Isolation continues

Update from lockdown: don't seem to have caught the virus yet so life is carrying on much as before.

It was Easter last weekend. It was a nice sunny day. I did an easter egg hunt round the garden and we had simnel cake for lunch so all in all a pretty good day. On Easter weekend last year I celebrated with my Italian hosts plus their extended family and friends and then flew home from Venice on the Sunday for the first time in 5 months. Now it looks like it'll be nothing but home for at least 5 months so bit of a contrast.

Easter 2019

I've started an online course with Nakai University on China's role in global tourism development. It's a five week course, four hours per week, so not too big a commitment. I think it'll be useful and interesting to explore some areas of economics that I might want to study in more depth or specialise in in the future. I'm enjoying the lectures so far and I'm learning lots about the tourism industry.

My research on the economies of different countries is going well. I've now done North Korea, Malaysia and Bangladesh and South Sudan's up next. It's very interesting and I've been surprised by what I've found out about each of them. So far Malaysia sounds like the best of the bunch but really I'm very happy to be living in Scotland.

I made some new bunting for the bench by the pond. It's supposed to stop birds from sitting on it and it looks nice. The bunting I made several years ago was very faded and worn so it was time for a replacement. I've also washed the car and progressed with the cleaning of my bedroom. Card making is still going strong. I should have a good stock of them by the time we get out of this. When is it acceptable to start making Christmas cards?

I managed to achieve my goal of 25 press ups but I'll continue to practice because I'm sure if I stopped it wouldn't be long before I could only do 3 again. I've also made significant progress with the pull ups. I can now do one from standing which may not sound like much but it is far more than I could do when I started. I'm still working on it but I've had to slow down because it seemed to be wearing out my elbows.

I've been focusing more on my core strength, trying to do a few core exercises each day. I've just finished Lilly Sabri's 7 day core challenge which I really enjoyed and I'm now trying Chari Hawkins' 10 day abs challenge. So far it's been awful - very repetitive and very hard. I've also been maintaining 10,000 steps every day but it's still as much of an effort as ever. I've tried out a few new walking routes.

I'm really enjoying the dance fitness Youtube videos. I've been trying different types of dancing in the hope that it might improve my dance skills but so far I still like the original videos the best which are k-pop/zumba style. Belly dancing definitely wasn't for me.

Date & nut brownies

I'm still reading the same books. Progress is slow but I'm getting there. I've been watching Killing Eve season 2 and 3. I watched season 1 when it first came out and now realise why the actresses look so familiar: Fiona Shaw played Petunia Dursley in Harry Potter and Sandra Oh played Cristina Yang in Grey's Anatomy. I also just found out that the actress who plays the Russian psychopath Villanelle has a Liverpudlian accent in real life which was very unexpected.

I've started watching Race Across the World after a friend tried to persuade me to apply for the next season and I'm enjoying it. South America looks incredible. Grey's Anatomy remains my favourite programme for the moment but now that I've caught up I only get to watch it once a week.

#covid19 #coronavirus #lockdown #isolation #quarantine #stayathome