A small bundle of Christmas fabric squares now ordered - we shall have Christmas masks!
We are having chicken and chorizo casserole for tea, courtesy of Mr Heavenly, followed by tapioca.
Face masks are such a pain to find - I don't mean to actually find them, they are everywhere - but finding ones which are comfortable, which fit and which (one presumes) do the job as well is much more difficult.
Or maybe I have an awkward face?
I found some lovely pleated ones made from William Morris fabrics and bought 6 of them. They came folded in half. And on Every Single One, where the nose wire was folded, it has now broken, leaving 2 sharpish edges and nothing to shape the fabric around the nose. Changing the wire will necessitate unpicking them, removing and reinserting wire, and stitching them closed. By hand, as my sewing machine is current 30 miles away from me and hasn't been used for over 30 years.
Given that I have a smallish but ever growing pile of things that need buttons sewing on, I'm not likely to actually do this sewing job as well.
I do a cheat's kedgeree - smoked haddie, sautéed onion, frozen peas, a packet of microwaveable pilau rice and way too much butter.
By way of variety I did a smoked haddock gratin last night. Layer of thinly sliced potato, ditto tomato, fish, more veg, doused in cream mixed with mustard and topped with cheddar and Parmesan.
Tonight - being Saturday - is the traditional steak'n'chips, with this week's variation being the smoked butter I got last week in the Grassmarket.
A lot of posts here on home made or purchased fabric masks. I understand that WHO advice is that people over 60 or with underlying medical conditions should wear a medical / surgical mask. As an "oldie", I'm using type IIR disposable surgical masks
A rather nice vegan laksa for tea tonight.
I’m really pleased in that I managed to grab tickets for a festive wine tasting event at a local pub just before Christmas. We went to a similar evening just before lockdown and it was fab. Assuming this can go ahead it’ll be a good end to the year as well as giving me an idea of what wines to buy for Christmas.
@St Everild have you come across ear savers? I made one for each person who I made a mask for - the design I chose is about 3 inches by 1 inch, with a large button towards each end. The elastic hooks around the buttons, and is the only way I can wear m
A lot of posts here on home made or purchased fabric masks. I understand that WHO advice is that people over 60 or with underlying medical conditions should wear a medical / surgical mask. As an "oldie", I'm using type IIR disposable surgical masks
... I found some lovely pleated ones made from William Morris fabrics and bought 6 of them. They came folded in half. And on Every Single One, where the nose wire was folded, it has now broken ...
I bought a couple of Liberty print masks early on from brora.co.uk, and the wire in one of them has broken. It's still usable, but not really very comfortable. I was particularly pissed off, as they cost £20 each (although £10 of that was going to the NHS). I haven't got the sewing skills to do anything about mending it, but now that I've got some more, it'll do as an emergency one.
The ones I bought today don't have wires: there's a seam that gives them a slightly beaked sort of shape that moulds round your nose, and I find it very comfortable. Also, because they fold without coming to any harm, I'm less worried about having them rolling about in my handbag, as the inside is folded inwards.
@Firenze, your haddock gratin sounds rather nice; I might give it a go with the other fillet from the pack.
I have another cheat kedgeree. Egg fried rice from Waitrose, lots of butter and parsley, curry powder and the smoked haddock. Poach the fish, microwave the rice, mix it all up.
I have also made my own mask, having read a letter in the Guardian from someone who did research on them some time ago. 4-ply cotton muslin stops 95% of microbes, and is better after washing. Happening to have too much muslin, I have made us a couple by hand. They are more comfortable than others, and do not mist up my glasses, despite not having nose wires. I need to make some more.
When I’ve made pleated ones I’ve put a wire in the top seam. When I’ve made fitted ones I’ve put a short wire across the peak but, like Piglet says, the curved shape of the mid seam means you can get away without a wire.
A lot of posts here on home made or purchased fabric masks. I understand that WHO advice is that people over 60 or with underlying medical conditions should wear a medical / surgical mask. As an "oldie", I'm using type IIR disposable surgical masks
I suspect part of the instruction was originally to preserve stocks of masks for medical staff. There is also the issue of whether people actually re-use their disposable surgical masks rather than throw them away; during my nurse training (which was over 3 decades ago) we were told disposable masks were ineffective after a couple of hours and needed changing. I’m really not convinced everyone throws them away after one use.
It is also cheaper to make a reusable mask than keep buying disposable ones and they will probably easier to access for people in poorer areas of the world, which is what most surprises me about WHO’s advice as they seem to assume they are readily available everywhere. There are also environmental issues, especially if wearing masks becomes a more long term feature.
