needless deaths of many infants, and I can only hope that they may see their folly before they learn the hard way through the death of their own children.

A murder mystery in Sudbury

Following her checkup, Ann had a second visit to the dentist's on Friday. This is something Ann never minds doing, and this was only to the hygienist so she actually enjoyed her visit, the first since lockdown. Coming back, we stopped at the Mill Hotel in Sudbury for a drink overlooking Sudbury Water Meadows, a huge flood plain flanking the Stour, popular with dog walkers and used for cattle grazing. The Mill is a beautiful old building, converted as its name suggests from an old water mill. The water wheel has been retained following the conversion and now sits slowly turning in the centre of the restaurant, covered in by glass panels.

Ordering at the bar, I overheard the bar staff talking about a local murder inquiry we'd just read about. Sure enough, when we walked through the field later, our way was blocked by police tape, and a lonely policeman stood eyeing us from a small gazebo-like tent set up to keep him from the rain. It seems that two bags of human bones had been found dumped in the river, along with a shopping trolley. This is not the normal news for quiet Suffolk, but to date no more details have been released: not even the age or sex of the victim, so it remains a complete mystery.

On Saturday, Ann fell headlong from the step outside the back door. Her foot is very swollen and bruised, and she's taking painkillers with the foot bandaged and kept off the floor. Then yesterday, walking in Clare park, I caught my foot in a fallen branch, brought down by the storms, and went flying full length. Unlike Ann, I was not hurt, only annoyed, for I fell flat into the muddy path so the landing was soft. Unfortunately, Bronte was just before me and I also fell onto her, so she acted like falling onto an airbag. The poor dog yelped in surprise, but happily she too was unhurt.

Then yesterday, on Bank Holiday Monday, we were invited out for a cream tea in Cambridge. We were greeted at the door by Edwin, the Maître d', and offered Champaigne as we were escorted to our seats, for the boys had prepared a full English cream tea. We started with a selection of thin-cut sandwiches laid out on a smart cake stand, followed by scones with jam and cream cooked fresh by Edwin, and then a wide selection of small cake deserts prepared by Andre, all accompanied by a selection of special flowering herb teas prepared in a glass teapot to watch the petals open as the teas brewed. The whole experience was amazing, and fully up to the standard of tea at the Dorchester. Later, Andre showed us his new hunting game, Horizon, for the PS4, and Edwin demonstrated his skill at designing cars, and with a Pokemon game. We got home late.

Flight to Edinburgh

 We flew from Edinburgh on Thursday for some away time. We were the first flight to leave City Airport for 4 hours, and the airport was deserted. We moved through security in record time, and a few people slowly gathered for our flight, but even that was barely a quarter full as so few were on the plane. Edinburgh airport too was like a ghost town with so few people. We wore masks the whole time (even in the taxi down to London and again in the taxi to the apartment), so it was good to finally get here and breath freely once more.

The woman greeting us was a cheerful hippy type in a long colourful dress and relaxed manner, reflected in the fresh apartment - one of Edinburgh's old stone buildings just behind the Royal Mile, with ultra high ceilings and vast rooms, expensively furnished in an eclectic style. She warned us to be careful with the dishwasher as she'd just had the engineer in because the door wouldn't shut properly. Soon after she left, the door wouldn't shut at all and the front fell off completely. What is it about dishwasher engineers that seems to turn them into useless tools? (See "how-to-fit-dishwasher")

On Thursday night we had a Deliveroo Thai meal to save shopping or cooking. It was supposed to be mild, but burnt our mouths out! But Friday made up for it with tea on the Royal Yacht Britannia, and a meal at one of our favourite veggie restaurants.

Our son Ben loves the Rebus books, so asked us to look up the "Ox" pub mentioned in the books as his local watering hole. It was favoured by Rankin because it is an old backstreet pub that was favoured by the Edinburgh police and has a unique atmosphere. We tracked it down after a long walk, but alas it was closed due to the Covid outbreak, with no sign of when it might reopen, so all we could do was take photos of the outside. It's official name is The Oxford Bar, so named because the Oxford University publishing house had business premises nearby. Interestingly, on the same street is another pub which was also closed for the duration, looks almost identical, and is called The Cambridge Bar.   

