How are you guys ?

Where is nobby ?

I think he's deactivated, Jonesy. Unusual for him not to mention it, but I have been a bit irregular since lockdown/shielding

I wonder why ? Are you sticking to the rules bert

I am behaving myself, Jonesy. I'm in the twelve-weekers (5 down, seven to go) so my world is the length of (stop it) my street. I live in a cul-de-sac so even with that, I can see a total of I think nineteen houses. I'm allowed outside but only into the 'exercise yards' and not even that for the first three days.

I can't even be salacious with you because if it's just you and me, that's just an old man getting fruity rather than smutty humour for the gallery.

Haha I'm not sure what's worse doing it privately or with other parties watching I hope he returns ffs
I'm more or less sticking to the rules .I mean I'm not having raves but I am going to the shops more than I should and a lot more items have become essential, I'm not worried in the slightest though I think I use up on my worry on my daughter

It's one thing playing for the gag in a room with a few of us, it's something entirely different to lob your rat out in an empty Tube carriage in front of a nun.

Common sense around the shops and as you say, it wouldn't matter how often you go. How is your daughter (and for that matter, the rest of you) holding up? I'm not too bad with cabin fever, I don't struggle to keep myself occupied but at the same time, I'm not a house cat - the poor fucking dog doesn't know what's wrong with me, we haven't been out as a team for 36 days and we both miss it. I'm down about 150 miles walking, which means I should roughly be in Northampton...

Oh god you might bump into each way .
My daughter is ok with the whole corona thing I thought it might be a trigger but it's not thank goodness ,she did have a bit of a wobble a couple of weeks ago ,she started to struggle with reality and had some delusions but after a few days got through it
I dont know about where you live but it's like being on a construction site here the left of me are building an extension and the right side are having a flat roof redone ,its so fucking noisy  and I sleep in late so it pisses me off
Is anyone walking the dog ?

Thank Christ it's only hypothetical Northampton, then - I'd take lockdown six days a week and twice on Sunday instead.

We have new neighbours next door who'd, fortunately for them, done much of the groundwork on putting the graft in before lockdown so as such, they haven't moved in yet and it's silent. The other side is the quiet old misery with the spaniel, wife and adult son. They're fine.

Good to hear you're nowhere worse than a wobble, I occasionally blow up when I'm being taken for granted (I do all the cooking and gladly but I'm not a fucking hired help) but no-one goes hungry... The dog is getting out but we have a routine (variations on a route, multiple options) which she'd miss because the start and end are constants and she looks forward to the wide open (I'll have her off the lead, she'll listen to me). She's also getting out in the back so she may actually be seeing more outside than usual, albeit she's less knackered by the end of the day (she'd stay out for as long as I would, tbh).

Baking at the weekend has become a regular thing and I've also perfected my pasta white sauce for lasagne/cannelloni for their tastes. Got my lad on to sea bass curry as well. Doing fair

Sounds good ,well ok understand the circumstances
I have just been sleeping a lot more than usual ,I feel a bit guilty that I haven't been learning a new language, making bread or whatever everyone seems to be doing .I dont even think I'm exercising enough .I'm only 8st something but I do feel my strength has depleted somewhat with age
.I am watching quite a few films and stuff like the mandalorian and devs .Sci fi is my favourite televisual jam
Other half and just got a job at morrisons, more for everyone's sanity than financial, though people currently dont want art .
Cats are good ,no changes there really as someone was always at home anyway .
Life for me hasn't changed much really I was on a 80%lockdown anyway .Really just miss trips away
My biggest fear is going back to work and having to wear a mask especially one of their making

Any sci-fi watcher will understand how a mate of mine put it, that it's like he's 'been waiting for lockdown all of his life'. The extra stuff is an opportunity, not a mandate, Jonesy - this is the time where you do what you need to first to keep yourself well. All the rest is frippery. I bake because it adds a frame to the week, it's something my daughter gets to explore options in ingredients and we do together and the brownies are a fucking awesome recipe I got from an ex-colleague who has a weekend sideline in selling them from a family market stall. She's also a redhead, which means if I were thirty years younger, she'd be telling me to fuck off, hair colour and baking are not enough for a marriage proposal three times a week.

On a less stalky note, though () , I have books aplenty to get through but I'm not getting through them at a pace because they aren't a chore, they're there for me to exploit and not the other way around. As such, I'm probably reading around the same amount as I ever do. I'm also sleeping better rather than more, since my daily round commute has been shortened by four hours or so. I'm still at work as I can and do work from home roughly once a week anyway, and the kids have schoolwork set them over the web where I can still do a job - my lad scored some kudos off his mates this week when I gave him a basic grounding in sine/cosine/tangent and he suddenly became the Problem Wizard because they'd been set work in an area they hadn't at that point covered. I can still do it, Jonesy (stop it) but it might take me a bit longer to get going (no, really, stop it). I'm quite comfortable in having my geek showing, I'm a trainer by inclination and always happy to help where I can.

