It was a horrible week. The infection numbers remained high and the pall of gloom that had descended before, remained to remove much of any sense of optimism ahead.

I ended the busy week with heaps of stuff logged for this new working week. I am armed however, with only a white knuckled frame of mind to accost these tasks.

To soften the harsh core and edges, I cleaned up the gardens on Saturday. The rains had stopped for a few days and while the ground still felt squishy, it was “dry” enough to do some necessary work. The hedges on the eastern side got trimmed, the edgings got done and the lawn got a good mowing. The lemon tree got parred back too, and by the time I swept up and put all the gears and tools away, nearly 4 hours had gone by. It had remained cool right through all that work, with the ambient temperature staying in single digits. I later told Tress I could not remember doing so much work on the greens under such conditions. I had my beanie, flannels and jumper on the whole time.

We then did a late takeaway lunch from an Indian shop near our home, and then did some grocery shopping. Jesslyn and Gerry had earlier brought some prawns we bulk purchased with them, and they brought along a couple of masks too. These were reusable cloth masks and they were far more comfortable to wear than the disposable ones I donned the week before. J&G’s gifts were very timely as the next day, the Premier made it mandatory for all Victorians to wear a mask when they leave home, or cop a $200 fine.

Later that night, we watched a movie about the Indian mathematician, Srinivasa Ramanujan. It was a fascinating, yet sad story. The genius died at a very young age of 32. His collaboration with a Cambridge professor who was an atheist, included the line “An equation for me has no meaning, unless it expresses a thought of God.” It’s a curious one – how mathematics can be approached from such polar ends. Ramanujan was a deeply religious man and had little objects of deity in his room at Cambridge. Hardy that atheist professor however, had no time for the deity and one of his closest friends, according to that movie (The Man Who Knew Infinity), was Bertrand Russell, who was another well known atheist. Or he may have been an agnostic.

We did another online service with St Alf’s on Sunday and increasingly, I am finding it a challenge to be engaged. The ease with which one gets distracted and wander around the house while the service is going on, makes it very hard to be present and be engaged. I try to do that (focus and be engaged) as much as I can, and I imagine being in situ – meaning I would not do anything I would not have done if I was in the building on Springfield Road. It is very hard though, as the scaffolding that facilitates engagement has been removed by this pandemic. Staying at home means we can’t sing together, listen to the word in person and in situ, and be engaged in a way that satisfies. We ploughed on regardless, and worked our way through. It is not as satisfying but it will do. For now.

After service, I prepped the cook for the working week. I peeled the prawns, prepped the aromatics, cut the veg, and set everything up for the cook later in the arvo. We then went to get takeaway lunch from Donvale, and after lunch, went to the shops to pick up some more stuff. After the cook (a pretty decent prawn curry) we got ready for the Masterchef semi final. I told Tress that I have enjoyed this season’s offering, as an escapist would clutch at to momentarily forget the travails around him. It has been a source of happiness for a little while. Maybe it is also that it has become an avenue for Tress and I sharing banter (on WhatsApp) with Kiddo and Mic while they watch it in the capital city. We will likely have withdrawal symptoms after the finale tonight.

It’s a little after 7.45am as I typed this and already, a couple of work messages have crept in. It will take some work to get on top of things.