Corona Diaries

Martin “…some daily humour to give a bit of a lift to the offspring…” Background Information Male, aged 65-74, Part-time Psychologist/Retired, Northwest England, Divorced, Four adult children.

March 2020 ‘The Daily Groaner’ – The Bulletin That Brings Out the Worst in ‘Humour’ (Dad Jokes) Started on March 21st 2020 as a way of trying some daily humour to give a bit of a lift to the offspring during the various emerging restrictions of the coronavirus pandemic First posted as ‘The Daily Groaner’ on March 24th 2020 when ‘entries’ were generally down to one per day. 1 March 21st 2020 Just filled time this afternoon watching a documentary about tea making…….it was rated PG. Because I’m stuck in quarantine, I can only tell insider jokes. Would one way of keeping our chins up during these troubled times be to start wearing bifocals? Reply to Lauren asking about loo rolls. Wasn’t he a pop singer during the 1960’s? He wrote crap lyrics (you would with a name like that) that never rhymed. Most people were averse to them. An old friend in Leeds has just had to take his cat to the vet and sent me this record of the start of the consultation: The vet asked, “Is it a tom?”. To which my friend said, quick as a flask, “Nay, it’s in t’car!”. Apparently, this pandemic has caused a severe shortage of aspirin in jungle parts of the world. The reason for the shortage of aspirin in heavily wooded tropical parts of the world is because……..The parrots ate em all!! 2 March 22nd I think I’ve got a virus that’s closely related to this Covid-19 thingy. It’s ‘cos I’ve got more than one car…….it’s the carowner virus. I tried to do some online shopping this morning to avoid the coronavirus that I might get if I went out. It was hopeless! The only thing I did get was………a computer virus!!

The Pope’s in quarantine as well. But he’s OK doing online shopping. He uses……Paypal!!! 3 March 23rd Just been to the local chemist’s and asked the lady in there if they had any recommendations fort disinfecting against coronavirus. She said “Ammonia cleaner”. So I apologised ‘cos I thought she was the chemist. Snow White’s fed up. She’s now only got six dwarves ‘cos Sneezy’s been quarantined. 4 March 24th. Now presented as ‘The Daily Groaner’ There’s a magic act doing the rounds at the moment with a novel slant aimed at cheering the world up in these troubling times ‘cos its material is all based around a chocolate theme……….It’s done by Coco the Clown with lots of Twix up his sleeves! If someone gets criticised for putting a ‘joke’ like that up involving confectionery, does that mean they’re being punished for their………Pastills!! 5 March 25th If dentists are told they have to go on lockdown at home, will they be pleased because…….they no longer have to look down in the mouth?? 6 March 26th Due to the Covid-19 pandemic, I’ll bet the manufacturers of hand sanitizers are rubbing their hands together at the boom in their profits. 7 March 27th All this panic buying has caused some rather sad things to happen. There’s an artisan bakery up the hill near where I live (true) and I phone up my orders and she delivers. When I spoke to her yesterday, she said that she’s having to put the bread behind a cage in the small shop at the bakery to stop people who come in fighting over it. I asked her if all her bread is cooked on site and she said yes because it’s all bread in captivity although the French baguettes don’t like being caged; they find it a real pain. 8 March 28th In view of the restricted opportunities for exercise with the lockdown, it is advisable not to eat too many carbohydrates, especially bread…….because it rises in the yeast and sets in the waist. 9 March 29th In these difficult times of isolation, now is not the time to go out and mix with positive people. So I’ve been staying in and gardening. But I don’t like worms because………..I’m lack toes intolerant.

10 March 30th Mrs. Jones has written in. For once not complaining, (although cross and thereby living up to her name) she writes, ’Although it’s a great shame that we’re all quarantined, at least it’s Spring. It’s such a releaf to see all the trees at this time of year’. Thank you, Mrs. Jones. 11 March 31st ‘The Daily Groaner’ has a report highlighting the way a number of God bothering evangelical groups have been exploiting ‘at risk’ elderly people’s fears by seeking donations for their money making ‘enterprises’. Personally, I’ll stick to atheism because……..It’s a non prophet organisation. And don’t say ‘God help us!’ when you read that. If you’re an atheist, it’s contradictory.

April 2020 12 April 1st There’s a ‘Daily Groaner’ report coming in that someone has been putting up blocks of ten puns on Twitter to try and cheer people up but, sadly………not one in ten did. 13 April 2nd No edition printed today. My head went on a Wapping big strike (you have to know the history of the battle between newspaper barons and the print unions to get the gist of that play on words) 13 April 3rd You may not know but I take Omega 3 extra strength capsules every day especially now to build every possible resistance to the Covid-19 thingy. Unfortunately, this morning, in my rush to get ‘The Daily Groaner’ out to you, I fell over while holding my capsule in my hand. I fell badly, breaking the capsule into my face. Fortunately, however, it was only a super fish oil injury. 14 April 4th We get some fascinating information here at ‘The Daily Groaner’. We were informed yesterday that, in France by law, you have to turn your headlights on when it’s raining. What puzzles us at ‘The Groaner’ though is how are we supposed to know when it’s raining in France???? 15 April 5th We had a bit of trouble in ‘The Daily Groaner’ office yesterday. A guy got serious grief for claiming a cure had been found for Covid-19. But when everyone in the office shouted at him to say what the cure was, he said “It’s an 80’s rock band fronted by Robert Smith”. The guy’s in hospital now, but not with coronavirus!!!

16 April 6th These are tough times for everyone and especially so for people who tend to be especially anxious due to being superstitious. We had that issue crop up this morning in ‘The Groaner’ office. I had to reprimand an insensitive character this morning who’d caused a lot of angst for a young woman whose anxiety is compounded by her being highly superstitious and sensitive. She’d come back from the loo in a totally distraught state because the person I had to admonish had removed the ‘W’ from the sign on the door to the ladies toilets. What an idiot!! 17 April 7th As editor of ‘The Groaner’ I have to make sure I avoid getting this coronavirus. So yesterday, after a few days of not feeling too well with clear symptoms of it, I thought I’d just better go see the doctor. What a let down! I know there’s a shortage of test but when he said he couldn’t figure out what was wrong with me because he thought it was probably the heavy drinking, I left straight away telling him I’ll find another who’s sober!! Have an orange drink instead of alcohol. It would then be Fantastic for your health. 18 April 8th It’s interesting how easy it is to make false assumptions about what you see in these difficult times. Having heard that Tesco have lots of stuff on their shelves for people to come in and buy directly, I popped into my local Tesco this morning only to see a very old man buy loads of paella, tortillas, chorizo, jamon serrano, and sangria. This struck me as being a bit unnecessary and selfish. So I went up and asked him, politely, what on earth he was doing. The old guy then apologised but explained that it was only Hispanic buying. Nevertheless, I reckon he must have been having a senor moment..... 19 April 9th Had a bit of confusion this morning in ‘The Groaner’ editorial room. There’s a need to be careful when people are under a lot of stress and get depressed in these difficult times. One of the reporters had put up a story about a phone conversation he’d had with a distraught French guy who’s a superb, albeit rather dramatic, chef in a local restaurant. The reporter had thought the F rench chap was suicidal because he kept going on about having lost the will to live. Fortunately, one of our editorial team is a fluent French speaker and twigged that the French guy had merely been panicking about not having, and not being able to get hold of, some ‘huile d’olive’. 20 April 10th The need to keep exercising during this pandemic has led a lot of ‘The Daily Groaner’ staff to start cycling. That’s OK for people already used to it but, for those people who haven’t been used to cycling, they’ve been complaining that, compared to the ease and stability of the four wheels of car driving, cycling makes them too tired.

21 April 11th Just had a report into ‘The Daily Groaner’ that some wag, who probably isn’t too happy with the shutting of facilities where the population could have their spirits lifted in these difficult times, has removed the ‘F’ from the huge sign over the entrance to the local funfair.

April 12th No edition published 22 April 13th With all quarantining stuff, I’ve been able to spend more time away from ‘The Groaner’ office and more time at home. This morning I tackled the much needed reorganisation of my spice rack in the kitchen. It’s a long time since I last did it and so wasn’t surprised that quite a few were out of date and were ready for the bin. I should have known their thyme was cumin. 23 April 14th ‘The Groaner’ has had a request for assistance from the police. They say there’s been a dramatic fall in thefts from domestic properties following people being at home due to quarantine. However, there’s been a surge in thefts from business properties, especially shops. The local Apple store has had a break in and lots of phones and computers stolen. So the police have asked us to print in today’s edition a request for information from any iwitnesses. 24 April 15th As editor of ‘The Daily Groaner’ I’m putting out a request for help from our reader. We’ve had a letter from an optician asking to publish a joke to cheer her up because she’s had to close her shop due to the epidemic and she’s feeling pretty low. Unfortunately, we’re scratching our heads here to think of something suitable. So, I’d be grateful if our reader could think of a joke that could cheer her up; the cornea the better please. It’s a shame that there’s all this false news manipulation of data. I generally only trust about 20% of statistics anyway so I’m really wary of the other 90%. I’m usually pretty hot with predictive statistics. For example, I’m always able to predict the score of any football match before it’s even started. All games start at 0-0. 25 April 16th Here at ‘The Daily Groaner’ office we’re planning to be outside at 8.00pm clapping our thanks for all these amazing people in the NHS who are doing more than any other group to see those who are most on the brink during these difficult times and saving lives. However, we’re a little unsure about what to do for the ‘clap out’ for all the wonderful delivery drivers who are doing so much for surviving lives ‘cos it’s been set for ‘sometime between 2.00pm and 7.00pm’

26 April 17th A thought struck me this morning while sipping from my bottle of mineral water and trying to think of an attention grabbing headline for today’s edition of ‘The Daily Groaner’. Why does this bottle of mineral water I’m drinking from advertise its wonderful health giving benefits which are derived from having trickled through mountains for centuries have a ‘Use By’ date??? Or am I being naïve in my reading of Evian??? 27 April 18th (Lauren’s Birthday) During this quarantine period, we’ve been watching a lot of TV when not doing our grind at ‘The Daily Groaner’ and getting a bit fed up of seeing all these repeat adverts. And what on earth are Liverpool footballers doing advertising male aftershave stuff. It rather tweaked some memories of a very old report we’d run in ‘The Groaner’ many years ago when, apparently, some Liverpool players asked Yul Brynner if he’d join them in some male cosmetic adverts they wanted to do (presumably trying the satire ‘angle’ in view of Brynner’s totally shaved head). The request didn’t get them anywhere. They just got a terse reply from Brynner’s agent saying that ‘Yul never wore cologne’.

April 19th No edition printed 28 April 20th This pandemic is causing some very sad situations. Today at ‘The Daily Groaner’ we’ve had to print the sad news of the virus having claimed the life of the manager at our local cinema. He’d worked there for years and was very well known locally. We’ve also published the news of his funeral. However, in order to comply with social distancing rules and the limited number of people allowed at funerals due to the pandemic, his funeral will be tomorrow at 2.30, 4.15, 6.30 and 9.00pm with a matinee the day after at 1.45. 29 April 21st It’s very disappointing that, despite us being under the thumb of this pandemic for several weeks now, some people are still panic buying and stockpiling things. One of our reporters from ‘The Daily Groaner’ was invited by the police to go out to take photographs and do a report to name and shame a bloke who’s been bulk buying loads of ice cream and gallons of raspberry sauce. He’d even bought some commercial freezers to store the stuff in his garage. The reporter said that, although we’ve been under various restriction orders and instructions for four weeks now, he’d never seen anything like it in a month of sundaes. 30 April 22nd

Despite POTUS Trump saying that immigration into the USA is blocked, it doesn’t seem to apply to US nationals. We’ve had an American reporter from New York over here on an exchange work permit since December and he’s been struggling to find a way of getting home until last week. He’s become concerned about how the UK has been managing the pandemic here and wanted to get back. At last he managed to get a flight to New York this morning. From our point of view, however, we’re not so sure that he’ll be safer in New York in view of what we know about the severity of the outbreak there. Indeed, we wondered if he, deep down, didn’t feel the same because his parting words as he left for the airport sounded to us like “Armageddon home!!!!” 31 April 23rd I’ve just had the unfortunate task of having sack someone from ‘The Daily Groaner’ today. To be honest I’d been looking to do it for some time because women in the office found him creepy, I’d found him ‘odd’ and I have to maintain the highest standards here at ‘The Groaner’; we’re serious hacks here! The guy in question has been our gardening columnist for a few years and always had some pretty wierd and whacky beliefs. You could describe him as a bit ‘seedy’ (ho, ho). He’d sent in copy to the office this morning for editorial approval which eulogised about a course he’d been on related to ‘mind over matter’ and its application to gardening. I’ve never read anything like it in my life! His article header was ‘The End of Composting, Fertilisers and Watering’. From what he’d learned on this course, once you’ve planted the seed or seedlings (doesn’t matter if it’s flowers or veg), you then just sit back and don’t need to do anything else other than ‘picture in your mind’ what the plants will look like when they’re fully grown. Hey presto! That’s it. According to him, and what he’d written in his article, the only thing you need is a fertile imagination. 32 April 24th Despite the stress caused by this pandemic, there’s many interesting, uplifting things happen because of it. I suspect that the fear of potential death due to an invisible virus may also influence many people’s religious views. So today we’re going to run a story in ‘The Groaner’ about a fascinating thing involving a local group of homeless people. Here’s a group of people with nothing of any great financial substance who survive mainly in the locality here on charity and sat in the streets holding cups waiting for people to drop money into them. We know that they are particularly vulnerable to Covid19. Hence, a roof over their heads has been found using some new office block that’s been built but not yet leased out. It may have been driven by their thanks and/or their sense of vulnerability to the virus, but, while respecting social distancing, they’ve formed a prayer group. An amazing thing to happen..... beggars belief in fact. 33 April 25th It is interesting to note that, despite all the stress and restrictions caused by the pandemic, people are still maintaining their efforts at conservation. However, yesterday, I had to seriously question a group of staff here at ‘The Groaner’ who tried to argue that, because they’d been out on their bikes more than once during the day, they’d been recycling.