I was eight stone last, by my reckoning, when I was about eleven My lad is a fag paper behind me for height and is built not unlike me (in frame, I mean - he's broad-chested, hard to knock over, not a old man run to fat with creaking joints and a shot shoulder, I paint a sexy picture, don't I? ) and the lockdown is affecting him in that he doesn't get to run around (footie, cricket, basketball) to the point that he's been roped into doing some socially-distanced footie club 5k training runs around the park over the back. The fact that he can run 5k without turning a hair (I was a sprinter, believe it or not, and so if I ran more than a lap, I'd assume I was in half a dozen races) is testament to him. Daughter is not dissimilar but she can make use of the garden more as she's less team sport specific and although she eats, she isn't the gannet her brother is (I do love to see people eat well, though - food isn't an enemy).

Day 40 yesterday. It is amazing how quickly we adapt as a species.

You like redheads ? Me too ,absolutely love freckles. A gingerbread man still sends me weak at the knees ,oh that made me think of the baker in viz who tupped ring doughnuts lol cant remember his name .
Sounds very harmonious in your home which is good ,there is without doubt people who are loving this situation and are benefitting from it,coming closer together.I love that.
Regardless of the virus since my daughter got ill I feel I just exist ,every day I just wait to hear if shes ok so I can carry on .If shes not i worry sick things are going to go down the psycosis route and another stay in a unit (3 so far) on those days i just sit and do nothing but worry and fear the worst a couple of days ago she didn't sleep all night and that started to give her strange thoughts so i was just existing again but things improved quickly and all was well .I just wish I could let go a bit more , luckily she is in lockdown with her bf who's a lovely lad in a pub of all places which could be heaven or hell haha .its ok for them as he doesn't drink and she cant really .
Ok nobster,I know you are reading I demand you come back and post some of your lockdown highs and lows
Must rant before I go my fucking neighbours on the left side are diying inside next to my room obviously and outside on an extension constant banging!

Christ, Jonesy, do you not read anything of mine? Redheads, a well-appointed rack (a proper fitting bra on any breast beats too big in too small every time, and enhancements aren't for me on the same principle), a woman who know what cake tastes like rather than who eats a drawing of a Ryvita as a meal and for the love of God, if you shave it all off are you trying to attract paedos (that's just a general observation - I don't go around asking whether collar and cuffs match or are we wearing short sleeves?)

They're guidelines, not rules, of course, they're the things that turn my head, but only insofar as I want to walk up to them and shake their hand and say "well done". I think it might have been William Morris who said you should surround yourself with beautiful things. I can understand that.

Fru T Bunn would be your baker. I can appreciate how hard it is with your daughter as well, good that she's got a decent bloke who's not a potential further worry for you (that they're not boxing rather than that he's smuggling pandas and dealing in Jif or something). Meanwhile, do your own loud DIY to put them off, even if you're faking it by just bouncing up and down on the bed while pushing the headboard back and forth and screaming

Haha I do read your posts but but retaining information I'm not so good at that ,however I have not forgotten your cartoon kink I like my redheads and the odd other skinny always ,the rent boy look works for me
Someone said if its neither useful or beautiful, bin it ! I think of this when I'm sorting stuff out and consequently have fuck all
How great is this weather I could stay looked in forever, hopefully cafes wont be open for a bit .l do miss the cinema though

The useful/beautiful thing was definitely Morris. The weather is quite welcome - the garden is as far as I get to go so I won't knock it, I tend to have a sunshine/book spell where I can for the vitamin D and for the air and warmth. Have the odd off day physically, but I can pull that back far easier now if already at home, of course

My house and garden have had more done in the past few weeks than in years my face is really brown now but my hair is white ,well two ins of it plus I have a cold sore so looking a bit rough good job there is no work for the next few weeks which is fucking great because I hate people

I'm the same, Jonesy. Mrs Bert got a set of clippers for a cut for me and I all but told her to go to the wood. Had a no. 3 all over and it's only getting to regular post-cut length now, a good month later. "No-one going to see me for twelve weeks" I said. I am full on grey as a badger's arse but I'd love to go white and have it done with. I haven't worn "hard trousers" since mid-March as I'm at home so the shorts are in early rotation...

I have bearly got dressed unless shopping of course hope the hot weather returns bra and shorts all day

missyj wrote:I have bearly got dressed unless shopping of course hope the hot weather returns bra and shorts all day

Me too. I may even go down to my knicks, oh yes, even the string to get a pretty much all-over

Bert you ok ? Been a while ,lots has happened

Changed internet supplier, Jonesy, only got back on today, a tale of woe from both suppliers...

