{"id":5821,"date":"2022-01-01T18:11:34","date_gmt":"2022-01-01T17:11:34","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blog360.back2sq1.co.uk\/?p=5821"},"modified":"2022-01-01T18:11:34","modified_gmt":"2022-01-01T17:11:34","slug":"familiar-look-to-new-year","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blog360.back2sq1.co.uk\/?p=5821","title":{"rendered":"Familiar look to new year"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<figure class=\"wp-block-image\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" width=\"1024\" height=\"768\" src=\"http:\/\/blog360.back2sq1.co.uk\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/01\/IMG_3323-1024x768.jpg\" alt=\"\" class=\"wp-image-5822\" srcset=\"https:\/\/blog360.back2sq1.co.uk\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/01\/IMG_3323-1024x768.jpg 1024w, https:\/\/blog360.back2sq1.co.uk\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/01\/IMG_3323-300x225.jpg 300w, https:\/\/blog360.back2sq1.co.uk\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/01\/IMG_3323-768x576.jpg 768w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 1024px) 100vw, 1024px\" \/><figcaption>Furthest point on our walk today: Dot pauses <em>at Coslany bridge<\/em> for a gaze upriver .<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-drop-cap\">Well, here we are in 2022, and it looks kind of familiar. Dot and I took a longish walk this morning \u2013 about three miles \u2013 and there were plenty of people about, quite a few of them in masks, which always seems to me pointless in the open air. But perhaps they don&#8217;t want to be recognised. We walked round the riverside path, crossed Coslany bridge and came back through the city and the Close. Very pleasant weather for a change \u2013 high cloud, some sun and pretty mild. Apparently the warmest new year&#8217;s day since records started a couple of years ago.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>We were due some decent weather. Until yesterday the week had been deep grey, wet and extremely unpleasant. On Tuesday I only went out once \u2013 to take three of my latest books to Joy McCall, placing them carefully in her bin. Joy is one of my greatest admirers and a huge encouragement, but she&#8217;s been having a hard time. Her daughter died last year, and Joy herself has continual health problems, of course, being paraplegic.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Back home I managed to write my two Parish Pump pieces and a short blurb for one of Joy\u2019s books, among other things, then watched Norwich play Crystal Palace on Amazon Prime and lose 3-0. It\u2019s getting pretty disheartening. Then England lost the third test and the Ashes series against Australia. Pretty inept all around. Watched an episode of <em>Vienna Blood<\/em> \u2013\u00a0very good \u2013 and the Christmas special of <em>Call the Midwife<\/em>, which just teetered on the right side of sickly. We are on the penultimate season of <em>Friends<\/em>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Wednesday was \u2013 guess what? \u2013 grey and wet again.  Amy started her journey home: all seemed to be going well. We FTd David, but Amy was in the shower. Played through some chess games from <em>En Passant<\/em> while Dot went to Morrisons.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Thursday was \u2013 yes \u2013 damp and grey yet again. Amy\u2019s journey home went well, though she apparently slept for 18 hours after getting there. Kristine came up by train: I met her at the station at 11.45 while Dot finished getting ready. Dot cooked a salmon tart and a pseudo-pavlova, both of which were delicious. Carrie came round while we were talking and had a coffee: Kristine seemed to like her. When she went, we moved upstairs and watched <em>The Chosen<\/em>, then Kristine caught the 17.30 train home: we both went to the station. In the evening we watched the last <em>Vienna Blood<\/em>, which was excellent again, as well as the film <em>Paddington<\/em> and a surprisingly good documentary on Prince Philip.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>New Year\u2019s Eve yesterday surprised everyone by being mild, with some sun. I walked up to the Rosary in early afternoon after posting books to Philip Butcher and a letter to Mike Read, who coincidentally rang just as I was about to go out. He wanted to bring me a copy of his latest book, which contains four of my games (+2-2), but Dot had already bought it for me for Christmas, and I had mentioned it on my website. Wrote a number of thank-you e-mails before going over to Des and Chris\u2019s for tea and nibbles in the afternoon. This was followed by drinks in the street (or under the garage) and our evening meal, which was lamb chops. We watched TV after that, ending with the usual Jools\u2019 Hootenanny, which was pretty predictable. Went to bed about 12.20am.\u00a0<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Well, here we are in 2022, and it looks kind of familiar. Dot and I took a longish walk this morning \u2013 about three miles \u2013 and there were plenty of people about, quite a few of them in masks, which always seems to me pointless in the open air. But perhaps they don&#8217;t want &hellip; <a href=\"https:\/\/blog360.back2sq1.co.uk\/?p=5821\" class=\"more-link\">Continue reading <span class=\"screen-reader-text\">Familiar look to new year<\/span> <span class=\"meta-nav\">&rarr;<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-5821","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog360.back2sq1.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5821","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog360.back2sq1.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog360.back2sq1.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog360.back2sq1.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog360.back2sq1.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=5821"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/blog360.back2sq1.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5821\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":5823,"href":"https:\/\/blog360.back2sq1.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5821\/revisions\/5823"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog360.back2sq1.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=5821"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog360.back2sq1.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=5821"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog360.back2sq1.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=5821"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}