April 26th

No edition printed today 34 April 27th Sorry about the missed edition yesterday from ‘The Daily Groaner’. It was all ready for printing but the printer decided to have a dicky fit. In fairness, however, we were distracted in the office by planning a bit of a get together this evening and have invited local people to join in. Social distancing rules will, of course, apply to the get together. The highlight of the evening will be the hokey cokey done within social distancing rules. However, we recognise that some people may still regard it as too difficult to do within the terms of social distancing. Consequently, everyone is being asked beforehand to decide if they’re in or out. In ‘The Daily Groaner’ office we’ve got a bit of a whacky European desk correspondent. He and his accompanying photographer make a very strong team whose strength is, in no small part, due to the photographer’s tolerance of his team mate’s foibles not least of which is the correspondent’s love affair with Hollywood ‘B’ movie cowboy films. This nigh on addiction extends to him wearing a lot of American ranchers type clothing (think rhinestone covered tassled jackets, heeled calf length pointy toed boots etc.). This ‘addiction’ to the cowboy image is counterbalanced by him being a bit of a ‘petrol head’ which leads him to being scornful of American muscle cars and an afficionado of German cars and their engineering excellence. So, it was no surprise that, when he walked into the office this morning and proudly announced to his photographer colleague that he’d just bought a new car, his colleague should enquire whether it was a Mercedes or a BMW. I suppose it was equally unsurprising that the correspondent, pushing his Stetson to the back of his head as he flopped his feet on his desk, should reply “Audi partner”. 35 April 28th It’s interesting how times of significant stress can lead to people being more considerate of one another. Here in ‘The Daily Groaner’ office, despite all the strain of trying to keep going, the staff have been taking moments when there’s a lull in the hectic activity for each of them by occupying themselves playing games such as sudoku, doing word searches, individual card games like patience, jigsaws and the like. I believe that these kind of activities contribute to a happy office because there never seems to be a crossword. 36 April 29th It is dreadful at times like this that some businesses are exploiting the shortage of goods and excessively charging for them. Here at ‘The Daily Groaner’ we ran a supporting article to WHICH magazine about this very subject as a precursor to a local wine and spirits shop owner who had been selling long ‘out of date’ bottles of blended coffee, cream and Irish whisky. His case comes up in the central London court next week so I’ve alerted our court correspondent to cover the trial. He usually does our Old Bailey’s trials. 37 April 30th You may have read in an earlier edition of ‘The Daily Groaner’ about having ‘disposed of the services of’ the previous gardening correspondent. I was delighted to have very quickly appointed a replacement. Unfortunately, the social distancing requirements of this pandemic have had a sudden and significant effect

on the new gardening correspondent. She herself, fortunately, has so far not had any symptoms of the Coronavirus or been in close contact with a person known to have symptoms.........until yesterday. Her partner, who has only just moved in to live with her a few days ago after several years of them having been working at opposite ends of the country and so only meeting at weekends and for holidays, discovered that she had been in close contact with a person who is now hospitalised with COVID-19. As a result, the new gardening correspondent and her partner are each self isolating within the confines of their new home together. However, they are trying to be extra safe by the gardening correspondent’s partner having moved into the summer house (aka ‘shed’) at the bottom of their garden to securely maintain a more than adequate social distance. It’s therefore incredibly bad luck for them, after so many years of being apart, to now have to return to a lawn distance relationship.

May 2020 38 May 1st These are difficult, uncertain times for people, especially creating uncertainty over job security when the pandemic restrictions are over. It will probably then be a different world in many ways. This uncertainty has also affected a number of our staff here at ‘The Daily Groaner’. Only the other day I heard about our travel correspondent, Hugo, hedging his bets regarding his future job not only at ‘The Groaner’ as a travel correspondent but within the journalistic world generally. He’s also known to be concerned about his ability to survive a Covid-19 infection due to some underlying health issues. However, I’m not convinced he’s got a lot to worry about as a travel journalist because he is very, very good and, as he’s a very religious man, I would have thought that any sense of doom and gloom about the worst that could happen to him if he contracted Covid-19 would be ameliorated by his strong religious faith. His faith is very strong indeed, to the extent that he almost lives a double life having an alternative pious persona which he adopts when not working as a journalist. Despite this, he is a fantastic travel correspondent when he’s in his journalistic persona. He goes here, there and everywhere for us. So much so his nickname in the office is ‘Hugo Hego’. Nevertheless, he informed me the other day that he’s decided to follow his religious faith and, as it were, ‘insure’ his future by training as a priest while also continuing as our travel correspondent, albeit on a part time basis. Good luck to him! As the manager of ‘The Groaner’ I let the rest of the staff know of the situation and that, on their behalf, I wished Hugo well in his travels to find his altar ego. 39 May 2nd This is very annoying but at the same time sad. I’ve had to print another warning for my reader today about the need to be very, very careful when buying certain products in order to make sure you’re not being exploited by unscrupulous people selling well out of date foodstuffs. It’s a sad day that there’s people out there with so little moral spine that they can sell such stuff. I’ve been informed that various condiments such as HP sauce, mayonnaise, English and French mustard etc. are out there which are many months, in some cases years, out of date.

I’ve not seen such out of date products myself personally but I’ve printed the warning on the basis of what my more up to date sauces tell me. 40 May 3rd During this lockdown and self quarantining, it’s interesting how people are spending their time and that they’re not necessarily free from other causes for concern even when self isolating. There’s one of our staff at ‘The Daily Groaner’ who’s been furloughed and so not actually working. I phoned her the other day to find out how she’s getting on. She mentioned that she’s become absolutely obsessed reading books about famous women to the extent that she gets withdrawal symptoms if she’s not spent at least ten hours a day reading about them. She’s read books about specific people such as Marie Curie, Florence Nightingale, Catherine the Great and the like and more general tomes such as ‘Heroines’ by Kate Zambrero, ‘Bygone Badass Broads’ by Mackenzie Lee and Petra Eriksson, ‘Rebel Women’ by Rosalind Miles and she’s just finished a non stop read of the highly commended ‘Difficult Women-A History of Feminism in 11 Fights’. She added that she’s now becoming worried if this obsession is going too far. From my point of view, from a health and care perspective as her boss, I advised her to phone her GP to arrange an appointment with a psychiatrist at the local hospital because she may now be suffering from the early stages of heroine addiction. 41 May 4th It fascinating what you discover about people’s hidden talents which they have despite your own prejudices about whether they’d have such amazing skills. The other day I was talking to the guy who has the contract at ‘The Daily Groaner’ for sorting out any technical issues with our computers. This guy’s a proper ‘techi’. He’s a complete wizz with anything technical. So it was no surprise to find out that he does all the setting up and sound testing for a local rock band. What was really surprising was that he’s also the singer with the band, despite having a significant stammer. From his point of view, however, when he’s singing, he doesn’t have a stammer (No! No thank you for the corny non PC ‘joke’ about him not stammering when he sings ‘He doesn’t have a stammer’, or worse ‘If I had a stammer, I’d stammer in the morning, I’d stammer in the evening.....). During our, albeit lengthy, conversation, I was intrigued to know how he coped with the pressure of setting up all the gear for a gig with the band, then sound testing it and then singing. However, as he subsequently explained, “I....It’s not a ppppproblem. I enjoy it. Anyanyanyway, I’m pppppretty easy going. When I’m sssound testing the gggggear I’m not one to, one to complain”. 42 May 5th In view of the particularly stressful times for so many people recently, I’m not surprised that people’s mental health has wobbled. Consequently, I decided to run a lead article in ‘The Daily Groaner’ about the issue. In the best journalistic tradition, I also decided to do some research in the matter. So, I visited a local psychotherapist to find out how she was experiencing the situation and whether, for example, she was getting an increase in numbers of referrals and/or severity of problems. I was also interested in what she actually did in a ‘therapy session’ and she kindly offered to give me some direct experience, with me as ‘patient/client’.

Well, I was amazed but also very troubled by what I found myself talking about regarding all sorts of troubles, worries, hidden ‘skeletons in the cupboard’ of my life and any number of dark secrets I’d alwa ys kept to myself. Needless to say, I was very concerned about her keeping all this stuff to herself. However, she gave me a lot of reassurance that stringent confidentiality is a cornerstone of any therapist’s professional responsibilities to their ‘patient/client’. I have to say that I was really impressed by her skill and, with regard to the issue of confidentiality, I can recommend Chantelle to anyone as a therapist. 43 May 6th Hey ho! We were having a discussion in ‘The Daily Groaner’ office about the long term effects of this pandemic with a view to a lead article. Part of the ruminations involved considering how previous generations had had to deal with huge upheavals. This was especially so for the ‘golden generation’ who’d lived through WW1, the Great Depression and WW2 in a context of no NHS or Welfare State. That generation then sired the ‘baby boomer’ generation who’d never had any similar hardships at all......until now and, even then, this ‘bb’ generation are mostly retired on pensions so haven’t got the huge stresses which the ‘bb’ generation’s combination of profligacy and negligence and now this pandemic have inflicted on their offspring. Despite this, one of our staff with ‘baby boomer’ generation parents mentioned that so many of her parent’s peers complain about how the quality of their lives is not good and made worse by this pandemic. For example, this Groaner staff mentioned the case of one of her mother’s friends who, when her mother’s friend was younger, she had had a great time. She had had a solid, secure career, a great time at University, which was free, getting into the soft drug scene, enjoying sexual freedoms that her own parents had never had and generally having a whale of a time. But, now, her mother’s friend is complaining that modern society is failing her because she’s been told there’s no more that can be done for her heart condition and arthritis which are so severe that she can’t cook for herself but relies on her husband popping into the nearby Greggs for an easy meal for them both. She’s also now complaining about having failing eyesight, is on constant medication for other medical issues and that having a Gregg’s take out is a big eating pleasure. She also forever ‘goes on’ about having been a mad besotted fan of ‘The Cure’ and ‘Ian Drury and the Blockheads’ when she was younger and moans that modern bands aren’t anywhere near as good and that, even if they were, she wouldn’t be able to go and see them because of her poor health. So, she complains vehemently and constantly that her life is in ruins not only because of the pandemic but also because these two bands, that were so important to her when she was younger, are no longer around such that all she’s left with in her life therefore is an illness that can’t be healed and specs and drugs and sausage rolls. 44 May 7th Oh the simple pleasures in life when people find themselves confined! I sent our roving reporter from ‘The Daily Groaner’ out to do a story on a local Buddhist monastery where the monks haven’t had a great deal of bother keeping social distancing rules but I’d heard they’ve been trying novel ways of meditating with a view to making meditation more appealing to a younger generation. When the reporter got to the monastery, he expected to hear the typical sounds of repetitive chanting, gongs and the aroma of smouldering joss sticks. However, although he whiffed the predicted aroma, the only sounds

