As well I baked a four-layer vanilla cake for Maggie's birthday, with homemade Provencale apricot jam thinned out with limoncello, and butter cream icing (also with lemon and more limoncello). I have to admit that Maggie did apply the icing while I was cooking everything else, but otherwise she didn't have to cook.
Unfortunately for her it was not the most restful of birthdays. She was on the computer most of the day, having ten minute teleconferences with every student and their parents... this was the substitute for the usual in person parent-teacher conferences. She even had to do some of those using her iPhone while we were driving to Beauvechain to get our latest COVID tests...
That was a bit of an adventure: I had to contact the doctor in the morning by telephone, go down the checklist with her, and then go pick up the prescriptions, and then we rushed to the testing centre. Fortunately we made it with a couple of minutes to spare before they closed down the line: the one we like is only open from 10h-12h, and has almost no waiting time, unlike the one that is a little closer. The closer one is open from 14h-18h, but has huge lineups and a waiting time that is growing longer as the pandemic drags on, with delays of up to two hours.
After the tests we came home and Maggie continued with her interviews, which I did a bunch of the shopping for the dinner, and then sat down to try to lead a choral rehearsal with the kids at St. John's... They set up a computer in the theatre and had me join. I could sort of hear what was going on in the theatre but as they were attached via wifi, I felt that there was a substantial lag, and as well they didn't have an external microphone. Not ideal. We are going to try again with a better mic tonight, and see how that goes... I hope that we get our test results back quickly (and that they are negative) so that I can go back to music rehearsals in person.
Thank you to everyone who has expressed concern for Duncan; he's doing much better now, and in fact he didn't have terribly intense symptoms: he hasn't had a fever since perhaps Sunday or Monday, so that's a good sign. He still has the occasional cough, and a slightly scratchy throat, but he isn't feeling too poorly. He was up and dressed, dusting his bookshelves, and reorganising things this morning. We're still keeping him in his room, and not going in without a mask when we bring him his meals. The doctor has explained that we need to wait forty-eight houre after the disappearance of symptoms before he can leave isolation, which most likely will be early next week.
This morning we caught the two cats and put them into their carriers, not without some complaining: Bonnie is sweet and cuddly but her back claws sliced me open in several places on my left hand...
It was time for their vaccinations, and a yearly examination. They are both in good health: Clyde is tipping the scales at almost fifteen pounds, and Bonnie is around ten pounds. We also took the opportunity to order replacement passports for the two of them, and get their microchips registered. Both are inside/outside cats, and neither is used to wearing a collar, so it's important that if they were found we could be notified. The passports and the chip registration were supposed to have already been done by the cat rescue organisation that we adopted them from, but they never delivered them, so we had no choice.
Okay, that's about it; I have to go for a quick run and then get ready for the rehearsal this afternoon. Fingers crossed that we'll be receiving our negative reports shortly...
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