October 2021

October 31, 2021

The clocks went back this morning, which allowed for a bit of a lie in after our late night without feeling that we’d wasted the morning. Coffee in bed and knocked off a good chunk of another cryptic crossword before getting up.

We’ve decided not to do anything Halloweenish around here. What with Covid and the “trick-or-treat trail”, which I didn’t get organised to sign up for, there’s not much point in putting out a jack-o-lantern and stocking up on candy as the kids won’t venture down here.

I did make our traditional pumpkin soup (though I used sweet potato instead of pumpkin) – but no toasted pumpkin seeds, no witches fingers, no blood-sucking orange segments…

Went for a walk on my own mid afternoon, as Adam was working. Down Fitzroy Park, onto the Heath, around to Kenwood, then down Sheldon Avenue before wending home. There were a number of houses getting into the Halloween spirit. Things have certainly changed since I first moved here. Back then Halloween just wasn’t on the radar…

Picked up some snacks for Lyra, who’s having a sleepover with Ellie tonight. We had soup and toast together, after which they retreated to her bedroom for the evening and we watched a couple of episodes of Succession before bed.

October 30, 2021

Slept pretty well, not properly surfacing until almost 8am. I certainly needed that. I’d planned to go running this morning, but it was pelting with rain and my resolve weakened. Had a coffee and did one of our cryptic crosswords that have been piling up before starting my day.

Meditated with Adam, then made an omelette for brunch before heading out for a walk. The rain had let up by this point – the sky was a brilliant blue and the air crisp. I do love autumn weather.

Headed down the High Street (dropping some stuff at the charity shop), through the Cholmeleys to Jacksons Lane, then Priory Gardens to Queens Woods and across to Highgate Woods. The rain has been great for fungi, which was bursting forth everywhere I looked.

Finished Overstory by Richard Powers. I definitely won’t be voting for that one as my Booker winner. I find his writing a bit worthy and dull, and never much like any of his characters. Dipped my toe into Great Circle, which is last on the list. At 600 pages, I’ll be doing well to make much of an inroad before they announce on the 3rd. I hope I’ll be able to form an opinion at least.

Out for dinner with Will and Sara and the Gatehouse. Lyra was babysitting for Gabriel, so I didn’t have to prepare anything for her beforehand. We met in the pub part first for a drink, but it was a relief when our table was ready and we transferred to the restaurant – quieter and less buzzy.

Tapas to start, lemon sole with broccoli and green beans, and shared a dessert with Adam. Home about 12:45am…

October 29, 2021

Up at 6am, or at least awake… My FitBit recorded five hours sleep, but that feels generous. Even if my body managed to conk out for a bit, my mind was still whirring on the same things I fell asleep to…

The guide looks good, but there were a few things still to snag around the mega menu. Had another run at converting it to five columns and it worked this time (hurrah!), which meant I could space the contents more logically.

I took Adam through it, and he encouraged me to build the pages we hadn’t included so that it is complete. Most were quick to do, but a couple took more effort. It also made sense to increase the mega menu to six columns. While I was doing all that, there was a flurry of excitement about changes required to the final pdf, which meant changes to the web copy as well, and swapping out the pdf for a new one.

Finally wrapped on that project about at about 1:30pm and fixed some lunch for Adam and me. I have too many other things on my to-do list to take the rest of the day off, but I opted to finish the cv redacting, which is relatively mindless, and means they can do the shortlisting for three of the four jobs.

Adam was out at his book group tonight. Lyra and I made keto nachos – you bake triangles of sliced cheese to form the “chips” then eat with guac and salsa. Cracked on with Sex Education – I thought I’d crash after one episode, but I was good until 11pm. What a week it’s been…

October 28, 2021

Only managed five hours sleep last night…:-( I’d bailed on swimming with my “mermaids”, knowing I had too much work to do, and gave meditating a miss as well. At least I managed a quick shower before getting stuck in.

I’d been dodging emails from Ruth all yesterday, looking for an update on how the guide was progressing. At least the support person had come back to me about the grid issue, and by 10am I had that sorted. There wasn’t anything wrong with what I’d done – she’d just moved the order of the modules in the back end and it had started working…

I pretty much just sat and worked all day. Occasionally, I’d feel the blood pooling in my ankles and get up and move around a bit, but was otherwise completely focused. I’d turned the oven on first thing to bake my over-risen bread from the night before, then forgot about it until noon. Baked it anyway, and apparently it’s still pretty good…

Had a Zoom with the Guide team in the afternoon. Turns out there is a major piece of PR about it in Glamour magazine tomorrow, so it was important to have something in place by 8am tomorrow at the latest.

