"Hey you! Don't watch that, watch this". So I did.
Square-eyed from the many hours spent watching Netflix (I'm now starting Series 5 of Better Call Saul, which I prefer to Breaking Bad because it's written better, and El Camino, which was just a satisfactory conclusion to BB) and something written by Julian Fellowes called 'The Beautiful Game' which was good, I then 'reused' an old stone planter I found in the back of the shed as a bird-bath. Now my new telly is outside my french doors, from about 7am to about 8pm.
You can never have enough Robins. Sure, the blackbirds, the wood pigeons with their dopey, doe-eyed watchfulness and the goldfinches, with their nice colours, are great. But it's robins that have the personality. Blue-tits just land, eat and zip off. Robins land, eat, bathe, drink and generally hang out, hoping you've got a few stale digestives or a bit of old cake you don't want. They'll even eat old chapatis and bits of peshwari naan. I like to think I'm cultivating their palates.
Our local Indian has reopened. You park your motor in their car park, they slip you a paper copy of the menu through a wound-down window with a pencil and you tick what you want. They cook it, bring it out to your car with a card reader for payment and bingo, you drive off with a brown paper bag full of cartons and white paper bags. No fuss. True, also no beer to help the wait, no gorgeous pint of draught Kingfisher imbibed greedily as you exchange heavily-accented small talk with the owner. But curry you haven't had to prepare and cook yourself, which doesn't come from Tesco with its cellophane wrapper to be popped with a knife prior to the microwave? That's progress.
Tel and I indulged in one on Friday. I went and got it. The Isolation VE Day Anniversary was marked by an absence of folk and a few colourful threads of bunting on hedges as I drove past. Tel is in good spirits at the moment. He's counting down the days to Friday 3rd July, when his job ends and he joins the ranks of the great unemployed, or 'retired' as he puts it, vehemently.
He joined me on Friday as I said earlier, my birthday celebrations a near memory. He hasn't worked since last Wednesday, having agreed to take more time off to clear his remaining annual leave owed. He went back today. "Bleedin' Kings Lynn" he remarked with resignation. "Still, Maldon on Toosdy an' Tiptree, Chelmsford, Mersea an' Colch'ster, then Saffron Walden, Bedford an' Kempston Wedn'sdy, Scumland on Fursdy an' Yarmuff Fridy". he smiled with a knowing, almost leering sort of smile. "Nearly done".
We had king prawn butterflies, poppadoms and sheek kebabs to start, then chicken vindaloo, lamb madras, king prawn jalfrezi and a keema naan and a peshwari naan with some bombay potatoes they chucked in for the hell of it gratis. Served on my best plates, with bottles of ice-cold Asahi to wash it down, we were like pigs in sh*t. Neither of us like rice from the indian so we didn't bother.
Tel told stories of acquaintances as we munched, often gobbing flecks of sauce at me as he launched on yet another tale. "Paula's bin asked ter cover Chingford" he said, masticating on a bit of naan. "She don' wanna leave Larton (Loughton) but they need an emergency manager in an' 'er boss is back from the sick. Be more money though an' she's lookin' at buyin' 'ouse wiv Blake in Norf Weald. Told er she needs a decent deposit, but it'll be a buyers markit come the end of all this palaver". He grinned, his new-found role as Financial Analyst complete.
"Tone's got piles. 'Ad 'em since after Chrissmuss, keeps 'oping the old Anusol'll shrink 'em. Ah told 'im, he might need them cuttin' out in 'ospital, legs in the ole stirrups'n'that, sleepin' on his belly for munfs". This was said with the cheerfulness of a true bastard. "Still, 'e'll be well used ter sleepin' on 'is front. Done it since 'e was sixteen, nightly. I bet iss 'is default position, bird optional". He nearly choked on his poppadom laughing, and I deftly changed subjects to one less crude.
We saw the Queen's speech. Tel remarked he thought 'she's on the way out, poor ole gel', but he's been saying that for years. He carries a disinfectant spray in one of the pockets of his cargo trousers for work and he sprayed a bit in my living room so I could smell just how chemical it was. It reminded me of fly spray. I haven't had any annoying houseflies since he did it. He said, Apocalypse Now-style, "Smells great after a hard day's toil in the van', and I wondered if Napalm was an active ingredient.
He left at 10, driving back having had his quota of two beers and a San Pelligrino. "Meet up nex' Saturday? I'm working til four but should be back by six. I'll pick anuvver ruby up on the way, my treat this time". I nodded and he backed the van out inch-by-inch, causing a car to pull up sharply and then sit waiting for him, resignedly, as he hit the road. He waved to the driver from his window and got a stiff little wave back. He then lurched forward and was gone, a cloud of dust and diesel engine marking his retreat.
I washed up then reached for the telly remote and the brandy bottle, almost in one movement. Glass, ice, feet up on the footstool, Jimmy McGill/Saul Goodman on the screen (Series Five Episode One) and life restarted much as I'd left it since yesterday. The smell of Tel's disinfectant spray eventually dissipated. Lockdown life. It's repetitive, but it's starting to feel easy. |  |
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