Covid

So now both Jim and Stella have tested positive for covid. 

I can't talk to Jim directly all that often. He managed to disable his phone again and I have decommissioned it. He had more or less stopped using it anyway and it didn't seem worth getting it fixed just for him to disable it again. I can organise to speak to him on the nurses' phone, which I do once or twice a week. Briefly, it must be said. But the nurses tell me that he isn't too bad. He is as vaccinated as it is possible to be, plus they got him onto antiviral medication very quickly and they say he seems cheerful enough.

I can speak to Stella directly. She has her phone with her and uses it. She says she isn't feeling all that well, but is not feeling as though she has a particularly dreadful illness. She says she feels tired, not hungry and under the weather, but not absolutely awful. She too is fully vaccinated and has just started on the antiviral medication. So fingers crossed for both of them. Although Stella is unimpressed that she has obediently stayed in her room since they were locked down and still the virus managed to sneak its way in!

I have observed before that one of the significant advantages of owning rather than renting a place is that you do not get six monthly visits from estate agents wanting to check on the state of your home. This is also a significant disadvantage.  There is no regular incentive to deep clean and tidy up. I have recently discovered that this is also true of visits from district nurses and carers. On the days that they were expected I would run the vacuum cleaner round, sweep the dining room and kitchen floors and tidy things up. Now that they don't come anymore, I don't think about the floors until I look at them closely and realise just how many crumbs there are and how much cat hair is on the carpet. Tidying isn't such a bother - I tend not to have too much stuff lying about, unless it is in a room that I am clearing out. (Don't venture into the study at the moment!!)

Mind you - I accidentally swept under my bed at Hill House this morning. I used a broom to fish out a slipper which was lurking out of reach under the bed and swept out a surprising number of other things and a startling amount of dust, debris and Great Dane hair. Then, of course, I had to properly sweep under the bed which meant I also had to do the rest of the bedroom floor. Perhaps I should organise some sort of inspection of that room every six months or so! I now have three pairs of slippers (when I started this enterprise I had three slippers; I wasn't expecting to get another three). Bizarrely, I now have three thongs/flipflops. I have no idea at all where the fourth one is. I had completely forgotten there was supposed to be another pair. 

I suppose now I should look under my bed at home and see what's under that. Or might that be a Bad Plan?

Hugo was behaving very oddly when I got up here on Sunday afternoon. He was standing in the hallway, refusing to come into the lounge room. Then he went outside and flatly refused to come back in again. He would not come in through the laundry door. I rang Lindsey, who was on her way to a birthday party in Melbourne. She said he had been doing that during the morning and she had enticed him into the lounge room with a packet of cheezels. I had already tried chicken and cheese but hadn't though of cheezels. Even with cheezels, he would not come in through the laundry door. I managed to get him in through the outside door up in the visitors' wing. Then more cheezels to get him into the lounge room. Plus, of course, Rupert expected to get his fair share of cheezels, if Hugo was having them.

I don't know what had spooked Hugo so much. He was behaving in very much the way that he did when he and Rupert were puppies and Rupert had done something so egregiously awful that Hugo was expecting them both to be yelled at. But no matter how hard I looked, I couldn't see any evidence of extremely bad behaviour. I wonder if something had fallen on him, or near him. He doesn't like it when things fall on him or near him and there are lots of things in the laundry and by the laundry door which might have spooked him. He's back to his old self now. Tail wagging, playing with squeaky toys, delighted by the discovery of long forgotten squeaky toys hiding under my bed. His appetite had not been affected, which suggested that he was spooked and not sick.

There are no more cheezels at Rupert and Hugo's house. Just cheese twisties. I suspect they would also do as an enticement.

Uh oh!

The care facility has been invaded by Covid!!!

They had a Covid outbreak last January. I had Jim booked in for a few days so I could go to Marlo but they were locked down so he couldn't go in and I couldn't go to Marlo. I went in May instead. Since then they've had the odd case here and there, among residents and staff, but have managed to keep it all under control.

