I wrote the following entry a year ago and then decided not to publish it given the uncertainty over how COVID would affect everyone. It seems okay to publish it now as a way to look back at this time last year.

There are rainbows in windows. Mostly hand drawn, mostly the work of young children but others are clearly the work of parents with a steady hand and a good eye for a radius while drawing onto a window. I didn’t know what they were so, for the last two days, I thought that Pride had moved indoors. That’s nice, support the LBTG+ community. However, it turns out to be a project started by schools and spread online to encourage children to put up paintings to spread hope. This week the rainbows have been joined by soft toys. Teddy bears and plush dolls hanging in the windows next to the rainbows. Now it looks like Pride has moved indoors and started lynching Big Ted.  

On Thursday we were outside walking the dog when the clap for the NHS started. We were in a park and could see people stand on their doorsteps in the houses which surrounded it. As the clapping started, as people banged on pots and pans, I joined in and thought: “this must be what it’s like to be a footballer for a team with no supporters. I thought of ‘doing the airplane’ and maybe a celebratory knee slide but joining in and clapping instead was the right thing to do.  

It’s peak week. Two weeks into lockdown and life has a routine. Get up at 7am. Breakfast. Mrs TwinbikeRun walks the dog and I start work at 8am and she starts at 9am. Team call at 9:15. Less about work and more about seeing everyone. Yesterday we were asked what we did at the weekend. I said: “On Friday, I watched One Man Two Governors streamed from the National Theatre. On Sunday, I watched Swan Lake from the Paris Opera House. God, I miss Scottish football.”

I was called a middle class tosser. I couldn’t argue with that.

Lunch is 12:30. Mrs TwinBike Run has tried lunchtime yoga while I have a toastie. If you want to survive the apocalypse, don’t get flexible, get a toastie machine. You’ll run out of stretches, but you’ll never run out of fillings.

Work until 5 then close computer and try not to check work again until next day. We’ll have dinner, walk the dog and then watch some television. Normally I would have the news on a loop but I don’t think it’s healthy to have hours of virus news with updating death scores and speculation about what might happen next. I like my news with indirect consequences. Brexit. Politics. A disagreement about ideologies not a scythe cutting through the nation. Boris Johnson is seriously ill. Last night he was admitted to hospital and has been given oxygen to breathe. I do wish him well though. I disagree with his complete lack of beliefs but I offer my best wishes to him and his family. And his family. And his family. And his American IT woman. And the woman he met down the pub on Tuesday night. And…

[Postscript. Boris got better. Wait, that’s not right. Sorry. He recovered. He didn’t get better, he’s still useless.]