Saturday 8 August:

As usual, no dawn walk on Saturdays… so I finished my Chris Stewart book instead (which I thoroughly enjoyed).

Disappointed to find our newsagents closed when I went to fetch a newspaper and so ended up going to the local ‘Tesco Express’ instead (with some reluctance). People are required to wear face masks in shops and so I was really annoyed to see that two of the three other customers weren’t wearing them (a rather arrogant ‘geezer’ about my age and a woman in her 30s)… when I expressed my frustration to woman on the cash till, she just laughed. What have we become? Of course, it won’t be ‘them’ who cause the second wave/spike!

Morning coffee with Moira in the garden on a lovely sunny day.

Received notification from Dan at StorySmith that my bookgroup was available for collection… so I popped down to collect it. Two other people in the shop and, once again, neither of them were wearing face masks. It’s so frustrating to see people ignoring the ‘rules’… and I don’t blame StorySmith – in these difficult days, they need as many customers as they can get and the onus is on customers to comply.

Read some of my new book (‘The Princess Bride’) in the afternoon and also did some sketching… while listening to the cricket – Pakistan in full voice! – and an England fight back. Riveting (but incredibly tense) listening… 160 runs needed by England with only 5 wickets left… but Butler+Woakes 139-plus partnership… but England ended up winning by 3 wickets (with Woakes 84 not out). Cor lummee!

Image: last night’s sky from bedroom window.