A broken laptop. The dog wanting walkies. A cleaner who loves a good natter. Working from home is pure hell!

FIRST, a shameful confession: when news of the coronavirus first broke, I planned to write a column asking what all the fuss was about. We oldies have lived through any number of these health scares, I was going to say — bird flu, Asian flu, swine flu, egg-related salmonella, Sars . . . you name it — and they had all come to precious little.

The few poor souls carried off by these various bugs were probably going to die pretty soon anyway.

Like many an independent-minded Brit, I thought it insufferably bossy of ministers to behave like nannies, hectoring us to wash our hands umpteen times every day.

As for the advice that we should avoid shaking hands with friends and strangers, I was damned if I would obey. It would seem so prissy and cowardly — not to mention rude.

Or so I intended to write, before wiser heads prevailed upon me to witter about something else.

Threat

A column playing down the dangers of the coronavirus would be a hostage to fortune, they said. All the signs were that this was a far graver threat than most we had experienced before, and I would end up looking very foolish if the death toll began to mount sharply.

Far worse, it was possible that my blasé attitude to the bug might put readers at risk if it discouraged them from taking simple precautions.

Today I’m delighted that my plan was overruled — and I’m full of remorse for even having considered the column I was persuaded not to write.

Clearly, the coronavirus is extremely infectious — and if the rising number of deaths in First World Italy is any guide, we’re only just beginning to feel its effects here.

I wouldn’t say I’m panicking. I haven’t been raiding the supermarket shelves for loo paper, baked beans, anti-viral gels or anything else. But it’s certainly true that I share the general unease, felt particularly by members of my generation and those older. So, for the first time in my life, I’ve begun following the Chief Medical Officer’s advice almost to the letter.

After all, I tick most of the boxes said to identify those most at risk. I’m over 60 (66, to be precise). I’m male, a smoker and I live in a densely populated conurbation. Though I feel as right as rain, I dare say the renal department at King’s College Hospital would claim I have ‘ underlying health issues’.

I also mix with quite a few journalists and others forever jetting off all over the place — China and Italy included.

So one way or another, it is highly likely I’ll catch this wretched thing, and when I do I’ll be hit worse than many others.

Meanwhile, I’m horrified by the idea that I might pass it on.

So I’ve taken to washing my hands constantly, for at least 20 seconds a time. I’ve given up handshakes, offering a facetious elbow-bump or a slight bow instead. I also try not to touch my face (much easier said than done). I’ve even taken to paying in the pub by contactless card, in preference to cash that may be contaminated — a practice I used to condemn as sacrilegious, old fogey that I am.

Which brings me to yesterday morning, when I fully intended to go one step further by following the official advice to work from home if possible.

On the face of it, it’s palpably unnecessary for me to write my weekly ramblings from the Mail’s offices, 50 minutes from home.

Such research as I do can be easily conducted over the telephone or via the internet. All I really need is a keyboard and a spot of inspiration.

Indeed, when I gave up my full-time job on my 65th birthday almost 16 months ago, I thought I’d never need visit the office again, except perhaps for the odd party. I even bought myself a new laptop (the old one kept crashing), with the intention of composing my musings at the kitchen table.

I told myself I wouldn’t have to waste an hour and 40 minutes of my day in commuting — or often a great deal longer, thanks to incessant delays on my line. I could feed my addiction to cigarettes, without having to go three floors down from the office to pursue my filthy habit on the street outside.

Distractions

And, without the incessant distractions of office life — the gossip, the trips to the canteen for coffee, the invitations to nip across the road for a quick one — I could get the whole thing done and dusted in no time at all.

It didn’t work out like that. I’d sit in the kitchen, unshaven, staring at the blank screen of my spanking new laptop, vainly begging the muse of journalism to whisper into my ear.

I’d get ratty with my sons, a couple of whom were still at home, accusing them of derailing my ( non- existent) train of thought. When alone in the house, I’d invent all sorts of distractions, telling myself they couldn’t wait — putting out the bins, emptying the dishwasher etc.

Very quickly I realised that working from home was strictly for the self-disciplined and not for me. So I followed instead my unchanging routine of a quarter of a century of writing newspaper columns. I’d shave, shower, wash my hair (I always do on column day — call it a mild form of obsessive compulsive disorder) and dress in suit and tie. Then I’d walk down to the station, stopping at the newsagent to stock up on fags before tackling the crossword on my train to Victoria.

Next, I’d switch to the Circle Line, where I’d start thinking of roughly what to write.

At the office, I’d chat to all and sundry about nothing in particular until the morning conference. Then it was off to the pub for a liquid lunch with my fellow regulars, whose brains I would pick for anecdotes or apercus to flesh out my fledgling column.

Routine

Only after lunch, with the clock ticking towards my deadline and the features editor beginning to scowl, would I get down seriously to work — with constant trips up and down for coffee and a smoke when the muse failed me.

After all these years, it was the only way I could operate.

In this national crisis, however, I resolved that yesterday would be different. If nothing else, working from home would spare me the dirty looks I get from fellow passengers on public transport these days when I succumb to my smoker’s cough.

So I dug out the laptop, plugged it in and switched it on. Nothing happened. After gathering dust all these months, it was stone dead.

Oh, where were the whizz-kids of the office IT department when I needed them? I’d just have to tap out my column, letter by letter, on my iPad. What a pain.

At this point, Minnie the dog started whimpering for her walk, scratching at my knees as I sat at the kitchen table in my pyjamas. Didn’t she realise this was the day lovely Maddie from our local comes round to look after her? Apparently not.

I looked at the clock. In half an hour our wonderful cleaning lady would arrive (Mrs U quickly abandoned hope that I would honour my pledge to share the housework when I retired). Now, Lorraine may be perfect in almost every way, but she does love a good natter. I saw no hope of getting any writing done when I was under her feet.

So I dashed up to the bathroom, shaved, washed my hair, put on suit and tie and set off for the office, following my 25-year routine in every detail.

As I write, I’m at my old desk at the Mail. God knows how I’ll cope if I develop symptoms and the Government confines me to quarters.

Indeed, I suspect in the coming weeks, many others — not least those with young children, cats or dogs — may find working from home is not all it’s cracked up to be.

And that’s even if the internet, the National Grid and the phone companies cope with the extra demand. A very big if.

As for any good that may come of this grim virus, all I can think of is that a shortage of loo paper may encourage people to buy more newspapers — for many years, the substitute favoured by the hard-up.

Readers may then put this column to the use long recommended by some of my sterner critics.