Lockdown Week 3: Chocolate Heaven, Thursday nights with the Three Amigos, and entertaining Woman’s Best Friend.

Dear Diary, this week’s entry comes to you from a much happier place!

Easter Sunday arrived at last; restoring calm and common sense to this house with its chocolatey goodness.

No more haunted dreams and no more sitting smiling manically as so-called family rip into my favourite treats before my very eyes.

Just sheer joy as I finally got to find out that my favourite new Shiraz really does pair well with dark chocolate.

Yes, ok! A bit of undignified behaviour too; as I destroyed a huge slice of cake in mere seconds like the scumbag I undoubtedly am!

Thursday nights with the Three Amigos

How many times have you heard the old adage “laughter is the best medicine”?

Diary, I now know this to be quite true.

We are not the Walton’s by any stretch of the imagination, but for the last few weeks, Thursday nights at nine pm have become treasured family time.

We congregate in the living room, complete with nibbles and drinks, to find out where Messieurs Gordon Ramsay, Gino D’Acampo  and Fred Sirieix are headed on the next stage of their road trip across America.

Five minutes in and we are hooked!

We will usually have seen much more of Gino’s naked posterior than is strictly necessary and heard enough bad language to rival any building site, but the house is filled with raucous belly laughter.

For this glorious hour, no-one mentions the C word and we are thankful for this precious time together.

Ok, no-one is calling out “Night John Boy!” as we go our separate ways afterwards, but the shared experience of seeing the guys participate in an incomparable session of Goat Yoga has made us forget our trivial petty squabbles.

Still dubious about my claims?

It’s fun to share a good laugh, but did you know it can actually improve your health? Learn how to harness the powerful benefits of laughter.

Don’t forget, you can find the Three Amigos current series on the ITV player.

Entertaining woman’s best friend

Lockdown has thrown up an added difficulty for those of us who have assistance dogs.

Animals like Felix absolutely thrive on being challenged and their minds need to be kept sharp, so we have been playing a few new games.

One in particular has proven popular with humans as well as canines: it involves hiding biscuits around the house and encouraging the dog to find them.

Diary, we have pretty much established that I am a hopeless case so you won’t be surprised to learn my first attempt was less than successful.