he heard were a whole load of random short twanging sounds each of which rose in frequency towards the end of their short duration. Bemused and intrigued, he followed the sounds to find lots of appropriately red garbed, bald headed m onks sat, relevantly socially distanced and in a cloud of joss stick smoke, sat either side of an enormous refectory table each with a 30cm ruler. Astoundingly, in the great schoolboy tradition, they were all randomly flicking these rulers over the edge of the refectory table while moving the ruler at the same time. Hence the random twanging racket. However, this was not accompanied by laughter and schoolboy giggling. Rather, each monk sat intently, presumably, meditating on the twanging sound as it dissolved into the auditory ether of silence. To resolve his bemusement and satiate his intrigue, as all good reporters would do, he tracked down the head monk to enquire what was on earth was going on. Apparently, this form of meditation had started after one of the monks had been on an exchange visit to a Buddhist monastery in France where this form of meditation had been developed and had proved to be very popular with young people in their local community. The monk had come back totally enthused and had very easily transmitted his enthusiasm to the other monks who were all now doing it. On enquiring further, the reported discovered that this form of meditation had been started at this particular French monastery and that, unsurprisingly, the monastery is in the Dordogne. 45 May 8th – Friday, VE Day. As editor of ‘The Daily Groaner’, I have to make sure that I don’t get the Coronavirus. Hence, I’m pretty sensitive about potential symptoms. I’m very aware of the main symptoms of dry cough, fever etc but I’ve also heard about the less common symptoms, especially reported by colleagues, and our correspondent there, in Spain of blisters at toe and finger ends, skin rashes and, from sources closer to home, of the loss of sense of taste and smell. So, when I started to just see the world around me in black and white, I thought I’d better go see my GP and have this checked. He did a few tests and what he then told me was the classic ‘bad news/ good news’. I opted for the bad news first, whereupon he told me that I was going colour blind. Now that was news to me and came right out of the purple! Nevertheless, the good news is that seeing the world in black and white doesn’t mean I’ve got Covid - 19, but that I’m just off colour. 46 May 9th – Saturday Our reader of ‘The Daily Groaner’ may recall from yesterday’s edition the article about having visited my GP to have certain symptoms checked out which I mistakenly thought might be indicative of the coronavirus. Following that article, I’ve had a phone call from our German correspondent who now has concerns although his potential symptoms have yet to be checked out medically. His concerns come from not feeling very well and that he might have been hallucinating. It started when, waking up this morning, he didn’t feel his usual effervescent self and was feeling under the weather. Feeling non too good, he nevertheless got out of bed to try and shake himself into action. Looking out of his bedroom window, to his amazement, he could have sworn he saw a sausage fly past the window. His immediate reaction was, naturally enough, one of eye rubbing disbelief which then unfortunately morfed into anxiety about whether he his feeling non too well indicated that he had contracted the coronavirus and that hallucinating might be something symptomatic of Covid-19.

Fighting to bring the rational side of his consciousness to the fore, he knew, deep down in all rational common sense, that it couldn’t have been a flying sausage he’d seen but that, most probably, he had mistaken it for some kind of bird. It then dawned on him that, while he hadn’t actually hallucinated, he genuinely couldn’t be very well because he’d obviously taken a tern for the wurst. 47 May 10th – Sunday During this pandemic, the staff here at ‘The Daily Groaner’ have all worked extraordinarily hard writing numerous articles in support of the many people, not only those working in the NHS, who have striven tirelessly to maintain basic services, such as postal workers, care home staff, delivery people, utility service providers etc. However, ‘The Groaner’ is the only paper to campaign also for those companies which have continued making payments throughout their organisation even when the people working in whole sections of their organisation are, strictly speaking, not their employees, such as in franchises. Many such franchise businesses would ‘go under’ without such payments because they are ‘face to face’, direct personal contact businesses and the lockdown prohibits customers accessing them. However, despite those businesses being out of the public eye and therefore not receiving much publicity or any government funded support, ‘The Groaner’ believes many franchises provide crucially important services and that the public are suffering because of not being able to access them. ‘The Groaner’ has therefore started a campaign for many such franchises to start operating again and we have chosen one particular franchise as the example on which to build the campaign. We have chosen Timpsons as the example not only because the government is now specifically encouraging people to leave their house and take exercise via walking but also because so many Timpsons are located on, or even in, supermarket sites which are allowed to be accessible to the public. Hence, even though they’re not the sole company we could have chosen, we’re legitimately asking, ‘In this lockdown, how come Timpsons aren’t a ‘shoo in’ key business?’ 48 May 11th – Monday As editor of ‘The Daily Groaner’, I’m sorry to report that I’m non too happy this morning. You will be aware that the pandemic has caused a haemorrhaging of newspaper sales as the public have stayed at home and, well, when did you last see a child doing a newspaper round even before this pandemic? There is therefore now a significant competitive battle between the newspapers for readership in order to survive. As editor of ‘The Groaner’ I consequently make stringent efforts to ensure that our reader is provided with the very best in quality journalism reporting on the issues which are relevant to our reader. Further, as was mentioned in yesterday’s edition, we have also supported and exclusively campaigned for numerous worthy ‘causes’ during this pandemic. In view of these extraordinarily challenging market conditions, it is therefore vitally important that we in the newspaper business obtain information not only about our circulation figures but also about readership opinions regarding our particular newspaper/’product’. So, it was with enormous disappointment and considerable anger that, in a recent analysis of various sectors of the potential readership market, the concluding comment about ‘The Daily Groaner’ in the report written by the statisticians, who had devised the survey’s method as well as carrying out the analysis of the results and writing the final report, was “…..only an average read”.

To say the least, I’m not at all impressed with this conclusion. However, I’ve figured out that, within the normal distribution of writing quality, statisticians’ writing quality isn’t worth a cent. I’ll therefore console myself by not expecting anything else from this reports’ concluding comment other than something which is a mean description. 49 May 12th – Tuesday As the editor of a newspaper, albeit with a severely limited readership (it’s a good job I recognised a typo there before going to print because it was initially ‘reader’), I really do wonder about the decline in the quality of communication these days. My particular concern is the way that communication via machine, either in e- mail or text message, seems to be the default mode in people’s minds for communicating and information in the spoken word often doesn’t now seem to be processed as it should. As an example of this just the other day, to my surprise, I received a phone call from a young member of staff wanting a fact check for an article he was writing for ‘The Daily Groaner’. He wanted to know the second largest state in America. Knowing the answer but being in a hurry because I was late for a meeting, I simply told him ‘Texas’. His response of a quick “OK” and immediately ending the call suited my need for haste and I thought that was the end of the interaction. Why should I have been surprised when, thirty seconds later, I received a text message from him which read, “I need a fact check please. What is the second largest state in America?” 50 May 13th Wednesday At long last, there has been information about a tentative, albeit unclear, release from the stringent lockdown stipulations such that people can have a greater level of social contact than hitherto. This has not been a particular problem for us at ‘The Daily Groaner’ because a fair number of staff can work from home and, for those who have to come into the office, maintaining social distance is not difficult. So, on hearing the news of the restriction easing, I sought the views of the staff regarding some way to celebrate this. The clear consensus view was to hold a bit of a ‘get together’ for all the staff who felt safe enough to come. We will hold it in the spacious reception area of the building with its access to the gardens outside so that people can comfortably maintain social distance. I’ll lay on a bar but no more than one person at it at any one time and people will have to bring their own glasses. A firm of caterers will provide food, all of which will be on separate individual plates so there’s reduced potential for virus transmission via touching the same serving platter. People can leave what food they don’t like on their own individual plate. As a means of ‘lightening’ the gathering, the consensus view was also to make it fancy dress. Now I’ve never been keen on fancy dress because I never know what to wear and, even then, I believe I look more worthy of ridicule than I generally do, even when not in fancy dress. However, fortuitously, I was struck by the inspirational idea that my enjoyment of this particular gathering will be significantly enhanced by hav ing chosen a fancy dress which will enable me to relax and, thereby, actually really enjoy it. The outfit I’ve chose will do it by shifting the constant worry about maintaining social distance from my own shoulders and putting it onto the shoulders of absolutely everyone else who attends! I reckon coming dressed as ‘The Grim Reaper’ should do the job very well. 51 May 14th Thursday

I’m very pleased to report that the gathering we had yesterday in the office to celebrate the start of lockdown easing went extremely well. Virtually all staff of ‘The Daily Groaner’ turned up and everyone agreed that, even though we had to maintain social distancing, actually meeting face to face ‘in the flesh’ was a very positive, psychologically refreshing experience. Needless to say though, there was a fair mess to clear up at the end. However, to everyone’s credit, the great majority of people gave a hand. I claimed the hoovering job so , for me, it was really only carrying on walking round. Inevitably, there were a few people who were a little worse for alcoholic wear, so they had to be carefully watched so they maintained social distancing during this clean up. From my point of view, I felt reasonably safe because I was able to warn them that, if they came too close to me while I was doing the hoovering and still dressed as ‘The Grim Reaper’, they were Dyson with Death. 52 May 15th. Friday With the easing of the lockdown restrictions on Wednesday including the effort to stimulate the property market into action by allowing house viewings, I invited a well known local estate agent into the office to gather the views of someone in the business. However, this particular estate agent is not my favourite ‘cup of tea’. He takes a huge amount of money out of the family business, which was actually started and developed into the multi office business it is today, by his doting late mother who spoiled him to death. His character has predictably emerged as the antithesis of his parents, especially the integrity of his very well respected mother. From his narcissistic, pompous point of view, however, the business’ success is all down to his own personal charisma and business acumen. His legendary laziness and ability at propping up the bar at the local golf club must therefore clearly be fake news. Nevertheless, his offices spend a lot of money advertising in ‘The Groaner’, so I have to caress his ego. I was surprised that he agreed to meet at our office rather than his. So, on his arrival, I offered him a cup of tea. This immediately prompted his enquiring what tea was to be used. Mindful of his disdain for anything which, in his terms, was of poor quality, I’d bought in some ‘Yorkshire Gold’ tea specially. Wonderful stuff! However, when I told him this, he sniffly poo pooed it on the grounds that he only drank dawn picked, budding leafed Darjeeling brewed for absolutely no longer than two minutes. He then pompously justified this by commenting, “As the owner of the most significant estate agency in this region, I only have the highest quality proper tea”. I could have lamped him! 53 May 16th Saturday. A social distancing visit from Polly! We are all only too aware of the effects on many people’s mental health due to the enforced isolation and social separation caused by the pandemic. The medical correspondent of ‘The Daily Groaner’ therefo re answers many letters from our reader with questions regarding this. The vast majority of our good doctor’s responses are able to reassure the troubled reader that they are very, very unlikely to have contracted the coronavirus. A recent letter and our correspondent’s response exemplifies this. Our reader had written in expressing concern about her husband. During their already lengthy time in isolation, her husband had become obsessed with both ‘The Hobbit’ and the ‘Lord of the Rings’ trilogy. Durin g

isolation, he had read the books twice and watched the films on DVD several times. Initially, she had viewed this with a degree of gratitude because it had kept him occupied and out from under her feet. However, he had become concerned as his obsession had begun to affect much of his life, even unconsciously in his sleep. For the last week, he had been shouting out in his sleep characters from both great epics such as Frodo, Smaug, Gandalf, Bilbo Baggins and waking up in sweat covered terror screaming , “Saruman, Nooooo!!!! No Saruman!!! No Saruman, please nooooooo. Aaaaaagh!!!!!”. She was concerned whether his sweaty panic was a rarely known symptom of the coronavirus. Our good doctor was able to reassure her that it was not some indication of Covid-19 but, rather, only a severe case of Tolkien in his sleep. 54 May 17th Sunday There are times when, as editor of ‘The Daily Groaner’, I have to hold may hand up and admit that something I tried failed miserably. I wanted to publish an article about life before the pandemic, during it and, as far as possible, projecting into what it might be like when it’s all finished. So, I brought together three of our most eloquent writers on the staff to do this. My mistake was not so much that they’re all ‘prima donnas’ but, rather, that I wanted them to write the three articles together in order to give a consensus view rather than an individualistic one. Needless to say, instead of healthy discussion, it caused hugely heated arguments between them and, in the end, I had to cancel the article. I never predicted that bringing three disparate prima donnas together to agree about the past, present and future would be such a tense affair. 55 May 18th Monday Our sports correspondents of ‘The Daily Groaner’ have been rather short of live sporting events on which to report recently. Nevertheless, yesterday our senior reporter decided to give our newly appointed junior sports correspondent her first job to cover the world origami championship. For the first time ever, this was taking place locally, rather than in Japan. It was being held in a large marquee to provide the necessary social distancing and was being televised. Being her first ever job, she was not hugely confident and therefore coy about her capabilities and carped about whether she should go. Her reticent was nevertheless rebuffed by numerous reassurances. In particular, it gave her the opportunity to be noticed by national TV people and establish contacts which could potentially further her career. However, as the origami day unfolded, she hadn’t been able to do any useful career networking because there were no UK free to air, or even satellite, TV stations there but, as I should have realised beforehand, only Japanese pay per view. 56 May 19th – Tuesday The cookery correspondent of ‘The Daily Groaner’ has done some really tasty (ho,ho….) articles for the paper during the ‘pan’demic (ho,ho,ho….) to support people doing more home cooking than they may have done previously. Today, she reminded our reader that, when cooking pizzas, to cook them at the highest temperature their oven can reach. Commercial pizza ovens operate at well over 700C. Some domestic ovens can reach 450- 500C which is just about adequate for thin crust pizzas and fine for think crust. However, if doing a Hawaiian

