I am starting a thread on things I am really grateful for at the moment. It will be a mixture of Aristotelian virtues and cheap thrills because that is the way of things.

Today I am grateful for @kexp and especially @loserboy and his morning show. Loved it for a decade. Recently started listening again. A mix of musics that brings new delights and old ones; rare in the US. They care about music. Give them money. https://www.kexp.org/donate/ 

Another thing I am grateful for: jigsaws. They have taken me through rainy summer holidays, dark winter evenings, and now a pandemic. Huge fun and very satisfying. Blessed are the jigsaw makers.

I am reading more. Because of the times, but also my daughter is at an age where we have more hours to ourselves. I am reading Middlemarch for the first time, and stunned I haven’t read it before; very grateful to discover Eliot’s incisive, acutely judgmental writing.

I’m grateful for things I no longer have. Like a barber. Sheesh. I can’t cut my own and my wife frankly has better things to do. Barbers. Please stay safe.

Walking in the countryside has always been a favourite thing to do. It’s incredibly valuable to me now: away from crowds, out of the house, in the woods. Wonderful to see my daughter enjoying it too.

Plenty to be grateful for today. Storm took down a tree and our power went with it. Thanks to Pepco, but also neighbors for help and support. We gave the power crew a big round of applause when lights came back on - a nice bonding moment in the midst of a tough week.

Had a drive out to walk in woods at the weekend and found this terrific pie store: amazing banana cream pie sold with good social distancing. Very grateful for those places still surviving and selling homemade delights.

A pre-modern economy based on barter exchange, favors, gifts and small transactions is flourishing in our neighborhood, oiled by the listserve, frenetic spring cleaning, proximity, and good neighbors. We are lucky and indeed privileged; I don’t forget that.

Child’s Play is a great DC toy shop. We bought some things from them by phone today. They were on our doorstep tonight. Games to play, another jigsaw, more paper to draw on. Really important for our family and will bring much joy. Thank you. https://childsplaytoysandbooks.com/ 

Grateful for British children’s TV, especially those from the 1960s/70s which are slower paced, calming, musical, a bit whimsical - just right for my daughter at the moment. She is loving Bagpuss. Next week Camberwick Green, or perhaps Noggin the Nog.

There is a (disused) supermarket car park near us and all the local kids go there to bike. Half the neighborhood has learnt to ride there. I love the way children find and colonize these empty spaces; grateful for having one so close.

I am glad for whatever sense of Resilience I have. I‘m good at emergencies and crises, which tend to clear my mind and leave me calm. Working over the longer haul is harder. My wife is better at that. We all have strengths and weak points and I am glad to share both with others.

There are few more joyful sounds than children running around in a lawn sprinkler on a hot summer day.

Except possibly the sound of a child with a water balloon

The DC govt has allowed some local stores to (partly) reopen - some great ones: lovely music store @MiddleCMusic, great books @PoliticsProse, and toys @ChildsPlayDCetc, all of whom we adore. We’re lucky to have them and to live here. Thanks @marycheh and @MayorBowser

Thank you @loserboy and @kexp - not often you hear Red Lorry Yellow Lorry on the radio. I listen to the Friday show at the weekend while cleaning the bathroom; music keeps things moving and everything is more fun.

Thank you @MayorBowser for the New paint job on our city’s streets. https://time.com/5849305/dc-black-lives-matter-mural-protests/

So grateful to the family with whom we have formed a “bubble” for the last few months. They are heading off to vacation now. Will miss their son as almost a family member. We have been very lucky and it’s helped make a very difficult few months much easier.

Very thankful to be in Maine. A beautiful state and the climate is great at this time of year. We have the chance to work virtually, the opportunity of a family house, and my family can travel. Not everyone has these things.

A neighbor runs this train in his front garden and it’s a lovely thing. I’m very grateful for neigbours with a spirit of fun like this (and model trains!).

@coronatrain I forgot to tag you!

A terrific morning’s walk to @BullfrogBagels and @CityBikesDC - nothing nicer than #bagelsandlocks

Enjoying this morning the music of JS Bach played by Julian Bream, on @WPFWDC - currently doing a pledge drive to fund its excellent jazz-and-justice programming (Bream/Bach fits in there so it’s a fairly inclusive programming).

I am on balance grateful for Twitter, and especially for those few people that I know only through it, and who enliven my life and imagination; @Nicole_Cliffe is one of them, and I am very glad she is back on Twitter. https://twitter.com/Nicole_Cliffe/status/1298809802093506561

I think I like the Galaxie 500 version of Ceremony almost as much as the New Order original; which is a lot. I am very grateful for the musical imagination, something I don’t have but appreciate, and for the transcendental effect of music in such a difficult year.

Since I work alone, I appreciate the little microbursts of companionship like seeing what music others are playing on @Spotify: Half Man Half Biscuit ( @willfrancis), Bill Callahan ( @wildebees), At The Drive In (@gjeffzombie). Musical worlds that my friends live and work in.

We’ve been in quarantine for two weeks now after my daughter had a brush with Covid. It’s been a pain - claustrophobic and irritating - but I’m very glad we are all well, and that we have a comfortable home to do it in. (Also bloody grateful it’s over).

First day out for some time at the gorgeous Beverley-Triton Nature Park, near Annapolis. Really grateful for the work that @RecParks puts into keeping it so beautiful and such a great place to hike, fish and mess about in the Chesapeake Bay. Thank you @AACountyGovt!

Thanks to everyone that helps make Greenbrier State Park such a wonderful place to camp, hike, boat swim. We’re lucky to live in such a terrific area with so much greenery to explore. Thank you @MDStateParks!

And special thanks to the Park Rangers of @MDStateParks, to Floyd from Evergreen, and the lovely hosts of Dogwood loop for helping start our car (twice!). Couldn’t be a nicer and more helpful crew.

Thanks to @FLEETFEETDC I now have my first pair of decent running shoes. Their ability to think through what you need is awe inspiring and slightly scary. My inability is run is not. But now at least I have decent shoes.

There are many great things about parenthood but wow, watching “kids” movies is really one of them. If that’s what “Fantastic Mr Fox” is. What a wonderful way to spend an evening.

Massively enjoying the animated Dr Who series @DoctorWho_BBCA with the voice of Patrick Troughton - a series that was lost and has now been reconstructed. TV is wonderful, as Homer Simpson reminds us: “Gives so much, asks so little.”

This morning my daughter watched a little Dr Who for the first time by mistake instead of Doc McStuffins; she liked it a little. A very exciting moment, brought to us by the miracle of Verizon DVR.

For anyone vaguely interested in music - you should be checking out #TimsTwitterListeningParty which has brought such terrific things. @Tim_Burgess has tuned into something wonderful with this.

Am sat with a nice cup of tea listening to Grotesque by the #Fall which is the subject of this evening’s #TimsTwitterListeningParty “The North will rise again/ Not in 10,000 years /Too many people cower to criminals /And government crap.”

Thank you to the rangers and staff of @MDStateParks and especially Martinak State Park for a fabulous weekend of camping. And when the rain starts, those cabins are pretty terrific. It’s a beautiful part of the world.

Our neighbourhood has been a wonderful place this #Halloween2020 with kids, candy, lights, and above all a wonderful sense of community. Seeing neighbours we haven’t seen for a while, and it’s a lovely warm glow (not just from the glow sticks).

This is very nice! Many of these were things I loved when I was single and lived downtown. I can still feel pleasure that others are doing them and experiencing this great city in the way I did. https://twitter.com/awmccall/status/1327364475360579585