On Thursday, Stella mentioned that they had a couple of cases in  the facility . On Friday it was 4. By yesterday it was 27,  among both residents and staff. Once again the facility is locked down. They can't come out and we can't go in. Bugger!

Stella is unimpressed but at least understands what is happening and why locking down and keeping the residents in their rooms is a plan. Also, she has a phone and so has access to the outside world. Poor Jim has no phone (he broke his last one and in any case has increasingly found it hard to use) and I don't know if he remembers that he was supposed to be coming out for lunch yesterday. But the facility does have a process where they can organise phone calls for residents so I'll organise that. 

I have things to take in for both of them (shelves and pictures and stuff) but there's no real hurry for that. Next week will do, or whenever they let us back in. But I did find myself with three pieces of salmon yesterday and only me to eat them. I couldn't put them in the freezer - I had only just defrosted them. Fortunately I hadn't opened the tin of mushy peas I was going to give Stella and Jim. They both lerv mushy peas. I am definitely not a fan. The mushy peas have gone back in the pantry. I also hadn't peeled any potatoes for the roasties I was going to make and I hadn't sorted out the rest of the veg. I was going to do all that when I had brought Stella and Jim to the house. Potatoes and vegetables are patiently waiting for me to get around to using them during the week.

I had salmon with noodles and teriyaki vegetables yesterday. I had salmon for breakfast today (you wouldn't think it odd if I said I had smoked salmon on toast for breakfast so I can't see why I shouldn't have fresh salmon if I am minded). And Rupert and Hugo dogfully volunteered to eat the third piece. With some toast, please.

It's not just Mount Clear. Covid is running rampant through Aged Care facilities around Australia. Fortunately, most residents are fully vaccinated and the staff have to be. Come to that, visitors have to be vaccinated as well, in Victoria and NSW. Not sure about the other states. They PCR tested everyone on Saturday. I am hopeful that now they have noticed the virus they may halt its progress.

Thursday

I took Jim into the residential aged care facility in Mount Clear on Thursday. His dementia has become noticeably worse recently and his behaviour has become somewhat erratic. Not violent, but confused, particularly first thing in the morning. He would get up and start rushing about because he had to catch the bus to work, or go to the football (by bus!) in Southampton, or go somewhere else by bus. I'm not sure why the buses. He hasn't ever been a regular commuter by bus. 

I was beginning to feel as though I was living in a TS Eliot poem. Not a specific poem - just the sense of wandering about in the rain wearing a grey coat and popping into greasy spoon cafes and drinking poorly made tea. And catching buses (do they catch buses in TS Eliot's world?) It was quite hard persuading him that running out into the early morning light, in the drizzly rain and cold was not a good plan. ("Oh dear; you've missed the football - they've just blown the final whistle" "Going to work? But it's Sunday. You don't work on Sundays") I was also beginning to worry about leaving him at home alone when I went out, and I have to go out sometimes.

He was going to go in for another fortnight's respite but I decided that it would be better if he just went in as a permanent resident, for continuity and consistency. He can come home or go out for lunch or afternoon tea or whatever when (my) time and the weather permit. With Stella, who is in the same facility but not in the memory unit. There is nothing wrong with Stella's memory.

He was asleep when I called in on Friday and wasn't much inclined to chat when I woke him up. He was more alert this afternoon and seemed cheery enough. I am up at Rupert and Hugo's place  this weekend, while Lindsey and Ian are away. I am planning to bring both Jim and Stella up here tomorrow for lunch. Getting them both here without the assistance of another able-bodied responsible adult may be a challenge, but we'll give it a go.

Mount Martha

This weekend might have been the last time Stella was in Mount Martha. I think it likely that Lindsey and I will be there again, possibly also Matthew. There is a LOT of sorting, tidying and organising of the house to be done before it can go on the market. There is stuff absolutely everywhere!

We did our best over the weekend. Lindsey took Stella down on Saturday and they stayed overnight. Jim and I went on Sunday morning, as did Matthew. Freyja and Simon joined us at the Dava for what might have been our last Sunday lunch there. We all went back to the house and filled our cars with things that Stella wants in her room in Mount Clear, things that we want (or don't particularly want but were prevailed upon to take!) and papers that need sorting out.