pizza, with chunks of pineapple on top, in order not to dry the pineapple out and burn it, it is important to cook it at aloha temperature. 57 May 20th Wednesday The ease with which this coronavirus can spread can cause difficulty for people regarding their responsibilities concerning its transmission. To illustrate this, ‘The Daily Groaner’ printed an article yesterday about a landlord who had difficulty with a group of tenants who were in one of her properties. Her tenants were into mysticism, witchcraft, the ‘after life’ and related beliefs. She had no concern about this this group being into, as she put it, “all sorts of weird beliefs and goings on” or that they sometimes struggled to pay the rent and were currently in considerable rent arrears. However, she was justifiably worried about the social distancing among the groups which her tenants were inviting back to the house and, as a result, the house becoming a ‘hot spot’ of local infection. The issue then for her was being unsure about who to inform of her concern in order to get something done about it. In the end, the final straw for her was the tenants initiating formal complaints that the house was haunted by some form of evil spirit of a long dead past occupant and they were inviting friends into the house for their own safety. They were now witholding the rent unless the landlord had the house exorcised. In her view, such complaints of the house being ‘possessed’ were merely an excuse for not paying the rent. Having taken relevant legal and health advice, however, she has been able to resolve her dilemma by having the tenants evicted and the house repossessed. 58 May 21st Thursday ‘The Daily Groaner’ continues its campaign alerting its reader to the numerous scams that criminals are using to exploit vulnerable people during this pandemic, especially those who are extremely lonely and have very few, or even no, friends. For them, ‘social contact’ via internet dating sites is very important but leaves them wide open to exploitation. Today, we have an article about such a local guy who was scammed out of his savings by a ‘woman’ from an Eastern European country he’d met on an internet dating site. He’d been sent a photograph o f a young woman which had hugely flattered his fragile ego by what he saw as her physical attributes, despite it clearly being a big ‘front’. Nevertheless, the scammers’ skill at exploiting his vulnerability via photos of increasingly risqué poses and promises of ‘her’ coming to be with him in the UK induced him into numerous online meetings with ‘her’. This grooming gradually led him into the typical trap of ‘her’ financial ‘sob story’ and him sending ‘her’ increasing amounts of money. Until the money ran out and ‘she’ disappeared. These scams can be difficult to spot. So it’s therefore very important to be alert for them. Dating site messages from any Eastern European person need to be viewed with considerable circumspection. In the case of this particular local guy, the woman’s name should have aroused additional suspicion, but it didn’t. Despite the scammers probably not having checked the name they had given ‘her’ and, presumably, misspelling ‘Smile’ as ‘Simile’, it is nevertheless not difficult to understand what he’d metaphor. 59 May 22nd Friday

It’s good to know that some local businesses are thriving despite the limitations caused by the pandemic. ‘The Daily Groaner’ is therefore more than pleased to carry an article about a local farmer who diversified a few years ago by turning over a couple of his fields previously used for cattle to lavender growing. He’s done very well using it in various products that he now makes on site. Since the pandemic and the explosion in the need for handwashing, his lavender scented soaps and hand wash sales in particular are going through a fantastic purple patch. 60 May 23rd Saturday Being in the business of language based communication, both myself, as editor of ‘The Groaner’, and my staff now rely on voice activated word processing rather than typing. However, I’m often left wondering how the designers of such software have managed to deal with the peculiarities of English pronunciation. My thoughts aren’t so much around how they managed to deal with the likes of ‘trough’ and ‘bough’ but, rather, how did they sorted out the oddities of individual letter pronunciation. Why does ‘H’ start with ‘A’, ‘C’ with ‘S’, ‘F’ with an ‘E’, ‘G’ with a ‘J’, and ‘L’,’M’ and ‘N’ all start with an ‘E’??? Very odd….. 61 May 24th Sunday We have to deal with a lot of scam items from bogus news agencies sent to us at ‘The Daily Groaner’ these days. One such item yesterday suggested that there is a new pandemic threatened by a virus which originated in ticks living on the lips of Peruvian alpacas. The virus has no effect on either the alpacas or the ticks, but the ensuing disease is 99% lethal for humans irrespective of age. To date, there is no known cure. The virus is initially transmitted by the ticks getting onto the clothing of people close to the alpacas and then people’s direct skin contact with that clothing. Once a person is infected, subsequent human to human transmission is by the all too familiar coughing, sneezing and/or direct skin contact. This alarmist news item also indicated that urgent international cooperation would be needed to avoid the predicted 1% survivors of the human race having to live in what would then be a post alpaca lip tick wasteland. 62 May 25th Monday I have the task of appointing new members to our team here at ‘The Daily Groaner’. It can be a tedious challenge at times getting through the over rehearsed answers and comments which they think I want to hear into what their real attitudes, beliefs and likely actual behaviours are. Occasionally, however, such tedium is thankfully avoided when the interview process is enlightened by an interviewee whose psychological security as true to themselves shines through. This is often exemplified by an unexpected response to a standard interview question. This morning I held an interview for a back room job here. Most applicants churned out the usual predictable stuff. However, one person was a heartening exception. Overall, she was ‘herself’ throughout. Towards the end of the interview, when asked what she is like performing under pressure, she stunned me by saying, ‘Pretty crap’ but immediately followed that with, ‘But I’m not bad at most other Queen stuff’. She got the job. 63 May 26th Tuesday ‘The Daily Groaner’ has never had a mail bag like it this morning.

It is full of people’s very angry comments about the Prime Minister’s right hand man, Dominic Cummings, having run roughshod over government guidelines for self isolating. This included having travelled the length of Britain to see his parents despite both he and his wife supposedly self isolating due to having significant coronavirus symptoms and despite government guidelines specifically advising against such travel and supporting this advice by having passed legislation enabling the police to fine people who ignore it. Particular vitriol is poured on Mr.Cummings’ excuses. Firstly, that he broke self isolation while in London because he was unable to get child care for his ill child and had to take his child to hospital himself and, secondly, that he ‘acted reasonably’ by doing an additional drive while in the North East to check that his eyesight was OK because he was concerned that one of his coronavirus effects was on his eyesight which ma y affect his driving, despite having driven up there in the first place. Additional vitriol is poured on the Prime Minister himself for not sacking him especially because, as Cummings is not elected, he is only judged by the Prime Minister’s own particular standards of behaviour. In view of this corruption of the use of power, ‘The Daily Groaner’ is today launching a campaign for the Prime Minister to introduce a new guideline for easing the lockdown. We suggest that the new guideline permits anyone, at their own personal discretion, to travel anywhere without restriction of any kind, without consideration for the concerns of other people around them while still observing the governments’ current general advice of ‘staying alert’ in order not to be run over by other people following this new guideline. We recommend that this new guideline be known as the ‘Cummings and Goings Rule’. 64 May 27th Wednesday All these rules regarding how we should behave during the pandemic can be tiresome, albeit necessary. Nevertheless, ‘The Daily Groaner’ is concerned that some of the public signs restricting people’s movements are now actually counterproductive. In particular, this concern is directed at those signs which obstruct the current need for people to step outdoors and begin exercising ideally in open spaces. These signs are invariably in public parks in urban areas where there can be limited publicly accessible space in which to exercise while also maintaining social distance. These signs, such as ‘Keep off the Grass’, may have relevance prior to the pandemic in order to maintain people’s use of the parks within manageable boundaries. However, in view of the current recommendation for people to start exercising outdoors but still maintaining social distance, there is a need for public parks to be totally accessible without the sort of restriction imposed by signs such as ‘Keep off the Grass’. Consequently, it is our view at ‘The Groaner’ that these signs should be removed because they impose counterproductive lawn order. 65 May 28th Thursday Even before the pandemic, ‘The Daily Groaner’ has always been reminding its reader to be on the alert for scammers and having their personal information stolen by cyber criminals. We have increased our reminders following the closure of shops due to the pandemic and the ensuing enormous increase in ‘online’ shopping. This method of purchasing has necessitated people putting their personal banking details online and thereby giving cyber criminals a much wider ‘market’ from which they can steal such valuable data. As editor of ‘The Groaner’, I try to lead by example. I was therefore shocked when checking my bank statement last evening to find a range of debits for things I had no recollection of ever having bought. They included a bowler hat, a stick on red nose, size 75 (yes ’75’) multi coloured painted lace up boots, face paints

and polka dot trousers which were also miles too big in the waist and short in the leg. This was also alarming because this stuff was hideously expensive and had blown a massive hole in my bank account. When I checked with the bank, however, my combined anger and panic dissipated when the bank reimbursed the money because, as their investigation showed, my account had, indeed, been clowned. 66 May 28th Friday ‘The Daily Groaner’s’ gardening column is hugely popular at the moment. While this is clearly due to people staying at home due to the pandemic, my editorial opinion is that it is equally due to the quality of our new gardening correspondent’s articles. Every article manages to induce a sense of relaxation in the reader by painting the meditative picture which connecting with ‘Mother Earth’ can bring: the garden is out of bounds to the virus where the gardener is thus safe and not as vulnerable. In this respect her articles contribute to reducing the anxieties caused by the pandemic. Yet, at the same time, her articles equally inspire energy and optimism in the reader. I attribute this to two features embedded in her articles. Firstly, her articles give the reader a strong sense of self worth from gardening. This comes from the gardener tending for fragile, vulnerable seeds into delicate, dependent seedlings and then into strong, healthy, useful plants either as flowers to nurture people’s feelings and emotional health or as vegetables for fo od which nurture people’s physical health. This can only help the gardener step away from the sense of powerlessness which the coronavirus and pandemic bring. Secondly, her articles involve the reader thinking positively about the future in terms of what the plants will look like in the weeks and months ahead. The reader catches a sense of optimistic anticipation for the future which takes their mind away from the current ongoing concerns about how the pandemic will unfold in the future. There is a future, and it has positive elements irrespective of what the pandemic will bring. Our gardening correspondent is a real asset to ‘The Groaner’. I’ve got some great plans for her fuchsia. 67 May 30th Saturday Much as I dislike having to suppress anyone’s enthusiasm for their pet interest, especially at times like these when there is a need for people to keep their spirits up, I had to exert my authority as editor of ‘The Daily Groaner’ the other day and tell the old boy who does our ‘From the Archives’ column to ‘pipe down’. He’s totally obsessed with the ballad singers from the 1940’s, 50’s and 60’s such as Al Bowley, Dean Martin, Frank Sinatra, Tony Bennett, Dickie Valentine, Val Doonican and the like. He’s always, always humming or singing their songs under his breath when he’s in the office. Needless to say, this gets on some people’s nerves especially those near him. When polite requests to stop had no effect, the person at the desk next to his formally complained to me because they were getting headaches, stressed out and couldn’t work properly due to his incessant droning. When I discussed the issue with the old boy, it transpired that his whole life has been taken over by his obsession. He’s got pictures or these singers all over the house, thousands of their records which he plays all the time, and even had wallpaper specially made which sets out the lyrics. No wonder his wife left him and he’s only one or two friends, equally like minded. So, taking my duty of care responsibilities seriously, I had a chat with a psychiatrist friend about the old boy’s obsession and whether stopping his droning would have implications for him. The shrink reassured me that it was nothing to greatly worry about and that banning his droning was not going to cause the old boy any great problem.

