30-XI-2020.
Monthly recap, nothing much happening.
On 11th, we took the twins to one last visit to Čankovo, just to get some air. November is the ugliest month here, but we were lucky this year - the weather was mild, almost no wind until the last week. So it was all nice, except perhaps the time when they almost stepped into someone's shit in the middle of the garden. So now theft has gone into thanksgiving, nice.
We finally got some quince, nice yellow and half rotten with worms. Perhaps one bucket. Promises to be more of it next year, maybe enough for some brandy.
(... 54 words...)
On 16th, went to Springfield with the girls. The place looks deserted, the lights in the playroom are out, a waiter jumps in to turn them on when we arrive.
News from Dragana - we won't be seeing each other for a couple of weeks. Her nephew, floor above, and his wife have contracted the corona virus, and she was in contact with them on friday, so just in case, she'll self-isolate for two weeks. Borko proposed to do a shorter version, but no, we aren't complete. So we'll wait this out. From him I heard that the younger brother of Zova has died a few days ago (he was at the funeral, but not in the chapel - the contagion is around). Didn't die of corona, but probably had it. Allegedly a quick and rapid stroke, though there is a version whereby he died of booze, which may be ridiculous, he wasn't drinking, the other brother did (Borko knew him from his time in erc). Perhaps he knew he was doomed and just spent the last weeks drunk. I saw the guy twice, perhaps, and fully expected him to live longer - it's Zova who is the drunken deadbeat.
On 19th we got into the car and took the girls downtown. Bought some winter outfit for them, riding gloves for me - the plan is to ride a bike to downtown, activate the new debit card, change its PIN to be the same on the old one. Actually got two cards, one short-range, the Dina aka dinar card, with which I can't do much but expand the pockets of the prime minister's (called AirBnB), which I really don't plan to use. But I got caught up in the daily rhythm and gradually worsening weather, and now it's the end of the month and I didn't even touch the bike. And now when we were downtown, I forgot to bring that card.
On 22nd we had Boba for a sunday lunch. Being all alone now (Milena is still in Vienna, passing some language test, next level, Dragan is in Kladovo with the kids, apartment sold - btw, made 10000€ more than it had cost), he accepted. As for the matter of oma's house, which Višnja doesn't want, a neighbor, who did the roof last time, estimated the cost of fixing it to about 15000€, while it's impossible to say whether the house would bring a dozen thousand if sold. I actually know the guy, his brother was Arpi's tentmate in summer 1975, and he himself worked at stambena's warehouse when I was renting scaffolds in 1987. But she remembers the time when he did that job. While he may have been good at it, his workers were drinking, engaging in small theft, and he didn't check them much. We proposed to finance the reconstruction, to be done by majstor Mile (and we recited the long list of what he did for us so far and what it had cost), to be repaid when the current house is sold and he gets his share of it. Višnja is supposed to get two thirds (half as spouse, and splitting the rest with him and Dragan's kids) of that, so he gets one sixth if/when it's sold.
This guy has more hair than I ever had.
On 24th the chimney sweep came, punctual as always, did a thorough job. There was a lot of tar in the boiler and the smoke tube.
Nina's visits to dentist go regularly (just she and I, not taking the van in winter), but today we didn't even visit Lena - she's got some flu, so not to spread it. Also we had no eggs to bring her. In the summer we sometimes bring a dozen cartons (that's 120 eggs, not 144 - decimal cartons). We did get her some four cartons on 10th, probably the last for the year. Each time we'd drop by a pet shop along the way, to buy more critters for her aquarium. The goldfish (or whatever they're called) she got first were pregnant (yup, the kind that lets them grow in mother's body) so now she has a dozen of those.
We were supposed to pick some pljeskavica along the way, last village truck stop, but they were closed. So early, it's only 18:40. They do take delivery, just park across the road and call. Well, we got hungry so just went home, it's just ten minutes away. Raja was very disappointed, cried, so we took him and the twins (they don't want to miss a ride) and went to our usual place to get them.
Only yesterday I've heard that the municipality is under extraordinary state, with cafes etc closing at 18:00, no gatherings of more than five people etc. Heard it from Dragana, when she said we'll not gather this time either, as her other cousin's wife gave birth the day before ("I hope this happens while I still have a gynaecologist, don't want a dermatologist to do my birth" - as the country is rapidly running out of medical staff, the plague is getting serious; the running joke is "it will be seriously serious when they go for veterinarians"), so she wants to stay isolated until she has the chance to see the kid. He's okay, 4,9 kg by 55cm, a little elefant. So far, we agreed that she calls for us to reconvene as soon as she sees the baby and closes the door behind herself.
And ahem, it's not a real pljeskavica (patter) anymore, it's now a burger. True, it's real meat, not the pink goo like in the US, but still closer to that than to the original recipe, which required minced onion in the mass and somewhat different spice.
I do love linux. Today there was some glitch on burundi, it had "too many requests" in the evening, which is a first. There was a twitter video of a bear downing a PET bottle of some yellow soda, and I wrote a comment how "I wanted to rerun it with a sound, but it stops prematurely. Now I'll never hear a bear's burp.", but sending it failed some seven times... out of ten. I'm a moderator, I can kill the two extra messages. But not when I log in as myself, we have a separate account for that (because moderators can't be on ignore list, and we can't have that kind of polar bears, can we). I kept the credentials in Chromium... but then didn't install it when I switched to Mint (which was actually three installations one on top of the other). Never mind, installed it, ran it, and of course it kept all the bookmarks and the credentials. Beautiful. Compare that with scorched earth installations of windowses. I was finished before anyone noticed that there was now one message where there were three.
On 26th Magi appeared on skype, out of the blue. She got her mother into hospital, and it turned out to be the virus, so she'd probably be moved into the pulmonary hospital. Not that we can do anything, anyone we know is retired, but she wants to have us on file, to be informed and pass the information if there's any change. She still has to work, her ID is expiring these days and can't move much because of the virus, it's all falling apart around her.
Mentions: Arpad Gunaroši (Arpi), burundi, Čankovo, Dobrivoj Gunaroši (Boba), Dragana Vitas (Dragana), Dragan Umljanić, erc, Jelena Sredljević (Lena), majstor Mile, Mališa Borkovski (Borko), Margita Gunaroši (Magi), Milena Požarić, Nevena Sredljević (Nina), oma, Ryu (Raja), Springfield, stambena zadruga, Višnja, Zdravko Smetovački (Zova), in serbian