Lyra headed off in the afternoon to hang out with Lucia. I’m glad those two are spending a bit of time together. Millie is taking them to COP26 next Tuesday when she travels up there to launch the Guide, and they have scarcely seen one another since August.

Adam surfaced about 8:30pm wondering about dinner, so I suggested he make some. He used the leftover chicken thigh fillets from the other night to make a version of the peanut butter–chilli chicken which we had with broccoli.

Watched an episode of Succession while we ate, after which I went back to work. Finally launched the pages about 1am, editing the home page, placing the banner ad, and swapping out the navigation. It all looks fine, but fingers crossed for tomorrow…

October 27, 2021

Another morning, another excuse to blow off my run. Just not in the groove with it at the moment… At least I managed to meditate before starting in on the desk work…

I need to focus on the Planet Positive Beauty Guide for the rest of the week. I’m building a landing page on the beauty site for it, but also recreating some of it in html as well. The problem is the content and design of the report are still very much a work in progress, which makes it difficult to build anything.

I emailed the designer and got him to send me the latest version of the guide. Unfortunately, the copy has changed quite a bit since I built that initial flipcard thing. The definitions vary much more in length, and they’ve moved away from the unifying icons (which I thought looked great) to trademarks and logos instead.

There’s no way the flipcards can all be the same size, but came up with a solution using css grid that I was largely happy with by the end of the day. Made a quick pad thai-ish thing for Lyra and me (Adam being out again), which we ate in front of Sex Education.

October 26, 2021

Managed to meditate this morning – my first time since Friday – which I felt better for. Shifted my work focus to Junxion today. I have a campaign report to write for the UN Environment Programme, as well a pile of recruitment work to do.

I was a bit nervous about the report, as I wasn’t sure I’d set up the social monitoring properly, but everything seems to be in order. The problem is the campaign itself didn’t make much of a splash, but there’s nothing I can do about that.

Adam is out at a work thing this evening, so I cooked for Lyra and me when I finally managed to turn off my computer at 7:15pm – chicken piccata with spinach and broccoli. We’ve started watching Sex Education together. She’s watched it a couple of times already, but it’s new to me.

October 25, 2021

Slept like a log last night, a solid seven hours which I very much needed. I had a string of dreadful sleeps last week. It should have set me up nicely for my usual Monday run, but I just didn’t fancy it. Didn’t feel like meditating either, so I gave that a miss as well.

Did a couple of loads of laundry, sorted out the grocery order, then got down to work. Spent most of the day sorting out the new project template for the architecture website. There are some design elements they are after that are pushing the envelope of my skills. Good for my development, but I’m not going to be able to bill them for most of the hours I put in today.

Made Israeli meatballs with herbs and pine nuts, with an ezme salad on the side. Watched Maid with Lyra, then an episode of Succession with Adam and to bed.

October 24, 2021

I was slow off the mark this morning. By the time I got my ducks in a row it was gone 10:30am. I had it in my head that the clocks had gone back and it was even later, but turns out that’s next weekend…

Adam headed off for a visit with his mum, and I made a quick scoot round the village for something to take to Ben’s risotto-fest. He specifically requested people not bring wine, saying he had too much already, but also because most people’s wine don’t meet his standards I suspect.

Lyra was just returning from her sleepover when I got home. She’d spent the evening with her friend Alex and been to see The French Dispatch at the cinema. (Anything with Timothy Chalamet in it works for her.)

There were 12 of us for lunch, about half of whom I knew – Dave, Ed, Anthony, Marek, as well as Ben and Lu. Autumn slaw, mushroom risotto with both fresh and dried porcini, and pears poached in red wine for dessert. Took it easy on the drinking, but we still opted to catch the bus home and return for the car later.

No need for any dinner. Read a chunk of my latest novel – The Fortune Men, based on the life of a Somali merchant sailor in Cardiff in the late 1940s. Less of a page turner than the other three I’ve read thus far, but I’m enjoying it…

October 23, 2021

Spent the day at Kew Gardens with Adam. They have a Japanese thing going on this month, with a trail linking the Japanese elements of the grounds, and exhibitions, art installations etc. Made our way to Gospel Oak and then across London on the overground, which is a very efficient way to get there. 