Apparently, according to the psychiatrist, the old boy’s obsession is a typical case of crooner virus. 68 May 31st Sunday ‘The Daily Groaner’ is pleased to support the easing of lockdown measures, although the timing of their announcement by the Prime Minister in the context of his favourite advisor’s recent behaviour raises questions about the political, rather than public health, motivation behind them. Nevertheless, ‘The Groaner’ believes the government should allow certain shops, such as hairdressers, to open before the government’s projected July 1st or September. Our rationale is that such businesses have always operated on an appointment basis so customer flow into the shop is controlled and social distancing is controlled by customers remaining seated in specified places, rather than randomly wandering about. We also wonder if politicians’ reluctance allowing hair salons to open reflects the dominance parliament by men. Hair trimmer sales have rocketed. However, their sales are targeted at men viz. they are sold as hair and beard trimmers. During the pandemic, internet footage show how men can use them to cut their own hair or someone else use them to cut/trim another person’s hair; there are none for women. However, it is not a sexist issue pointing out that it is very unlikely that many women would use a hair/beard trimmer to cut their own hair or let a partner loose with such equipment on their hair, especially a male partner. Is t therefore coincidence that men don’t perceive staying in control of one’s ‘barnet’ as being a significant problem? The owner of our local village hair salon is therefore concerned that, ultimately when her salon is allowed to open, she will have such a huge surge in demand that her appointment system will be overwhelmed. Even with an appointment system, she believes there will be probably be some queueing outside her salon. Also, within the salon, she is concerned that social distancing will not be easy to maintain, especially since some customers are likely to be lax about it. Added to this, she is feeling very bad about not being able to return to her previous staffing level because, despite the expected surge in demand, social distancing requirements within the salon mean that she can’t work with as many customers at the same time as she could before the pandemic. She’s therefore rather pleased to have come up with an imaginative idea for maintaining one of her previous staff in her employ. She’s created a job specifically for keeping the anticipated problems with the future appointments system, the probable queueing and the inevitable social distancing within the salon all under control. She’s given it the rather descriptive job title of ‘Hair Traffic Controller’. 69 June 1st Monday ‘The Daily Groaner’ has been covering the worse rioting across America since the murder of Martin Luther King following the murder of George Floyd in Minneapolis. This murder appears to be the final straw for black people having been too subdued about their continued persecution for too long. It is probable that the the pandemic’s greater effects on the disproportionately represented black, impoverished people in the USA have further fanned the flames of this reaction. POTUS Trump calling them ‘terrorists’ has also clearly not helped calm the situation at all. Fortunately, internationally, the early fears by national authorities across the world that the pandemic would lead to the complete breakdown of social order have not been realised. Nevertheless, these ongoing events in America have made certain people very uneasy, even in our usually gentile part of England.

This morning, despite strong arguments by certain people that our society has none of the dreadful characteristics seen behind the American riots, I decided to go into print about a local policeman whose anxiety had gone seriously ‘over the top’ recently. He had called armed ‘back up’ when he saw a black youth in the village wearing a hoodie with a loaded rucksack on his back also carrying what appeared to be a gun heading into the centre of our village. A clear recipe for a particular type of prejudice and a very dangerous prejudice when held by a person in a position of power, especially with the power to call on armed weapons to invoke it. The policeman’s prejudicially selective perception about black people in hoodies being ‘up to no good’ had then led him to the flawed assumptions that the rucksack contained a bomb and the gun was going to be used to eliminate anyone trying to stop him using it. You can imagine the panic caused in the village by all the wailing sirens, squealing tyres, armed police in armour gear, bomb disposal unit, ambulances etc associated with the policeman’s call for ‘back up’. The fiasco ended up with the youth flat on the ground surrounded by gun toting screaming armed police. To the confounding of the prejudices, they found his rucksack full of potatoes and the ’weapon’ turning out to be a spud gun! It transpired that he’d been quietly going on his way to meet with five friends in a nearby field and, maintaining social distance within the new rules for up to six people meeting, they were going to have a harmless spud gun ‘battle’ because they’d become bored of playing computer games and not actually meeting up face to face. Clearly, the ‘gun’ wasn’t any kind of support for a bomb of mass destruction. Rather, only a weapon for mash destruction. 70 June 2nd Tuesday The weather has been remarkable during the last month. ‘The Daily Groaner’ climate and weather correspondent’s column today informs our reader that May 2020 has been the sunniest month ever and that this spring has been the warmest. Our health and medical correspondent has written about this good weather tempering the psychological effects of the pandemic lockdown. He believes that the psychological effects would have been much, much worse had the lockdown started in October or November. People would then not have been able to often get into their gardens as much or go for walks due to inclement weather and families would have faced a very troubled isolating Christmas. This consistently decent weather has also led to our weather correspondent taking fewer complaints than usual from other staff here in the office about getting inaccuracies in her weather forecasts (no need here for cheap puns about her being Met with a frosty reception when she arrives in the building). The spring in her step from her sunny mood has also recently been boosted by her having won a prestigious international competition for weather forecasters. The competition format involves dozens of meteorologists from around the world having to predict the weather in certain places, based on perusing series of meteorological maps. It is a fiercely contested competition and, for the winner, a shower of accolades. For the past four years, it has been won by the same person from the Southern Sudan who, unfortunately, had become very arrogant in his self perception of superiority, although he was justifiably renowned for his uncanny ability to accurately predict rainfall patterns. Our own weather correspondent was therefore doubly delighted. Not only had she weathered the storm of the competition and received a worthy hail of praise for winning but she had also defeated the raining champion.

71 June 3rd Wednesday The lifting of the pandemic imposed restrictions by the Prime Minister has opened the door for many people to exercise outdoors rather than in the confines of their own homes. This has been a huge relief to the many fitness fanatics, although not all, due to the lack of clarity about the criteria for easing the lockdown. One such person is the electrician who we call on at ‘The Daily Groaner’ whenever we have some problem with the electrics in the building. He has asthma and a significant heart condition, so he works hard at maintaining a very healthy lifestyle and keeping super fit to offset any potential effects. Unfortunately, his heart condition and asthma have necessitated self isolating shielding at home. Equally unfortunately, he ruptured his ACL in an accident at work shortly before the pandemic lockdown. Consequently, even if he weren’t shielding, the injury has meant that he’s not able to work and his overall fitness level has deteriorated considerably. More recently, he has had to face the Hobson’s choice between leaving shielding and going into the high risk virus context of hospital for the ACL operation. After much deliberation, he chose the operation and subsequent testing has shown that he’s not had, or got, the virus. Having worked hard within his home at getting the affected knee moving properly and building strength in his legs, the lifting of lockdown has provided the opportunity to exercise outdoors to further rebuild his fitness. Despite the lack of clarity for people with health conditions such as his, he has decided to take the risk and start running because he needs to be much fitter before he can resume work as an electrician. However, he’s not yet fit enough to do the full circular run he used to take but he’s good enough for a short circuit. 72 June 4th Thursday ‘The Daily Groaner’ has been reporting in the last few days how pandemic restrictions are gradually being eased across Europe, India and Australasia. There would appear to be a relationship between those countries whose governments took early clear, decisive lockdown actions and the number of fatalities linked to the virus and, thereby, the ability to remove lockdown restrictions and the level of concern about a second spike in referrals. The Netherlands, however, took a middle course, initially applying herd immunity principles but then adopting a firm lockdown by mid March. Although it is difficult to directly compare effectiveness of different strategies, the difference between the UK and the Netherlands is nevertheless stark. As of the end of May/beginning of June 2020, the UK Covid-19 related mortality rate is 929 per million of population, while the Dutch is 292. The same numbers but in a significantly different combination. This difference has been enthusiastically noted by ‘The Groaner’s’ European correspondent because he has a Dutch fiancee who lives in Amsterdam. They’ve not been able to meet since late February but the easing of travel restrictions between countries augers well for them being able to meet. Sadly for them, however , although travel between Holland and the majority of the rest of Europe is now possible, travel to the UK isn’t included due to the UK’s continued high level of infection and mortality rates. Nevertheless, our European correspondent talks optimistically of meeting her in Amsterdam and giving each other a big hug and kiss. From the beginning of April, she’s been sending him cards every other day which she’s marked with her lipstick marked big kisses all over them. He’s pinned many of them on the wall around his desk. However, we’ll all be glad in the office when they ultimately meet and she stops sending the cards. Then, hopefully, it will stop him incessantly singing the song which he romantically associates with her lip marked cards, although we can well appreciate why it’s ‘Two Lips from Amsterdam’.

73 June 5th Friday – Theo’s Birthday I’ve been managing to keep in contact with distant members of my family and friends during the various types of lockdown that people have been under by using ‘Zoom’. Also, as editor of ‘The Daily Groaner’, it has been useful to stay in touch with our various correspondents around the country and world. Unfortunately, yesterday I couldn’t use ‘Zoom’ because, when I tried to use it, it informed me that I needed to install an update. However, despite my best endeavours, I couldn’t find the way to do it. It is particularly annoying because today is my grandson’s fifth birthday and our family meetings have been using ‘Zoom’ which I now won’t be able to access. So, when they have his birthday meeting today, I’ll toast his good health and future with a wee dram of my favourite scotch so that, although I can’t be there via ‘Zoom’, at least I’ll be there in spirit. 74 June 6th Saturday Amidst all the tragedies of coronavirus related deaths, it is important that we do not overlook the emotional pain of people who have died of causes other than that. ‘The Daily Groaner’s’ obituary column today highlighted the ‘passing’ of a very well known and loved lady who had built a very successful local cottage industry training sheep dogs over the last forty or so years. She was devoted to dogs, Border Collies in particular, never ever entered into a relationship with a partner, was never seen without a collie at her side and, to all of us locally, was known only by the abbreviation of her Christian name i.e. simply as ‘Mel’. She had developed a truly international reputation as her dogs had won numerous sheepdog trials across the world. A real character. Across not only the local area but also the whole region, she will be remembered with feelings of great affection, albeit tinged with many memories of mel and collie. 75 June 7th Sunday As editor of ‘The Daily Groaner’, I need to stay on top of my health and take every opportunity for health checks, particularly during the additional health problems caused by the pandemic. I recently had to have a blood test as part of my GP keeping an eye on my general health. I’m not keen on this most particular blood test because it involves not eating anything for eight hours before the test and not drinking alcohol for twenty four hours beforehand. I was also not happy about the possibility of hanging around in the surgery waiting to have the blood test where there could be an increased possibility of encountering the coronavirus. So, I phoned the GP practice to find out what they were doing to make sure I wasn’t waiting for any longer than necessary so I could also get home and end the enforced starvation. They reassured me that they take the actual blood test in as short a time as possible and, via their appointment system, make sure that waiting times are at a minimum so it’s a fast in test. 76 June 8th Monday It is important that articles in newspapers such as ‘The Daily Groaner’ are very careful to control for how perceptions of situations are influenced by the assumptions of the reporter.

I was subtly reminded of this the other day when I passed a homeless man sat in the street with the all too common tragic note scrawled on a piece of cardboard asking for donations. ‘The Groaner’ has supported a local campaign to provide a roof over the heads and clothing and food for homeless people, so I was a little surprised to see him there. I also noticed that he was wearing only one shoe and asked him where he’d lost the other shoe, only for him to reply, “I’ve not lost one. I’ve just found one”. 77 June 9th Tuesday Fast food deliveries have been a godsend for many people during the pandemic. Personally, I’m not a great fan of fast food, except fish and ships. However, yesterday in ’The Daily Groaner’ office, I succumbed to one of the journalists organising a fast food delivery for whoever was in the office over lunchtime. Despite many staff still working from home, there were half a dozen takers including, for once, myself. I ordered a burger with all the trimmings plus chips. The delivery duly arrived, along with handfuls of red and brown sauce sachets. The big decision then involved whether I had red or brown sauce with the burger. I’m a traditionalist 99% of the time and go for brown sauce, such as when I have an egg and bacon buttie. However, everyone else chose red sauce. So I deferred from my usual HP sauce, chanced it, and tried red sauce. It turned out to be not a good idea for me at all, influenced then as I was by the dominant choice of red sauce. I should have chosen brown sauce but, yesterday unfortunately, my choice wasn’t influenced by the effects of Heinz sight. 78 June 10th Wednesday The stresses of the lockdown can expose relationship fault lines between people who live together because they’re not able to have the breaks from one another that day to day living gave them before the pandemic and which patched over those fault lines. However, there are instances where the opposite can occur such that the easing of the lockdown can bring to the fore stresses that the lockdown masked over. Yesterday, ‘The Daily Groaner’ racing correspondent came to see me wanting some advice. This guy is horse racing potty. However, despite his not inconsiderable steady income from his job here at ‘The Groaner’, he always seemed to lurch between having plenty of money and having none. I therefore often speculated that he had some form of gambling addiction and people in the office have often commented on how tolerant his wife must be to have coped with it for thirty years of marriage to him. He came to see me yesterday in great distress because his wife had had finally confronted him about his horse racing gambling addiction and told him that she’d had enough and wanted a divorce. His addiction had not been apparent during the lockdown because horse racing had been suspended since Cheltenham. However, since its very recent resumption, his addiction had clearly resurfaced. He was in considerable distress because he didn’t want a divorce and their relationship to end. Unfortunately, I have to report that I don’t hold much hope for him based on the level to which his addiction has even ingrained itself into his day to day language. Hence, in my view, it doesn’t presage very well for him because he started the conversation, “She’s a Group One filly and kept me on the rails for years. Have you got any tips for improving my odds on winning her back!” 79 June 11th Thursday