It wouldn't have occurred to me that Georgian was written in a script that wasn't either Cyrillic or Roman.
It's a mixed sort of day here weather-wise: it's been alternating between Really Quite Nice and absolutely p*ssing with rain. I might take a little stroll past the loch and back along the street once I've put the lamb-shank into the slow-cooker.
I've been raking the interweb to try and establish how much liquid you need for one medium-sized lamb-shank, but all the recipes seem to presume that you're cooking for at least two. I suppose it's just another thing to get used to about being on my own. I think I'll go with about a cup of stock and a splash or three of red wine and hope for the best; I can always thicken it with flour-and-butter if it's too much.
I'm rather looking forward to it - lamb-shanks really are proof that God loves us.
You don't need any liquid if you're doing the lamb shank in the slow cooker - it will make its own as it cooks. But a slosh of red wine in with it will aid the flavour and enhance any gravy-making.
Sundays are our Zoomy day, we've done our first two (family and then friends) and have a lunch break now before a 2.30 one (Sunday sort-of-church group) and then an extra one this evening which I may bow out of or turn my camera off for. I'm moderately interested in it but have Other Things To Do.
This week's Sunday meal was pintade forestière (guinea fowl with girolle mushrooms) and the Trial Run Christmas Pudding.
The amount of pudding mixture I made filled one medium and one small basin, and some water got inside the foil of the small one during the first steam, so I didn't think it would keep. Consequently it was eaten for lunch today and found to be tasty. The other one has now been doused in cognac as per the parental recipe and can macerate merrily away until Christmas.
I have a lots of plans for Christmas cakes/pudding this year. I want to make a chocolate Christmas pudding with a candied orange inside, a trad Christmas pudding, an Earl Grey stollen, a chocolate orange log and a rainbow sponge with white fondant Christmas cake. I’m also trying to convince my other half that he’d really like the challenge of making panettone.
I have 2 weeks leave at Christmas so I could spread some of the baking.
Those all sound very nice @Heavenlyannie , but I'd eat the lot, which wouldn't do my figure any good. I've made a vegan Christmas cake, which looks promising, and in a couple of weeks I'm going to be attempting to make some vegan marzipan to cover the cake with. I'm cheating with the icing though.
When our son was home a couple of weeks ago we made some rough plans about what we are going to eat. This will include celery sauce (non-vegan) from a cook book I once got as a secret Santa present on Ship of Fools (I think it might have been from @daisydaisy ) and vegan pigs in blankets. The 'bacon' is marinated aubergine. Son has a mandolin so he'll need to bring it with him so we can get the aubergine slices right.
If both children with partners can be with us this Christmas I'll have to provide a vegetarian option. Not vegan, thankfully - that really does seem to be very limiting, but I'm not someone who particularly enjoys cooking. In fact, I'll be off to Heavenlyannie's for the cake.
DH has decided ( and I do not disagree) that, whatever the rules may allow for family get togethers, he will not be visiting his daughter 250 miles away who he hasn’t seen since February and would normally have visited about once a month, and equally I will not be going to spend any time with my family this Christmas. As mine live locally I will pop over with presents and hopefully we can spend a while in the garden.
Even if the grandchildren have been away from school germs for a week, that is not long enough to be certain, and also they. (legally) flit between their two homes, which involves a half brother at a different school.
So the risks of transmission of the virus are just too high for us. My other granddaughter works for Aldi when she is not at college, so I won’t be going to see my son either.
So just the two of us for meals, which will not be anything very different from our norm.
I so wish we hadn't lost that "eek" smilie ...
As it had stopped raining, I had a lovely little amble round the Palace and down by the loch while the lamb was cooking, and by the time I got back the flat was getting decidedly aromatic. I did put more stock in than it needed (I have a paranoia about letting things dry out or burn), but it was jolly nice all the same. I'm thinking I might have the leftover gravy and veggies with some mashed potatoes tomorrow - it would seem a shame to just throw it out.
Of course, I could pop over to the butcher's and get a lamb chop to go with it ...
Are you learning the Georgian alphabet and script as well?
I can write Anuka’s name in Georgian script.
ასეთი larks გვექნება, Anuka, ასეთი larks!
aseti larks gvekneba, Anuka, aseti larks!
Which Google tells me is Georgian for such larks we shall have, Anuka, such larks! (thank you, Mr Dickens), but you notice that her name is not actually in Georgian script!
