A bit more garden!

[curiouswombat]

It remains hot and dry. Officially the temperature in the shade reached just over 28C - but when I was driving NYK home at 6.15pm the car was registering an outside temperature of 31C. As our usual summer temperature is around 21-22C we are all feeling the heat; remember our houses do not have air-conditioning - it is seen as an environmentally

Comments

[epiphyta]

An article in the Guardian about your upcoming elections caught my attention, as your town was mentioned - it is good to hear that matters are not worse.

[curiouswombat]

There has been a bit of a kerfuffle. The local commissioners election was put off last year because of covid - and then it didn't seem to occur to anyone that if the border was opened before this new date we were bound to have a lot of new cases and a lot of people in isolation who couldn't vote. There are, of course, arrangements for postal voting, but that would have required people to predict at least 2 weeks in advance that they were going to be ill...

Feelings here are mainly a mixture of worry at the figures whilst, at the same time, a determination to just get on with life or there will have been no point in all being vaccinated - most people managing equal amounts of both at the same time. The Chief Minister has said that he doesn't rule out reintroducing some restrictions - but would prefer not to. We are like a small, 85,500 people, experiment at the moment.

[epiphyta]

Oh, bother! While I did like the "facilitation of community engagement" when I worked as an elections judge, situations like this are why I prefer Washington's system of "postal ballots for everyone" (originally proposed by a Republican Secretary of State who recognised that not everyone could take time away from work on Election Day - I know, I was astonished in light of recent goings-on, too).

[curiouswombat]

It really would be sensible - but then there would be an outcry about how easy it would be to complete someone else's and so on...

[kazzy_cee]

The roses are lovely! It's interesting to hear about your infections - I hope those getting it are not going to have the issues with long covid, but it's encouraging to see so few in hospital.

[curiouswombat]

At the moment I think we are a bit of an 85,500 people experiment. Actually one where we can provide our own 'control'.

A local news site has pointed out that when we went into Lockdown in early March our vaccination programme had only got as far as the over 70s, and most of them had only had their first shot. There were just under half as many active cases as we have at the moment - and there were 23 in hospital. So it really does look as if there is a lot of protection from severe illness from being vaccinated. But the long covid figures will take longer to work out.

[thismaz]

That red rose is lovely. I love the deep colour and profusion of flowers.

[curiouswombat]

It's amazing - it just flowers and flowers. I give them rose feed every 3 or 4 weeks and water them in this hot weather, but really it just does its own thing.

[elwenlj]

I do adore a velvet red rose.

[curiouswombat]

Me too. These were, in effect, a gift from a previous resident - I regard it as a great kindness!

[shirebound]

Mmmm, I can almost smell those roses from here.

[curiouswombat]

They are lovely. And the last of the freesias are in a trough just below that wall, so the combination is really rather wonderful.