It’s good to report in ‘The Daily Groaner’ that the pandemic has peeled back a layer of society to reveal the inherent decency of the great majority of people. This has been clearly evidenced by the level of commitment and care shown to their patients by people in the NHS, shown to clients by carers, to customers by post office workers, delivery people, supermarket staff, utility company workers etc and by the level of community volunteering shown by people generally. However, there are people who exploit the pandemic for much less honourable purposes. Although ‘The Groaner’ has reported on crimes such as burglaries falling because of more people staying in their homes, we have also reported in earlier editions about some legitimate companies profiteering with scarce products. Equally seriously, certain criminal gangs have also used the pandemic to increase their operations. Such behaviour clearly reflects a moral corruption in a minority that contrasts markedly with the morally honourable underpinnings reflected in the personal sacrifice and generosity shown by the majority. It is therefore with some regret that ‘The Groaner’ has to report on a situation which, sadly, seems to indicate the extent to which certain formal institutions during this pandemic have fallen short in fulfilling their responsibilities for protecting the rights of the ordinary citizen. The extent to which the government itself has failed, and is failing, with regard to its primary role of protecting the people it gove rns is a matter for future analysis. ‘The Groaner’s’ immediate focus, however, is closer to home. Our issue reflects the considerable local ire caused by a recent case which came up for a preliminary hearing at the nearby Crown Court. An organised criminal gang specialising in stealing agricultural equipment to export it had clearly sought to make hay while the countryside is less occupied during the pandemic. During the middle of the night, they had stolen a couple of combine harvesters from local farm s and rapidly dissembled them for ease of shipping abroad. This was cruel for the local farmers involved because they have been working tirelessly to keep supplying milk and vegetables during the pandemic and they rely totally on the harvesters for bringing in their arable crops when they’re ready for harvesting. Fortunately, the gang were apprehended before the harvesters were exported, all seven members charged and made an initial appearance in court where they pleaded not guilty. However, in the opinion of ‘The Groaner’, the court totally failed in its duty to protect the local citizens when, to the amazement and fury of both the local community and the apprehending police, rather than being remanded for the attempted theft of two combine harvesters, the crooks were merely bailed. 80 June 12th Friday The April 10th copy of ‘The Daily Groaner’ reported on the increase in people taking up cycling partly for fitness reasons as well as for being ‘green’. I haven’t done it myself but decided to join a gym now that lockdown stringencies are being eased. It was a salutary experience. My initial visit joining the gym was so much hard work that it drew the attention of the boss of the gym who came over to see me because he noticed my perspiration and breathlessness. He politely commented that my rather desperate state clearly implied that I was seriously unfit. From my point of view, while I agreed with his observation, I thought he was being unreasonable making the application form so long that just filling it in was as strenuous as it was for me. 81 June 13th Saturday The pandemic has had a disastrous impact on airlines throughout the world, not least in the UK. Yesterday, ‘The Daily Groaner’ printed the news about British Airways and Virgin Airlines planning to axe up to 25% of

their pilots and the furore this has caused. Even when on the maximum allowed to be paid under furloughing regulations, some pilots will have not found it easy to make the ends meet in their particular high end lifestyle. To alleviate the boredom of not working, some pilots have been making used of their time to take up, or develop, various interests such as learning a musical instrument, gardening, reading a particular series of novels, personal fitness etc. Today, ‘The Groaner’ printed a story today about one pilot filling his time with the more mundane activity of catching up on a lot of home decorating which, apparently, he enjoys, finds restful and is pretty good at it. Thus far, his own house has had a big make over and he was left twiddling his thumbs and frustrated about what next to turn his decorating attentions to. So, he was relieved at the recent easing of lockdown restrictions enabling him to visit one other person especially in the particular circumstances which occurred. His elderly shielding mother who lives alone had had a burst pipe in her loft which had then damaged some of the upstairs to her house. The problem had been fixed by an on call plumber but a particular central part of the upstairs decorations had been left in a water stained mess. So, he was able to ease his frustration at both his lack of something to decorate and the restrictions on visiting his mother by now being able to go round to her house and sort out a landing emergency. 82 June 14th Sunday Now that a wider range of shops can open as lockdown restrictions are eased, today’s edition of ‘The Daily Groaner’ has included a supplement devoted to cheese recipes produced by our popular cookery correspondent. I asked her to do this supplement because, although supermarkets have been allowed to keep open du ring the lockdown, the dairy industry informs us that the range of cheeses available for purchase has been narrow and their publicity people have expressed concern about the future of small specialist cheese retailers and delicatessen. These specialist shops have not been allowed to open and it is likely that many will go out of business. Consequently, the cookery correspondent’s supplement has focussed on recipes using those cheeses which have not been easily available during the pandemic so far but may be more available now, as well as using cheeses more likely to be found in specialist cheese shops and delicatessen. She has also included recipes using cheeses not often included in recipes, even those cheeses which may now become more readily available in supermarkets. Whilst she hasn’t included cheeses of the level of rarity included in the Monty Python ‘Cheese Shop’ sketch, she has included cheeses which would not, in my experience, usually be the dominant ingredient in a recipe. In my opinion, she has made too much use those French cheeses which are renowned for their malodorous pungency. However, I didn’t invoke any editorial alterations to her supplement. After all, she’s the specialist; who am I to dis a brie. 83 June 15th Monday Being editor of ‘The Daily Groaner’ can be a difficult job at times dealing with journalists. I was faced with querying the usually excellent copy supplied by our gardening correspondent this morning. She had submitted an article about growing onions but hadn’t filled the column inches which I’d allocated to her article. When I read it, she had only written about growing Spanish and white bulb onions.

However, when I asked her whether she could write about growing wider varieties so her column inches could be taken up, I got the terse reply, ‘Sorry, that’s shallot’. 84 June 16th Tuesday There is a long held view that some people’s futures, if not destined, have an element of predictability based on some characteristic about them. I suspect that this has been the case about the person who writes our weekly ‘Pets Corner’ column for ‘The Daily Groaner’. He runs the family pet shop, ‘Hugh Boyden’s’, in a nearby town and has devoted his life to the care of domestic pets. People who know him say his devotion to his speciality interest, budgerigars, is to the exclusion of everything else, including relationships with other human beings. Much of his shop is, in fact, an aviary. So, it was to everyone’s amazement when they found out that he’d recently married an Italian woman he’d met when he’d been judging at an international small bird competition in Whistler, America. She had even moved into his flat above his shop a few days ago. However, when I read his latest copy article about budgerigars, I had to suggest to him that, while linking his wife’s name with his own into a double barrelled surname was a wonderfully respectful thing to do for her, he needed to reconsider the sequence of their surnames he was using. I felt that he was possibly leaving h imself and his new wife open to some unwelcome humour. Not only had he used the double barrelled surname at the end of his latest ‘Pets Corner’ article on his adored budgerigars but he told me he was also changing the name of his shop to ‘Hugh Zapritti-Boyden’. 85 June 17th Wednesday During the lockdown, it hasn’t been easy getting repairs done on private vehicles. It was unfortunate that, in the week before the lockdown started, someone crashed into the back of my car at a junction shunting me into the back of the car in front of me. Not only had it put a huge dent in the boot of my car such that I couldn’t open it, but the bonnet was buckled, a headlamp smashed and the grill broken off. Despite this, fortunately, the car was driveable so I could still get around. Nevertheless, it looked a wreck parked on the road outside my home and in ‘The Daily Groaner’ car park as well as drawing quizzical looks from other drivers when I was driving it. I also got stopped by the police a couple of times. The problem caused by the pandemic was that I couldn’t get it repaired. Now, much worse, I find that the man locally who specialises in vehicle bodywork has ceased trading. He was renowned for the quality, speed and value of his work such that garages would transport cars from miles around to have bodywork repairs done by him. I’m suspicious of many car bodyshop specialists, so I’m now asking our motoring correspondent if she knows of one that can not only mend a wreck but, more importantly, she can wreck a mend. 86 June 18th Thursday There have been figures published in the last week that around 600,000 people are set to lose their jobs when furloughing payments from the Government end. Many regard this as an underestimate and that the unemployment numbers will rise dramatically when the income support ends.

As editor of ‘The Daily Groaner’, I published these figures with great sadness because of the enormous hardship that being on limited income, especially when unemployed, causes. This is exemplified by our headline today about the footballer, Marcus Rashford, directly influencing the Government to change its policy over providing free school meal vouchers during school holidays for people on restricted budgets. Although he has been involved in raising over £20million to support this, his well publicised comments about the hardship being brought up in a family on very limited income, even though his mother was employed, and the importance of free school meals struck a chord with all but the most hard hearted and appeared to be the action that caused the Government’s U turn. ‘The Groaner’ has a long tradition of campaigning against the effects of unemployment and the changes to the benefits system which have left many people financially worse off. Part of this policy by us has been to challenge those papers of the right wing when they demean or criticise the unemployed using humorous references or jokes about them because none of them work. 87 June 19th Friday The pandemic has thrown significant light on the extent to which fake news has fuelled conspiracy theories about not only the coronavirus’ source but also various ‘cures’ for it. Sadly, a measure of modern distrust of more valid information is reflected in recent research showing the extent to which pe ople believe such false information over more valid evidence. This has not been helped by POTUS Trump talking about bleach and then malaria medication. To counter this, ‘The Daily Groaner’ medical correspondent, who is a local GP, has been writing column s three times a week providing up to date valid evidence based information to keep our readers well informed and ease their anxieties. She has managed to do this despite it being very hard for her trying to avoid what, from her own and our editorial point of view, is legitimate anger at the shambles with which the UK government has managed the pandemic. She and her fellow GP’s in the practice have also provided an ongoing an e-mail support service for our readers and people in their practice. She tells me that they have received a significant number from carers and relatives concerned about over 70’s living alone with early stages of dementia who are also shielding. Fortunately, most of these concerns only require reassurance rather than specific further referral. One example recently was a young man’s concern about whether there was any ‘truth’ in the various old wife tales which his grandmother was repetitively telling him about for curing the coronavirus. The core of her particular ‘remedies’ involves mainly apples. They range from the delicious golden oldie of ‘an apple a day’ through to using cider vinegar for salad dressings and in various recipes as well as drinking a cup of apple cider a day. Our GP medical correspondent was able to reassure the old lady’s grandson that such apple based remedies are only grannie’s myths. 88 June 20th Saturday It has been a sad day today at ‘The Daily Groaner’. The man who was our music correspondent for many years until he retired from the job ten years ago has died. He also had a weekly local radio programme on his favourite music, folk music, for nearly forty years and ran the guy very close who had run a similar folk music programme on Radio Merseyside, Stan Ambrose, for longer. I’d worked with Stan in his day job for many years; a lovely man. Our man also had a phenomenal record collection and, like Stan, assuaged using

