The new uploaded podcast/interview took me off into strange, relaxed mid-Covid places, I think.

I wanted to explain my stance on the vile interloper. But we meandered and hit on other interesting points and continued in a conversational ramble, so my thoughts drifted into the ether, lost through the ethos.

Live interviews, to me, are a minefield, a maze of yew and slow-growth box, signifying nothing but fear and dread, which manifest in a look of calm.
“As flies to wanton boys are we to th' gods.
They kill us for their sport”

Podcasts won’t kill me. Of course, they won’t. But it feels at times in this heart that I am playing a game. A silly game. A game devised by clever but unconscionable “experts”. Nor will the filthy bug we’re all dodging kill me.

To explain: Sunday lunch at a big Victorian Pub in Chiswick, west London. Tables slightly distanced. Staff wearing almost useless plastic visors, no masks. China plates, real cutlery. Out of maybe 100 people I saw enter that place, many crossing through the building to get to the outdoor seating area, only four (two couples in their 30s) were wearing masks.

Really, who cares? I was at an appointment yesterday. Necessary. Not to be postponed. We waited outside, in the car, until a minute before kick-off, as advised. The receptionist asked me to stand in front of her screen. “Look into the Blah, Blah…area…”  and it repeated this several times. Useless.  It was meant to take my temperature. Crikey, I carry one of those, a handheld thermometer, £50 worth, dead accurate.  “It’s not working. Never mind, follow me….” Bless her. She wasn’t ill; I am not ill. I followed her to another room where we went through the silly mask procedure, occasionally popping the mask down, drinking from my own tea (takeaway) cup…popping it back on, pretending it actually worked.

I want it to work. I want the bug to go away, of course.
But are we over-reacting? The twenty-somethings who have suffered the virus report that it is “like ‘flu, with a smoker’s cough.” I imagine that’s not pleasant. But it doesn’t demand a hospital bed or even A&E.

I am a realist. A dreamer too. But never a conspiracy-theorist.
“As flies to wanton boys…. It does make you wonder what’s going on, though.

I’ve seen 2020, it’s in a terrible state. Did I really say that?