It was heaving as ever – I’m always surprised by how much British people seem to like gardens, and also by the types of people who visit. Followed the trail round, stopping for an okonomiyaki from a street food pop-up.

The Japanese rock garden was pretty crap (to my surprise), but we really liked the ginko grove, Japanese farmhouse and bamboo varietals. The acers looked like they’d been planted last week – none was higher than three feet (another surprise). 

Checked out the Hive (quite cool), stopped for a sandwich, then made our way to the temperate house. By now the line to enter stretch most of the way round the building – “Queue Gardens” indeed – but we sucked it up and I’m glad we did.  It was the high point of the day.

Had a bit of time at home before we needed to head out again for dinner at the Bull & Last with Kate and Tim. Our table was at 9pm, so it ended up being quite a late evening…

October 22, 2021

Tired this morning, my brain was too busy  to sleep deeply,… Did one quick client update, meditated then put in a good hour of thinking about my pitch meeting at 10:30. It wasn’t a clear brief, and I didn’t know what they were expecting from the meeting either, which I found stressful.

The pitch meeting wasn’t much better. Teams was acting up, one guy was on a bus, the other late. I had thrown together a few slides in case I was expected to show something, but it wasn’t needed. The bus guy threw a couple of curve balls early on, talking about an intranet that hadn’t even been mentioned in the brief, and then banging on about how their greatest need was for enterprise-level integration with their CRM and bespoke estimating tool to generate estimates dynamically (also not in the brief).

Things approved when the big cheese joined the call, and the upshot was I think I have the work, and the intranet/enterprise yada has been pushed back to a “phase two”…

Could have used a stiff drink after that one, but it was only 12pm and I had a meeting with my architecture client to prepare for as well. Got the new project template to a pretty good place and walked down for 2pm. I was worried they wouldn’t think I’d developed the concept far enough but they were very pleased.

Straight from there to my hair appointment with Becky. I’m done with highlights – just a cut and a style, which only took an hour, but provided a nice breather. Bought a bottle of gin from the Sacred shop on the way home. Put in another hour or so on Junxion work, then it was finally gin o’clock.

Turkish takeaway and Airplane for movie night. What a week…

October 21, 2021

Happy birthday, mum… you would have been 94 today…
Another rotten night’s sleep… There’s too much rattling around in my head. Got an email from some random punter forwarded to me about  the log in button on the beauty site being a security risk. I’m  pretty they are exaggerating, but it planted the seed. I don’t want to be responsible for the site being hacked, and disabled it first thing before I did my meditation.

At my desk by the time Adam got back from his walk on the Heath with Doron. I blew off swimming this morning because of a catch-up meeting with the Green Beauty Guide team. I’m still not totally clear on the brief and how much of it I’m meant to recreate on the website.

The graphic designer who’s laying out the booklet,– a lovely Irish guy called Connor – took us through his v2, after which I showed the flip cards I built yesterday. Everyone seems very pleased with them, and I stressed again that I was only doing an intro page and three (now four) of the flip card pages, but I’m not confident that sunk in…

Had a new business meeting this afternoon with a woman in Priory Garden who wants some support with her gardening blog. It was good to get out of the house for a bit and shift to something relatively easy. She’s looking for a mentor really and support with social media and SEO, as well as a blog facelift. Probably should have said no, but hey ho…

Finally got down to working on the new project template for my architecture client, which I need to present tomorrow afternoon. They have given me a super prescriptive pdf of how they want the website to look – one of those “three pixels to the left” type jobs. I pulled something together by about 7:30pm, but hope to put in another hour or so tomorrow.

Made coquilles St Jacques for dinner. I’ve evolved that recipe somewhat from mum’s version now. I cook the onion and shellfish in butter, add the seasonings (Worcestershire, mustard etc), toss in double cream and cook to reduce, transfer to shells, scatter with Parmesan and finish under the grill.

Watched an episode of Succession and to bed.