all forms of modern recordings as much as possible, even CD’s if he could. They each clung loyally to valve amplifiers, record players and their record collections were immaculately catalogued and filled most of their houses from floor to ceiling. While not at the John Peel level, they must have been close. It is sad that the pandemic lockdown rules restrict the number of people who can attend the funeral of our late ‘Groaner’s’ correspondent. However, I suspect that he himself won’t be too bothered; he’s requested that ten of his favourite records are placed in his coffin with him so that they share the same vinyl resting place. 89 June 21st Sunday - Father’s Day Today is Father’s Day and ‘The Daily Groaner’ cookery correspondent’s article today has given our reader’s children an interesting way of celebrating it for their father if they wish to do so by cooking something special for him. She has suggested a recipe which is a significant development of cooking the omelette for him which is often made by children for their father on this day. Omelette’s are simple and difficult to spoil. Rather, she believes children are capable of rising to greater heights. Consequently, she has listed a recipe which involves adding to the milk and eggs, which would be used for the conventional omelette, specified amounts of sugar, butter and flour together with prodigious quantities of dates, prunes, and figs. The ingredients are then oven cooked rather than fried, as is the case with an omelette. Apparently, it’s an old German recipe for Father’s Day called Farter’s Day Cake. 90 June 22nd Monday The lockdown is causing enormous emotional and financial stress for a great many people and we at ‘The Daily Groaner’ are not convinced that easing the lockdown is going to make a great deal of difference for many of them. Large numbers of people are now having to claim benefits and we believe that even more are likely to lose their jobs when furloughing ends. We are concerned that the combination of the easing of lockdown and the increasing financial straits of people will lead to an increase in theft from shops. A portent of this occurred in a local village ironmongers yesterday. A young shopkeeper was using a labelling gun to price tins of paint when she noticed a guy surreptitiously moving some spanners which were on display under his coat. When she asked him what he was doing, he turned aggressively towards her. Pandemonium then broke out in the shop as, instinctively, she threw the labelling gun at him, he turned on his heels as it crashed into his forehead, the labelling gun then careered into a shelf of glassware smashing it, a couple of elderly customers screamed in panic and he ran full pelt out of the shop swearing and shouting as he disappeared down the road. The owner of the ironmongers offered to give a reward for anyone who could help identify the felon. However, the police did not think this was necessary because, having been hit on the head by the labelling gun, they thought that he probably had a price on his head already. 91 June 23rd Tuesday While the devotion and commitment of front line workers and the unsung support given by people in their communities have been inspiring, it is difficult to see many positives emerging from the pandemic. The loss felt by people who have lost friends and relatives must be so very hard to bear especially as they have not

been able to comfort one another with physical contact due to social distancing or attend funerals in numbers more than six. ‘The Daily Groaner’ has repeatedly run articles about this issue and urged easing of restrictions which limit appropriate, and necessary, grieving and support at such an emotionally difficult time. However, I, as editor of ‘The Groaner, take full responsibility for the invective criticism the paper received for sanctioning what, I thought, would be a welcomed gesture by our reader to reduce the potential stress caused by grieving relatives. I thought this would be particularly appreciated by the reader who is also financially stretched due to the pandemic’s effects. I had arranged with a local solicitor for the paper to provide a free will writing service for our reader. I anticipated that this would be taken by our reader with the consideration intended. Unfortunately, the opposite occurred. We received hundreds of emails and phone calls all complaining that, in the reader’s eyes, the offer of such a ‘freebie’ was patently an obvious morally and financially cheap way of trying to increase circulation. As such therefore, the reader saw through my actual intention of the free will writing as nothing but a dead giveaway. 92 June 24th Wednesday I think it is a measure of many people’s resilience in the face of the constraints caused by the pandemic is their ability to retain a sense of humour. Yesterday, I published in ‘The Daily Groaner’ an example of this which I directly experienced myself. Being able to use my car to get around has been invaluable in my job as editor of ‘The Daily Groaner’. Fortunately, there hasn’t been a problem with it………..until yesterday! One of the radiator hoses sprang a leak. When I inspected it, however, it wasn’t the actual piping that had developed a leak but that the clip, called a jubilee clip, joining the hose to the radiator had broken and come adrift. Jubilee clips are a very common item used in all sorts of applications so I popped into the local Halfords store to buy one anticipating that they would have a range of them. Consequently, when I asked the assistant if they had any jubilee clips, I was amazed when he said they hadn’t. However, I was reassured when, totally deadpan, he did say they had some DVD’s showing highlights of celebrations marking the Queen’s fiftieth year reign. 93 June 25th Thursday At long last, the local council has restarted collecting the green bins for garden waste. However, ‘The Daily Groaner’s’ editorial today has said that this needs to be done at least twice a week for a couple of weeks in order to catch up on the mounds of garden waste which has built up during the lockdown restrictions. People have been gardening to take up the time they have spare due to having been furloughed or shielding. Consequently, there has been much more waste than otherwise there would have been. Unfortunately, what hasn’t helped has been the dismissive attitude of the council official who was answering phone and email queries from the public regarding what to do with the huge quantities of garden waste which was likely to remain even after the first green bin collection. This had been exemplified by our reader who had contacted me with their experience of this particular council employee.

Our reader had enquired of this particular employee if one way of helping the Council to deal with the excess garden waste was for him to have a skip outside the house. The very unhelpful response was simply “Why not! If you need the exercise, go for it fatty!”. 94 June 26th Friday The ‘The Daily Groaner’ sports correspondent has filled three of our back pages with articles celebrating Liverpool having won the Premiership title last night after thirty years of trying since their previous one. I was unfortunately not able to be in the office to see the celebrations among all the staff who are Liverpool fans, aka ‘addicts’. Rather than being in the office, I was restricted to being sat at home with my feet in a warm antiseptic foot bath. This was necessitated by having been bought some humorous socks by my children for Father’s Day. They were things of care and skill, albeit arguable beauty. They had been hand made in wool but portrayed images of a well known superhero and, regrettably, were much too small for me. Out of consideration for my children’s thoughtfulness, despite them being too small and the wool being abrasive, I wore them a couple of days ago. Needless to say, they didn’t do my feet much good despite supposedly transferring to the wearer some of the attributes of the superhero whose images the socks adorned. Consequently, I had to spend much of yesterday at home using the foot bath to restore my Thor feet. 95 June 27th Saturday I received my car back from the body shop this morning. The motoring correspondent’s recommendation was a good on: they’ve done a good job and the car is back to its shining pre crash self. Being able to get about is not only very important as editor of ‘The Daily Groaner’ but it enables me to go and visit some friends, albeit maintaining social distance when we meet. One old friend I wanted to visit hasn’t been very well recently. However, he lives a fair distance away, so going in the car is the only option. Nevertheless, I like driving and the journey is made more enjoyable by being able to take the back roads through a particularly beautiful part of the country even though it’s not the most direct route. So, on the way to Nick’s, it was rather obvious that I was going to choose the scenic route. 96 June 28th Sunday Although the government has provided some financial support for many employers, the lockdown has cause particular financial difficulty for so many people who cannot access any of it, especially self employed people with incomes below a particular revenue threshold. While the financial strains for many of these businesses will ease when they can start operating again in early July, one group still excluded from opening are hairdressers. So, it was good to report, in today’s edition of ‘The Daily Groaner’, how our local village hairdresser has cleverly adapted her skills into a different context in order to maintain some level of income. The roots of her business diversity lie in our local area being rural with many equine based businesses. For example, around our village, there are three polo grounds and one of the UK’s largest polo pony breeding and training stables, three racehorse training stables and one of the country’s largest shire horse centres. The county fox hunt is also based in the village. Many individuals also own horses in the area so there is are several thriving riding schools and stabling facilities.

However, horses aren’t susceptible to the coronavirus but still need humans to attend to their needs despite humans being subjected to numerous privations. Our hairdresser seized on the idea of adapting her hair dressing skills to horses. She therefore contacted the numerous local equine businesses to offer a service which promised having horses looking much more presentable than typical, even when being ‘dressed’ for such as the county show. She has been amazed at the take up of this venture. It’s turned out to be so successful that, even when she can re-open her human hairdressing salon, the horsehair side of her business will be her mane source of income. 97 June 29th Monday There are some people who tend to leave themselves open to becoming, while not depressed in a clinical sense, at least ‘down’ by noticing, and catastrophising from, the negatives in situations and ignoring the positives. The pandemic is one of those situations which is fertile ground for people who take such negative doom and gloom perspectives. ‘The Daily Groaner’ office has one such person. Despite doing ‘The Groaner’s’ weekly horoscope, George has always been a cynic and ‘prophet of doom’ even before the pandemic and not an easy person to manage because of it. He would always notice catch 22 situations and predict potential flaws in decisions made by other people. Needless to say, his favourite books were things like ‘Catch 22’, ‘The Prince’ by Machiavelli, anything by Edgar Allan Poe and any doom and gloom novel he could lay his hands on. I once made the mistake of reading a book he recommended, ‘Life After Chocolate’. Never again! I’ve never read anything that left me feeling so unbelievably jaundiced about life. It’s no surprise that Leonard Cohen is his favourite singer/songwriter. Since the pandemic, he has become increasingly tiresome. He goes on endlessly about how governments across the world now taking authoritarian draconian control, the emergence of fake news, th e manipulation of the media, the suppression of social gatherings etc are fulfilling the prophetic content of the novel ‘1984’. It’s almost as if he’s enjoying the pandemic. However, I think people in the office have finally had enough of his grim moaning. Hence, yesterday, I clearly heard someone at the desk next to him say, very firmly and very loudly for all in the office to hear, “For goodness sake, George, us in the office have had enough!!! Pack it in about all this prophetic nonsense in ‘1984’ George, or we’ll throw you out of the office!!” 98 June 30th Tuesday Today, ‘The Daily Groaner’s medical correspondent has presented information about Covid-19 as more is gradually learned about it. Some of it is rather troubling, such as the possibility of long term lung damage of people who have had even only very minor symptoms and the frequency of tragic blood clotting problems for people who have appeared to recover. Other information is more encouraging, such as the notion of ‘dark matter immunity’ and evidence that a 20% infection rate may be a threshold of herd immunity rather than the predicted 60-70%. Unfortunately, our medical correspondent is very concerned that some of the information which is emerging is also fake news. One such piece of information which she has chosen not to publish until she gains more provenance of its validity concerns evidence, apparently emanating from China, of Covid-19 being found in the sperm of men who have had the virus at a level which necessitated ventilation. Apparently, human evolution has led to

certain ‘superimmune’ organisms, especially ones related to procreation and, thereby, serving to protect the next generation from inheriting certain diseases. The placenta and male testes are therefore among the several ‘superimmune’ organisms which humans possess. Consequently, the possibility of the virus surviving in sperm is particularly serious and alarming. It raises concerns that, firstly, these ‘superimmune’ organs are not immune to Covid-19 and, secondly, that as well as air borne transmission, it can also be transmitted to a sexual partner and thereby, most alarming of all, to the next generation. This information which our correspondent has obtained therefore advises that, until the possibility of the coronavirus being sexually transmitted is validated, men who have had the virus should adopt the relevant advice for the prevention of any sexually transmitted disease i.e. that condoms should be used on every conceivable occasion.

July 2020 99 July 1st Wednesday As ever, ‘The Daily Groaner’ celebrates the resilience of people despite the privations of the pandemic, especially their ability to retain their sense of humour and to share with other people the opportunity for a laugh and a smile. Today, we printed an example of this. Our reader is an avid cartoon collector, their favourite being Bugs Bunny. Wanting other people to share the enjoyment, our reader has gathered together every Bugs Bunny cartoon ever made for everyone to enjoy. Consequently, ‘The Groaner’ has made it known that it’s available to download as a What’s App doc. 100 July 2nd Thursday – The 100th Edition. ‘The Daily Groaner’ music correspondent came to see me yesterday to explain why I hadn’t seen her for a while. She’s been sending in her copy by email but not actually been in the office in person. I’d started to wonder if she was OK and asked her to come in for a chat, which she did yesterday. She an enthusiastic musician and has learned to play an array of obscure instruments as well as the couple of more conventional ones. She also writes great articles. It transpired that her absence from the office has been because she’s been exploring first national Australian musical culture. As part of this journey, she’s thrown herself into learning a first national Australian instrument. I was also surprised to find out that there’s actually a music school specialising in teaching these instruments which, in her commitment, she had been attending. Further, learning these instruments is subject to the same series of competence grading levels which are used to measure the learning of conventional ‘Western’ instruments. Apparently, she had passed Grades 1 and 2 easily but, unfortunately, had struggled with Grade 3 and failed it. This surprised me because she’s a talented musician. However, she’s a very determined lady and not a person to give in easily, so I shouldn’t have been surprised at her steely eyed affirmative answer to my question of, “Did you redo it”. 101 July 3rd Friday My staff in ‘The Daily Groaner’ have taken to teasing me about how, as I get older, my memory is starting to ‘go’. I find it particularly annoying that it seems to happen randomly and in public, which leaves me open to most ribaldry.

