I must confess it is rather difficult to keep one’s spirits up during this third Lockdown. 100,000 UK dead, an irresponsible media seizing on every scare-story, political point-scoring by the Imperial pint, the usual cold, wet and windy January weather, are all unfavourable factors likely to depress us. I suppose we could all “Whistle a happy tune”, “Climb every mountain” and “Keep right on to the end of the road” but I doubt if we feel sufficiently heroic at this precise moment.
The ever-present nightmare
Yet there are bright spots. My lovely wife and
I (in our high 70s) were given our first Oxford AstraZeneca jab this week
joining 7m others so far and rising fast. This is a great morale-booster though
we know we need a second jab to give us real protection. The NHS process was
calm and efficient in our civic centre car park – the vaccinations delivered
through the car windows. May the UK vaccination programme roll out seamlessly
to every adult resident! The moans, groans and arrogant threats from Brussels
merely mask her procurement inefficiency and fortify our approval of the Brexit
decision.
That will do nicely –
protection is at hand
Another plus this week was Burns Night, an
excuse for all Scots to get dewey-eyed over their incomparable country and its
achievements and pie-eyed as they guzzle haggis, neeps and tatties washed down
with a whisky or three. We certainly had the MacSween’s haggis (delicious), but
I have to admit my rendering of My love is like a Red, Red Rose and
later Auld Lang Syne was feebly unmelodious. I was rather upset by Woke
Scottish academic demonisation of Rabbie as a seducer of young women (guilty as
charged) and as a sympathiser with slavery (very far-fetched). He wrote much
lovely poetry, for a’ that.
Haggis and Burns forever!
In lockdown we read rather a lot, not always of
the highest literary standard, but it has not been very cheerful stuff. I am
still wading through volume 3 of Hilary Mantel’s Wolf Hall Trilogy,
viewing the court of Henry VIII through the eyes of Thomas Cromwell. Mantel
invests Cromwell with many attractive human qualities but we know that he is
doomed and one day he will await “the sensation of a short, sharp shock, from a
cheap and chippy chopper, on a big, black block!” For lighter relief I read a Maigret
story by Simenon and a Sicilian Inspector Montalbano story too,
rather sad to read the fertile author Andrea Camilleri has gone blind and needs
an amanuensis. I have bought, but not yet had the courage to open, Booker Prize
winner Shuggie Bain by Douglas Stuart, a heart-breaker about a boy
growing up in impoverished, drug-ridden Glasgow. Instead, I have embarked on
wholly escapist The Chanel Sisters by Judithe Little, all about the
careers in fashion, high society and loves of Coco and her sister Antoinette,
so I can keep up with the interests of my lovely wife!
Thomas Cromwell by Hans Holbein
Really TV should provide a rich diet of
entertainment but somehow it has not risen to the challenge. There have been
some jewels but the general run has been uninspired. By the way, I did not
realise that half the population of the UK is Afro-Caribbean or from the
sub-Continent to judge by most advertisements or new series. I understand and
support the wish to have an inclusive society but come off it, BBC and ITV, do
not grossly distort the mirror of UK life you are holding aloft!
A real bonus to the world since January 20, is
that President Donald J Trump is history, slinking away in disgrace with future
impeachment very possible. The world can breathe anew and we no longer have to
read about Trump, his moronic opinions and his ghastly entourage. True, Joe
Biden is no plaster saint, but he understands the art and necessity of
compromise, a quality much to be valued in our woke-infested politics. I wish
him well.
SMD
27.01.21
Text copyright © Sidney Donald
2021
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