Chilly.

Last night's clear skies gave us stars to wonder at, surprisingly clear despite the street light behind me, and a frosty morning. Most of the day has been bright and sunny, the photo below was taken later in the afternoon when the clouds had begun gathering in.

It's been a good day beginning with not having to get up early after a decent night's sleep. It's too early to say what effect the injection has had. The lidocaine will give temporary relief but if the steroid will have any effect no one could say. However it was a pleasure to spend time relaxing in the cleaned up sitting room with the last of my Christmas chocs and easy tv.

We've had a few visitors today. All masked and at a safe distance of course. One was a chap from the windows company to have a look at the front door which has been proving difficult to lock. Putting a level against it it was obvious that the door is warped. There'll be no problem in getting a replacement but they better use the glass from this one or refund the cost of the window film we put on. The man who came today thought they would be able to reuse the glass though I'm not sure how that will work as they can't leave us without a door while they swap the glass over.

Our other visitor was a builder, now our new builder. The parting from the first builder was completely amicable, indeed the new guy wouldn't take us on if it hadn't been, but the first builder works on his own and had found it increasingly difficult to cope with his workload. Also a friend of his is in ICU with covid so he only wants to do outside jobs. The new guy has a full team and with luck things should move more quickly.

We also had an oil delivery this morning. We still had a third of a tank of oil but you never know when the weather conditions might put a halt to deliveries in this part of the world. Now we've more than enough oil to see us through the worst of the winter months. Being warm gets even more important as you get older.

Looking at the figures the covid situation is worse than it ever was in the first lockdown with the added complication of the new variant being so much more infectious. Over 1,000 deaths today. The whole country is in lockdown and thank goodness schools are closed at last. It was ridiculous that children could be in a class bubble (30 children) or a year group bubble (200 children) with no social distancing or mask requirements. Even if children are less likely to get the illness, there are no published figures - I wonder why? surely they are vectors to carry the virus from their family to the families of everyone else in their bubble? And what about the adults in the schools? I'll be taking extra precautions when I do go shopping, back to wearing safety glasses and fresh latex gloves for each shop as well as the standard mask and plenty of hand gel. We can only hope and pray that we all get vaccinated before the virus changes beyond the effectiveness of the vaccines.