Life in lockdown: Maintaining a sense of humour helps during Victoria’s dark times

We are keeping up with current affairs: a blast. It is lockdown living again for our southern state in Australia. Victoria has been reduced to a lowly worm, our citizens are pariahs, with unemployment rising. Can you do nervous laughter too? We could be anywhere in the world today.

Really, nervous laughter in the face of adversity is a human characteristic. People used laughter as a weapon, even despite having typhus in the Warsaw ghetto, or in Auschwitz. So, we must all lighten up. Some humour is dark humour. For instance, young ones are describing the viral pandemic as the ‘Boomer Remover’. Most of the fatalities have been older people. As I said, dark humour.

Iso games are here again. Resting can cause us anxiety, so I shall focus on my senior hobbies, one of them writing. Here we all are, masked up in public again, like furless greyhounds. Now we cannot bite each other. Definitely no snogging!

The new villains in Victoria are hoarding toilet paper again, while masking at the supermarket. But if the authorities lift the restrictions, I can walk into my writers’ group at the local pub next week. Our select group of non-Dolly Partons can order coffees with our masks on, remove our masks to drink coffee, while sharing potential airborne respiratory germs. Not really logical.

Really bad Victorians are experiencing our fourth lockdown. I heard a joke at the chemist recently. Why did the senior citizen cross the road? Answer: Because the senior behind her was not social distancing! No one touches anyone with a six-foot barge pole anyway. We Victorians can now purchase six-foot barge poles as red spot specials. Just to be sure, to be sure. More nervous laughter about our current affairs, or lack thereof.

Oh well. One bat started this pandemic, somewhere over there. Imagine if China had a whole cricket team of batsmen! Lockdown laughs, dark humour. Never mind, it is a lovely sunny morning. There goes the lady next door, taking her adorable dog for another walk. I think its paws are falling off, home to hide the leash under the bed. Cute. But fresh air is good.
We still allowed to exercise for 5 km with one other person. I cannot walk 5 km, be realistic. I am a boomer babe with pulsating hips and knees. I google, where to limp today? Yes, I live only 140 metres from the supermarket bottle shop. Now that is tempting.

For my exercise, I could possibly saunter to the bottle shop. I could collect a stash to channel my inner Master Chef. Cooking with Alcohol might be my next epic lit. I could serve beer with brown bread toast, to be followed by vodka in the scrambled eggs. Cuisine! I would see the world through spiritual eyes, alcoholic, that is. Unfortunately, it took a whole global village to create this pandemic, it might take a whole global vineyard for the human race to survive.

But I do not drink alcohol. Hence, these iso games do require nervous lockdown laughter. Apes laugh, rats laugh. I hope you all cast a thought for the lowly worms in Victoria. Might be your state or city next. Current affairs: no snogging, with a smile. We must all dodge the ‘Boomer Remover’!