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Saturday 4th July 2020

6429/19349

I attempted a run this morning, but unlike last time (was it 3 weeks ago? I could check but I am not going to) the hill defeated me and it turned into a walk instead. Which is better than nothing, but only just. 
I wonder if the virus hadn’t shown up whether I would have kept up with this year’s health kick. I was in the swing of it back in March so I suspect I might have done. But even the fear of Corona hitting the obese much harder has not made me pull myself together. 
Maybe now I will pull myself together.
At the start of the year I resolved to spend some evenings reading instead of watching TV. I think I made it through one chapter of my book of intelligent octopuses. It’s on the side in the lounge and I occasionally look at it and think of my failure. I can’t blame Corona for that.

I put on actual proper trousers for the first time in 104 days (I am pretty sure). By which I mean I wore jeans rather than sweat pants, shorts, swimming trunks or just pants.
I was a bit worried about fitting in to them to be honest, but they have a little bit of stretch in them and I got away with it.
It’s a return to normality that hopefully signals it is time to stop wallowing in prison and act like a decent civilised human again,
But we were having people round - friends, but not ones that I know well enough to be a total slob - and so I made the effort. 
Imagine how low I’ve sunk if wearing jeans is classy.

I am in no hurry to get to the pub, but to be fair I can’t really remember the last time I went to a pub even pre lockdown. And I never enjoyed crowded spaces anyway so the pub at the weekend is a nightmare enough without airborne viruses and the populace suddenly having been released from solitary confinement and hoping for a fuck or a fight. Some people seemed to be acting like they weren’t allowed alcohol at home. I understand that it’s a big deal to be able to socialise again, but I don’t trust people to do it sensibly and it all just confirms my fears that we’ll be locked down again by September. And a second spell inside is going to really hurt.

We met up with a family of four, but the kids were hugging and we all ate at the same table and we just trusted that we were all safe. So we may be just as crazy as the Saturday night revellers. It was a wonderful novelty to have people over

I cooked lunch and then played with the kids and by 3pm I was seriously flagging, but I pushed through the tiredness and we managed to watch a bit of “The Ballad of Buster Scruggs”. It’s an anthology so quite good for interrupted viewing, though I could happily have watched the weird and entrancing Buster Scruggs for an entire film.  The Coen Brothers are usually pretty reliable and this one is funny and thought provoking and we’re only two stories in. Hope they all come together at the end for a Tales That Witness Madness style twist. Don’t tell me what happens.


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