I quite fancy having a go at stollen. The trouble with panetonne is the same as most kinds of brioche, ie. you need a mixer and I don't have one. If anything of that nature is going to be made for Christmas breakfast, I think it will have to be fouace (a kind of dense brioche traditional to foie gras land).
Panettone works well in a bread maker - we tried it for the first time last year.
Where did you get the William Morris facemasks? I got one from the Radical Teatowel Company and it’s lasted fine - also it has a little widget thing so you can adjust the length of the elastic, which makes it much more comfortable. It seems to have several layers. They do a number of designs (the African rainbow peace doves is my other favourite).
I got a William Morris mask on ebay - in fact I got all my masks on eBay. The William Morris - Strawberry Thief - made its first outing yesterday and I was disappointed as it kept slipping off my nose. In the end I tucked it in under my specs which worked but was not idea.
I haven’t really had to combine specs and a mask yet - all my mask wearing has been in shops, where I don't generally need my specs - but I suspect I might need to use both when I start work.
I understand that I won't need to wear a mask at my desk, but there will probably be other situations where I will, while also needing reading specs.
The masks I make have a flap for putting high on the nose and under the specs. My family really like them. I’m going to make some Christmasy ones to put in with their presents.
I've only started wearing glasses all the time quite recently and have yet to find the optimum mask-glasses combo. I bought a lot of masks locally at the beginning Of All This and the people making them clearly changed their method: in later ones the elastic is longer and thicker and they contain some sort of wire to bend over the nose. I'm going to need to shorten the elastic on quite a few of them; meanwhile I'm using the same ones over and over again and the elastic on them is getting loose simply through frequency of use.
It's taking me longer than I thought to get used to glasses and I'm still waiting for that "Where did I put my glasses? Oh, they're on my face" moment. I'm very conscious of them all the time at present.
Peculiar thing last night. I have a wireless doorbell in my bedroom, since I can't hear the main house bell there. It has two buttons, one, obviously, at the door, the other next to the receiver in my room. That one was used previously in the study, when the patient was there in her hospital bed, so she could call me if she needed anything. I carried the receiver round with me. About 20 past 1, I was woken up by it going off. I struggled up, yelled "the doorbell went off" downstairs, where my friend was still up, and went into the front room to lean out of the window, falling over the laundry bag on the way. Not a soul in sight, not a movement, nobody around. My friend called me down about his laptop and the intrusive Edge. He had not heard the bell - but we found later he would not have done, anyway. But he pointed out that it was a year since his mother died, and about the time that he called me down that night, using the bell, to tell me that she had gone. He had been, earlier, but not at the time the bell went off, in my study, praying.
Fortunately for my wellbeing, there has been another incident of the bell going off without proper cause, during the day, but again on the edge of sleep, but it doesn't feel good. I've not slept properly since.
I'm not surprised @Penny S, I would not sleep well either!! I'm alone here now, and often hear strange noises, which I try to convince myself is the fridge (it usually is!), but its still unsettling!
I'm not surprised @Penny S, I would not sleep well either!! I'm alone here now, and often hear strange noises, which I try to convince myself is the fridge (it usually is!), but its still unsettling!
Fridges make the weirdest noises. This one at ‘our’ German flat especially!
I'll second that, Thomasina - I'm beginning to get used to what are "normal" noises for around these parts.
Talking of such things, there's a security buzzer at the entrance to my block of flats, and someone buzzed my number on it yesterday looking for someone other than me. Although I wasn't expecting anyone, I picked up the entryphone (like Brother Cadfael, curiosity is my besetting sin), but when he asked for number X, because "their buzzer isnae working" I apologised and put the phone down. I didn't think it was my place to let someone in to go to a different flat - how was I to know he wasn't someone the people in number X really didn't want to see?
I'm new to this stuff - did I do the right thing?
In other news, I was delighted to see there's a magpie who lives nearby, and have said "good morning" to him several times (making sure to break the curse by asking after his wife and children or telling him what a fine fellow he is - they're just such handsome birds!). I was even more delighted when his friend turned up as well - two for joy.
But "Ding dong" a couple of feet away is not a normal creaking noise. And much louder than the normal dream sound level.
There was a peculiar evening some time ago when I had a group of physicists at my last place. I had a very early version of a wifi doorbell, which ran through batteries very fast, and which I had to keep plugged in to the power. It had started to ring for no reason, and I suspected a neighbour had something producing the same frequency. There was a matching bell up the road, but too far away. I had checked out the possibility of knock down ginger. Finding no solution, I put a notice beside the button, asking callers to ring twice.
