Cuckoos in the nest

Sunday, 24^th May 2020

Do you remember when you felt that being alive on this planet at this time in this body was an exceptional, beautiful coincidence of events instead of feeling like a witness to humanity’s final, pathetic death twitches? No, me neither.

*

So, the vast worldwide home lockdown laboratory experiment continues as we, the guinea pigs, flounder about with our hordes of bog roll, mainlining the internet’s never-ending stream of colourful moving images so that we can stay home, stay safe, stay alert, stay still.

Unless you’re Dominic Cummings. In which case, do what the fuck you like. Why not? You always have. And Boris has his head so far up your arse that he’s headbanging your tonsils. This blog post is not about him, although I would just like to quote the following from his own blog, posted on January 2nd this year:

‘We want to improve performance and make me much less important — and within a year largely redundant. At the moment I have to make decisions well outside what Charlie Munger calls my ‘circle of competence’ and we do not have the sort of expertise supporting the PM and ministers that is needed. This must change fast so we can properly serve the public.’

How prescient, Dominic. How about we go for ‘completely redundant’ instead of just ‘largely’? I’d say your ‘circle of competence’ is within arms’ reach but, although despicable, you’re just too easy a target for my wrath. Maybe I am just weakened by the continual lying, cover-ups, U-turns, and lack of leadership by the Tory govt. to aim another salvo.

*

Before I get to what I want to say, does anyone else think that Donald Trump is desperately losing at a game of Wink Murder. He seems to be frantically spinning around on his own axis and shouting out names as the dead fall at his feet: Wuhan Virus Lab? Obamagate? WHO? Joe Biden? Everyone shakes their head; the dead keep dropping. Eventually, the mighty POTAS is faced with the conclusion that it was him; he was winking. Then he’ll smile and nod, thinking, ‘Oh, how clever of me.’

*

Everyone knows best. That’s the basic problem isn’t it? Dominic Cummings wants ‘weirdos and misfits’ directing the government, Michael Gove thinks the teaching profession is a ‘blob’, and Trump just wants to be left alone to play a little golf and grab some pussy (soon to be enshrined as the Trump Amendment to the American Constitution).

I know best, too. This blog is full of my oh-so-superior opinions which are better than everyone else’s, all fired from the comfort of my own home, away from the corridors of power and free from responsibility. Humility seems in short supply.

Hubris – not so much. One thing this virus does very well is expose any flaws in a leader’s personality: Jair Bolsonaro, impotent rage; Trump, narcissism (What me, wear a mask? Over my dead body!), Bozza, wanting to rub his body over everything. Sorry, that’s a horrible image. You just can’t have enough social distance between yourself and this man, though. We’ve all been crossing the road to avoid being near a stranger; for Boris, I’m prepared to cross continents (in my bad dreams he appears at my remote Antarctic cabin, scratching at the window, his polar bear hair frozen into a white wave, as he shakes a bottle of port at me in the hope of seeking entry).

How many times have I washed up since lockdown began? asks the Screenager

But again, I’m getting distracted. I want to talk about the perfect film for lockdown, recommended to you right now by me: Vivarium. I know everyone has been watching Contagion, but that film focuses on the difficulty of holding back a highly infectious disease whereas Vivarium makes no mention of any virus or disease. What it does do is shine a light onto how being confined in a house, being denied any social contact, and with no prospect of change to the endless repetition of days, leads to mental breakdown. It is a brilliant study of how our individuality needs to be rooted in a society. Take away work, play, personal milestones, local and national events, and what are we?

In other words, Vivarium is the perfect film for lockdown. Its creeping paranoia and claustrophobia. The stress of maintaining a functional relationship when you are confined with the same person. The strangeness of small children. It’s all there. Unless of course, you want some escapism in which case avoid it at all costs.

*

There have been some changes on the home front. The Voodoo Parsnip has gone home after being here for nearly all of lockdown. Maybe it was the awful vegetarian food we kept serving or maybe it was the barrage of insults we poured down on her (this is actually our way of saying ‘you belong’). I will miss her iced coffees, her singing, seeing her nose poke out of the top of the duvet in the Cine-Teen’s bedroom like a chad, and definitely how she mercilessly ripped into the Cine-Teen. If you’re reading this, Mrs Parsnip, it was a real pleasure to get to know you.

The Screenager has now not gone further than the end of our drive for about six days. I have missed his school efforts this week as I have been in school myself but at the end of the week we receive a letter from school which the wife summarises for us all over dinner on Friday.

‘Basically, it says that Year 10 (this is the Screenager) will be going back for some face to face time with their teachers but not formal lessons.’

The Screen continues shovelling food into himself without showing any emotion – he was expecting this, as we had already told him that was the govt. plan. Then the wife drops the bombshell:

‘But the letter also says that those children with the worst engagement with home learning will be the first back in…’

Cine-Teen and myself burst into laughter. The Screenager wears an expression somewhere between embarrassment and resignation. Karma has kicked him in the butt and all he can do is jump. I refrain from reminding him of his repeated retort to our pleas to upload his completed work to the school system: ‘It doesn’t matter. They’re not going to look at it. I know I’ve done it.’ In a couple of weeks, I think we might all get up to wave him off to school, smiling and waving, the dog wagging its tail, the puppy held aloft to shake a sarcastic paw.

If lockdown has, for many of us, been a time to re-discover things that give us pleasure but may have been neglected, then great, I hope your knowledge of Esperanto is expanding. Unfortunately, here in the Punk Krow household, the Screenager has found all his Nerf guns in the cupboard. Just when he couldn’t get any more annoying…. Now, entering a room means being greeted with a whistle and then a missile. The route between the lounge doorway and the conservatory where we work is now a soft-war version of the Gaza Strip. In this sniper’s alley, he lurks with loaded weapons, waiting for his targets to rush past. His eyes never leave the TV screen where he hopes to break into the top 100 Madden 20 players but his hand drifts for his gun and then the whistling begins.

I will miss him when he’s in school. Just not much.

Latest data for the UK (as of 6pm):

Infected: 259. 559

Deaths: 36,793

Celebrity deaths: Some (just not the right ones)

People I know who are infected: 0

Song of the Day: ‘The Bonny Cuckoo' - Shirley Collins