I opened my eyes and may have heard a slight bang outside. Perhaps it was a car going over a speed bump, mayhap a front door banging, to me there was total comparability to the bin men hurling stuff around.
I rose to the vertical like a porpoise surfacing. Friday! It must be Friday!
In one movement so smooth as to be indistinguishable from a grass snake emerging from a clump of daisies, I slid from bed, slid open the drawer where my workout clothes reside and slid into my leggings, leaping down the stairs three at a time, my hands pushing my arms up on the bannisters, my feet barely touching.
Scarcely a moment later the hall cupboard door was open and I was in my white jacket, zipped, through doors and into the utility, The two bags on the recycling box flung aside. the box, full of newspapers, pulled in one smooth movement from under the sink, the door unlocked, my feet thrust into my wellies as simultaneously I elevated the box, opened the door, sprinted into the damp side passage and up the slope of the drive to arrive on the corner and look up and down the street.
Not a bin man to be seen.
Not a sniff of a lorry.
And, strangely, no sign of any recycling boxes or bags on the end of any neighbour’s drive.
So I popped the box on the drive and ran back inside to find out A) what time it was and B) what day it might be.
You’d be amazed how difficult it is to find out what day of the week it is.
Eventually I ran upstairs and interrogated my alarm clock, which is radio controlled and has numerous buttons. At last I discerned the interesting icon: TH.
TH, it’s TH! Bin day is FRI!
I had just trampled the mud off my wellies all over the new bedroom carpet for nothing because it’s only TH and not FRI at all.
So I walked back down stairs, retrieved the box, shut the door, took off my wellies, found a watch and took my pulse.
60 per minute.
Well that’s OK, I’m fit.
Stupid but fit.
So I made a cup of tea, emptied the dishwasher and then came upstairs and wrote this.
Last March various television channels ran Groundhog Day on an endless loop, seemingly and I thought ho ho ho.
And I still haven’t learned to ice sculpt or play Chopin.
Nor, apparently, to put the recycling out on the right day.
Der.
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The OH says that the speeding up of the appearances of new Covid variants means that we need to upgrade our Personal Protection Equipment. The same paper disposable mask worn until it falls to bits is no longer quite good enough. You don’t need to go full hazmat suit yet but a bit of an upgrade would not go amiss. Put PPE into your search engine and see what comes up and have a bit of it. I have disinfected the shopping from the start but I am now disinfecting anything coming through the door and I think I’ll give the library a squirt before I put it out today.
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