Shortly after, the bell started to ring twice for no reason. I now suspected that a neighbour's child was doing it from indoors.
So, with the physicists there, I put a new notice, for three rings. And sure enough, it started to do three. I think it built up to five that evening. Usually close to the hour. We wondered if someone's thermostat was producing a surge, or if the AA man working on a car outside was producing a signal via sparks. I think there was no ring when the receiver was on the battery. The next day the power company denied any surges in the supply, and I took the thing back to Argos. It was extremely odd.
But the date and the time of this one was odder.
Yes. Definitely. I suppose if you were feeling really helpful you could offer to go and chap their door for them to go down and let the caller in. (Or even, check with your ‘neighbour’ whether they go have trouble with their buzzer.)
The system is intended to make sure that the only people in the building are people who are permitted by a resident who is expecting them to be there.
TBH, I don't even know where that particular number is; there are two or three blocks, and apart from the block where my flat is, I don't know how the numbering works!
I suppose if I had any sense I'd ignore the buzzer unless I'm actually expecting someone - not something that's happening under the current restrictions ...
Yes, I would not get in the habit of letting people you don't know in, both from a security point of view and also for the fact that you don't want it to keep happening.
I've done the usual morning admin, had a vegan pie for lunch (sag aloo) and I'm now about to mark some stray late essays so that I am marking-free for the rest of the week.
Yes. Definitely. I suppose if you were feeling really helpful you could offer to go and chap their door for them to go down and let the caller in. (Or even, check with your ‘neighbour’ whether they go have trouble with their buzzer.)
The system is intended to make sure that the only people in the building are people who are permitted by a resident who is expecting them to be there.
I agree. In these days of mobile phones there's nothing to stop someone phoning their friends to say "I'm on the doorstep and your buzzer isnae working."
That sounds like a scam to me @piglet, so I think you were wise not to let them in.
I'm having a lazyish day today, but we've booked to go to a local gardens for a walk tomorrow, so I feel justified in not doing much today.
I'm not surprised @Penny S, I would not sleep well either!! I'm alone here now, and often hear strange noises, which I try to convince myself is the fridge (it usually is!), but its still unsettling!
The fridge in the new château us commendably quiet, unlike the oven, which emits something between a purr and a rattle.
It's doing so just now, as I've got a spud baking for supper; it'll be joined by the remains of yesterday's gravy and a couple of lamb chops which are heating up in the slow-cooker. And a glass of WINE.
We are having the rest of the stir fry I cooked on Saturday - there's a lot of work doing the chopping for a stir fry and I always make enough for two days - so a minimum of food prep this evening. WINE sounds lovely but we do try to keep alcohol to weekend evenings.
Leftovers are the best. Tonight we'll be having the remains of yesterday's decidedly inauthentic haggis with ratatouille (but not with gnocchi as we finished those yesterday).
I'm not surprised @Penny S, I would not sleep well either!! I'm alone here now, and often hear strange noises, which I try to convince myself is the fridge (it usually is!), but its still unsettling!
I'm not surprised @Penny S, I would not sleep well either!! I'm alone here now, and often hear strange noises, which I try to convince myself is the fridge (it usually is!), but its still unsettling!
Fridges make the weirdest noises. This one at ‘our’ German flat especially!
Ours intermittently sounds like a broody chicken.
I read that as ‘intentionally’ 🤣
I'm not ruling it out. It was a wedding present from my parents 16 years ago. Buying the one with the "chicken noise" upgrade is in keeping with the sense of humour on my mother's side of the family.
Comments
We are having chicken and chorizo casserole for tea, courtesy of Mr Heavenly, followed by tapioca.
Or maybe I have an awkward face?
I found some lovely pleated ones made from William Morris fabrics and bought 6 of them. They came folded in half. And on Every Single One, where the nose wire was folded, it has now broken, leaving 2 sharpish edges and nothing to shape the fabric around the nose. Changing the wire will necessitate unpicking them, removing and reinserting wire, and stitching them closed. By hand, as my sewing machine is current 30 miles away from me and hasn't been used for over 30 years.
Given that I have a smallish but ever growing pile of things that need buttons sewing on, I'm not likely to actually do this sewing job as well.
By way of variety I did a smoked haddock gratin last night. Layer of thinly sliced potato, ditto tomato, fish, more veg, doused in cream mixed with mustard and topped with cheddar and Parmesan.
