The featured image shows the junction of real and artificial turf at the Lathlain stadium. As this practice oval is open to the public it makes a good walking track.

The restrictions for visiting Matt have been set at having to notify the house if we want to visit, limiting our visits to two hours, and either being with him outdoors or in his room, not the communal living areas. Plus signing in and much handwashing, and not going if we have symptoms.

Staff brought him over for lunch on Thursday to celebrate his birthday. This was arranged so that he didn’t have to travel by taxi. We also set up that staff would bring him today for his ‘normal’ visit and we set it up for lunchtime as I think it’s easier than trying to keep him awake until 8.30 p.m. when staff would come to pick him up. We found his cot tag from when he spent four weeks in hospital as a newborn. Amazing that I had kept it.

Working Voices Choir members met on Thursday afternoon and have decided to go into recess for the duration of the crisis. We will be paying our new choir director four weeks additional payments because we have ‘terminated’ his contract and he depends on music for his living. We want him back when we resume. He has been very good for the choir and leaves us feeling revitalised. Stephen chose not to go because of his back pain and I didn’t want to go because of seeing Matt today.

We’ve started taking regular evening walks after spending our days doing some household chores, watching YouTube and reading. We are exploring our local area again and have made a vow to go to some of the local restaurants and cafes in future to help them get going again. We looked a menues, but feel it is safer to eat at home. We need to shop for food and will keep that to a minimum. Stephen went to his GP about his back and was told it would heal itself and can take about six weeks. He feels reassured even though no action was taken.

At the moment we are planning to do an overnight at the beach Sunday night. With warm weather forecast we should be able to swim. As we have our own facilities we won’t neet to use the showers/toilets and will use our own table and chairs for sitting outside. Our beach is rarely crowded so it should be easily possible to keep away from people. Although going to swimming pools is not recommended the ocean should be fine.

Three nights ago we walked to the refurbished Lathlain football stadium. They have kept the old football devil symbol.

Sunset from the bridge over train tracks. I couldn’t get a shot without the power lines and it wasn’t very colourful. Sunset takes us a bit unawares as it is so much earlier than a few weeks ago. Sometimes there is a pink glow well after sunset.

We had quite a lot of rain this week coming from the north, which means the weather has mostly been only slightly cooler. Pretty much normal for this time of year, perhaps a bit more rain and a bit warmer than usual?

We are not going to plan any more visits home for Matt, but wait until the end of next week. At the moment they are allowing family visits from his house, but by the end of next week that may change. Hopefully we can visit him.

The new plants in our garden are doing well, probably helped by the rain and warm weather.