Why in this day and age is it such a ball ache to change .I have been with sky forever ,it seems alright
When is all this going to be over bert

We only left Sky because they can't do the upspeed we need while we're all at home. We arranged for a handover at the end of the thirty-one days notice and they cut us off after ten working and refunded the balance despite our asking for the contrary. They left us with the TV and phone, though, but the one thing we needed, they stopped. To put it back on would take two wweeks at which point it would be the day they'd shut it off again. Virgin then offered us an earlier date, then moved it back three months to November because I was shielding despite the day they'd have come, shielding would have been over. We rearranged to the original day again.

Not funny at all.

This, meanwhile, isn't going away. I went to 'work' last week for the first time in five months - place was empty as we can work from home and do but they're refurbing and I needed to pick up my personal stuff. There are few plans for anyone in such a situation to go back. NT of Australian have spoken about locking the state down until 2022, never mind 2021. I miss a few things but in general, I don't mind it

What a shitshow

Yeah I don't mind it too much
Went back to the cinema for the first time last week ,no one including us had their masks up but there was only about eight of us in there, film was so so bad The gladiator really has gone to shit but it was nice to get out .Had a dishy rishi meal afterwards in a curry house which was shit too ,had absolutely zero heat to it despite not asking for the blandest dish on the menu .This was all in the shit hole that is Northampton because my local cinema isn't open yet .
Looking forward to Tenet next week and hopefully a better meal
Daughter is much much better atm and is holding down her job coffee tasting ,doing lots of running ,painting etc so that's a weight off my mind
Nobby I see there have been developments in the maddie case ,what a crazy fucking year

Jesus, where is the time going?  And how did I miss not embellishing the 'down to the string' comment?  No wonder you were asking where I was, I never asked for or offered a single 'pic or GTFO', I'm ashamed of myself.  I'll be thrown out of the Guild for not being all over that (although that Sid James style smut might get me back in).  You deserve more robust response, Jonesy, your credentials are well known and if it helps, I now can't concentrate because of the mental image and my typing may go to shit.

Now, back to nsjmk, sjhdym hshheb.

Lot of work for that gag, but at the same time, I'll never get that out of my keyboard.

Back to real world stuff - is the Ninja in the hole because of Cowley cuts?  Industry is going to have a massive kick in the knackers as everything changes - it's a total reset and the government trying to send everyone back to the old pit isn't going to fly.  It shows you how shit society has become because of the way power is managed through money control but I'm not going to go into that rant.  Good to hear your daughter is on an upward curve, though - it's crippling for everyone when it sets in and it's at least a worry less now she has improved and pulled some good ends together to boot.

I'm being taken over by cricket.  My lad has the bug burrowing into him and although my shoulder is shot to bits, I can nurture that, it was my game after all.  I've lost weight as well (sadly, a string would not show my assets off, it's thirty years too late) and am on more severe haircuts that I've ever had and don't mind how I look - I might have been tidy once, you know, Jonesy?  Suppleness is wasted on the young...

Mum broke her ankle in my garden on the hottest day of the year (she fell in a dead faint) and spent 5 weeks in isolation in hospital (on a ward but no visitors are allowed save for dementia patients and those in end-of-life care).  She's been out the last couple of weeks and gets her last cast off on Wednesday.  Even this virus has allowed us to get up there and spend a bit of time doing stuff we normally wouldn't or couldn't (I've been cooking in two kitchens, for example, and walked down the all-night garage the other day for snacks for us which dragged me back fully thirty-five to forty years) and yesterday, I scored for the cricket and was paid a small stipend for it (which in truth I didn't want nor ask for) which is as close as being paid for my own hand-provided pleasure as I could be without using a plastic cup and a jazzmag.

We're making pretty good of it.

Hi bert ,you gag away ,dont lose your touch
Ninj left cowley about 5 years ago he was off for months after a back op ,then took voluntary redundancy of 27k which was a good deal .He sells art now (his own ) and works 12 hrs a week at morrisons on the early shift which involves doing peoples click and collect ,like a typical old style man he refuses to go down the sanny aisle because it's too confusing so just no stocks those items but hey its hip to free bleed isn't it

Cricket is one of the sports along with golf where all I know is a ball gets hit with something then men men walk or run
You can touch the cricket ball with your hands but not the golf one in play ,zero idea about scoring .so I wouldn't get paid much haha
Tennis I love though and the cancelling of Wimbledon is one of my big pissers of covid
Hope your mums feeling better and things have worked nows the cast is off .
I'm off to warsaw next week ,well if things dont change again