Planting out

I took a covid test this morning as two friends who I spent some time ringing with at the weekend have tested positive. Fortunately I am negative, at least so far! My lettuce seedlings all failed. They became too leggy and then could not cope with the transition outside. I therefore bought a dozen Batavia lettuce plants and planted them out on my return from the market. There has been some scratching in the beds. Trying to identify the droppings, we think it is probably a weasel. It is certainly not a cat or a dog. I have had to put stones and twigs around the plants to protect them. I played tennis in the afternoon with three others. We should have been having a lesson but it was cancelled. I went on to French conversation but the others did not attend as they had not tested and were playing safe, having also been with the Covid positive friends at the weekend. A young Spanish man did turn up, an ex captain of oil tankers, who has given up the hard life at sea to join his Belgian girlfriend in the next village. He wants to improve his French so as to be able to work and integrate. He spoke French with a lot of Spanish words interjected but I was able to identify a lot of the Spanish vocabulary so we could easily communicate.