Happy Monday!

Last week I went back to the office for a day. I’m going to be going in 1-2 days a week. I understand both sides of the argument, after a weekend of cold and nosebleeds, I don’t like sticking things up my nose and swabbing the back of my throat makes me gag (I am a sympathetic vomiter too!). That and the amount of people on the Tube who don’t wear a mask gives me the rage…

Actually being in the office was fine, leaving the house in the dark…not so much. I haven’t done it in January since 2019 and it’s not got any better.

I’m an introvert with SAD, honestly working from home in December, January and February should be something I can get on prescription..

So the rest of the week was as usual. Walk with Sue, work from home and so on. A while ago I talked about English Pastoral and I follow both James Rebanks and his wife on social media. I had one of those moments of bizarre social media synchronicity when she posted about taking her kids to the local museum which had an exhibition about reivers on the borders of England and Scotland and then about Paddington Bear. I’m currently deep into P. F. Chisholm’s Carey novels about Sir Robert Carey. I’m so deep into them that I bought the the first three books for Josephine as a birthday present because we’ve done all the Heyer’s and something set in 1592 is so completely about our friendship and how we met! Anyway, it’s fascinating and so worth reading, there will be a ‘book squee’ about it soon!

The other exhibition they went too was about Paddington Bear. I love Paddington Bear but I’m struck by how location is so much more important that we think it is. I’m, as I’ve said so many times, at least a fifth generation Londoner, so Paddington, the station and the area is it hits me differently (and with a bit more dirt). Both my parents were born in Paddington General, my great Grandfather enlisted into the Army Reserves in 1912 at Paddington, my great Aunt got told off by the local prostitutes for trying to steal a patch while waiting for her sister to meet her during when she came down from Lincolnshire during the war, my Grandad’s Salvation Army Corp was in Paddington for years and they used to collect money during Self Denial from the ladies of the night in Paddington. (Self Denial is like Lent for Salvationists). It strikes me that in 1958, you wouldn’t want to leave a small defenceless bear by himself at Paddington!

There are a lot of things that I take for granted as a Londoner, that people from other parts of country wouldn’t be aware of (and vice versa of course). I think we could all do with trying to find out about them.

Ok cultural differences of different parts of England aside. The rest of the week was pretty dull.

This week will not be much different, it’s going to be February tomorrow, so at least we’re over January! I’ll go to the office for a day, and then nothing bar making it through the week on the schedule.