October 20, 2021

Lyra’s back at school today. It’s a nice break for us to have her going to school by Tube this week. It’s not a big deal to drive her to the bus, more the time constraint of it. Up at 6:45am and out of the house by 7:15am, every bloody week day…

Worked away on the Green Beauty Guide page for the most part. It’s launching at COP26 at the start of November, and I’ve yet to receive a clear brief of what I need to do/build or even seen much draft copy. I have a v1 pdf from the graphic designer that I used to create demo flip cards of one section, which I hope is the kind of thing they want…

More rounds of graphic revisions for my insurance client – that’s pretty much all I do for them now – at an hour of online support for the Irish fitness woman. We needed to upgrade her plan to one that allows unlimited video, which should have been a straightforward thing to do, but she somehow managed to buy an entirely new plan instead…

Made Lyra some pesto pasta for dinner (Adam was out at a Board meeting) and sat down to watch the first episode of Sex Education together. Pretty funny, I’ve been meaning to watch it for a while but too much other stuff on the go to commit to yet another show…

October 19, 2021

Lyra’s not feeling well this morning. Her jab has left her with an achy arm, a puffy face and crushing headache. I reported her absence to the school and let her sleep in. Meditated then got down to work. My cold has pretty much passed but I’m going to give it another day or so before I return to running.

I’m awash in work again, partly the result of taking five days off, but also some unexpected new things popping up, like a woman who wants me to rebuild her gardening website, or the cricket club I helped months ago wanting me to redo their site.

Adam was at home today as well, so it was a full house, but we all circulated in our own orbits for the most part until dinner time. Adam ended up driving Lyra to her PCR test, which was just as well, because we hadn’t realised that fourteen-year-olds need to have an adult present. Should get the results within 24 hours…

Made chicken thighs with chorizo, red onions and broccoli, which is pretty much a weekly standby these days. Watched Maid with Lyra, then started season two of Succession with Lyra before heading to bed. I was too tired to read much of my novel – The Promise by Damon Galgut. I’d never heard his name before, but he’s written a string of novels and been shortlisted for other awards.

The first two I read were by newer authors, and you can feel it in assurance of his writing. Makes me wonder how the Booker panel goes about choosing the best novel, especially by committee. I’ll have to look into that…

October 18, 2021

Feeling a bit ropey this morning, dragged myself up regardless and went to check Lyra was awake. With Ellie isolating, she had decided to go by Tube, which meant she could leave fifteen minutes later, and no driving for me…:-)

Finished listening to my latest Criminal podcast before getting up to start my day. Couple in California who underwent a home invasion and kidnapping. Police were utterly crap, assumed they boyfriend was guilty, and when the woman was returned that they’d staged it for attention. At one point the kidnapper was calling in to corroborate their story, but to no avail. It wasn’t until the man was caught for a different crime that they got any semblance of support from the police.

A mountain of email to trawl through, and couple of quick, urgent bits of client work, a few meetings, and poof, that was the work day gone…

Adam arranged a PCR test for Lyra at the Sobell Centre walk-in – fingers crossed it’s negative, though it sounds like half her year has it at the moment. Lyra got her jab today, so that’s something. (In the end, we rescheduled for tomorrow. There was an Arsenal match, which meant traffic was awful, the weather was nasty, and she was already feeling the effects of the jab.)

Lyra said she was told that it’s bad to be jabbed when you actually have Covid, but given the incidence among teens at the moment, I don’t know how they will avoid that, unless they PCR test people first. I lateral flowed myself, just in case, which came back negative…

Sausages, mash and green beans for dinner, and episode of Maid, the finale of season 1 of Succession, and to bed.

October 17, 2021

Lyra was keen to venture into town today for a mini girls day out. The usual structure for these outings is something cultural, some shopping and some food. I rejoined the Tate in the hope we could get some kind of members’ access to the Yayoi Kusama installation, but it’s booked until next June. Apparently, they release members’ only slots occasionally, so I’ll be on the lookout for those.

In the event, she didn’t emerge from her bedroom until after 12pm. I spent the morning redacting CVs, and got that work to a good place. We headed into town mid-afternoon, taking the Tube to Tottenham Court Road, then heading down to Foyles. Spent a very happy hour in the new fiction section, emerging with an armload of books.

Hit the Korean supermart, then Chinatown for dimsum at Gerrards Corner (our family staple), before heading home again. Adam was back from his walking weekend, which sounds like a good time. I was a bit tuckered out (my head cold has zapped my energy) and had a little doze before heading upstairs to watch an episode of Succession before bed.

Jess notified me  Ellie has come down with Covid, so we’ll need to organise a PCR test for Lyra…

October 16, 2021

Happy birthday, Gale! Feeling a bit ropey still – head achy, eyes scratchy, and just generally off. I’d arranged for Pasc and Lizzie to come round for coffee, but when Pasc turned up she was feeling considerably worse than me.

