On decluttering

 I see a lot of references to decluttering on social media. Perhaps it's the circles I'm in; plus, of course, as soon as I clicked one link on the topic, I was inevitably going to see a whole lot more similar posts. Clutter is something of a divisive subject. There are people who like collecting a lot of things, and are comfortable around boxes, bags and other unsorted items. There are people who would like to be organised, but have difficulty finding spaces for things, or who don't have sufficent time and motivation to do anything about it.

There is also a third category of people who somehow manage to get things away, and tidy, without any apparent effort.  I aspired to be one of those as a young adult, but was firmly in the second category. The spirit was willing - well, mostly - but I was working full-time, and then had small children.  It was far more important to spend time with them - and they seemed to acquire a lot of stuff, too, mainly gifts from generous friends and family - than to keep the house tidy. 

Moving to Cyprus in 1997 forced us to be quite radical about our stuff. We donated some things to charity shops, although we had a large room and a couple of closets full of things we had stored, in addition to what we brought out. We also stored a lot of things in a friend's garage. In subsequent years, we moved more and more things here (mainly books), and when we sold the UK house, we gave away a lot of things that we had not used for nine years, and evidently didn't need.

It's still January...

What is it about the first month of each year? While time usually races by, more rapidly each year as I get older, January seems to last forever. The humorous poet Brian Bilston captured it perfectly. Well, perhaps it's not quite 6184 days, but I'm sure it's a lot more than five weeks since Christmas. I took the decorations down on Saturday 4th January so I could clean properly - they had been up for nearly a month - but I didn't do a whole lot else. 

I had such good plans for my time. Not 'resolutions' - I don't really see the point of them. Just a realistic way of trying to ensure I made the best use of my days, without over-scheduling or stress. I more-or-less followed that in the first full week of January.  On the Monday, I did some work on my recipe blog. I added a new recipe, edited some older ones, and added in some photos. I played around with the theme, too. It's not ideal, but I think probably better than the previous one. 

On the Wednesday I walked to my favourite haberdashery shop, and bought some new yarn for knitting baby hats, and then went to the thrift store, where I found a couple of DVDs that looked good. On the Thursday, I spent a couple of hours working on photos. I did some writing in the afternoons, too, though not as much as I had hoped. 

On the Friday, we didn't need to do any extra grocery shopping, but had decided that we would upgrade the rather rickety bookshelving in our guest flat living room, replacing with an Ikea Billy bookcase with glass doors. We were also thinking about a dedicated TV unit. So we drove (in the van) to Nicosia, and found not just the bookcase we needed, but a kitchen unit thing in pine which, we knew, would make a good TV unit. 

On Friday afternoon, Richard put the bookcase together...

After I had removed all the books from the old shelving: 

The TV was still on its old shelving along with a lot of other books which had become quite dusty over the years. And we agreed that we would need a second bookcase to match the first one, since we had too many books to fit in just the one. 

We didn't want to go back to Ikea, and we knew what we wanted, so we ordered online. We quickly realised that it was better to make two orders, each one less than 35kg, rather than all in one, from the postage point of view. The site said delivery would be 3 working days to Larnaka... 

.. although when the order was sent, it said that delivery would be 'within 6 working days'. Our first guest flat visitor of the year was due to arrive on Monday 20th, and we had hoped to get everything ready and tidied before then. Still, we hoped it might arrive on Friday or Saturday...

On the Monday morning, January 13th, was the first writers' group meeting of the year. And on the Wednesday I had planned to do a thorough clean of the guest flat, hoping to get it ready.  Our last guests were friends who left towards the end of October. Since then, the flat has been used by Richard to work on his PA system, and, in early January, for items from his boat, which was out of the water for a couple of weeks, for its biannual 'dry dock'. And it still had tools for building Ikea furniture, and wood varnish for the unit which Richard put together: 

I was becoming a bit concerned about getting everything ready for our visitor (who is staying for about eight weeks). So it was something of a relief to hear, on Wednesday, that there had been a delay, and he wasn't arriving until Wednesday 29th. 

Still, I did clean the main bedroom on Wednesday 13th, and made up the bed.  On Thursday morning I did more in the flat: washing cushion covers, and the sofa throw, and cleaning the bathroom. I also sorted the books better, calculating how many would fill up the two billy bookcases. I wanted to remove the books which had been taking up space in the bedroom, too, and the ones occupying space, rather precariously, on a spice rack in the kitchen. 

And... shock, horror! - I decided that we should probably get rid of about fifty or sixty books which we were never going to read, and which, we're pretty sure, none of our guests has ever looked at. We gave our local friends first refusal (and they took a fair selection) and I chose about fifteen of the remainder that were in the best condition for the church book sale. The rest, to our relief, were eventually taken by the Larnaka thrift store. 

But that's leaping forwards. On Friday 17th we went to Superhome store, then on to the nut shop (for five or six weeks' worth of nuts, seeds and dried fruit) and then Metro (for dried cat food and one or two other items). Richard had a phone call from Ikea while we were out, letting us know that the new bookcase would be delivered on Sunday. When he was hoping to be out sailing, and I had planned to go to the church service. But they didn't give any other options.

As it turned out, we were both at home. On Friday evening, Richard didn't want any food, and said he felt queasy. He slept most of the evening. In the morning I got up to walk with Sheila but after a short distance I knew I wasn't feeling well, so we turned around and I came in. 

I won't mention the details; suffice it to say that we both had a very miserable 24 hours with what we assume was an attack of norovirus. Richard felt a little better by Saturday afternoon, and got up. Sheila had brought us a loaf of bread, as I'd mentioned in passing that we'd run out and I was going to make some but wasn't sure I would cope with the smell of baking bread. We were very, very thankful for her thoughtfulness as the only thing either of us wanted to eat at first was toast with Marmite. I don't usually eat Marmite as it can be a migraine trigger; thankfully it wasn't on Monday, which is the first time I wanted to eat anything at all. 