This didn't seem to make much of a dint in the Stuff! I found a bundle of receipts kept by my father and all clipped together, from supermarket shops, Dava lunches, various other things, dating back years and years. I'm not sure why he had this obsession with keeping receipts for absolutely everything. When he died I found the itemised lists of supermarket deliveries dating back years. I threw them away, just as yesterday I threw away the bundle of faded receipts. It is possible that I err the opposite way - I almost never keep receipts unless I need them for proof of warranty on very expensive items. I don't buy very many hugely expensive items! And I can't remember many, or indeed any, occasions when I have wished that I had kept a receipt.

Anyway. There is a great deal of clearing, organising and furniture moving to be done. I must keep up the "death cleaning" of our place, and particularly the study. Tony's study was always immaculate until he got sick. Since then, and especially since he died, it has become more and more dishevelled and in recent times has become something of a dumping ground. I would not want my study to induce the same level of heart sinking after my death or incapacity.

I think we are going to need a large skip at some point. Or two. Or more.

Sunday lunch at the Dava:

I was there too!

A significant advantage of having Stella a mere 5 minute drive away in Mount Clear is that, when I ring her on a Sunday morning and tell her that I am making a chicken and vegetable stew with roasties for lunch and would she like to join us - she can. I went and picked her up. We had a lovely lunch. I took her back. Almost no effort at all

Things have been trundling along much as usual. Lindsey and I have been to the markets on Saturdays and then out to the mushroom farm. There weren't as many stalls yesterday at Zoo Drive, although there were a lot of people there. Not bad, considering it had been foggy and misty and drizzly in the morning. We didn't really need anything much but it was nice to have a potter around outside.

I am hoping for a few dry days this coming week. I really need to get back out into the back garden and get the new garden beds sorted out. I did get into the front veg beds in between showers yesterday and pull most of the grass out. The peas and broad beans are growing happily. I could do to put wire up so they don't get blown over as they grow. I've mad a start on chopping back one of the bushes along the side fence along the driveway. I need to finish that one, tackle the other two (on of which is REALLY overgrown) and sort out the horrible agapanthus which are attempting to take over the whole known universe. One day, in the far, far future, when I have a bit of spare cash, I'm going to get someone with a Machine to dig them out. But I have other things to do first. I want to get the gas stove removed. I would like to get a new front door. I wouldn't mind some more solar lights in the hallway and lounge room. The list of things I would quite like to do is quite long.

Lindsey has taken Stella back to her place in Mount Martha this weekend, so she can decide which things she would like to take with her to Mount Clear and say goodbye to her neighbours. We will head down in an hour or so and join them and various other people for (a probably final) lunch in the Dava. a 2.5 hour drive, rather than a 5 minute drive! But I should perhaps get dressed first. They might look at me strangely if I go in my pyjamas and dressing gown!

I was quite please with this milestone on Drops:

A(nother) winter sunrise:

Brandy, plotting mischief:

Whiskey, sleeping at the wheel:

Stella's Busy Weekend

It's been a busy weekend.

It started on Friday when I collected Stella and took her to Rupert and Hugo's house for cups of tea and chocolate biscuits (in honour of Austin's birthday).

Rupert and Hugo were very pleased to see her. They were also pleased to see the chocolate biscuits - although they weren't allowed to have any. They had dog chews instead.

Rupert, very pleased to see Stella.
I'm not sure Stella really wanted a Great Dane
head on her lap!

Wendy came up by train on Saturday and she, Jim and I met Lindsey and Stella at a "new" coffee shop in Buninyong. It used to be the Pig and Goose but they left and the bike shop moved from up by the fish and chip shop into the empty premises. They have added a cafe to their collection of bikes and I must say they do excellent hot chocolates and Very Good Cakes.