She’s been having a terrible time with migraines the last few years, and had been up all night with a particularly bad one. I suggested rescheduling, but she wanted the distraction of getting out of the house. She didn’t stay that long, but Lizzie and I had a good catch-up afterwards. Pretty sure I haven’t seen her since before lockdown…

Drove Lyra to Beulah’s house to collect her suitcase and stayed for yet more coffee. Worked the rest of the afternoon redacting CVs, then turned my attention to dinner. We had cauliflower-sweet potato tacos, and binged on the rest of You. Started my second Booker Prize shortlisted novel – A Passage North by Anuk Arudpragasam.

October 15, 2021

Managed a pretty early start considering my cold is somewhat worse this morning. I’m still not congested, but my throat is sore,  head achy and my eyes scratchy and itchy. I’ll do a Covid test this weekend, but I’m pretty confident it’s the same cold that everyone seems to be getting…

Had coffee in bed then packed our things. We didn’t spread out much from our bedroom aside, from the kitchen, so it didn’t take long. Set off about 9:30am and drove a couple of hours to the Gordano services outside Bristol where we bought a sandwich and doughnut for lunch.

Traffic slowed up around Slough, but we still did the journey in about five hours. Unpacked then had a little rest until Lyra came back from school. Adam set off for Hastings not long after for a walking weekend with his dad group. Lyra was keen to order Nandos, and I certainly didn’t fancy cooking, so we did that. Watched the first half of the new season of You, which dropped today and to bed.

October 14, 2021

Our last full day in Cornwall. We’d planned to get a 9am departure so we could do an 8km walk round the headland above Boscastle before hitting the farm shop for lunch. In the event, Rachel and I both walk with scratchy throats this morning, so we decided to roll things back a bit. There was also some lingering fog it made sense to let burn off before we tackled any cliff paths.

Used the time to finish my novel, The Salt Path, about a 50-something couple who walk the South West Coat Path, which runs 630 miles from north Devon, round the entire coast of Cornwall ending up in Dorset.

Drove to Boscastle on a tremendously windy road. Adam sat up front with Rachel in order to navigate, with Richard, Luna and me in the back. We covered our laps with towels, rolled the windows down, and he kept her head trained out the open window as much as possible. Managed to complete the journey unscathed.

Boscastle is such a pretty little town, one of the nicest I’ve seen in Cornwall, which is saying something. Walked through the town then climbed up to the headland and made our way along the coast for a mile or so before turnng back. Drove to the local farmshop for a crab sandwich lunch and to buy supplies for tonight’s dinner.

Richard’s turn to cook tonight – roast topside of beef, with veg and gravy and a bottle of Cornish red. We were all feeling a bit meh and it was a pretty early one…

October 13, 2021

Happy birthday, Margo! Slept a bit later this morning, helped by Adam turning off his weekday alarm… The weather is glorious, brilliant blue sky and more like early September than October.

Followed a path set back from the village, up and across a series of fields, with all manner of stiles. It’s amazing to me how many different styles of stile (and other fence crossings) there are.  You’d expect with all the walking we’ve done that we’d have seen all there are to see, but that is so not the case.

Our destination was St Neotan’s waterfall destination, but after following the riverside path for a good mile, it turned out they were charging £6 to actually see it so we didn’t bother. Retraced our steps to the main road and headed into Tintagel. Relieved to see that it’s not only King Arthur Tea Rooms, Excalibur Pasty Shops, Merlins Crystal Emporium and so on. The road into town had a Boots, a little hardware shop and a few other places local residents might want to use.

We were hoping for a crab sandwich, but the only pub we could get an outdoor table at was out of crab. Afterwards we cut back to the coast path and took the same route home as yesterday’s walk.

Leftovers for dinner tonight – Indo-Italian fare – leftover lasagne and chicken curry topped up with another batch of raita, some fresh rice, and a saag aloo with the potatoes we hadn’t needed yesterday. A few rounds of Uno and to bed about 10pm.

October 12, 2021

Beautiful morning and we were up bright and early. Adam’s alarm went off at 6:45am which was the main reason… Although small, our bed is super-comfortable and the room nice and dark.

Made a round of coffees with their behemoth of a coffee machine then booted up and headed out the door. It’s my first time on the north coast of Cornwall and it is certainly beautiful. Maybe a bit more rugged than the southern coast, and prone to be more wet and windy though not today. Sky blue, sea calm, and just a hint of a breeze.

