Monday, January 4th, 2021
One of my pleasures during the pandemic has been food. We do try to shop nice food in DC and cook well. I am finding however, that the variety is so much greater here in Germany or in France and Italy. The spread at the markets is amazing and cooking is simply fun. I am not sure why we do not have the same variety in US markets, maybe people care less about good food.
Here I make a point of getting groceries which I do not happen upon in the USA. Today we had three varieties of herring with green beans. Yesterday we had venison sausages with Brussel sprouts and a cross breed of kale and Brussel sprouts. The week before we had different sweet water fish found in local waters, dumplings and local varieties of pasta.
I know I can not do this permanently as without exercise (pools are closed, dojos are closed) I shall invariably end up putting on weight (as I have already). For the three or so weeks now, I am enjoying the nice food though. Once back in the US I shall reengage in my swimming routine and go to practice in the park twice a week. I should probably restart stretches and weight shifting exercises at home also, just to drop weight. And of course, our food intake shall be much reduced. No more fresh bread rolls and cold cuts for breakfast. No more carbs. The holiday feasting shall be truly over, and I am sure the weight will drop again – certainly to comfortably fit a size 12 (which is becoming a wee bit tight with all the feasting) if not a size 10.
Other than cooking a nice meal for mum and I every day lock down life just moves along. Nothing exciting happens and we just hang out at home. I copied most of my blog posts back into a word document. Maybe one day it will make a book. If not, I shall just print one version for EM as a memory of what our lives were like for a year or two. Maybe I find the wherewithal to begin editing the write ups as of tomorrow.
I did do some work today but am finding I am not terribly motivated. I am rather enjoying the break.
Breaking news at the home front today was EM’s acceptance into Penn State. I am so glad she did get accepted, but more as boost to her moral than anything else. There is no way I am willing or able to afford the 75k tuition fee per annum. We are still waiting on IE Madrid and Jacobs University in Bremen. She has also sent of applications to the University of Amsterdam, Amsterdam University College and the University of Tilburg. I desperately hope some of these will come through, so she has a choice. Penn State really has ever only been the back up in case the IB does not work out. I firmly believe she will get into at least two or three others. She has been working so hard this year and it has not been easy. School send out a note today about deadlines. Apparently the IB board will decide on exams in the next four weeks. Here is hoping they will be cancelled. On the downside it means the IAs will become so much more important. Thankfully EM is taking them very serious, so should hopefully get good grades.
New infections are likely to go up in three to four weeks reflecting holiday gatherings. This is bad news even without mutant induced transmissions as hospitals are already overwhelmed. Health officials worst fears are coming to bear. The trend can already be seen. New cases continue to exceed 201k and the USA reports 21.1 million total infected with death just over 360k. There is some light at the end of the tunnel at least. The UK has started vaccination using Oxford/ AstraZeneca vaccine. This is very exciting news! I am hoping the FDA will soon approve Oxford/ AstraZenca’s vaccine also, which has now been approved for use in India.
Most of Europe continues to be in lockdown mode and as the mutant spreads these are likely to be extended. Germany is even considering keeping schools closed.
That means things are bad.