30/03/20 A bitterly cold day. Sue took a short walk to the postbox to post an Easter card and I chose a route on my morning cycle that I haven’t been able to follow for quite a few months. The fields and rural pathways have sufficiently dried out enough to take a tyre without slipping or slowly clogging up the tread, gears and brakes with clag. I found it revitalizing to rediscover those views that possibly only the farmers have been privy too since the rains arrived. I met just one lone lady and her dog in nearly two hours of off road, but as soon as hit urban streets it seemed as if the population of Harborough had decided to take their animals for a walk at the same time. Earlier, listening to Harborough FM as I sipped my ‘wake-up’ coffee, one of the local news items was an appeal from farmers to dog owners not to walk their dogs along paths through fields, especially where the sheep are lambing and increasing the danger to farmers of picking up the virus from gates and other equipment. The second point mentioned was an issue I hadn’t considered, we assume that farming is a sufficient enough remote life-style, ensuring isolation is the norm, it appears not so.

The other day I listened to a fascinating podcast from the BBC World Service concerning South Korea and how they have been successful in combating Corvid-19. They point the way in preparing for any future pandemic: Coronavirus: What can the world learn from South Korea?

The fruitful part of my day was spent transplanting tomato seedlings into larger pots inside a warm greenhouse. I like to try a new variety each year and purchase them off a seller on eBay. A few years ago I discovered a large, fleshy and very juicy variety called Speckled Roman and have grown them ever since. This year I ordered a sweet, juicy, pointed, American cherry variety called Pink Tiger and they came with a free packet of Blush Tiger, I think they may be similar to the Pink, it will be interesting to compare the two when I harvest them later in the year.

A week ago today, I advertised my poorly mower on local eBay. I had discovered last year when my ancient Stihl chainsaw stopped working, that there is always someone willing to buy broken mechanical equipment, either for the parts or to repair it. This evening, it sold for £26 and was picked up by an eastern European man from Leicester, coincidentally, it was also an eastern European who bought my chainsaw. Is this an indictment of the British way of thinking, “It’s broken, I’ll get e new one!” I guess that it will be repaired and sold on at a profit, didn’t we used to have little shops in the side streets that repaired stuff for us? Where did they all go?

Sue rang Dorothy (wife of a cousin) today, she is 70 yrs old and lives in London. It was a very short conversation as she is very poorly with a temperature and cough and couldn’t talk for very long. She is obviously self isolating and hasn’t been tested for the virus. Fingers crossed that she recovers soon.