Lindsey and Stella went back to Mount Clear. Wendy hasn't been to Buninyong for a very long time so we did a quick tour around in the car (this did not take very long) and then we drove up Mount Buninyong to look at the view. We did not climb up the fire tower!!! Then we drove out to Lal Lal to look at the falls. We've had a bit of rain recently so Lal Lal Creek had enough water in it to feed the falls

Wendy and a waterfall

A waterfall without Wendy

Sunday was Tatsuki's birthday so Lindsey, Stella, Wendy, Jim and I celebrated with a Sunday roast at my place. Roast chicken, roast potatoes and pumpkin, vegetables and mushroom gravy, followed by apple and blackberry crumble. It was going to be apple and blueberry but blueberries were $8 a punnet. Blackberries were $2.50 so blackberries it was. Sunday morning was slightly enlivened by the power going off. Only briefly, it must be said and it wasn't at all inconvenient - until I realised that the cats' water fountain had stopped working. Nothing could persuade it to spring back to life so Wendy and I made an emergency dash to Petstock in Delacombe to buy a new one. There's only so much being stared at reproachfully by two discontented cats that I can take.

Brandy thinks this is a perfectly acceptable replacement
Whiskey does not.
The previous fountain flowed into a little reservoir which he could
lap water from. The new one does not

Matthew and family came to inspect Stella's new abode on Sunday evening and stayed at Hill House overnight. Wendy went home on the train

Sun rising behind a car covered with frosted patterns

Matthew and William called down on Monday morning for a cup of tea and to inspect Jim's tool collection. He has a lot of very nice tools that he can't use any more. I can't or won't use them. If I need something done that requires more than a hammer, a screwdriver, a pair of pliers or the garden tools, I'll get someone in to do it. I would really rather like to sort the garage out and get rid of things that won't be used, so the next time they're in Ballarat, Matthew is going to come and take anything that he wants. Then I'll drop the rest off at the Buninyong Men's Shed. I'm sure they'll find a use for them.

Matthew and family took Stella out for morning tea before they went home. She has now had her two weeks respite "taster" and will now transition to permanent care. At least, I hope she will. I often drive past or close to the Mount Clear Aged Care facility and it is very much more convenient to drop in for a chat there than it is if she is in Mount Martha, which is becoming increasingly difficult for me. It is more and more difficult to take Jim there overnight. Mount Clear is much easier.

Construction on the new housing estate continues apace. There is now one house that is almost finished. There are two that have their frames and roof joists up. And there are two plots that are being prepared for building. I think there will be 20 something houses in the end. All the activity gives Jim something to watch from both the lounge room and the bedroom windows.

Stella

A few weeks ago, Stella had some teeth removed - to the bewilderment of practically everyone who knew about it, apart from her dentist and the dental surgeon. We all knew it would not go well. They persuaded her is was Very Necessary Indeed.

It did not go well! Her mouth bled and bled and bled and was very sore and did not get better.

Then she had her 4th Covid shot and her Flu shot and had the expected reaction to the Covid shot.

The combination of everything saw her in hospital for a day or two. Except that it wasn't a day or two. As is usual with Stella, the day or two turned into several days. We tried to get her out of hospital and into respite care but there was a long, long wait and it didn't happen. Eventually she went back home to the tender ministrations of her carers.

While all this was going on, Jim was in having respite care at the Mount Clear Aged Care facility which is not quite two years old and is very lovely indeed. Stella was bored and lonely at home - the rest of us for various reasons couldn't drop everything and head on down to Mount Martha. Stella was persuaded that going into respite in Mount Clear might be a plan, with a view to staying. The facility is a five minute drive from my place and a ten minute drive from Lindsey's. It's no further for Wendy and other Melbourne based family to get to Ballarat than it is to get to Mount Martha. No one else lives on or near the Mornington Peninsula.

So Lindsey went and picked her up on Saturday and brought her to Ballarat. I think she nearly turned around and went straight back to Mount Martha. It was wet and cold and horrible all weekend and she was cold, all weekend!

