Imaginal Casements

Happy new year to all of us. May we all be safe, well and happy.

Off down home tomorrow (that is, Thursday 22nd, even though it's already that because I'm up stupidly late) for Christmas and new year with my parents. Coming back up on Monday 2nd January. Cross your fingers for rail travel going reasonably smoothly. (And if not, ah well, I will have things to read, and I can wait for the next train.)

I wish everyone the compliments of the season. May you enjoy whatever holiday you celebrate, and may you and yours be happy.

Getting packed and ready for a few days in Rome — clothes, toiletries, phone and ipad chargers, etc. Bought Euros, checked details, checked in at airport, notified building society (provider of debit card) that I'm going abroad and they shouldn't cancel my card if they get charges from Rome, etc . . .

It'll be my first time out of the UK in over two years, and I'm nervous, but I'm also very buzzed indeed. I'll be back on Saturday.

Though alas, I will be having to get up at 4.30am or so. Still, nothing's perfect.

There will doubtless be something I've forgotten; fingers crossed that it's not too significant.

It was the Eurovision Song Contest today (after semifinals on Tuesday and Thursday) and to the great surprise of the entire nation, the UK managed to score some points and even did quite well for itself. No great shock that Ukraine won, but they had a good number and I think it would have been a contender even under normal circumstances.

For amusement (and possibly my later playback), here are some of my favourites:

Portugal - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mZtbD47u6yI - my personal favourite, quiet and moody
Poland - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jRVDZ6446eM - somewhere between a spiritual and someone being hunted down by rusalkas or zombies
Lithuania - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=B6uEWHrr6fM - neat, jazzy, sparkly
Serbia - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nBtQj1MfNYA - very weird, somewhere between a paean to washing hands and a dark ritual to bring the Apocalypse, catchy
Norway - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=adCU2rQyDeY - another weird one, involving feeding bananas to wolves, also catchy
Ukraine - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=F1fl60ypdLs - the winner, and understandably so
UK - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RZ0hqX_92zI - we came second, and I think we might actually have deserved it.

This year, touch wood, I am spending Christmas with my parents. Off down south tomorrow (Tuesday) and back after the new year.

Take care and stay safe, everyone.

If all had gone as planned, today I would be sorting my packing to head back to Leeds tomorrow, after a really lovely vacation at home with my parents, and getting back to work on Monday.

Alas for plans.

On Wednesday my phone COVID app notified me that I’d been in contact - well, within 2 metres for more than 15 minutes - with someone who was COVID-positive, and therefore had to self-isolate for another 7 days. (10 days from the date of exposure, which must have been my train journey down on the Saturday.)

Fortunately the logistics of this are manageable (have notified work, booked new train tickets for Wednesday, etc) and I’ve got some lateral flow tests with me (negative) and am asymptomatic, which relieves a bit of my anxiety. Still very irritated, though.

My parents have been very understanding. In lieu of being able to go out for healthy walks, I’m weeding in the back garden.

I did realise that this was a possibility, with a 5-hour train journey, but I’d been hoping to be lucky. Ah well.

For public release: I have a new trilogy coming out (over the next few years) involving (a) the Scarlet Pimpernel, and (b) vampires. (Also mayhem, magic, and revolution.)

To quote the release:
In Revolutionary France, the aristocrats are vampires – and they face the guillotine. However, the Scarlet Pimpernel, a disguised British noble, is determined to rescue them. These predators are being offered sanctuary by their aristocratic British kin, but at great cost to London's ordinary people. Then an English maid discovers the only power that could stop them. Assuming she survives . . .

https://trade.panmacmillan.com/pan-macmillan-acquires-scarlet-pimpernel-inspired-adventures-by-genevieve-cogman?utm_content=buffer6d83d&utm_medium=social&utm_source=twitter.com&utm_campaign=tor

I'm somewhere between delighted, buzzed, thrilled, and panicking . . .

Minor annoyance today; one of my radiators (a plug-in, freestanding one) didn't work when I turned it on. Fortunately it was in my lounge/kitchen area, so not as vital as the one in my bedroom; also fortunately, the weather here has turned much milder these last few days, and looks set to stay that way for the next week. Also fortunately, it was a cheap one I got several years ago.

I've ordered a replacement, which will be delivered in the "next 4-7 working days", so, well, fingers crossed. It is annoying - but at the moment the daytime temperature in that room is mild enough that I don't need a radiator (especially if I put a quilt over my legs when I'm sitting in there to work). It'd have been much more annoying if it had been the bedroom radiator which gave up the ghost.

On the whole, my strongest emotion is gratitude that this didn't happen while we were in the middle of the really cold snap (0 degrees C) last week. I could probably have coped, by moving the working radiator between rooms and paying for faster delivery or actually picking it up from the shop and carrying it home . . . but I'm very glad I don't have to.

Happy new year to everyone!

Here's hoping it moves towards improvement for us all.

Take care and stay safe.

Well - we've known it was coming for a couple of weeks now, but today on my weekly phone call to my parents I actually said out loud that I definitely wasn't coming down for Christmas.

Back in September we'd hoped it might be possible. Over the last month of lockdown we'd started talking about what we'd do if it turned out not to be feasible - but basically we had known that short of a miracle it wasn't going to happen. So I decided to be the one who'd outright say I wasn't coming on the call today, rather than my parents being the ones who had to say that I shouldn't come.

We're all three of us healthy. It's the five hours travelling down from Leeds to Southampton on the train (no direct planes), including the change midway, that's the big risk.

There will be zoom calls and phone calls and other things, and presents, and texts, and whatever, and I know it's the sensible thing to do - no, the right thing to do. And so do they. We will have a physical gettogether once people are vaccinated and the situation is less severe.

Forgive me this whine; I know it's nothing more than what lots of other people are doing. I'm already making a list of all the things I can do or work on over Christmas and the New Year, since I have the time booked off, in a deliberately strong-minded sort of way.

Roll on next year.