I trekked down to my opticians at lunchtime (my opticians have been moving further and further away since I started going to them - they used to be at the top end of Tottenham Court Road and are now about halfway between TCR Tube Station and Oxford Circus, having made various stops in between). They looked at the scratch across one lens of my glasses (a freak accident involving a wire coat hanger, don't ask) and were not of the opinion that they could do anything for it. And then, without actually asking me if I wanted a quote for a replacement lens, one of them immediately started looking this up, taking a chunk of time that I didn't really want to spare from my other errands. Although I couldn't suggest an exact amount, I have a reasonable idea of the ball-park figure for a coated thin plastic varifocal lens in my particularly idiosyncratic prescription, and the scratch really isn't that much of a bothersome. Especially as I think I'm due for another eye-test and probably another change of prescription.
And finally, today, when I really didn't want One More Thing to have to carry home, a delivery from Amazon that was despatched last week, which I had assumed irretrievably lost by the Post Office, turned up this afternoon (I'd also bought an alternative present for the person concerned). But, at least it turned up! at least I don't have to go through the performance of establishing non-delivery and making a claim! (the last time I did this, and got compensated, they made the cheque out to my employers, because the delivery address was my work address... duh).
Julian Baggini's
Wisdom's Folly today strikes me as a bit weak: dare we guess thrown together after a seasonal boozy lunch or party?
However, on the up side, even with a bit of difficulty (e.g. the vanishing of a couple of large branches of Boots near my opticians, which I had factored into my plans) I now have presents all covered, including a couple of spares in case for any nephews' girlfriends who haven't been mentioned.
Also, finished a cataloguing job, all except the labelling the boxes, finding a stack location, getting an oversize folder made, and a few final database fields completed, before quitting work for the holiday.
And, having looked at the text I have, think I can just do a bit of polishing and pasting in to a paper I already have on hand, for the seminar at the end of January.
And, best of all, no work, no open-plan office, until 4 Jan!
[ETA: I also managed to fit in a - though still cautiously post-virus fairly minimalist - workout at the gym this evening]