Levels, phases and a festival of tomfoolery
AT some point I just lost track. After six months of diligently reading statements and roadmaps, dutifully listening to each public decree, and slavishly watching bi- weekly broadcasts to the nation, my brain announced it was going into lockdown and there was nothing I could do about it.
Given my line of work this is of grave concern. I need to know what the current situation is, at all times. People expect me to have the answers, I work in the news, therefore I should, by proxy, have plenty of news, an abundance of information, ready to dole out at a moment’s notice.
Family members, friends, regard me – laughably I might add – as an authority on current affairs, someone with an inside track on matters of importance, a person capable of uncovering the truth, and not just any old truth, but the real truth.
And on a good day, when the stars align, the fates convene and a valued source comes to me with something salacious, I can do just that. But, as far as Covid-19 goes, not even a two-hour, sit-down interview with Doctor Ronan Glynn, Deputy Micheál Martin and Professor Luke O’Neill would provide me with a story at the moment.
In the unlikely scenario I was granted an audience with those three amigos, got them all in a room together (is that allowed?), within five minutes of the discussion beginning, my eyes would glaze over, mind go blank, as I wondered how Brod was going to manage without Síoda, whether Michael D was too old to be thinking about getting a new dog, and what kind of dogs Micheál liked.
Yes, I know it’s my job, that I’m paid to know about things like the coronavirus, but right now the computer says no; the screen has gone blank and not even Control Alt Delete is capable of rebooting it.
Ultimately, it was the levels that killed me off. I’d been doing alright until then, been well on top of things, been able to answer every tricky question fired at me by my social media-obsessed aunt, fooled everyone into thinking I was an authority on matters of importance. But the levels, oh the levels.
Why did we have to have levels? Were the phases not enough?
We knew where we stood with the phases; progress to Phase Five and you’ve completed your mission, congratulations here’s a pint, we didn’t even wash the glass, but who cares?
These levels though, they’re a different beast. For a start they operate the other way round to the phases. Level One is the best level to be at, it’s a great level, whereas Phase One is absolutely terrible, the most awful of phases.
Reach Level Five and you’re hunkered in a bomb shelter, eating bits of concrete, drinking out of puddles, waiting for the sirens to stop – or so I believe. Because who knows anymore? What level are you at? I think I’m two, or maybe one, Dublin is three I believe, and, last I heard, we’re all at Phase Four.
Meanwhile, they’ve cordoned off Dublin to make sure we don’t get to a higher level before it does – while the rest of us wonder why they didn’t do that at the start, or even just years ago, because, well, they’re annoying – and started referring to places as being at Level 2.5 before we’ve even had a chance to figure out what the single digit numbers mean.
Oh, and while we were panicking over levels the numbers of cases are rising and a second wave is imminent. We’re being told we all have to get the flu jab and to run for the hills if we get the sniffles this winter.
Also, the testing facilities aren’t fit for purpose, Greenland has been removed from the Green List, we can go into pubs (but only to watch a hurling match on the telly when the game is being played across the road), and 12,000 students have lodged appeals over their Leaving Cert results.
Luckily, I’m due some annual leave in the coming weeks.
It’ll be an opportunity to recharge the batteries, to take stock, to visit Leitrim, Longford, maybe even Cavan. And, most importantly, it will provide me with the time to consume the latest manifesto to emerge from the asylum, give myself an aneurysm trying to assess The Ten Chapters of Covid, The Nine Stages to Salvation, or whatever fancy name they put on this unending festival of tomfoolery.