The new bookcase arrived on Sunday and Richard was able to let the men in. He had cancelled sailing, and there was no way I could get to church; even if I'd been feeling up to it, I wouldn't have wanted to pass on such a nasty bug to anyone else. By Monday 20th, he felt a bit stronger, and put the bookcase together. And since I didn't want to remain in bed (and my worst symptoms had stopped, although I was still very tired) I did organise and sort the books. 

We were very pleased with how it all looked when we had finished. 

We were also extremely grateful that our visitor was not arriving that day!

On Wednesday some friends from Limassol were coming to dinner. We were past the infectious stage by then, though being extra careful with hand-washing still. I had started eating again, but was still incredibly tired, so it took me most of the day to organise the food for the evening. I had to keep sitting down every ten minutes or so. 

Then on Thursday I basically collapsed in a heap (after walking about half our usual route first thing with Sheila) and vegged out. On Friday we took the remaining books to the thrift store, and on Saturday I finally managed to clean the kitchen, and even sort and tidy the area over the washing machine which somehow accumulates a lot of random stuff. It still looks a bit cluttered: 

But I filled an entire bag with almost-empty long-expired bottles of suntan lotion, and hair spray, and body wash, and so on, to get rid of.  It's probably three years since we last did a proper spring clean of the flat, so it was good to do. 

And on Monday morning, this week, I took our carpet shampooer downstairs and thoroughly cleaned the rug in the living room, which had been looking very tired. 

That's the difference after I had cleaned the two stripes nearest the bookcases.  

Our visitor is now here, and the flat is going to be occupied almost continually for the next five months, with a variety of different people. We're very thankful to have it, and love being able to make it available to family, friends, church workers and friends of friends. 

It feels like we've done a lot this month, and there's still another day of January remaining. Today, Thursday, I worked on photos for an hour or so, for the second time this month, and this afternoon am updating this blog. Maybe in February, when it eventually gets here, I'll be back to the supposedly regular schedule...

Introducing... Dustin!

No, Dustin is not a new cat, nor any other animal. Neither is Dustin a lodger, or a guest or a new family member. Not a human one, anyway. But an extremely effective worker, mostly found under the front window in our living room...

A decade or so ago, when I first heard about robot vacuum cleaners, I thought they sounded like a great idea. But they were very expensive, and reviews suggested that they had a lot of flaws. Quite apart from the infamous stories about dragging dog mess over expensive carpets, I was concerned about tiny pieces of Lego, or little electronic components that might have fallen to the floor. 

So I hadn't thought about them much until a couple of months ago when we were in a shop that had robot vacuum cleaners on special offer, at a price that was similar to that of regular vacuum cleaners. Not that we needed a new vacuum cleaner; the one we have works perfectly well. But it's noisy, and a bit heavy to take upstairs, and I find vacuuming one of the most tiring household chores - so I didn't do it very often. I aimed for once a week in the main part of our house, once a month upstairs. I rarely succeeded in either aim. 

We have mostly hard floors, so I did also clean them with a dry swiffer,  and mop with a wet one. My aim for that was once a week upstairs and twice a week in the main floor. I didn't always succeed in that aim, either, although it did help to reduce dust and thus sneezing and - most importantly - snoring.  Every so often I would read an article about dust mites, and shudder, and determine to vacuum more often. But 'good intentions' do not lead to a good place...

And mostly it didn't matter too much. Cyprus is a dusty country and if someone visiting the house feels judgemental about dust, it's their problem, not mine. Before it got too bad, I would take action, if somewhat half-heartedly. If guests were expected, I would at least dust the tops of shelves and mop the floor in the living and eating areas of the house if I hadn't done them on the previous Saturday. 

This year I have been a lot more tired than previously. I said in an earlier post that it was perhaps due to my advancing years, and two different people pointed out that my years are less than theirs, so perhaps not. It's not as if I have any chronic health conditions. But Covid in January left me very tired. I thought I was mostly myself by the end of the month, ten days after I was finally released from isolation, but I am not sure that I ever fully regained my prior energy. And I've never had a lot of stamina. 

I was beginning to feel more myself by the end of March. Then I had a booster vaccination in April, which made me feel extremely grim for 24 hours, and fatigued in the extreme for a couple more days. I still don't feel as if I've returned to normal. My brain is foggy, my energy levels fluctuating even more than they used to. If I have a busy, active day (and my 'busy, active' days are calm and relaxed compared to those of many people I know) I can't do much more than sit and read a day later.

All of which, combined with a generous financial gift, came together to convince me that a robot vacuum cleaner would be a Good Thing. We didn't just buy it in impulse, even so. We came home, and researched the many available options - most of which are now reasonably priced - and eventually decided on a 'Roomba'. 

There are buttons on top to tell it to clean, or to go home. But the instruction manual recommended downloading an app for our phones. My phone doesn't have room for any more apps, and I'd rather use the actual buttons anyway. But Richard downloaded it, and that's when we learned that we had to give it a name. 'Roomba' seemed rather boring, so I Googled for a site that listed names others have given to their robot vacuum cleaners. None of them appealed until we came to 'Dusty' - but, as I pointed out, we didn't want it to make the house dusty. We wanted it to eat the dirt, to suck the dust in... and thus it got its name. And we sometimes started referring to it as 'he'.  

One of the reviews I read said that these robot gadgets lurched around the room like drunken babies, and when we set it off for the first time, we could see what the reviewer meant. It started off in a fairly straight line, bumped into something, changed direction, set off until it bumped into something else... it seemed entirely random, and we could hardly take our eyes off it. 