Tonight - being Saturday - is the traditional steak'n'chips, with this week's variation being the smoked butter I got last week in the Grassmarket.
That's... remarkably similar to what I had for dinner tonight, though I used smoked trout, and replaced the peas with pepper and sweetcorn.
I’m really pleased in that I managed to grab tickets for a festive wine tasting event at a local pub just before Christmas. We went to a similar evening just before lockdown and it was fab. Assuming this can go ahead it’ll be a good end to the year as well as giving me an idea of what wines to buy for Christmas.
The UK government recommends surgical masks be used in medical situations, and says the public can use fabric or disposable masks https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/face-coverings-when-to-wear-one-and-how-to-make-your-own/face-coverings-when-to-wear-one-and-how-to-make-your-own the government even provides patterns for making fabric masks.
The ones I bought today don't have wires: there's a seam that gives them a slightly beaked sort of shape that moulds round your nose, and I find it very comfortable. Also, because they fold without coming to any harm, I'm less worried about having them rolling about in my handbag, as the inside is folded inwards.
@Firenze, your haddock gratin sounds rather nice; I might give it a go with the other fillet from the pack.
I have also made my own mask, having read a letter in the Guardian from someone who did research on them some time ago. 4-ply cotton muslin stops 95% of microbes, and is better after washing. Happening to have too much muslin, I have made us a couple by hand. They are more comfortable than others, and do not mist up my glasses, despite not having nose wires. I need to make some more.
Which seems to contradict the World Health Organisation advice for over 60s / more vulnerable?
https://www.who.int/emergencies/diseases/novel-coronavirus-2019/advice-for-public/when-and-how-to-use-masks
It is also cheaper to make a reusable mask than keep buying disposable ones and they will probably easier to access for people in poorer areas of the world, which is what most surprises me about WHO’s advice as they seem to assume they are readily available everywhere. There are also environmental issues, especially if wearing masks becomes a more long term feature.
I’m learning some Georgian thanks to a cartoon giraffe called Jose.
Colours - https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=LSzWA2hJulI#dialog
Are you learning the Georgian alphabet and script as well?
It's a mixed sort of day here weather-wise: it's been alternating between Really Quite Nice and absolutely p*ssing with rain. I might take a little stroll past the loch and back along the street once I've put the lamb-shank into the slow-cooker.
I've been raking the interweb to try and establish how much liquid you need for one medium-sized lamb-shank, but all the recipes seem to presume that you're cooking for at least two. I suppose it's just another thing to get used to about being on my own. I think I'll go with about a cup of stock and a splash or three of red wine and hope for the best; I can always thicken it with flour-and-butter if it's too much.
I'm rather looking forward to it - lamb-shanks really are proof that God loves us.
Sundays are our Zoomy day, we've done our first two (family and then friends) and have a lunch break now before a 2.30 one (Sunday sort-of-church group) and then an extra one this evening which I may bow out of or turn my camera off for. I'm moderately interested in it but have Other Things To Do.
It's lovely and sunny here.
The amount of pudding mixture I made filled one medium and one small basin, and some water got inside the foil of the small one during the first steam, so I didn't think it would keep. Consequently it was eaten for lunch today and found to be tasty. The other one has now been doused in cognac as per the parental recipe and can macerate merrily away until Christmas.
I have a lots of plans for Christmas cakes/pudding this year. I want to make a chocolate Christmas pudding with a candied orange inside, a trad Christmas pudding, an Earl Grey stollen, a chocolate orange log and a rainbow sponge with white fondant Christmas cake. I’m also trying to convince my other half that he’d really like the challenge of making panettone.
I have 2 weeks leave at Christmas so I could spread some of the baking.
When our son was home a couple of weeks ago we made some rough plans about what we are going to eat. This will include celery sauce (non-vegan) from a cook book I once got as a secret Santa present on Ship of Fools (I think it might have been from @daisydaisy ) and vegan pigs in blankets. The 'bacon' is marinated aubergine. Son has a mandolin so he'll need to bring it with him so we can get the aubergine slices right.
I can write Anuka’s name in Georgian script.
Even if the grandchildren have been away from school germs for a week, that is not long enough to be certain, and also they. (legally) flit between their two homes, which involves a half brother at a different school.
So the risks of transmission of the virus are just too high for us. My other granddaughter works for Aldi when she is not at college, so I won’t be going to see my son either.
So just the two of us for meals, which will not be anything very different from our norm.