Sunny days and warm nights

 

We enjoyed al fresco fish'n'chips last night, in the company of our friends Rae and Malcolm. The local pub is not serving meals at present, but they are accommodating take-aways, so they were ordered by phone and picked up from the bar. It is surprising how quickly time passes in the company of friends, and we ended in full darkness, picking out stars and constellations from between the passing clouds. Rae and Malcolm usually go to France each year for their break, but not this year. Everything is so uncertain, they will not risk booking the travel and will holiday in the UK.

On Sunday, we don't get the paper delivered, so following my Sunday routine I drove to Clare early before the heat got up to walk the dogs the long round behind the Swan. I went across to the paper shop, donning my mask as I went, and bought the Times.  I know the Sunday Times is a broadsheet, but this was a tabloid size, so I wondered if they had switched over to the new format.

It was still well before nine o'clock when I got home, so I got a bowl of cereal and took the paper to read on the patio. To my surprise, there was a Telegraph delivered on the mat and I wondered if the paper shop had suddenly started Sunday deliveries. I picked it up and noted it said in bold letters, "Saturday". I looked at the Times then, and noted it too said "Saturday". I must be getting a little dopey - somehow I was a whole day out. At least we ended up with two crosswords to complete.

Clearing out rubbish

We have started to reduce some of our excess rubbish and unwanted things. As I mentioned in my previous blog, this began last week with a trip to the tip to get rid of the old dishwasher and barbecue, but with Covid it is no longer a straightforward business of just turning up with ones rubbish. We had to make an appointment nearly two weeks ago, and we got a ten minute slot to unload everything. Only one person is allowed out at a time, and we had to wear gloves and a mask, so Ann stayed in the car. With half an ear missing, I have trouble keeping my mask on. I was struggling up the steps with the heavy old barbecue in both hands when the mask suddenly slipped off round my missing lobe, and was hanging from the other ear by its elastic. I had to continue up the steps till I could  dump the barbecue, with my head tilted wildly to the other side hoping the mask would not blow away.

Then at the weekend, I tried to get rid of two of the four old bikes cluttering the garage. I had put them up for sale on Gumtree for £20 each, but had no takers even when I reduced them to £10 each! So I took two of them out to lean against the tree by the road, and made a large notice saying "FREE BIKES" which I glued to stiff cardboard. They both went within the hour, and whoever took them even took my notice, so if I want to try the same with the better of the other two bikes, I'll have to make a new sign. The other bike is quite rusty, so will probably end up at the tip on my next trip.

Our first barbecue of the year

Lucus cooks the barbecue

On Friday, we got to the tip after making an appointment two weeks ago. We had a 10 minute slot, and only I was permitted to get out wearing gloves and a mask. But we finally got rid of the old dishwasher, and our old barbecue which had rusted up. The stores are now very low on barbecues (it is well into the season), but we managed to find a good one in the sale at HomeBase with a double grill to segregate the meat from our vegetarian dishes,  and we finally had our big barbecue yesterday.

Andre takes a turn with the barbecue

I am not permitted to cook them, as I've previously mentioned, since on my only two attempts I poisoned everyone badly, so we can only hold them if we can persuade a visitor to do the cooking. This time, we were fortunate that our visitors were Edwin and Andre, plus two of their friends, Brenda and her husband Lucas, also from Brazil. Lucas used to work with Andre but now works for ARM and is the barbecue expert. He and Brenda moved here in January and rented a house in Cambridge, but were immediately faced with our cold wet winters and lockdown, so they couldn't go out and meet anyone. Even worse, all their furniture was in a container ship unable to dock in the UK, so for over three months they had only a mattress on the floor, two chairs and a small table they'd bought from a local shop. They are quite gregarious, so were glad when they could finally escape the confines of their rooms. 

Brenda holds a degree in law, but is here wanting to learn English, and  hopes to apply to Anglia Ruskin to take a further degree in psychology. In the meantime, she is working as a volunteer in Cambridge, helping it to raise money to protect unwanted animals. They have a dog in Brazil, but have been unable to bring it over yet, and it will have to be quarantined when it arrives, so she was delighted to meet our two animals. After the barbeque, but before desert, they took them for an ultra long walk of one and a half hours. Bronte was exhausted on her return and retired to the bedroom; she wouldn't even come down for a treat!

Edwin, Brenda, Ann, Andre and Lucus