The cats were puzzled too, disturbed at first, but quickly accepting that it didn't mean any harm. And over the course of the next ninety minutes or so, it managed to find the entire main floor. I hadn't vacuumed the rug for about ten days, and had swiffered (but not mopped) the floors a few days earlier. So it had to work hard. But I was still rather shocked when it returned to its base after about an hour and a half, and we opened the dust container to check and empty it:

We were surprised it hadn't choked and stopped. According to the app, it had found 39 'dust events' - places where it was so dirty it had to do a kind of twirl to get properly clean.

We thought we had better run it again the following day, and did so. It struggled a bit on some of the lighter-weight rugs, so we lifted those out of the way - they're easy enough to throw in the washing machine.  More of a problem was its proclivity for trying to swallow electrical cables, of which we had rather a lot on the floor: at the back of the TV, around my computer, and elsewhere. It was a good incentive to find ways to move them off the floor. 

On the Saturday, when I would normally procrastinate about cleaning as I so disliked vacuuming, I had a burst of enthusiasm for dusting the shelves, and even lifted the chairs so Dustin could clean under the dining room table: 

Mopping suddenly became less effort, too, as less dusty floors meant less general mess... so I didn't have to keep stopping to clean the mop. Dustin has cleaned upstairs, too, and is excellent underneath the bed. Twice a week seems to be about right for upstairs. We had read that it was supposed to be able to sense stairs, so we watched it the first time it ran upstairs, hoping it would see the stairs coming and move away. I sat on one of the top stairs watching it approach... and was ready to catch it, if it didn't turn around. 

What happened was that it stopped, rather precariously balanced with about a quarter of it hanging over the edge. A red light came on, and a message appeared on Richard's phone, telling him that Dustin was teetering on the edge of a cliff. We rescued it, and decided to put the cat litter box at the top of the stairs, as it's fairly heavy and bulky, and would prevent the robot from toppling over or sending out the SOS. 

About ten days ago, I remembered that it's probably six months or more since we last moved our big sofa to clean underneath. Sure enough, when I moved it, this is what I saw: 

I had to pick Dustin up and put it in the right place a couple of times, but the resultant dust-free floor was quite a contrast: 

It's been quite a revelation having this robot vacuum cleaner. I didn't think the house was THAT dirty, and assumed that once or twice per week would be sufficient to keep it clean. But we've been running it six times a week in the main part of the house - we give it a rest on Sundays - and still it sucks up a significant amount of dust every day, albeit not as much as the first time. Here, for instance, is today's offering, after about six weeks of use and something like 55 hours running time in total (according to the app):

The white bits that fell out when I opened it are probably plaster dust; considerable work is happening upstairs, which will be the subject of another blog post when it's finished. But there's not much of that. The cats are moulting as the weather warms up, so no doubt a large part of the dust is due to cat hairs, but even so... the house must have been much dirtier than we realised, and it may be months before we can run the Roomba less frequently.

And I'm happy to report that both sneezing (notwithstanding the plaster dust) and snoring have reduced considerably. 

Sorting our Guest Flat

The ground floor of our house is a separate flat - it was the house that was originally built on our plot, before the owners extended upwards. Since we moved here in 2006 we have considered it our 'guest flat' - and over the years it's been quite widely used. We've had relatives staying, and friends, and friends of friends... we've also had people connected with Richard's work, and other random people, needing a place to stay. The only criteria is that if we don't know them, we know someone who can vouch for them.

We don't run it commercially - it's not an AirBnB or anything like that - it's part of our home. When it's not occupied by guests it sometimes gets used for construction work, or things related to Richard's boat. Some years it's quite busy, other years less so.  And, of course, last year there were virtually no visitors at all. We did have someone who stayed a few nights over the 2020 New Year, but then she was able to go somewhere else that was more convenient. Visitors due to come in the spring - and the autumn - had to cancel as the world went into lockdown. 

In September last year, we did host the son of friends who flew back from another country and had to self-isolate for a week or so, and a few weeks later hosted a young woman who was here for a few days working with the refugees. But I don't think either of them did any cooking - one had food provided by his family, the other was out and about.  We did a quick vacuum and mop before both these people arrived, of course, and ensured the bedding and towels were clean. But it was a long time since we did any serious cleaning - there didn't seem to be much point, as nobody has stayed there since October 2020. 

At the start of June this year, we hosted our first barbecue of the season for our closest friends. I realised as I took lids off salads that I hadn't brought down sufficient serving spoons, so I popped into the guest flat and grabbed a couple out of the drawer. And was shocked at the mustiness. I washed them, of course, and afterwards they went through our dishwasher. But I made a mental note that before we had any guests in the flat, we would need to go through all the drawers and cupboards, and wash all the cutlery and crockery. 

For about six months the second bedroom in the guest flat was full of boxes belonging to some other friends who have moved to a different country.  And although we've had a lot of people provisionally booking to come and stay in the Autumn, there wasn't anyone due to come before then. But I felt the urge to get started with the cleaning and sorting while the weather wasn't quite as hot as it was likely to be in July and August. So when I stopped walking with Sheila towards the end of June - as it was starting to get hot - I decided to spend an hour or so each day, first thing, doing some sorting in the guest flat. Richard was able to move the boxes, and also took away the last of his tools and sailing bits and pieces... and I began. 

I started with the main/front bedroom, as that seemed like the easiest. I washed the curtains and cleaned the windows, and the radiator (which was full of dust). We cleaned the air conditioner, and I washed the mattress cover and pillowcases that were out, and dusted and mopped.  That took a couple of days, but it was quite satisfying when it was done: 

Each day I did another load in the guest flat washing machine - other curtains, bedding, musty towels and tea-towels - but there's not a lot of hanging space outside, so I limited it to one load per day.  I did a load of washing up too - all the mugs, and then the cutlery, and then started on the pots and pans and other containers, leaving each load to dry before I embarked on the next.

