Always Look on the Bright Side of Life

As an interesting week draws to a close, I find myself searching out the good things in life at the moment, though they seem to be few and far between.  Let's start with the bad and not dwell too much on them - get them over and done with quickly...

- The cat's flight was cancelled and no animals are allowed to travel until further notice.

- Flights are being cancelled regularly from China.  Matt's flight is cancelled.

- Watching the news is awful. We are having to watch a happy movie every night after the news in order to cheer ourselves up.

- My last week of e-lessons in China is next week. I am very sad to be saying goodbye to my students via Skype.

Good things that are happening:

- My family and friends are all healthy

- Matt will be home in just over a week (hopefully)

- I am staying in touch with people much better than I have ever done before.

- We are getting to spend more time with our lovely animals.  Matt has Sooty and Snowball all to himself and they are very much enjoying the cuddles.  Lola is thrilled to have extra playtime and cuddles in the garden.

- I am coming off steroids FOR GOOD on Wednesday.  It's been nearly 2 years that i've been on these awful drugs, so I can't wait to be off them forever.

- I have lost 4 pounds since getting back from China.  With the lockdown I was either going to get really fat, or lose weight. I'm pleased that it seems to be the latter so far.  Coming off the steroids is largely why this is happening.

- Living in the New Forest means that we have beautiful places to walk the dog right on our doorstep.

- Plenty of time for crochet and cross stitch.  Lots of designers are bringing out free patterns to help combat boredom. #bewellandstitch

- We have been able to buy food and toilet paper.  I've never been so grateful for these simple things.

- The cats will go back to the cattery where they are very well looked after.  They will come to England eventually.

- The garden is in bloom and we have plenty of time to appreciate the beautiful flowers coming out to make us smile.

- My new job is going well.  I am grateful to be getting out of the house for a few hours every day.

- I have plenty of time to do things that I wouldn't normally do, like clearing out the garage of 31 years of junk!

- We have started doing living room yoga as a family.

So, the bad things are pretty big and it's easy to get lost in your own personal bubble, but notice how the good things outnumber the bad quite considerably.  That's what we need to focus on.  

To quote Monty Python's best movie, 

'Always look on the bright side of life.'

Here are a few photos from Hampshire and Shanghai of our lovely animals enjoying spending time with us.

This is Sooty sitting on Matt in bed in case you can't tell!