SINCE EVERYONE ELSE IS CELEBRATING THE CORONA-VERSARY….

Published by Rick on Tagged Uncategorized

Exactly a year ago today, Maggie and I were in the southern coastal town of Rye, knowing that this could be our last time away for the unforeseeable future. That “future” has made it to a full year, and while there’s light at the end of the tunnel, it’s still a relatively dim one. In the year that has passed, I have been out of London exactly once (a day trip to the market town of Berkhamsted, about 40 miles north), and only out of North London on three occasions, the most recent being in February, when she and I bussed into Central London to walk along the Thames for the first time in god knows how long.

The night before we left for Rye, March 14, I did something I hadn’t been doing much of in the past few years, a stand-up comedy set. The gig was at the first place I had ever worked in London over 20 years ago, Downstairs at the King’s Head, less than a 15 minute walk from my house in Crouch End. That gig was a big question mark up until a few hours before, when there were suddenly enough advance bookings to justify going ahead. For a couple of hours, people’s attention was diverted away from the impending crisis, and we could relax in the comfort of a few dick jokes. It was probably good that we knew so little about the virus at that point, for with a basement room, the chance of spreading it was probably greater than in most similar venues. And the night before that, I had my last night of DJing in the upstairs of the same club, along with doing my quiz night the previous Tuesday. Definitely getting in my last licks!

On the morning of the 15th, we drove down to Rye, unable to stay at the hotel we usually stayed, as it had suffered fire damage a few months earlier, but we found a lovely place a few doors down. The mood of all the employees at the hotel was one of despair, not knowing how much longer they could stay open, and even worse, how long they’d have to close. One thing I noticed in their favour was they seemed to have a fair supply of toilet paper, as people had already been in panic buying mode. It was also a bit early in the season for any real outdoor activity. The wind and the temperature were at their March usual, meaning not very conducive to spending that much time outdoors. It wasn’t that joyful inside the hotel room, either, as we tended to keep the TV on, only to find out that the worst was to come. On the 15th, there were 14 deaths in UK from Covid-19, on the 16th, there were 22. Those numbers look pretty paltry now.

To add to the frustration, I got a text on the 16th from a quiz booking agency asking if I was available to quiz that night. This would have been my first booking from them, but I wasn’t about to cut my holiday short, so I had to pass on it. The following night, St. Patrick’s Day, we’d be back in London, and I was slated to run my regular quiz at the Shaftesbury Pub. That very day, I’d gotten a text from one of the regular teams and an email from another, both saying they were going to be isolating. Maggie strongly urged me to cancel as well, and ultimately I didn’t need that much prodding. I thought of a quiz night in February where one of the teams playing went by the name of “Covid 4,” and I had no idea what that was a reference to, though I’d find out soon enough. At least I would get the chance in September and October to do seven weeks of quizzing before the second surge took over to where we are now. Hopefully we start again in June.

Lockdown would begin the following Friday, and many of my neighbourhood haunts have never reopened. I feel sorry for this one vegan restaurant near my house that, in one of the worst cases of timing, was slated to open on that very day, March 20. It has remained shut a year later, and who knows whether that’s going to change.

It may not have been our loveliest of holidays, but it is memorable in that if we had waited any longer to do it, we’d still be waiting. We hiked around our usual places, it was just a bit colder and windier than we would have wanted. On our way back, we thought we’d use some ingenuity, and stopped in a village called Tenterden, in Kent, population 7700, where we thought we could go to the Waitrose supermarket there and get everything that was in short supply in London. Well, no, the toilet paper, pasta, rice, and paper towel racks were, like the rest of the country, completely empty, so we stocked up on the other important things, like wine and gin. Probably should have nicked a roll or two from the hotel!

A year has elapsed since that trip, and at least Maggie was able to get away to Mallorca for a week at the end of July. It wasn’t all rosy, as the day before she was going to return, the UK issued a dictum that all UK citizens returning from Spain were to isolate for 14 days. A day earlier and she’d have been in the clear! Assuming things go according to plan, I have booked us a two-day getaway in Brighton for the second weekend of July. Presumably, we’ll both have had our second vaccinations by then, and people will have behaved themselves, so we can return to whatever will pass for normal. Fingers/toes/eyes crossed!

March 16th, 2021



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