And then I tackled the games cupboard - possibly not a priority for most of our likely guests, but it was beginning to smell more than musty. I'm not sure if the dampness on the bottom was due to a leak somewhere, or just the excessive humidity. But however it happened, some of the jigsaws at the bottom - old ones, mostly - and one or two of the games were beyond any hope of repair.  We have all our favourite games upstairs, so it wasn't a huge loss.  

Having got rid of the worst,  I washed everything that was plastic, sat musty boxes out in the sunshine, and realised that we really didn't need half a dozen different sets of chess pieces, or games with half the tokens missing. I found somewhere else to put the jigsaws and decided to limit the games to the top shelf of the cupboard only, at least until we discover the source of the dampness. The damp patch is rather obvious in this photo - I took this after thorough cleaning of the cupboard as well as sorting, cleaning and rationalising the games:

Friends had asked if we could host some of their friends for ten days or so in the middle of July, so suddenly there was a motivation to get the flat finished - and I was beginning to feel more and more overwhelmed. By the end of June, I was realising that just an hour a day was not going to get everything done, so we both spent more time sorting. I was glad it wasn't just me, as it turned out that some of the pots and pans were also past redemption - and there were so many of them, some broken, some mouldy.  We took everything out and began the task of sorting out and cleaning what looked as if it might be useful:

Given that most of our visitors stay only a week or two, and are out and about - or, if they're family or close friends, eating with us - it's really not necessary to have a vast amount of kitchen equipment in the flat. Particularly things that are broken, or can't be properly cleaned. We've tended to put things there when we run out of space upstairs, or invest in something new. And some visitors have left things behind for the flat - so we were fairly ruthless about getting rid of any rubbish, or anything that clearly hasn't been used in a decade or more.  

So the air conditioners were cleaned, and everywhere was dusted, and everything washable had been washed... but it still smelled a bit musty, though considerably better than it had done. And some of the drawers and cupboards (such as the bottom of the games cupboard) looked rather unsavoury, despite having been thoroughly cleaned. 

So we bought some inexpensive drawer-lining stuff, in white, and on the first Saturday of July determined to finish - if at all possible. We bought a small dehumidifying device for the games cupboard, too. 

The drawer lining made a huge difference to - for instance - the under-sink cupboard, which had been plagued with leaks for years until Richard replaced all the plumbing earlier in the year:

However, although we spent about three hours in the flat that morning, and achieved a considerable amount, it still wasn't completely tidy. And we were exhausted. By that stage the people due to come in the middle of July had cancelled, and although we'd had a query about early August, we knew those guests weren't likely to make it. And there didn't seem much point doing final mopping and vacuuming - or sorting the last few bits and pieces - if we weren't having any guests until the middle of September. 

Then we had a query about the whole of August, from a family who have been before. As the flat was available we were able to say 'yes'.  And then, last Thursday, a young friend called to ask if by any chance a friend of his could stay, as her brother had tested positive for Covid, and she was told that if she wanted to continue working, she had to be away from him.  

So on Thursday afternoon, we did the final cleaning and tidying. I put the washed sofa throw and cushion covers back in the living room:

I put sheets and a duvet cover on the bed, and got out a fan:

Richard got rid of the last of the rubbish, and vacuumed, and swept, and I mopped:

And suddenly it looked like a habitable guest flat again, ready for visitors. 

Cyprus covid-19 shutdown, part two

I originally called my last post a 'lockdown', but apparently that is incorrect terminology.  So I changed the title.  Some countries are observing 'lockdown' where nobody is allowed out of their houses at all, other than for essential errands.

It's not like that here in Cyprus. Not yet, anyway. We can still go out for walks, and - if we choose - see friends. Social distancing is expected, and the few remaining shops are required to be strict about numbers of customers and keeping them at least a metre away from each other. The supermarkets have started requiring customers to use hand sanitiser and gloves.

So far it hasn't made much difference to us, in practical terms. But there's an atmosphere of concern, just one topic of conversation.  It's hard to focus on anything else. Facebook is full of reminders that some people in the past had it much worse, during wars or occupations.  I wonder how long it will take for this to feel 'normal'.

Wednesday 18th March (continued)
In the evening, our friends came over for our weekly game of Cities and Knights. It was an auspicious occasion; Facebook had reminded me that morning that it was exactly ten years since we taught the game - as an expansion of Settlers of Catan - to Sheila.  It was a good game, rather longer than some, and Sheila won with rather an impressive 17 points:

Another nine confirmed cases of covid-19 taking the numbers up to 58 in the Republic of Cyprus.

Thursday 19th March
I woke around 5.30am and got up despite the house feeling decidedly chilly. My phone told me it was only 8 degrees outside. But I decided not to take my woolly hat out with me; I knew that by the time I had walked a kilometre or so I would feel warm enough. I did wear gloves, though.

I walked to Sheila's house, and we then did our usual walk along part of the Salt Lake trail.  There were fewer people out than normal, but the roads were fairly busy.  I had done 10,000 steps by the time I got home, according to my phone, so that was a good start to the day.

However when I arrived back, I felt as if I were starting a cold.  A couple of sneezes, and some coughing. Normally I would barely notice, but of course every cough is a worry at present.  It wasn't even particularly productive, but was possibly triggered by the change in temperature.  I'm not coughing most of the time, just once or twice when I move to a different room in the house.  I'm not particularly concerned. I don't have a fever, as far as I know, and it's only an occasional cough.

We've been wondering if the general social distancing and extra hand-washing that's encouraged this year will lead to fewer cases of ordinary infections and seasonal flu.  I suppose that won't be obvious for a while; but somehow I've caught a cold, albeit a mild one, despite the extra care.

And it's cold.  After a sunny start to the day, it rained mid-morning. The house was down to 15C by lunch-time.  Since our central heating isn't working, Richard turned on our electric heater, and put our living room air conditioner on to heat.  It takes the chill off the house.

