A grumpy start to the year

It’s March and I’m feeling grumpy. The ball-cock in my cold-water header tank has failed and was pouring out last night. I’ve had to turn off the water and I’m waiting for a British Gas engineer (they run our plumbing cover).

On top of that, my electric bill jumped from £70 per month to £240 month in February (which was a milder month than December or January). I had a new smart-meter installed last year because I thought my old one was over-reading. My bills had gone down, but now this. Trying to get any sense out of a call-handler at Bulb will be next to impossible.

It’s surprising how a couple of relatively minor setbacks can make you feel miserable. I need to get things in perspective.

So what have I been up to this year? Due to Covid, a family Christmas was cancelled. We were not able to see Max, Inna and our new granddaughter Alice; or see Sam, Lucy, Arthur and Saoirse. Tom, of course, was in Ecuador. We did manage a Zoom meeting with Sam and Max and, later on, another with Tom, although the connection in Ambato wasn’t too good. It’s not the same as seeing everyone – obviously.

My sister came round for Christmas lunch, which was possible under the stricter regulations, so that was our Christmas. She had been hoping to see Alex and their plans for a weekend at one of the flats at Sutton Hoo was also scuppered. What wrecked Christmas? Was it the new Covid-19 variant that has proved far more virulent or was it more government incompetence in opening schools and universities with no management plan? Probably a combination of both and we now have three variants to worry about – Kent, South African and Brazilian. There are more, of course, and more will be spawned while infection rates remain so high.

I cannot believe how badly this has been handled by government and yet how unaccountable they remain. More than 125,000 people have died (within 28 days of contracting Covid) and yet the polls suggest people would still vote for them.

Tom arrived back in the UK on January 2, flying via Madrid on a packed plane. I went to pick him up. His return meant that we all had to self-isolate for 10 days, but within a couple of days, we heard that Carlos, Lucy’s dad, had tested positive for Covid and they’d all been together at Christmas. Tom had a Covid test and proved positive. Margaret and I had tests, which were negative, and we felt sort-of-all-right, although it’s hard to say you feel great when there’s a Covid case in the house. Tom was confined to his room and we faced an extended quarantine. Luckily, Tom had relatively mild symptoms. Carlos also recovered well. It had been a worry because his sister died from Covid last year.

Tom had come back to the UK and left Lucy, Julia, Aureliano and Florencia in Ecuador in order to try to get his business back up and running. It was a tough ask with lockdown rules tightening. He has managed to get a little work, including a couple of commercial jobs – filming “how-to” videos for fitting motorcycle accessories, also filming a local farmer’s cattle for an advert selling the beasts.