Stella frozen at Lindsey's house,
despite having a heated blanket and
a Great Dane on hand
(Lindsey's photo)

We had a seafood platter for lunch on the Monday Holiday, in honour of Tabitha's birthday, Ian's late father's birthday, the Queen's birthday and any other birthdays we may have missed

Stella at Monday Lunch at our place,
not quite so cold but she was sat
right next to our blazing wood fire
AND I had the central heating on!

On the Tuesday, I took her to the Aged Care facility to start her two week's respite. She has a lovely room, looking out over the rooftops of Mount Clear. It gets lots of sunlight (when there is any sunlight!). The only issue is that it's a bit of a hike to the dining room and the common rooms and it's too far for her to walk. She does, however, have her wheelchair and the staff take her along. They offered her a different room, much closer to the action, and with a private courtyard. But by then she had settled into her room. She likes the view and the aspect. And, as she points out, she has never been one to sit outside with her coffee or her lunch and a private courtyard would be wasted on her. So in her room she stays.

In the squishy chair that is in her room

She was a bit unsettled on the first couple of nights and most definitely had cold feet over this move but she is much more settled now. She is beginning to get to know some of the other residents and the carers. She likes the food and the people and the facility. She likes having people very close to her. I think it is all going to be good.

The weather picked up yesterday. Lindsey and I went out to Smythesdale to check out a little country market. Smythesdale is a very pretty village and has a very cute  if small market. It's a lovely drive out there. We think the market is monthly. It might well be somewhere we could take Stella and Jim, tying it in with lunch in one of the pubs. Or, indeed, we could just go out for a pub lunch. Ian would probably come too, if there was lunch on offer 😋

Smythesdale market

I wonder what the food is like in the pub.
The fish van isn't there all the time

We took Jim and Stellas out for afternoon tea and ended up by the lake, in The Boatshed, where we had delicious cakes to share and cups of tea or hot chocolate. I  haven't been in The Boatshed for years. Generally if I am heading up to the lake to eat, I go to Pipers. But Pipers closes at 3pm and we were just arriving. The Boatshed it was, and very good it was too. We will go there again, for lunch next time.

The view from our table

Jim, eating more than his fair share of the cakes!

Stella will miss her proximity to the sea
but we do have the rather lovely lake to offer

There were lots of people out and about around the lake, enjoying the winter sunshine. There were some people sailing model, remote control yachts. That looked like lots of fun.

The sun is shining again today too. Then the rain is forecast to move back in. I had better go and get some washing done. It probably won't dry outside but at least it will get a good airing.

Brandy, "chasing" the mouse on the wooden clock

Winter and Autumn seem confused

 We're definitely having winter weather. It's cold, wet and very windy

But the trees are only now donning their autumn colours

And we saw eagles over Eilish Court yesterday afternoon. We more usually see them up at Hill House and not usually during the winter. But I will accept eagles wherever and whenever they choose to show themselves (even if they won't come close enough for a decent photo!)

Winter has arrived (and Jim has come home)

While Jim was away I took the opportunity to clear out a couple of cupboards.

I started with the wardrobe in the third bedroom, which I use as a study. I completely emptied it, sorted through everything and got rid of a lot of stuff. Nice and mostly empty:

It does now have the summer clothes hanging in it, 
but they don't take up much room.

Then I turned my attention to the pantry. I wanted to swap the top shelf and the bottom shelf around. While I was about it, I  tidied up the other two shelves. I don't usually have tinned meat and tinned veg in the pantry. They are there in case we have to isolate for any length of time while the freezers are short of ingredients. The freezers, it must be said, are definitely not short of ingredients. They are, in fact, full to bursting. But the pantry looks good. For now!

Winter greeted the start of June with enthusiasm.

First frost of winter on the first day of winter

This was as hot as it got outside on Thursday

I have ordered more sawdust "briquettes" and 
am about to order a trailer load of wood

And here comes the rain

I have had the central heating fixed. You may remember that last winter the control panel on the wall stopped working, so we couldn't use the heating. We didn't miss the central heating, using the wood fire and the space heater through the winter. I decided this year that I was paying quite a lot for the privilege of using gas, when in fact we weren't using all that much. Just a bit for cooking and hot water. So I got someone in to see if it was worth fixing. Ten minutes and $250 later I had a new wall controller and a working central heating system.

