I was glad to find Tunåsen a small hill with a surprising view in this flat cycle-friendly city. It’s one of Swedish longest eskers, ridges of glacial deposits, winding under a series of names through Uppland to the Baltic.
Climbing it for the third time, there were too many virus cuddlers up there with modest social distancing skills but it was still enjoyable even though I didn’t find my lost hat. The pasque flowers were wilting but I found another yellow flower that I struggled to identify as one of the saxifrages before giving up (wrong colour, wrong time of year, wrong leaves but with a bit of flexibility and floral licence, perhaps it was a saxifrage…). Meadow saxifrage can be seen up there but these are white and later in the year. The name Saxifrage pleases me, literally “rock-breaking herb”, conjuring up visions of a plucky little plant nudging away some substantial chunk of glacial debris by sheer persistence. The herb was used to treat kidney stones but I prefer the derring-do explanation.
8,000 steps later I’m back in my flat ready for another session indexing my translated laws. I should go for a long walk every morning as it has a remarkably good effect on my humour and ability to focus.
Deciding how long I’m going to work for every day works well for me too. It’s artificial, given the entanglement of my leisure and work but it’s still beneficial to structure time in the absence of external pressure. And after I’ve done my day’s portion of laws, an hour of Bangla, some French and a chapter or so of my book on Brythonic Britain, before it’s time to cook.