Richard spent an hour at St Helena's church building this morning, recording a short video by the Chaplain, explaining what's happening.  I spent much of the morning - and afternoon - updating things on the church website, and the Facebook page.  I did then write a book review - of a book I finished a few days ago - but it's so tempting to sit and scroll through Facebook, finding out how family and friends are doing; and, of course, checking the news sites compulsively for updates...

On the last three Thursdays I went out mid-morning to the St Helena's Lent discussion group, but prior to that my Thursdays were usually very quiet. I rarely left the house after my early morning walk.  So it shouldn't have been a hardship to stay in today.  But there's a difference between choosing to stay at home, and feeling compelled to do so.  I didn't particularly want to go anywhere, so it makes no sense.

In the evening we both felt very tired. Still, we had a short but encouraging Facetime call with family in the UK.

We also discovered that Cyprus now has 67 confirmed cases of covid-19, including three on one of the military bases, plus 33 in the North (30 of whom are German tourists).  100 cases is a lot for a small island with a population of around 1.2 million.  Only one is critically ill.  None in Larnaka, so far, and most of the new cases were in contact with other cases, or arrived from elsewhere and had been self-isolating.

Tomorrow is the last day that any passenger flights can arrive in Cyprus; after that, nobody - even Cypriots - can come here for two weeks, other than a couple of specially chartered flights to pick up residents who were stranded after a cruise.

Friday 20th March
Usually on Fridays we do some shopping or 'house admin' - at least, that's the theory.  We didn't need anything from a supermarket so I decided to walk to the froutaria via the Post Office where we have a PO Box.  That gave me a little over four kilometres' worth of exercise, and some fresh air. It was still quite chilly but the sun was shining.

I collected some mail from our PO Box (mostly books I had ordered about three weeks ago, for the local book club I have joined, which - of course - might not meet for the next few months.

Although there was less traffic on the roads than normal for the time of day (I left the house about 7am) there was still construction work happening, on various buildings, and this, near the Post Office; I believe it's going to be an indoor mall of some kind eventually:

However, the town centre itself was almost deserted.  A lot of shops wouldn't be open at 7.30am anyway, but nothing at all seemed to be open today.

I saw very few people walking, until, almost at the municipal playground, I passed a man and - I assume - his son, who looked about seven or eight.  Unlike most other people I've passed in the streets in the last few days, they didn't move to the side of the pavement.  And just as I was about to go past, the boy started coughing.  Not into a tissue, or elbow, or even his hand, but into the air... and the man did nothing to try and stop him.

I'm assuming the  boy only had a cold, perhaps the one I've had for the last couple of days.  But even so, I was quite shocked that he was out on the streets with such a cough - which continued after I had passed - and that his father didn't quickly remind him to cough into his elbow, or a tissue.  I very much hope it was just a cold, since I had to keep walking along the street where they had been before I passed them!

I popped into the mini-market opposite the froutaria, and noted that there was still lots on the shelves, including toilet paper. I bought a couple of things, and then more at the fruitaria.  There weren't many other people there, but they had put red tape on the floor near the checkouts, a metre or so apart, and were telling people to queue behind the red lines. I dutifully did as I was told... and watched other shoppers ignore them completely. 

Later in the day, I wrote a rather overdue DVD review, and worked somewhat on my home education website, and wrote some emails.  Then I cooked some vegetables and we walked to our friends' house for our usual Friday shared evening meal.  Perhaps that will be forbidden in days to come, but for the meantime we're continuing with this.

In the evening the government announced that the period from 6am-10am will be reserved for over-60s and the vulnerable in supermarkets and pharmacies. I'm not quite 60 and not vulnerable, but it's a minor inconvenience; I can shop at other times. I don't know if this apples to the fruitaria anyway. 

We also learned that there are 8 more cases of Covid-19 in the Republic of Cyprus, taking the total to 75, and one extra in the North, making 34.

Saturday 21st March
Another sunny-but-chilly morning; another walk with Sheila. We saw even fewer people than on Thursday, but we did meet a couple of dog-walkers with large dogs. The dogs seemed extremely pleased to see us, unusually so. Perhaps social isolation is difficult for them too.

After we've walked, we usually sit on our side garden swing for a while, and at this time of year I often start to feel a bit chilly around 8.00am.  Today I felt, suddenly, very cold shortly before that time.  It didn't feel much warmer in the house, and despite moving around and organising breakfast, I continued to feel cold, almost shivery.  As Richard did a few days ago.  I put my fan heater on, and had a very enjoyable half hour or so video chatting with my grandchildren, who had woken early. And their parents, of course.

I usually clean the house and change the sheets on Saturdays, but I was feeling so cold that we turned on the living room air conditioner to 'heat', and I used my little fan heater too.  I did more online admin,  caught up with various things, didn't do anything particularly constructive.  Then suddenly, around 5.00pm I realised I was warm enough and felt fine. So I cleaned the bathrooms, changed the sheets and pillowcases and duvet cover, and did a few other bits of housework. Not as much as usual - I kept getting exhausted - but at least I did something.

Meanwhile, Richard has been preparing and checking equipment and software to enable a very short live-streamed service from St Helena's tomorrow morning.

Another nine cases of Covid-19 in Cyprus, taking the total for the Republic to 84.  It sounds from that report as if there are three in critical condition now, although the Worldometers site only shows one critical or serious.

So the first week ends.  Numbers are not increasing exponentially, but there have been another eight or nine confirmed cases each day.  We hope this will decrease with the strict measures being taken; whether that will happen remains to be seen.

Tomorrow, Mothering Sunday in the UK, is also a national day of prayer about the virus. It's likely to be an international day of prayer, as it involves church leaders from several denominations and has been shared widely. 

