First, here's my new lifesaving bit of equipment. My battery jump starter arrived, and seems to be in good order. So the borrowed one went home this morning. This little deal also charges cellphones, that kind of thing, too, and has a bright light on the end, always a good thing if you're needing to start a dead battery at night. It's like an insurance policy that I hope I won't need to use.
Meanwhile, among the cooking and spinning and visiting with Handsome Son, there has also been a jolly little murder mystery or several. I've read several of the Annie Haynes mysteries, and they're really fun. A good puzzle, and a kind of Victorian melodrama, along the lines of Maria Marten or Murder at the Red Barn, that audience participation murder mystery. Anyway, aside from bits of Hallmarky stuff put in for the love interest, it's a pretty entertaining few hours with any of her books.
Then I finally, after a pandemic-long wait, got a copy of Richard Osman's Thursday Murder Club, and it's as funny and amusing as billed. Set in an upscale retirement community, needs to be upscale, because they have to afford the shenanigans needed to follow up unsolved murders, it's a great sendup of murder mysteries, the quirks of retired folks, I'm a geezer, so I can laugh at geezers, and a politically leftish viewpoint. Highly recommended. I see that Kate Atkins, one of my favorite serious writers, also likes it, so that's a point. I don't believe he's written any more, yet, anyway, but I'm hopeful.
About murder mysteries, I've noticed how many take place around Christmas, completely with snow and country houses, with the suspects all stuck in the same house together, and snow revealing a lack of footsteps, just a lovely addition to your holiday celebrations, I guess. Also I suspect a boost to Christmas sales for the book, but let's not get cynical here. What every Christmas gathering needs, a nice cosy murder or two.
Yesterday, Handsome Son completely upended my sense of what day it is by visiting on a Monday instead of the usual Sunday, because of his work hours. So today has to be Monday, because he was here yesterday, and it suddenly felt like Sunday. I was puzzled that the mail was delivered, until I remembered.
He also mentioned that he thought the almond crescents were terrific and could I make them again some time, maybe? I explained the twists and turns to getting there, and he said, hm, too bad you didn't take notes..I'll give it a try sometime, but no guarantees are being offered.
And now the CDC tells us that the fear of contagion from surfaces is overdone. At first they feared that was a prime source, so we've all been gloving and wiping and spraying everything that gets near us, and now we find it may not be necessary, since the prime source is now believed to be respiratory droplets.
Masks continue to be the answer. They have apparently tested surfaces around actual Covid patients and found little to no contagious material, just the rna residue from the dead virus, not possible to get infected from it.
I've had the cleanest groceries, though, I will say.