I am reminded how much I don't like the central heating system! It is nice to have instant warmth, but I really do not like having hot air blowing from the ceiling at my face. And I really, really do not like the way it gets to temperature and then blows cold air at us until the temperature falls again to a level where it decided to blow hot air again. The bloke who came to fix it tells me that it is an old and outdated system (no s**t Sherlock - it was put in when the house was built 17 years or so ago and, I think, quite cheaply at that) and I might want to think about replacing it. He was aghast when I said that I would probably look to replacing it with an electric, or solar system. He informed me very solemnly that solar panels on the roof don't work when it is cloudy and that renewable energy is a disaster waiting to happen. You'd have thought that an electrician would be pleased by the thought of people using electricity, but there you go. In the meantime, I do like the warmth that the wood fire produces, even if it takes more effort.  The Pretty Kitty Kats like it too, although they have also discovered the pleasures of lying on the blanket on our bed under the central heating vent in our bedroom:

Jim has come home from his two week respite holiday and has thrown my routine completely out of whack. (Didn't take long for me to develop a "living alone" routine :-D ) He can have up to 9 weeks a (financial) year of government subsidised respite care and I am planning to use it, sending him in every few months so he gets used to it. It won't be all that many months before he will have to go in permanently if his dementia continues as it has been going over the last year. In the meantime, his next level of home care package has come into play. His new case manager is coming to see us tomorrow to sort out what he needs and how we can organise it

A week at home

On Monday morning we had a nice leisurely start. Freyja and Simon made toast in their room. I had tea and then coffee in mine. We packed up and made a last visit down along the beach road to say goodbye to the estuary

We drove back via Lakes Entrance, diverting on the way to look at the Trestle Railway Bridge at Stony Creek. It is a magnificent structure, though once again it is probably just as well there are no trains running along it and it is definitely not safe for pedestrians.

At Freyja's suggestion we went from Lakes Entrance to a little place called Metung for lunch. None of us knew anything about it and were pleasantly surprised (although perhaps we shouldn't have been, given that we were in the Gippsland Lakes area) to find a secret place filled with yachts, sailing boats and beautiful watery things. Also, a good choice of lunching places. We went to Aroma and had delicious food, sat outside in the sunshine, watching the boats:

And so home. Brandy and Whiskey were, as you might imagine, delighted to see me come back - although Lindsey had been visiting them and feeding them while I was away.

You're back! Hooray!!!

Jim is still in the aged care residence. I've spoken to him by phone a few times and he seems to be having a good time. I will go and visit him today, but he's not due to come home until Thursday. I must say that not having to think about him on Wednesday morning made getting up and ready to leave for work an absolute doddle. I was there by just after 8! It is very quiet in the house without him (which is strange, because he doesn't make a whole lot of noise and is no longer very active around the place) but it is also very peaceful.

And quite liberating. When Lindsey rang me on Thursday and said she needed to go to the Wendouree Shops and did I fancy going and perhaps having lunch in the little Japanese cafe,  I could just drop what I was doing and go. Nothing to think about, nothing to organise. Just grab my wallet, shopping bags and coat, turn out the lights and go.

I might have bought a new set of cookware at House while I was out. The saucepans I bought in Lakeland some years ago and brought over from the UK were beginning to look a bit sorry for themselves. My wok was definitely looking worse for wear. You can't have too many frying pans. And the box of cookware had been dramatically reduced (allegedly) in one of their ever present "stocktaking" sales.

While we were out, we dropped into a new sushi and poke bowl place in the city centre. I bought a prawn and glass noodle salad for lunch on Friday and it was delicious. Lovely and fresh and bright, even a day later. I also very much enjoyed my lunch at Tokyo Teriyaki in Wendouree. Fried chicken with ginger sauce and a share of Lindsey's fried rice and chips. Delicious.

They've been busy on the former reserve, now building site, soon to be housing. There are several new houses going in

The view from my front porch on Thursday morning