Walked north along the coast path towards Tintagel, stopping for a quick look at a little church on the headland. The graveyard had a prominent sign warning people to keep their dogs on a lead on account of poisonous adders, but I wonder if it’s to keep them from letting their dogs roam about digging and whizzing on the gravestones.

Headed past the island where the ruins of Tintagel stand, which weren’t what I expected at all. I thought they’d be looming into the sky, but it was a low rounded island, with scarcely any sign of building at all. A new bridge was opened 2019, joining the ruins to the mainland, which means people no longer hike up to from sea level.

Continued into town, where we purchased a round of the world’s second best pasties (the best ones were across the street, according to the sign) to take back for lunch. Parted ways with Richard and Rachel, who headed back not wanting to visit Tintagel with the dog.

We had another coffee and the world’s best scone then returned to the ruins. That bridge is quite something, and contains 40,000 hand-carved slates arranged on edge. Once you’re across to the island, you get a much better sense of the ruins, and there was excellent signposting telling the story of how long the site had been occupied.

Headed back on the lower coast path for our pasty lunch. Delicious but huge – Adam was the only one who was able to finish his. Rachel mentioned that Kyle MacLachlan was in Tintagel this morning, and showed a picture she’d seen on Twitter or Instagram, of him standing at the very café we’d had coffee with the two waitresses that had served us. Must have missed him by minutes…

In the mid-afternoon Rachel and I made a trip to a local farm shop to buy chicken for our turn to cook tonight – Indian food. It’s always a challenge cooking in a strange kitchen, and we ended up scaling things back a bit, but produced a nice spread in the end: bhel puri, chicken and potato curry, raita, basmati rice, Indian pickled onions, and these crispy breads from a packet. Uno & bed…

October 11, 2021

We’re off to Cornwall today! Got Lyra off to school as per usual, but meditating and running fell by the wayside. We hadn’t got much done yesterday, and what with the few work loose ends I needed to tie up, it was going flat out to be ready for our scheduled 11am departure.

Set off in convoy with Richard and Rachel, but managed to lose them before the North Circular. The M4 good for once – no roadworks for the first time in years – and we made good time to Bristol. Met up with R&R at services south of Bristol for a McDonalds lunch. Pretty happy not to be in the back of their car – Luna had thrown up twice already.

We wouldn’t have fit anyway, and we ended up with a bunch of their stuff on our back seat. I’m glad we were able to get petrol as the train plan would have had its challenges as well. We’d have had to pack drastically differently ourselves in order to make it travel feasible.

Swapped over the driving a bit after the services and I did the rest of the journey to our holiday home in Trebarwith Strand. Such a cute little house they’ve found. Its half way up the cliff with a sea view from the balcony.

After settling in, we walked down to the little beach to stretch our legs. There had been much talk of dips in the sea back in London, but I’m not going to be pushing for that myself. It looks cold as fuck.

Rachel had brought a lasagne for dinner. Heated that up and had it with green salad, garlic bread and copious amounts of wine. Played Uno and to bed.

October 10, 2021

Adam headed off to play football early, I did some more housework and a bit of food prep for brunch – ezme salad, egg salad, garlic yogurt. When he got back he drove me to my mammogram appointment at Finchley General and waited while I went in.

They’d told people to try to show up exactly on time, and there was no queue. I went straight through, had my breasts paninied at various angles and was out again in ten minutes. Before having the procedure, I’d been told by others how painful it is, but I scarcely feel a thing. Makes me wonder if that’s something wrong with me…

Picked up some Indian groceries on the way home to take to Cornwall tomorrow. Lyra had got everything ready for brunch by the time we got back and we actually had time to play backgammon before Doron dropped Beulah round about 1pm.

Adam took her home again afterwards, bringing Lyra came along with her suitcase for the week. She’s staying with her grandmother from tomorrow while we are in Cornwall. I did my friend Lynne’s Zoom yoga class, which I really enjoyed. She did a sideways sun salutation series – chair, goddess, standing fold, triangle, lunge, and maybe another pose in there – that I would love to learn properly so I could do it as an alternative to the forward/backward bending one when I practice on my own.

No one felt like dinner (or even a snack). Lyra did homework and we watched the Ted Lasso finale and called it a night.

October 9, 2021

Nova’s deparature shaped much of the day. We had a version of our Sunday brunch a  little earlier than usual, but otherwise she was pretty much focused on packing and the extra steps you have to complete travelwise in this era of Covid.

