Dear Diary, I'm planning a 'loch-down'
(Yes, it's a thing...)
This week I found out Max thinks the days of the year aren’t split up into neat little 30/31 day parcels, but instead are simply numbered 1 — 365 (or 366, as the case may be). If that was true, it would make today the 89th of March, and, yeah, that seems about right for this month so far, don’t you think?
March is the month that should be spring, but is still secretly reveling in being 100% winter. It’s been a month in which school gate conversations have revolved almost exclusively around how cold it is, and how ill everyone still is, and hasn’t it been a long winter?
(It has been a veerrrrryyy long winter, folks.)
It’s also, however, the month of Easter, which means this week’s newsletter will be shorter than usual, because, by the time it goes out, I’ll be off enjoying what I’m sure will be a very cold, wet Easter Egg trail with Max and some of our friends. Next week, we’re off to Loch Ness for a few days, and then, the week after that we’re at Loch Lomond for two nights. So it’s a pretty loch-centric Easter for us, all things considered, but I’m not complaining, because trying to keep Max entertained at home at this time of year gives me trauma flashbacks to the first lockdown, and, also, lochs are pretty. I mean, they are, aren’t they?
So, our Easter holiday will be not so much a lockdown as a loch-down. <punchline drumroll>
Here’s a picture of me perching precariously by the water on our last trip to Loch Lomond:
In a plot twist I couldn’t have predicted, both of our Easter trips are PR stays (i.e. we get to stay in the places in exchange for coverage on my blog/social media), which are something I used to do a lot of in my life as an OG blogger, but which I assumed I’d probably seen the last of now that personal blogging is no longer A Thing, and Instagram is… well, we all know what Instagram is. Ahem.
Anyway, I probably don’t need to tell you how exciting it is for me to be suddenly getting these opportunities again, after a year in which I genuinely thought I was going to have to close my site down altogether and go out and get a ‘real’ job, probably working down a mine, or up a chimney, because it turns out there is no real job market for people who only know how to make bad puns on the internet and overuse CAPSLOCK for dramatic effect. And I know everyone hates sponsored content, but, guys, it’s been a rough, rough year, and this month is the first time I’ve started to feel like I can maybe see some light at the end of the tunnel, so if you happen to see any of my ‘lochdown’ (Oh, come on, it can totally be a thing if we make it one…) posts on Instagram and feel able to engage with them in some way, even if it’s just by watching the stupid Reel, or hitting the ‘like’ button, then that would be very much appreciated, and make the tunnel feel a little bit shorter.
So, most of this week has revolved around preparing for the holidays by cramming in as much work as I possibly can, which makes for very dull newsletter content, unfortunately. Even more so than usual, I mean. On the topic of uninteresting news, though, the other thing I wanted to share with you is that I’m thinking of changing the name of this weekly newsletter to reflect the fact that it’s more of a diary, really, than a ‘guide’ to anything. Because it’s good to manage people’s expectations, you know?
That’s a task for next week, though; I just wanted to give you all a quick heads-up about it so you don’t unsubscribe if you don’t recognize the name of the newsletter next time it rolls into your inbox. In the meantime, I hope you all have a wonderful Easter weekend if you’re celebrating, and an equally excellent normal weekend if you’re not.
Until next week,
