August 19, 2022: Rivers and Caves -

I went punting in Cambridge two weeks ago, and I went boating on the Avon Wednesday morning, so this has been a wonderful trip for a boat-lover like me. (I used “boating” there, because we were in a craft called a “Kata-Kanu,” two hard plastic canoes lashed together, catamaran-style. It was great, but every fiber of my being resists turning that monstrous noun into a verb. I went boating.)

It’s lucky we went in the morning, because by afternoon, I had a tickle and a cough, and Thursday, I tested positive for COVID, for the first official time. I’m not posting a picture of the test. You’ve seen them.

I’m also not posting a picture of a slightly more alarming development, which is that I have a jowl. Just one jowl, on the left. I swear I didn’t have it when I left home, but I have it now.

It showed up yesterday, too, around the time my throat went raw, and I would be thrilled if it turned out to be an artifact of having COVID, maybe a temporarily angry lymph node, rather than a permanent resident of my face. (If I have long had a jowl, or two jowls, you can tell me, but maybe give it a couple of days. I’m feeling poorly.)

More luck – COVID held off until we finished the choir tour.  And I have a great spot to quarantine away from my family – a whole empty house belonging to their friends, who are away until September. If I ever get their TV going, I’ll be golden-considering-the-circumstances.

Two days ago, we went to the Cheddar Gorge, and took a tour of Gough’s Cave. (It’s pronounced “Goff.”) (Yes, we bought some cave-aged cheddar. Why even be a tourist if you don’t do any of the things?)

The cave system was huge, a half mile walk, many rooms, stalactites and stalagmites, bats, reflecting pools, a skeleton (“Cheddar Man,” in replica).  And it was blissfully cool, after this long heat wave. One room, the second biggest, was christened “St Paul’s,” in honor of the cathedral where I just sang last week. Papa Gough brought the whole family into the space as soon as he found it, and they sang a hymn of praise, Old 100^th.  I'm betting it had a long echo.

Less than a day later, Gough and his sons found an ever bigger room, but he’d already spent the name St. Paul’s, so he named that one Diamond Cave. No report on what they sang there.