Adam drove her to Tottenham Hale to catch the train, and Lyra suggested a game of chess. She’s been reading The Queen’s Gambit, which was the source of that impulse. Neither of us are any good at it, but interestingly, we have very different playing styles.

I’m aggressive, like taking pieces, and prone to make mistakes. (I lost my queen putting her in check on my second move.) She’s more considered and strategic, but overly cautious imho. Eventually, she had only her king, which I was trying clumsily to corner with a knight and a pawn. Switched to backgammon – a better fit for us both.

Adam and I went out for dinner to a fancy restaurant in Sloane Square called Kutir. Opted for the tasting menu for the first time in ages, though know enough not to do the wine pairing. We did have a cocktail beforehand, and Adam’s was exceptional – the Sariska, made with gin, sweet vermouth, sweet basil, lavender syrup& bitter, ginger and activated charcoal, was well worth the trek to west London.

Our meal:

A savoury herb sorbet

Soft shell crab with chickpeas

Salmon tikka with raita and pickle

Tandoori lambchop with kachumber

Chicken tikka

Coconut prawn curry

Rice, dhal, breads

Chocolate patisserie with banana elements

Pancake with reduced milk and berries

Most of the food was exceptional and I appreciated the way they’d elevated Indian classic dishes to new heights while keeping them recognizably themselves.

The only duff note was the pancake dessert, which was really pretty bad. The pancake was heavy, greasy, hard and cold. I only tried one bite, but Adam persevered for some reason and ate most of it. When the waiter asked, and we said we hadn’t enjoyed it, he whisked the scraps away and brought us a beautiful layered ice cream slice, which was much more the ticket.

Tube out, taxi back and to bed.

October 8, 2021

Nova’s last full day in the UK before she heads back to Madrid. It has certainly been a flying visit, but so good to see her…

Dropped Lyra at the bus, meditated and went for a four-mile run – first time I’ve managed that in a while. I could feel the swimming in my legs a bit, which is surprising as I hardly use my legs at all when I swim front crawl. Some people keep up an energetic flutter, but I’ve never done that. Maybe in a race, but not otherwise…

Another hectic day at work… I managed to resolve the javascript issue on the fitness website, sorted out a display problem with the teacher info, and launched that about 4:30pm.

I also dealt with a technical glitch on the Forum’s YouTube page, launched the video on demand for the British Beauty Week (which involved building and testing two updated member pages) and importing and styling fifteen videos, parlayed with my Irish fitness client around her video on demand, AND managed to upload the art school half-term classes, promote them on the site and do a major Woo Commerce upgrade. A small agency would have been pleased to churn through the volume of work I managed today…

Tonight’s takeaway was from Mildreds – Nova’s choice. She and Adam collected it from the Camden branch and we sat down to eat about 8pm when I knocked off work. We all had “chicken” burgers of various descriptions. I was curious to see what vegan chicken was like, but have definitely scratched that itch. Carried on watching Maid. To bed about 10:30pm.

October 7, 2021

Swimming again this morning, but at 9am instead of 8am. This meant I was able to do some work after getting Lyra away and meditating. The fitness ladies are very keen to get the new classfinder up on the site, but there are a couple of knotty functionality issues that need sorting first.

Swam a mile like last week, and maybe felt a bit less bad. The main thing I notice is how feeble my arms are – I’ve clearly lost upper body strength since the last time I was swimming regularly. Not surprising, as I don’t do any upper body exercise aside from typing…

Quick coffee afterwards with Kate, Helen and Jenny, then back to the coal face. Submitted a support request for the classfinder issue and chased the guy who built the site originally but didn’t hear back by the end of the day. I think it’s something to do with the website theme, but I’m at the edge of my technical knowledge with this one.

Adam was out for the evening so I had dinner with the girls – peanut-chilli chicken and slaw. Watched the first two episodes of Maid. After they went to bed, I carried on working for a bit. I’ve got a launch for the Beauty Council looming as well…

October 6, 2021

Nova has arrived safely from Madrid. Woke up at 4am and checked that she was in her bed. Woke her up at 8:30am to ensure she made it to the Spanish embassy in time to collect her visa.

She’s heard any number of horror stories, including one from a girl who’d flown back to the UK for the day to get her visa, only to be told they couldn’t issue it that day because “the printer was broken”. Happily all went well, and she has the damn thing…

Mom’s death day – 18 years… What with all the Nova excitement and lack of sleep, I got into a muddle about making coquilles. Adam had already returned from the fishmonger with the scallops and prawns by the time I remembered that I do that on the 21st, not the 6th.

