Sunday 20^th September, 2020 1315

Jody and I met up yesterday evening for dinner at Charlie's Burger. She had half a chicken done US barbecue style with vegetables, I played it safe and had a burger. Pity I never also played safe with the red wine.

When we got back I gave her the money to pay for the taxi and went to unlock the door. This time overindulgence was at fault, no idea how it happened but I managed to fall backwards down two steps and smacked onto the concrete floor.

Thankfully the only witness to this embarrassment was Jody, who kindly tried to help me to my feet. It was pointless as she is not strong enough for my weight so it was a very undignified case of me getting painfully on my knees and lifting myself up using the stair rods.

For my trouble I now have an extremely sore coccyx and a mincing walk.

This morning I had a bulletin from Shanghai concerning something I hadn't read in the news, not being a regular reader of The Independent. There have been 3245 or so diagnosed cases of brucellosis here in Lanzhou, caused by a biomedical factory producing vaccines for livestock using out of date disinfectants which allowed it to escape into the air. Apparently I am safe because human to human transmission doesn't happen but then they said that about Covid in the beginning........

http://www.businessworld.in/article/Bacterial-outbreak-in-China-infects-thousands-of-people-after-factory-leak-/18-09-2020-321833/

I researched the location of the plant and it is 13km from here but no wonder so many were infected – it is on the opposite bank of the Yellow river from the main downtown area where we were last night. Closer inspection reveals the outbreak actually took place last year and only now have they finalised the tally of those infected.

I never heard about it last year either!