Day 49 – The nextension

The President was only 22 minutes late for his address last night. In it, he said that there would be some relaxation of the lockdown at the end of the month and a gradual re-opening of the economy, but not for those areas with high and/or increasing transmission rates.

The next extension. The nextension.

The nextension means at least another 18 days at Level 4 before we even get considered for any sort of parole.

 

But as you can see, Cape Town is very much one of those red areas (it’s right at the top of the South African Covid tree, in fact), but then so are all the major metros to some extent. And Port Elizabeth.

And so it seems unlikely that we’ll get any lockdown relief any time soon. In the meantime, the economy will have rely on the 27 people who work outside Cape Town and Joburg, including the 2 guys in the Northern Cape.

Phew. Recession and economic disaster averted.

Not really – unless we are going to become a sand-based economy.
Still, I’m past ruling anything out at this stage.

Today, I’ve mainly been walking a grumpy beagle, putting the finishing touches to a quiz I’m hosting tomorrow evening, and helping out with school science projects. We’re delving deeply into Physics: my favourite of all the Sciences (assuming you exclude all the good ones first). I’m knee-deep in frequencies and wavelengths. I thought I’d left this all behind at school. That was always the plan, and indeed the intervening n years have been blissful – at least in their lack of physics.

(I admit that I have used gravity quite a bit, if I’m honest.)

My brain hurts and I need a beer. But even those have become much more valuable given the guaranteed extended time before I’m able to buy any more.

Day 48 – Plenty to go around

There aren’t a lot of positives at the moment ( I shared my observations on that here). But sometimes, all you have to do is look at the glass being half-full, rather than half-empty.

Sorry… did I say “glass? I meant dams.

Dams.

I really don’t want to be the first to mention this, but we’re halfway through May and we’ve not had any significant rainfall in the Cape yet. It’s stirring up early memories of the drought we went through between 2015-2018. While the virus has been (rightfully) taking centre stage, there are so many other problems that are still out there – they haven’t gone away just because we’re facing a bigger challenge right now.

The City has been (quietly) keeping us up to date with the demand for water and the dam levels. As you might expect in Autumn, (hopefully) heading into the rainy season, the dam levels aren’t all that they could be and they continue to decline slowly each week with the population using water and it not being replaced at quite the same rate.

I’m sure you know how it works.

However, it seems that the Covid-19 crisis might have some very positive spin-offs for the impending dry wet season – at least according to FB commenter Joachim:

 

Look, he’s not wrong: fewer residents use less water.

Fact.

There’s plenty of evidence of people leaving the city and trying to head home to their family homes in the Eastern Cape. And indeed, piles of corpses overwhelming our local medical facilities are unlikely to bathe, water their gardens or leave the tap running while they brush their teeth.

Which will save a fair bit as well.

But am I alone in thinking that Joachim hasn’t really gone through all of the implications of the situation he describes in his comment before sharing it with the world?

Day 47 – A moment of clarity

As one day blends into the next, into the next, into the next, it’s sometimes hard to work out when exactly we are right now. (No, that’s not a typo: I’m well aware of where I am, thank you very much.)
And so I’m just getting on with things: trying to keep the household going while listening to the radio.

And it was while doing these two exact things yesterday that I had a moment of clarity. Or whatever it is called when you have a moment which you immediately know you will remember for ages afterward. I’m not sure google would help me with that sort of query.

Anyway, mine was doing the ironing while listening to Karma Police by Radiohead. I dd quite a lot of ironing and listening to quite a lot of music yesterday, but most of it was understandably forgettable.

This moment though – a black and white check teacloth being flattened and Thom Yorke belting out some lovely lyrics from the speaker on the chest of drawers while the world unravelled outside – will always remain with me.

And I have no idea why.

Day 46 – Concerts and production

Given that there’s no sport and no socialising at the moment, I have found myself trawling the internet for stuff to watch.
They are generally quick trawls. You don’t have to look very far.

One of the things I have been enjoying is some of the concerts that have been made available for our lockdown entertainment. And one of the things that amuses me about them is just how polished a “proper” concert video is when compared to what’s being offered at the moment.

NOT THAT I AM COMPLAINING, you understand…

I’m very grateful to have these things to watch.

Here’s an example: my man-of-the-moment Baxter Dury playing an intimate gig in a French penthouse, BTV:

versus this from his bedroom for the Royal Albert Hall Home a couple of weeks ago:

Don’t be fooled by the impressive title page. Click through and it’s wonderfully laid-back, fun, sweary and deliciously informal and almost amateurish: backed by his son on guitar when the recorded backing track didn’t work and with a half dead fern in the background.

Love it!

One more example, and this one is somewhere in the middle. It’s an OMD gig and yes, the footage was also recorded BTV – last year, in fact – but never readied for performance. So you occasionally get hands in front of the camera, it gets bumped by energetic concert-goers and there are sometimes chunks missing between the songs. Who cares? It still looked and sounded great on the big 4K TV in the corner of my living room.

We watched this premiere on Saturday evening after winning the Captivity Pub Quiz Part II by a whole half a point. Really good evening, and some good memories of seeing them really live back in 2012.

Will we ever do concerts again? I wonder.

In the meantime: more online gigs, please.

Day 45 – Mother’s Day

Bit of a weird one this year. No walks in the Forest, no picnics in Kirstenbosch.

The kids and I managed some homemade biscuits, an amazing Knead breakfast hamper (croissants, bagels, brownies, scones, cheese, jam and granola) a pretty lily and a pamper voucher to use after this is all over.

Some recognition then, at least, for the amazing Mum that we have in our household. Patient, hard-working, available, loving, understanding…
We know that we’re very lucky to have Mrs 6000 to look after our family and we’re very happy to have a special opportunity today to show it.

Happy Mother’s Day to all the mums out there.