This month I've been...

Taking some time off...
As mentioned in my last post, I've been really feeling the pressure at work lately. I took some time off the other week to try and recharge. It worked - but now I really, really don't want to go back again! I'm finding working from home really difficult - it was something I already had to do for my PhD, but not in such long stretches. I'd never realised how much I relied on the social support of my colleagues and the structured environment of the office before. On my days off, I spent a few hours a day reading, continued on my quest to learn the Single Ladies dance, and cleaned the house. And it was all glorious.





Volunteering...
On Saturdays, I've been going along to the Lambeth food parcel hub with Michele. It's really cheering to see the same new faces each week, and to have an opportunity to stretch my legs and feel the burn (there is a lot of heavy lifting involved!). Saturday has now become our flop-down-on-sofa-with-takeaway-and-Netflix day, and it is marvellous.




Exploring...
The streets of South London, as usual! I've noticed that my energy levels on these walks is definitely down and I'm losing my stamina. When lockdown began, I'd put my sports gear on and run up and down the pavements around Michele. Now I'm dragging my feet and getting out of breath from what used to be a moderate pace for me.



Eating...
Banana bread like every other middle class person in lockdown. And allllll the chocolate. I'm pleased to say that we still have a good few bars of Tony from my original Easter stash (I'm ashamed but also proud to say that I spent £60 importing every flavour of Tony Chocolonely from the Netherlands. No regrets). I am also absolutely hooked on Creme Egg ice cream - I've filled our freezer with it, knowing that it'll be out of the shops for good soon!

 

Celebrating...
Easter! With all my chocolate. Michele also bought me an egg from Konditor because he is the best husband ever. I cooked cod with a creamy white wine sauce, and we cracked into a delicious bottle of Sancerre (#middleclasslife) to celebrate the end of Lent (I have been drinking pretty much every day since). I also put in a big order from GAIL's bakery for the bank holiday Monday - hot cross buns, smoked salmon rolls, cookies and croissants. Disappointingly Michele ate his hot cross bun WITH NUTELLA. The outrage.




Learning...
How to handle and analyse data in R. I took an amazing free online course by @wviechtb after years of completely failing to get to grips with the software (to the extent that... one time, R Studio literally deleted itself and moved locations on my hard drive... and another time I was struggling with it so much, I begged my second supervisor for help, likening myself to my grandmother trying to send an email for the first time and then my first supervisor emailed me moments later saying "ok, we need to find you another second supervisor..." [ok they were leaving the uni anyway, but for a horrifying moment I thought my ineptitude had pushed them to abandon me as a supervisee]). Turns out that it was an issue with my computer defaulting to a network drive, and me not having admin rights to be able to fix it. I have been being gaslighted over this FOR YEARS and I am now furious and elated because I figured it out and fixed it by myselffff.
I also had to learn to cut Michele's hair because lockdown, and I think I did a pretty good job!



Listening to...
My 30 day playlist challenge (which I have been shite at updating on Instagram, but I enjoyed choosing the songs and the memories). Still very much in a listening-to-music-from-the-past kinda mood. And Celeste. All the music by Celeste. Oh, also Single Ladies on repeat because I'm learning the daaaaannnnnncccceee....

 Reading online...


  • ...These wonderful words in a New York Times Cooking newsletter: "Cooking helps. It makes things just a tiny bit better for yourself and for those who are stuck at home alongside you. It transforms time into sustenance, into deliciousness, into something you can offer to others or yourself as a gift. Do it right, and it’s possible to forget, if only for a moment, that we’re sheltered in place."
  • ...A New World Through My Window - "We believe we are staying home, reading books and watching television, but, in fact, we are readying ourselves for a battle over a new reality that we cannot even imagine, slowly coming to understand that nothing will ever be the same."
  • ...The Sunday Short Reads newsletter (this one from #077 Off Islander - Excerpts from a Nantucket Journal) - "Nantucket is a long, low island, and even when the sea is not visible you can smell it and feel it. We follow a dirt road that becomes narrower and narrower, and I begin to think that we will never emerge anywhere, never be able to turn the car around again, and then suddenly the ocean is right there in front of us. We get out and create a small circle of our belongings, laying claim to this tiny parcel of beach with our lunch. Eating on this spot somehow makes it ours, as if the ceremony of peeling an egg, of uncorking a bottle, could possibly domesticate such wildness. The sun is very hot, and we undress gradually, layer by layer, until we are down to bathing suits. I wonder if nude swimming is allowed on Nantucket. Can there be rules or apples in this Eden?"
  • ...Coronavirus pandemic puts the spotlight on poor housing quality in England "In other words, a parent with two children under the age of ten could live in a single-room studio flat of just 20 square metres, and this would not meet the statutory criteria of being overcrowded."
  • ...The whole idea of global value chains will be reconsidered after coronavirus "While Burberry, Royal Mint and Rolls-Royce are producing gowns, and Ineos, Diageo and Unilever are making hand-hygiene products, the UK’s capacity for such flexibility is limited relative to Germany or South Korea. As Hancock again conceded, the UK “went into this crisis without a large-scale domestic PPE manufacturing industry to draw on” and “several countries have placed export bans on the sale of PPE”."
  • ...My Restaurant Was My Life for 20 Years. Does the World Need It Anymore? "I started my restaurant as a place for people to talk to one another, with a very decent but affordable glass of wine and an expertly prepared plate of simply braised lamb shoulder on the table to keep the conversation flowing, and ran it as such as long as I could. If this kind of place is not relevant to society, then it — we — should become extinct."
  • ...Edith Eger: 'This is an invitation to choose the life you want' "Hazards hurt and disempower us, but risks take us into discomfort where we are able to discover our strength."
  • ... Philip Pullman: 'It's all got to change'  "It’s no wonder that people feel disconnected from politics when most of us live in safe seats, and might as well not vote at all. We must be able to see that our opinions are accurately reflected in the composition of our government, not completely disregarded as they are now. So it might lead to coalitions: excellent. Discussion, compromise, working together are exactly how to run a decent country."
  • ...  Living Through the Blitz "The amazing part of it is the cheerfulness and fortitude with which ordinary individuals are doing their jobs under nerve-racking conditions. Girls who have taken twice the usual time to get to work look worn when they arrive, but their faces are nicely made up and they bring you a cup of tea or sell you a hat as chirpily as ever. Little shopkeepers whose windows have been blown out paste up “Business as usual” stickers and exchange cracks with their customers."
And reading offline...
  • The Best American Food Writing 2019 - edited by Samin Nosrat and bursting with the most delectable essays. Like sitting down to a tasting menu of fascinating documentaries.
  • The Little Snake by A. L. Kennedy - a fable on how to love, live and be a good friend; quite a short one, so good for those struggling to concentrate in these times
  • I Love Dick by Chris Kraus - a deconstruction of infatuation and desire that challenges the way we see and expect women to behave, and asks us who we allow to speak and be heard. Quite literally a work of art. It opened my mind.