A day without social commitments, a blessed change. I can’t say I got a lot of work done, and was slightly annoyed and distracted by learning that someone I like but isn’t very good at their job was about to leave their contract and was offered a permanent position to stay. Ah well. My perpetual struggle with this work is to just take the money, do the work and not care.
In the morning I had my exercising on the heath. This is something I began in Lahore where a trainer came over thrice a week to put me through my paces, and have continued on Zoom, though with interruptions when there isn’t a person coming in person. Today was one of the first days since arriving in London that the intensity was ramped up a notch, so I came out of it feeling quite enfeebled, and worse still because in London it starts at 7.15 when the morning stiffness of middle age is at its height. Not sure how long I’ll continue as an online session is just not the same as an in-person one. But I do like my trainer.
In the afternoon we went for coffee into Hampstead, where the ladies of Hampstead put on quite a repellent show in our eavesdropping. We did meet the GF’s au pair from his early childhood, a delightful lunatic who hugged and kissed us both many times, clutched our hands to her heart and burst into tears. I hadn’t ever met her before, and I’m not sure the GF has either, at least as an adult.