I so wish we hadn't lost that "eek" smilie ...
As it had stopped raining, I had a lovely little amble round the Palace and down by the loch while the lamb was cooking, and by the time I got back the flat was getting decidedly aromatic. I did put more stock in than it needed (I have a paranoia about letting things dry out or burn), but it was jolly nice all the same. I'm thinking I might have the leftover gravy and veggies with some mashed potatoes tomorrow - it would seem a shame to just throw it out.
Of course, I could pop over to the butcher's and get a lamb chop to go with it ...
ასეთი larks გვექნება, Anuka, ასეთი larks!
aseti larks gvekneba, Anuka, aseti larks!
Which Google tells me is Georgian for such larks we shall have, Anuka, such larks! (thank you, Mr Dickens), but you notice that her name is not actually in Georgian script!
Where did you get the William Morris facemasks? I got one from the Radical Teatowel Company and it’s lasted fine - also it has a little widget thing so you can adjust the length of the elastic, which makes it much more comfortable. It seems to have several layers. They do a number of designs (the African rainbow peace doves is my other favourite).
I understand that I won't need to wear a mask at my desk, but there will probably be other situations where I will, while also needing reading specs.
https://youtu.be/jKO8FcTxnX4
(The music on the tutorial is very calming!)
🙂
It's taking me longer than I thought to get used to glasses and I'm still waiting for that "Where did I put my glasses? Oh, they're on my face" moment. I'm very conscious of them all the time at present.
Fortunately for my wellbeing, there has been another incident of the bell going off without proper cause, during the day, but again on the edge of sleep, but it doesn't feel good. I've not slept properly since.
Fridges make the weirdest noises. This one at ‘our’ German flat especially!
Talking of such things, there's a security buzzer at the entrance to my block of flats, and someone buzzed my number on it yesterday looking for someone other than me. Although I wasn't expecting anyone, I picked up the entryphone (like Brother Cadfael, curiosity is my besetting sin), but when he asked for number X, because "their buzzer isnae working" I apologised and put the phone down. I didn't think it was my place to let someone in to go to a different flat - how was I to know he wasn't someone the people in number X really didn't want to see?
I'm new to this stuff - did I do the right thing?
In other news, I was delighted to see there's a magpie who lives nearby, and have said "good morning" to him several times (making sure to break the curse by asking after his wife and children or telling him what a fine fellow he is - they're just such handsome birds!). I was even more delighted when his friend turned up as well - two for joy.
There was a peculiar evening some time ago when I had a group of physicists at my last place. I had a very early version of a wifi doorbell, which ran through batteries very fast, and which I had to keep plugged in to the power. It had started to ring for no reason, and I suspected a neighbour had something producing the same frequency. There was a matching bell up the road, but too far away. I had checked out the possibility of knock down ginger. Finding no solution, I put a notice beside the button, asking callers to ring twice.
Shortly after, the bell started to ring twice for no reason. I now suspected that a neighbour's child was doing it from indoors.
So, with the physicists there, I put a new notice, for three rings. And sure enough, it started to do three. I think it built up to five that evening. Usually close to the hour. We wondered if someone's thermostat was producing a surge, or if the AA man working on a car outside was producing a signal via sparks. I think there was no ring when the receiver was on the battery. The next day the power company denied any surges in the supply, and I took the thing back to Argos. It was extremely odd.
But the date and the time of this one was odder.
The system is intended to make sure that the only people in the building are people who are permitted by a resident who is expecting them to be there.
I suppose if I had any sense I'd ignore the buzzer unless I'm actually expecting someone - not something that's happening under the current restrictions ...
I've done the usual morning admin, had a vegan pie for lunch (sag aloo) and I'm now about to mark some stray late essays so that I am marking-free for the rest of the week.
I agree. In these days of mobile phones there's nothing to stop someone phoning their friends to say "I'm on the doorstep and your buzzer isnae working."
I'm having a lazyish day today, but we've booked to go to a local gardens for a walk tomorrow, so I feel justified in not doing much today.
Ours intermittently sounds like a broody chicken.
It's doing so just now, as I've got a spud baking for supper; it'll be joined by the remains of yesterday's gravy and a couple of lamb chops which are heating up in the slow-cooker. And a glass of WINE.
I read that as ‘intentionally’ 🤣
I'm not ruling it out. It was a wedding present from my parents 16 years ago. Buying the one with the "chicken noise" upgrade is in keeping with the sense of humour on my mother's side of the family.