Technically a Borrowdale madame, Lucy better watch out, she has competition

 Well I am probably Helensvale where I am house sitting for the next two weeks. Learning new roads as I am out on Carrick Creagh, feels a bit like the back of beyond, and I thought Queen Elizabeth Drive in Greendale was far from civilisation last year. My prime duty is to look after two enormous great danes, Zara and Jack. I also have two rabbits, chickens, the garden birds ... and a piranha, I mean oscar fish! I won't lie, the oscar fish is a little scary. Turns out it is a "she" and she likes to jump out the tank. Was about to Skype call friends in Germany earlier and she did this. She can bite (like a piranha) and comes shooting to the surface when you try to put her pellets into the tank. Oh well, it should be interesting.

Tried to see the Jupiter/Saturn conjunction but a) I was looking in the wrong direction, thinking it was the bright star under Orion's Belt and b) I was rather late for it. Hopefully it might still be visible tomorrow. One really needs a nice, fancy telescope to really appreciate it. At the time when it should have been appearing I was trying to fathom out the gas stove and oven. There's a hitch, you have to leave the grill door open, otherwise the flame goes out, and none of the knobs have their numbers etc, visible as they have been rubbed off. When the oven kept going out, I ended up calling the maid, Chiedza, who was already in her nightie. Otherwise wouldn't have had dinner tonight.

There is apparently the new strain of Corona in South Africa now. The same one that is hitting London. A friend's boss here tested positive last week and the newspaper headlines here today suggested we might go back into stricter lock down again. Another year of remote teaching is not great. The students didn't do too well from my experience. Will see. Saying that, I am having a few friends round for drinks on Wednesday evening. Going to do deconstructed Christmas ham and other nibbles and a friend has offered to make gluhwein. Should be festive. My mum and I have agreed to go help make 500 meals for the homeless for Christmas Day at The Base Church on Christmas Eve and we've been invited to dinner at friends'. On Christmas Day we're taking the avoidance of cooking route and having a fish lunch at the new Fishmonger's at the Italian Club. Means not slaving over a stove and endless washing up.