Lent exercise

Wednesday morning I celebrated the Eucharist at St Germans with ten church members, no children this week as it's half term. Then I spent some time chatting with people in the day centre, before heading home to Newport to visit Martin. His 93 year old mother Jane was in hospital after a fall a week or so before Christmas and wasn't expected to survive, but she did, and last week was released so that she could be cared for at home, with appropriate support. A much happier arrangement for her, the family and the hospital, as she's not occupying a bed which could be put to better use for someone else who needed care they couldn't expect to have arranged for them at home.

Later, after I returned for lunch, I went into town and met Ashley in John Lewis' top floor restaurant for a sit-down with a cup of tea and a business planning chat, away from the office, and the inevitable work tasks we both get distracted by. It made a change for us.

We were both back in the office this morning for the monthly Radio Users Group meeting. I drove and parked in the basement, intending to spend the day in the office and then drive over to St German's for Stations of the Cross in the evening. Ian had asked for Microsoft Office to be installed on his machine, and I'd forgotten to bring in the disks with me, so I went home on the bus to collect them, and had lunch while I was there, before returning. 

I'm surprised every time by how long the installation process takes on newer machines, and wonder if having to install on a 64 bit machine a program designed 15 years ago to run on a 32 bit machine makes a difference. It seems to me that the CD drive doesn't run at such high speeds, as if it needs to take extra time to unpack and scan every item of really old software before installing. A two CD installation packet took the best part of an hour, but once installed it runs very quickly. 

There were nine of us for Stations of the Cross at St German's. Making the customary genuflection at each station was more taxing than I'd anticipated, as my dodgy left knee reminded me that the movement is not something I do very often. For years in church ritual I've favoured the deep Sarum bow over genuflection, to avoid clumsy movement and toppling over, and to protect the dodgy knee. I should have known better, giving unaccustomed exercise to underused and stiff muscles. The lousy weather this winter has meant that I've had less than enough regular exercise. I felt quite physically tired by the end, although undertaking this traditional form of Lenten devotion was refreshing to the soul.