The Twelfth Day of Christmas

While I'm not rigid about traditions, nor superstitious, I like to take our Christmas decorations down before January 6th. It's what I grew up doing, and it always feels like the right thing to do. The Christmas season is finishing; today is a public holiday in Cyprus for Epiphany.  Schools have been closed since just before Christmas and will re-open on Monday. That's not relevant to us, but somehow it makes the past week feel like a relaxed, post-Christmas period before the year gets going.

I thought my young friends might like to help me take decorations down on Tuesday, but their oldest sister was still here, back from the United States for two-and-a-half weeks, and she had been asking to play our game Dixit. So Sheila and her four daughters came over for the morning, and we played Dixit, followed by a few rounds of Ligretto. Then I taught them Kingdominoes, the new game which Tim bought us for Christmas.

So the decorations stayed up for a few days longer, which was appropriate as we finished the mince pies and various cakes. And on Friday, I took everything down. Four more Christmas cards had arrived that morning, so I put them, with the others for this year, in a large jiffy bag to put up in December.  I packed the decorations away, probably more efficiently than my small friends would have managed, and then started to take the tree apart.  Helped - or not - by Alex:

Alex is the kind of cat who accepts pretty much anything. He's good-natured and friendly and doesn't mind things changing around him. His sister Jane, by contrast, doesn't like anything to disrupt her day. So she spent the morning racing around the living room, clearly very disturbed by the fact that all the decorations were going away. She wasn't too pleased when they went up, but she'd got used to them. And now we were making yet more changes...

Today, when Richard went out, I set to work to dust and clean the house, as I usually do on Saturdays, after changing the sheets on our bed. The trouble with dusting is that it makes me notice when things are out of place, now that more surfaces are visible without decorations on them. I re-organised a couple of bookshelves, to make space for some new or recently read books and I also did a couple of loads of laundry. I sorted out the closets on our landing, too; one of them has central heating pipes running through it, so does duty as a kind or airing cupboard in the winter. It's useful on damp days, when the laundry is almost - but not quite - dry.  But there were other things in there, including several pillows that we've acquired recently, and a duvet that belongs in our guest flat..

Once I've started this kind of thing, I tend to keep going until it's finished. I don't know how many times I went up and down the stairs, moving books and bedding. And I still hadn't finished the dusting.  I started about 10.30am and didn't finish until almost 1.00pm.  After lunch I swept and mopped and vacuumed, and the house does look and feel a lot fresher and cleaner, which is good. But Jane was even more disturbed by all the movement, and since I kept going she decided to attack Alex instead. It wasn't just play-fighting, but the ears-back growling vicious fighting that she does when she sees another cat outside, or when Alex comes in smelling of another cat. He takes the brunt of anything that annoys her.

However, after I'd eventually finished, and showered, and sat down at the computer to check email and Facebook, Jane was happy again.

Sometimes traditions or schedules are the only way we get things done. We've been saying for months that we need to play more of our board games. We play Settlers of Catan and/or Cities and Knights at least once a week with our close friends. We don't forget simpler games such as Dixit, Ticket to Ride, or Kingdom Builder, and we're not going to forget Kingdominoes; it's the kind of game that we'll probably play fairly often when we have a spare half hour or so after another game.

But other games - in particular Puerto Rico, Agricola, Above and Below, and Grand Austria Hotel - are a great deal more complicated. So we don't tend to play them very often - and then, when we do, we have to re-read the rules and it takes awhile to get into them. But equally they're not games we want to play too often. About once a month works well.  So we decided that we'll play one of them per week, on a Saturday evening.  If we remember...

Laundering Lego...

As I have mentioned before, from time to time, on Tuesday mornings my friend Sheila comes over for a couple of hours, bringing one or more of her daughters. We started this when the 'Mums and Tots' group which she belonged to and where I helped stopped meeting on a Tuesday, many years ago now. The girls are a great deal older than 'Tots' age, but are all educated at home. So we've continued the tradition, and mostly enjoy it very much.

Sometimes they spend most of their time colouring or drawing, sometimes we play board or card games, sometimes we read a lot of books... and sometimes they spend their time with the Lego. I always considered Lego one of the most important educational tools: it teaches construction skills, various maths concepts, and also exercises the imagination. My sons had a lot of Lego as children, mostly sets given by generous relatives. They would always start by building the relevant objects or scenes, but would then quickly adapt them, and eventually incorporate them into other imaginative play. For some years they had a huge Lego city, which led to many hours of play with their friends.

We've gradually given away most of their childhood toys, but the Lego has remained. The boxes and instructions are long gone, but it doesn't matter at all.

A couple of weeks ago, H (7) decided to build a straw house, so she used a lot of yellow:

E (6) meanwhile had her king and queen feasting:

This 'forest' seemed a bit sparse....

K (10) had built this house, and was creating inside scenes:

E asked for some yarn, and then created a carriage out of what had been a ship:

After a couple of weeks of intensive Lego, I started thinking about the rest of our collection which was stored in our guest flat. From time to time we've gone down and gathered a few extra pieces - mostly dragons and horses - but I knew it was a muddle of pieces, some of which could potentially be useful.

So I went downstairs to fetch it. And the girls were delighted, and found several things they wanted to use....

Unfortunately, it had been stored for some years in an old trunk which had begun to disintegrate. While it was now in a more hygienic plastic box, it smelled very musty. So when Sheila and her daughters had gone home, I decided that it would be a good idea to wash it.

It was a pity I didn't think of that sooner, since a lot of the musty pieces had become mixed up with the Lego we previously had upstairs, meaning that ALL of it had to be washed. And this proved to be a major task, which took me most of the rest of that day, and almost all of Wednesday.  There were several times when I rather regretted having started, since the temperatures were quite hot - then again, it did all dry fairly quickly.

I used crates to wash pieces, a few hundred at a time, in the sink with a bit of washing-up liquid, then spread everything on a towel to dry.

