Sheringham

 We are in Norfolk. Norfolk has crashed both my phone and computer at once.

Sheringham hits your senses with an overwhelming aroma of chips as soon as you enter the town boundaries. There's a chip shop every few doors along, and that's why. All the other shops copy each other: souvenirs mix with wet weather wear, seafaring tat  and models of ducks. Apart from the toy train shop.

Along the seafront, there are murals of different types of lifeboatmen. We wondered if you were supposed to place a tick next to the one you preferred.

We ate chips sitting on the rocks next to the sea, and the seagulls told us the chips were theirs, not ours. They tried several different noises: 

'Ours, ours, ours'. 'Mine, mine mine, mine'. 'Pleeeaase! Pleeeaase!'. 'NOW!!!!'.

The chips were delicious. Sorry, gulls.

The sky was pink and reflected off the shiny sea-soaked sand. It was bitterly cold. We'd had to travel with the car windows open, so as not to do a Donald. The Air B&B is a bit worn out after a busy summer. The door doesn't lock, some of the lightbulbs have gone, the fridge door shelves are all broken, and the bathroom smells of... what it shouldn't. It is very beautiful though: a bit like an African Safari Lodge surrounded by damp pines and rough grass.

The main thing is, it isn't Home. Home has become Work: all the Work issues pour into my house, unabated. The Work Computer switches itself on at 7.30 every morning, weekdays and weekends, and off at 11.30 p.m. An entire universitysworth of lecture planning, tutorials, module guides, departmental meetings, research submission criteria and unimagined mysteries is all stored behind that eager computer screen, ready to flood out at the stroke of a key. 

No pressure!

I had to wait for Covid Test Man before we left. He comes every Friday with a little plastic bag with a testing kit. I jab my tonsils, jab my nostrils, and pack the little bottle in two plastic bags, which he then stuffs into a bin bag. Maybe he just throws them away.

Oh, these times, these times. How extraordinary they are! Terrifying, creative, unpredictable.....