Down with Covid!

You could read that title in two ways but here I mean it in the acutely personal sense that, yes, I’m down with Covid.

On Wednesday evening I was about to serve my highly acclaimed onions, peppers, sun dried tomatoes, baby potatoes and basil with a grilled haloumi topping when it hit me that I wasn’t at all hungry. Further, that while I didn’t exactly feel unwell, I sure as fuck didn’t feel well either.

Leaving Jackie to help herself and catch up on Snowfall, I took to my bed. Only in the morning, with appetite loss and fatigue augmented by chesty cough, aching head and body and dire ear did the obvious occur. Having dodged it these past thirty months, had Covid finally tracked me down?

With several of the lateral flow kits (from the time when these were issued free in the UK) still in the house, a moment or two of unpleasant swabbing of tonsils and left nostril, followed by 20 minute wait, confirmed my hypothesis with that dreaded second line. I’m now self isolating – so far successfully since Jackie tested negative today and yesterday – and spending my days and nights in a twilight zone of reading, listening to music and napping. All in all it ain’t too bad.  I’ve even accepted a new writing assignment from a company for whom I write film synopses and hooks – a once occasional sideline that’s developed into a substantial part time income stream for which I’m paid well, and thoroughly enjoy.

Speaking of reading and writing, I will of course be delivering as soon as health permits on my threat of the third and final installment of Why read Michael Hudson?

Meanwhile, if you’ll excuse me, I’ve been awake for almost an hour, so need to take a nap …

* * *