As I did, I started some rough sorting, including finding parts of 'people' which, in many cases, were muddled up with other pieces. The heads, round and yellow, were fairly easy to spot but some of the leg pieces were hidden until I spread them out and began to go through every piece.

It didn't all dry quite as fast as I hoped, so the kitchen was a complete muddle for a day and a half, with scenes like this:

As well as sorting people, I made a box for trees and foliage of all kinds, and was surprised at how much there was:

Another box took wheels and the pieces that held them together.

The girls had told me that they didn't need many of them, so the big 'space' and 'snow' wheels went in a box to go downstairs, along with some of the basic bricks and all the 'technic' lego which is really intended for older children and teens. They never play with the 'space' lego either, so when I found something that obviously belonged to that, I put it aside for downstairs too.

One of the 'people' we had upstairs was a skeleton, and I knew there must be another one somewhere, probably in parts, as we had a spare arm or two.  To my astonishment, I kept finding more skeleton pieces, and Tim told me that the 'Pharaoh' masks were supposed to go on some of them, as they were part of the Egyptian explorers sets which they had at some point.

Eventually I put together six of them, three to keep upstairs, and three for downstairs:

The girls were coming back Thursday morning, so Sheila could go and help at the Oasis refugee centre, so it was a useful deadline.  And sure enough, with a great deal of sorting - it became compulsive, somehow! - I managed to get everything back in the cupboard by nine o'clock Thursday morning:

I even managed to find three stacking blue crates, one of which I allocated to each of the girls, so they can keep their current projects in them rather than having them muddled in with the main box.

As well as Lego in the downstairs box, I found the boys' old Meccano, which has gone downstairs again:

I also found several pieces of K'nex, which I added to the larger box of that, also downstairs currently:

And this miscellaneous box of bits, which I might sort one day:

Or maybe not. Most mysterious of all are three purple knobbly square plastic objects, about a centimetre across. I've put them with the K'nex for now, although I think they belong to something else. But despite asking around, and even putting a photo on Facebook, I still have no idea what they are, or what toy - or game? - they belong to:

Preparing for the Onslaught of Summer in Cyprus: cleaning curtains and air conditioners

Here's what I had been saying to various people:

- Every year since we moved to this house (almost exactly ten years ago) we have cleaned our air conditioners before using them for the summer.
- We had not, however, had them properly serviced, even though one is supposed to do so every three or four years, so they were well overdue.

Apparently, however, memory - as so often - is faulty. Searching in this blog for previous posts about air conditioners, I discovered:

- We didn't even find air conditioner fluid in the shops until the Autumn of 2008, and then only sporadically used it for the next couple of years
- We DID have our air conditioners - most of them, anyway - properly serviced in the summer of 2009

I wrote a lengthy post about the service, including the way we use air conditioning, and mentioning that a couple of them were very dirty and full of gunk, so we were glad that we did have them serviced. The one in what is now Richard's study was not working well, and was topped up with gas. The one in Tim's room had not been very effective, and had to be cleaned very thoroughly.

But although I remembered the study one being topped up (subsequently we replaced it with one from Richard's office when that closed) I didn't remember that we'd had any of the others serviced.

Still, that was seven years ago, so it was more than time for a repeat. And this time Richard knew of a firm that does this kind of thing regularly. He phoned on Friday, and they arranged to come yesterday morning at 8.00am.  We said that we would do the initial cleaning, so on Monday we went around the house, including our guest flat, taking out the filters, washing and spraying them, and running them to check if they were working. If anyone reading this would like to know HOW to clean air conditioners at home, then I wrote a post about that four years ago.

We have eleven air conditioning units in all, which might seem rather excessive for two people, but we both have studies, and our guest flat has two bedrooms, and is used extensively, plus an edit suite for Richard's work, so it's not unreasonable. Some are used far more than others, of course: the ones with computers in use are often on for several hours per day in July and August, and we run our bedroom one for an hour or so each evening during those months too.

Since this post is getting rather wordy, I thought I'd pause for a moment to show a picture of the air conditioner in my study:

...and the one in the living room:

...and the one in the dining room:

Yes, that's three entirely different designs. The one in the kitchen and in the two upstairs bedrooms are the same as the dining room one; the one in Richard's study, and two in the guest flat are yet another kind.  We have no idea if some are better than others, but several of them are considerably more than ten years old, so we wondered if we might need to replace some of them.

The men arrived promptly and set to work with a kind of power washer, catching the liquid (and dirt) in a trough which they strapped to each unit in turn. It looked a bit worrying (and we did ask them to cover the TV when they were near that) but was surprisingly non-messy.

We have no idea what chemicals were used, but the smell was quite overpowering at first. We opened all the doors and windows, and have done so today too, but it still lingers. It's not unpleasant, but gave me quite a headache yesterday afternoon.

We were surprised to learn that the air conditioner in Tim's room was very dirty and full of fungus, since it's not been used for the past couple of years, and not extensively before that. It was so bad that the service guy asked if we smoked in there! (No, we don't, and nobody in the house smokes). The one in the guest flat front bedroom was also very bad, but that's the room where we've had mould on the walls. We hope to have solved that problem by installing the damp proofing that I wrote about a few months ago.

Happily, none of the air conditioners needed to be replaced, and the only one that had to have some extra gas added was the one in our bedroom, so evidently the others are well-sealed and seem to be working well.

With that job out of the way, I decided to start my annual curtain-cleaning.  Probably more necessary than usual this year, due to our recent bathroom renovation. I don't know why I usually do this in June; perhaps it's an in-built need to spring-clean when it's clear that Summer will soon be upon us.

So today I laundered, hung out on the line, and then - about an hour later - re-hung back in place, all our main floor curtains:

Tomorrow I hope to do the upstairs ones. It's not a major job, though it felt that way when I first started doing it. It takes a couple of minutes to take each curtain down, slightly longer to re-hang them at the end, and the washing machine does most of the work. They don't need ironing at all, which is good because I don't iron in general.

