My son attended a football match between Fulham and Sunderland over the weekend. He hadn’t been to a game since he saw Arsenal play when he was 3 years old. He had a lot of fun made much more special by his football enthusiast friend. Yeah for friends and for sport! The game ended in a tie so it will be replayed in Sunderland. Football is strange.

Our garbage never seems to be collected on time. Our pick up day is Friday. Sometimes they come on Friday morning or evening. Sometimes they come on Saturday and sometimes they just don’t come at all. This is perplexing to me. I don’t remember this being an issue in London on our last stint here. It most definitely never happened in Australia. I wonder if it’s a covid thing? So much has changed due to the pandemic that doesn’t include health care, it’s astounding. We can survive another week of waiting for the trucks to clean out the recycling and food waste bins, but unfortunately rubbish only comes once every two weeks. Yes, we have had to wait an entire month for pick up, yikes!

We attended a parent teacher night for my year 11 daughter. It was our first one since being back in the UK. They ask for the student to be present as well, which hadn’t been the case in the past. The teacher said hello, but then directed all of her attention to my daughter. My husband and I sat in silence while the pair had their conversation about how things were going. This scenario was repeated with each instructor, we were present literally just to witness it. Very different.

I’ve been trying to stick to a morning routine everyday. Part of this routine is walking the kids to school with the dog and then he and I continue on for a bit of a longer stroll. The first day we walked about 10k through Hampstead Heath. It was cold and muddy but really lovely. Our little Jack needed a bath when we returned as his normally white undercarriage was black and mucky. Day 2, I take him out again and he walks half a block and freezes. He won’t budge, paws rooted to the ground. Refusing to walk with me for fright of a long, cold and muddy hike I think, we return home failing to adhere to our new routine. I continue to try, but stick to shorter 5k walks with him which seem to suit him better.

We spent Sunday with new friends. A family from my son’s school had invited us over for lunch while the kids “hang out”. After being in “isolation central” Australia, it reminds me how out of practice I am socially. I’m astounded that whenever my kids go to a friend’s place, inevitably it means drinks and a meal for us parents as well. Note to self to stock the cupboard for unexpected guests.

I’ve had a new back pain for the last 6 weeks. Finally, our insurance had kicked in and I was able to visit a Physio this week. It turns out, my osteoporotic bones are worse than I thought because I managed to fracture a vertebrae doing yoga on a mat, on our wooden floor. Say what?! Dang. Description of old in the dictionary: bones crumbling with any applied pressure. Eye rolling commence.

I spent a half day working a bake sale at my daughter’s school to fundraise for a camping trip the girls on going on. It was nice to meet some other parent helpers and to see the girls in their school setting. The energy those teenagers have is intoxicating. I loved being around them all. Everyone was so friendly and so polite. My “trash” brownies were a big hit and among some of the first to sell out. It was a really nice experience and am looking forward to becoming more involved.