I was tied up in meetings half the day, including a face-to-face committee meeting at Highgate School. Got home about 7:45pm, and made scallops and bacon in a lemon butter sauces over pasta/zoodles. Ate at the table which made a nice change. Gourmet salted caramel marshmallows for dessert — the last remnant of my gourmet food hamper from Margo.

October 5, 2021

The usual morning routine, followed by a full-on day of work. I’m going all on on the classfinder this week, as I really need to get that launched…

Lyra is babysitting Gabriel tonight, so I took advantage of her absence to make salmon with creamed spinach, which not one of her favourites. Watched an excruciating episode of Succession, where the eldest son stages a vote of no-confidence coup against his father. Car crash television…

Nova is arriving from Madrid late tonight. Adam considered going to get her, but parking is such a bitch at Stansted, it’ll use half a tank of petrol, which we currently have no way of replacing, and her flight lands after midnight. She’s going to get the bus to Golders Green and then uber…

October 4, 2021

Another working week… Got Lyra off to school, meditated, and went for a four mile run…

I always check my calendar at the start of the day to fix my meeting schedule in my head, but something clearly went wrong this morning. Ended up with a clash, and the worst bit is the more important meeting didn’t show up for some reason until after the time had passed.

Put in a couple of hours redacting cvs for Adam’s company. It’s pretty low on my to-do list, but I’ve noticed I take refuge there sometimes when I have scary volumes of work to get through. The situation isn’t helped by the fact we’re planning to be away next week, spending Monday to Friday in Cornwall with Richard and Rachel.

We’d been planning to drive but are rethinking that now that the petrol shortage is dragging on. The train is so fucking expensive though. The back seat of their hire car with their carsick prone dog is hardly appealing either…

Stopped work to attend a sub-committee meeting at the Gatehouse in advance of full Forum meeting on Wednesday. I’m not sure what it was in aid of – we didn’t have an agenda and didn’t really agree anything, but nice to see people in person for a change and to end my working day at a reasonable time for once.

Made an aubergine and tomato curry from Mildreds cookbook for dinner. Adam and Lyra were getting it underway by the time I got home so we all cooked together. Watched an episode of Peaky Blinders, then carried on with Succession. There’s a new season out in a couple of weeks, so it’s getting a lot of hype…

October 3, 2021

Adam woke feeling worse than yesterday, and it seemed the best course of action to cancel the family brunch. He spent the morning in bed nursing his cold and finishing his book. I did my meditating, read my book and started on my invoicing.

After lunch, Lyra convinced me to watch the first episode of Squid Game with her. I was completely hooked by the end, and for the rest of the day we interspersed mini work breaks with a Squid binge and ended up watching the whole thing by bedtime. The ending was a complete surprise to me and I was tempted to watch the whole thing again…

October 2, 2021

Since we’re having Beulah round for brunch tomorrow, we decided to go whole hog and invite Doron and Antonia as well. After coffee and meditating I got straight into the housework, hoovering the whole house, mopping the kitchen floor, scrubbing the dining room table and dusting the livingroom. It’s easy to turn a blind eye when no one ever comes inside…

Adam was pretty sluggish about helping, and when I challenged him about it he said that he’s coming down with a cold Lyra is still struggling with hers a week on, and by all accounts the one circulating at the moment is a doozy…

Ended up putting more work in on the fitness site – she wants to run classes through it come Tuesday and there are still a few loose ends to sort out. Made cottage pie and green beans for dinner, and watched the latest episode of Ted Lasso before bed.

October 1, 2021

Rabbits… Didn’t fancy running this morning – I can feel that swimming from yesterday. Mainly in my neck and arms, but also in the legs.

Adam went to the office for the day. I tackled a bit of housework (we’re having Beulah round for brunch this weekend) then got down to work. Due to a diary mixup, I ended up blowing off an in-person meeting with Kate to discuss a potential new project. Managed fifteen minutes on the phone discussing it, and she’s sent me a couple of docs to read through.

My main work focus was mopping up details on the Irish fitness site. The membership feature doesn’t work quite the way we want it to, so I need to figure out a work around for her corproate membership clients.

Got Indian takeaway from Shahi Pakwan. Adam thinks food is better than Kiplings, but I’m not convinced. Tried to find a film to watch but none of us in the mood for The Phantom Thread and Lyra nixed Trainspotting after ten minutes. She fecked off downstairs and we switched to Succession…