On Monday I sprayed the soft furnishings with 'biokill', against summer insects, something I do once a month from the end of May until the end of September.

About two weeks ago I switched from jeans to shorts for the summer, and started drinking lunch-time frappés rather than hot coffees.  And yet my coconut oil still hasn't fully melted; the temperature in the house is around 24-26C during the day, and there's almost no humidity.  We haven't even put our duvet away for the summer yet, and I'm still - so far - going out for early walks.

Christmas Eve

Christmas on Wednesday seems ideal. On Sunday, I went to a carol service at LCC which Tim was organising and leading. It only lasted an hour, so we were home in time for me to ice and decorate the Christmas cake before lunch. I didn't feel inspired to do anything fancy, so this is what it looks like:

I didn't do anything much in the afternoon, other than updating another local church website, which I run, and also uploading our annual newsletter to our family website.

I designated Monday for cleaning the house. The usual dusting and mopping that I try to do weekly, plus some window-cleaning which was long overdue. I cleaned upstairs and changed our sheets too, something I usually do on Wednesdays. I had vaguely thought I might get everything done in two or three hours in the morning; in the event it took most of the day, alternating with various other things I wanted to do. Tim made some peppermint creams in the afternoon, and in the evening he assisted in the production of another 40+ mince pies.

Richard and I also went to the fruitaria on Monday, to buy large quantities of potatoes and carrots and broccoli and various other things we're going to need on Christmas Day.

And then, really, there wasn't much left to do.

This morning we went to Metro to pick up the turkey we had ordered; it turned out to be rather smaller than we need to feed twelve people, but happily there were some 'spare' turkeys, so we bought one of those too. And a few other items, but I didn't buy up half the supermarket, as some people seem to wish to do when it's going to be shut for - shock horror! - two whole days.

So Tim has now taken over in the kitchen. The first turkey is cooked and carved, ready for re-heating tomorrow. The second one is currently in the oven, with the smell driving the cats wild. I took the opportunity of putting about 100 photos in albums, when I realised that although I ordered some in October, I had done nothing with them. They date back to December last year, so it was quite a task. But that's now done.

I then found all the gifts we had been given by my siblings when we visited the UK in October, plus a few that have arrived in the post, and put them under the tree:

Now it's 5.15pm and the last thing on my pre-Christmas to-do list is to write this blog post. We're having our favourite local fast-food tonight ('Souvlaki Express') since the oven is fully occupied, then going to a carol service at the Greek Evangelical Church, in which Tim will be singing.

So let me take this opportunity to wish anyone who reads this a very happy, peaceful and blessed Christmas.

Cleaning our air conditioning units (in Cyprus)

Every year, we hope to wait until at least June before switching on any of our air conditioners. I've been pleasantly surprised at how (fairly) cool it's been during May - I don't think I've even been tempted to use any air conditioning yet. I shouldn't have been surprised - by the end of May last year, Summer was still a week or two away... and I enjoyed the long 'spring' then, too.  

Still, this is Cyprus, and a hot, humid summer is pretty much inevitable. That means that we'll want some air conditioning in the bedroom at night to keep the humidity down, and during the day in any rooms where we're using computers. Plus other odd times - when eating, maybe, or when cooking - when the heat and/or stickiness feel unbearable.

And yes, we know it's something of a luxury to be able to do this - and are very thankful for relatively inexpensive units and running costs. They're supposed to be cleaned every year, so one way that we economise is to do that ourselves. Or rather, I do it. This year, I decided to clean our air conditioners on June 1st.  Sometimes people ask me how to go about it, so here for your erudition is a photo-guide:

1. Open up the units to reveal the filters. Usually, that just means pulling gently at the cover, and lifting it, like this (in our dining room): 

Under the cover should be some kind of filter. This photo doesn't really show clearly how very dusty they were after a winter without use - but does at least show the filters:

Each kind of air conditioner is a bit different - this is the one in my study, which had even dustier looking filters:

2.  Remove the filters. That's easy enough - just lift and pull out. Take them to a convenient sink. 

3. Rinse the filters under running water to remove most of the obvious dust: 

4. Spray the filters lightly all over with special anti-fungal air conditioner spray. It really does have to be this stuff, although you don't want to breathe it in. Hence why I use an outdoor sink. 

You can buy the spray at DIY shops, hardware stores, and bigger supermarkets.  It costs around ten euros - and each container lasts us about two years. That's much better value than paying, probably, around 25 euro per unit for a service... 

5. Leave the filters for ten minutes or so, during which time you can dust the units behind where the filters go. A feather duster is useful, but a paintbrush can work too. Just swish it around to remove any obvious dust.

6.  Now, spray the units themselves, behind where the filters were. This is the bit I found a bit worrying at first - I don't like spraying any fluid inside electrical appliances. But it's necessary, so that mould and other nasties don't grow during the humid conditions during the summer: 

Note that some air conditioning units might not open up - the one in our living room has filters that have to be slid down like this to remove them:

7. Take the sprayed filters, and rinse them again in plenty of water to remove the spray and any remaining dust and grime. Leave them to dry. 

8. Return them to the units, then switch on for a few minutes, to make sure that all is working as it should, and to blow the spray through, along with any remaining dust. 

We have eleven units in all. I didn't do our guest flat ones - those will have to wait. And I didn't do the one in Tim's room, since (a) it's oddly difficult to open - much more so than any of the others - and (b) he's not planning to come to Cyprus at all this Summer. But still, six of our air condtioning units are now clean and, I hope, ready for the onslaught of summer. 

NB: I find it a good idea to keep as many windows open as possible during this process as the smell of the spray is quite strong - and it's another reason for doing the cleaning BEFORE actually needing to use the air conditioning!