Recently, we were having a chat in the office talking about film actors we liked. I could remember the names of whole strings of actors but one name just ‘went’ out of my head. For the life of me, I couldn’t recall it. I could reel off the films he’d starred in such as ‘The Green Mile’, ‘Forrest Gump’, ‘Saving Private Ryan’ and lots of others. I could even visualise him as clear as day in my mind’s eye but still couldn’t ‘find’ his name in my memory. Fortunately, the office cleaner came to my rescue and, out of other people’s hearing, whispered his name to me so I could say it to the rest of the group. Later on, I was able to express my gratitude to her with a heartfelt “Thanks”. 102 July 4th Saturday ‘The Daily Groaner’ has always been sceptical about the compensation culture which has emerged over the last decade or so. During that time, we have focussed on various scams which have been used and ‘ambulance chasing’ solicitors have been one particular target for us. So, we gave short shrift to an email which arrived from our reader to our legal correspondent yesterday which our reader wanted us to publish as a warning to others (whoever that might be because, with only one reader, ‘The Groaner’ doesn’t have significant impact on public opinion…….) Nevertheless, our reader’s sentinel email indicated that, shortly before the pandemic broke into the UK, our reader had been to a music gig performed by various tribute bands. During the performance by an ‘Ian Drury and the Blockhead’ tribute band, the overexuberant drummer had let one of his drumsticks fly out of his hand which had hit our reader full in the face, knocking him out. Since then, our reader has, allegedly, suffered from migraines, unpredictable black outs and occasional fits. Consequently, according to the solicitor he has engaged who ‘specialises in personal injuries’, our reader, having been hit with a rhythm stick, is now entitled to Ian Drury compensation. 103 July 5th Sunday There are times when I have to act as peacemaker between members of ‘The Daily Groaner’. Yesterday, there was a heated debate between the paper’s science correspondent and a new junior member of staff about an aspect of geometry. They were arguing about the difference between a hexagon and a square and between a pentangl e and a triangle. Neither would appreciate the other’s point of view. I just can’t understand why they would not recognise that any perspective used to justify an argument, especially about this particular subject, has more than one side. 104 July 6th Monday Following on from yesterday’s heated debate between ‘The Daily Groaner’ science correspondent and the new member of staff, I sent them an email today suggesting that geometry need not be a source of acute contention or obtuse viewpoints but, rather, can actually be fun if you look at it from the right angle. 105 July 7th Tuesday ‘The Daily Groaner’ racing correspondent was jubilant at the weekend having tipped the rank outsider, Serpentine, to win The Derby. He’d even secured odds several weeks ago at 33-1 when the ante post odds

had shortened to 25-1. Knowing his propensity for heavy bets, I suspect he’d laid at least £100, if not a lot more. I wouldn’t have been surprised if he’d found the Serpentine lake in the middle of London and celebrated by jumping in. The elation of his fortuitous bet had, fortunately for him, tempered the effects of him having been the unwitting protagonist of considerable distress for a young child shortly prior to the race being run. His neighbours traditionally hold BBQ’s on major horse racing days in summer. This year’s Derby Day event also coincided the easing of lockdown restrictions on 4th July. So, it was a double celebration. As usual on these occasions, our racing correspondent plays the role of ‘cook’ suitably attired with apron and chef’s hat and brandishing BBQ tongs and fork. However, to everyone’s surprise and concern at the BBQ, Poppy, the five year old daughter of one of the neighbours, suddenly burst into a howl of anguished torment. She was inconsolable, sobbing her heart out without any apparent justification. It took her mother’s not inconsiderable patience to calm Poppy down and find out the cause of her distress. As is so common with young children, they can have fixations on characters aimed at a child audience. Poppy is no exception. Her obsession is the glove puppets Sooty and his sidekick, Sweep. Typically, her bedroom is a shrine to this obsession. Apparently, the cause had been Poppy hearing our racing correspondent, apron wearing, tongs wielding, stood in the midst of swirling smoke from the sizzling BBQ, suddenly turn to the gathered throng and loudly enquire “Right then, who’s for the sweepsteak!!”. 106 July 8th Wednesday With lockdown restrictions easing, it’s good to hear about families being able to come together again and share typical family activities. However, occasionally, there can be a downside to this. ‘The Daily Groaner’ pet correspondent’s copy yesterday referred to one such incident mentioned to the correspondent by the local vet. A family in a nearby village had come together for the first time in several months and on the third day of their meeting indulged in their favourite family game of Scrabble. Apparently, one member of the family had in their mind that they could possibly manage to use all their letters in one word when, accidently, she knocked all the pieces off the table. Their Labrador dog, typically voraciously indiscrete about eating anything that came near it, promptly scoffed all seven letters without even pausing for breath. The game was abandoned as the dog was rushed to the vet due to scrabble pieces being hard plastic and therefore indigestible. Despite justified concern for the dog’s wellbeing, the lady was also none too pleased that her ‘B’, ’L’, ‘U’, ‘E’, ‘R’, ‘O’ and ‘T’ letters had disappeared. However, the vet was much more concerned about the dog’s future, commenting that its owners should look out for the dog’s next poo because it might well spell trouble. 107 July 9th Thursday It’s been very difficult during the lockdown for people to access dental treatment. However, visiting the dentist has never been a pleasantly anticipated experience by anyone I know. I also suspect that the extent to which such a visit is positively anticipated depends on the severity of the dental problem. Even then, there are people who unfortunately live in terror of visiting the dentist irrespective of the severity of the problem.

Fortunately, the correspondent who does articles on alternative medicine for ‘The Daily Groaner’ has sent in copy which provides strategies for dealing with such terrors. I cannot vouch for how useful they are, but, having read the article, I need to go away and think long and hard about them because, being based on Buddhist practice, these particular strategies transcend dental medication. 108 July 10th Friday The article yesterday in ‘The Daily Groaner’ about ways of using ‘alternative’ medicine for coping with a phobia of dental needles has produced a flurry of responses from our reader. Many of the comments have been critical of alternative medicines which, in our reader’s view, are nothing but ‘quackery’. From an editorial perspective, however, we attempt to be more open minded. For example, we recognise that many modern medical treatments and practices are rooted in plant extracts which people have used for hundreds, if not thousands, of years. The alpine ‘Ice Man’, Otzi who lived over 5,000 years ago, carried a pouch of mouldy mushrooms which, it is believed, he carried for their curative properties because the mould has antibiotic properties; he also shows evidence of having used acupuncture. Buddhist principles of meditation clearly shape current vogue treatments for mental health issues such as ‘mindfulness’. Nevertheless, ‘The Daily Groaner’ recognises the profound limitations of many alternative pseudo medical beliefs and the extent to which their blinkered devotees turn their particular beliefs into a cult which tolerates no wavering from their obsessive practices, many of which are actually dangerous. ‘The Groaner’ therefore takes a strong stance against such dangerous sects although we have no objection at all to people who adopt the practice of safe sects. 109 July 11th Saturday People will have heard about two weeks ago of the sad death at the age of 93 of Milton Glaser, the man who designed the iconic ‘I ‘red heart’ NY’. His celebrated status for this design drew obituaries from around the world’s press, including ‘The Daily Groaner’. However, we are the only press to report the untimely demise of the son of the Al Tabor who is widely credited with creating an even more iconic feature of popular culture, the hokey cokey. Although the origins of the hokey cokey can actually be traced back to English folk music of the 1820’s, it was the 1940’s London danceband leader, Al Tabor, who turned it into the form by which it is universally known today. Sadly, he has never received the acclaim which he deserves and it has been left to his son to campaign for his father’s recognition. However, Al’s son was himself somewhat obsessed with his campaign and the hokey cokey itself. So, it was no great surprise that the funeral directors reported that, although they lowered his comatose body into the coffin without any difficulty, problems really kicked off for them immediately after they put his left leg in. 110 July 12th Sunday - Polly and Theo down to Cornwall I had to invoke editorial authority over ‘The Daily Groaner’ science correspondent today. He had supplied copy positing that the study of Maths was a serious business that should not be devalued by injecting humour, in any form, into how it is taught. I’m not able to agree with this viewpoint and felt the need to leave ‘The Daily Groaner’ free to popularise what can be an intimidating subject to most people by using humour.

I therefore reminded him that I exercise editorial authority to make Maths’ articles humorous if I half two. 111 July 13th Monday The recent article in ’The Daily Groaner’ (ed.108) about alternative medicine has prompted yet another flurry of emails. Some have come from practitioners of conventional medicine emphasising the dangers of treatments other than their own, but the great majority have come from protagonists of alternative medicine. The ‘treatments’ propounded by most of these alternative medicine emails patently fulfil the relevant criteria for ‘quackery’. However, some would appear to have vestiges of validity as effective treatments, at least on a consistently reported anecdotal basis, despite none having been subjected to formal random double blind control group evaluations involving placebos. One set of emails lauded the significant benefits of treatments derived from seaweed for numerous conditions, especially certain skin conditions and dietary complaints. In fairness to these particular protagonists, they balanced their fervour for such treatments with the cautionary caveat that such treatments could become addictive for some people. All the protagonists therefore recommended that, if a person became so afflicted with any seaweed based treatment, they sea kelp. 112 July 14th Tuesday ‘The Daily Groaner’ food critic came into the office this morning recounting a very funny experience. He had been at an excellent restaurant a few days ago which had recently re-opened in response to lockdown restrictions having been eased. He and his partner often frequent this establishment because of the standard of its cuisine so they were eagerly anticipating their repast. Unfortunately, the next table was occupied by an overweight pompous character who was clearly intent on impressing his female companion. Despite the tables being well socially distanced, his loud voice was impossible to ignore. What was worse was that his forthright views aimed at impressing his companion provided vivid validation of the maxim that the loudness of a voice is in inverse proportion to the size of the brain which controls it. This was first evidenced by his loud proclamations regarding his rationale for the choice of wine. They obviously exposed the frailty of his knowledge about wine to anyone with even the slightest modicum of knowledge about wine varietals, regions and viniculture. However, ‘The Groaner’s food critic and his partner’s positive anticipation of the evening was saved from going in the bin by the pompous character’s over inflated ego receiving the most wonderful puncturing humiliation. The character had opened the menu book and, having very briefly scanned it, loudly declared to the waiter, in affected Italian accent, “I’ll partake of the excellent pageone but without the garlic, garcon”. The equally loud response from the waiter drew applause and laughter from everyone else in the restaurant as he very condescendingly and wearily, but very politely, suggested to the character, “Perhaps, sir, your partner may be more interested in the actual menu which you will find, if you turn over, sir, starts from page two”. 113 July 15th Wednesday I reckon I’ve been overworking lately. This isn’t surprising in view of the effort needed to keep ‘The Daily Groaner’ going. When I’m not in the office, I’m constantly on my iPhone. I’ve even been leaving it switched

on at my bedside through the night in order to be available 24/7 for ‘The Groaner’s correspondents or news agencies sending me information worthy of consideration for the next day’s edition. So, I went to my doctor because I’m struggling to keep my eyes open when I’m looking at my iPad and iPhone and needed something to help me stay awake. However, rather than prescribing any kind of stimulant, she simply suggested that I use my phone and find a nap for solving the problem. 114 July 16th Thursday For the past several weeks, ’The Daily Groaner’ has been running a series of articles from various people regarding how they have coped with shielding during lockdown. The vacillating messages from the government haven’t helped those people deemed vulnerable to the coronavirus and whether they should continue shielding or not. Various senior government ministers have even been giving differing messages about the basic issue of whether to wear a face mask or not. Consequently, effective ways which shielding people have dealt with their enforced isolation has provided them with an important psychological inoculation against their uncertainty induced anxiety. The variety of things which shielding people have done to not merely occupy their time but also to give focus to their lives is remarkable. Many have written diaries, others have learned to play musical instruments, others have written novels, others have taken daily video diaries of their lives during lockdown, one person we know of has written an opera etc. However, we feel that the person who had simply taken a selfie photograph of only his face every day of his lockdown should think about whether such narcissistic behaviour is particularly beneficial to his psychological wellbeing, especially as the pictures which we have seen show a noticeable decline in his appearance over the period of his shielding. Overall, we believe it would now be in his best interests to actually take a really good look at himself. 115 July 17th Friday – Owen’s Birthday while down in Cornwall. The loss of income which so many people have experienced due to the pandemic has led them to examine every possible way to reduce their costs. One major cost for families is their energy bill. The Consumer Society’s ‘WHICH’ magazine regularly investigates the numerous energy suppliers to find those providing the lowest tariffs and its latest edition sets out its most recent findings. So, it was no surprise to us in ‘The Daily Groaner’ office when our financial page editor, who is forever championing the benefits of a ‘WHICH’ magazine subscription to us all here, came dancing into the office waving the latest copy of ‘WHICH’ and boasting how much better off he now felt having changed his energy supplier. However, for once, our prejudicial assumption regarding the basis for the upturn in his joie de vie proved to be wrong. It transpired, on further enquiry, that, on this particular occasion, his change of energy supplier was actually from Lucozade to Red Bull. 116 July 18th Saturday The effects of lockdown have been very difficult to deal with, especially the severely restricted social contact and remaining within the boundary of one’s own home. However, for many people who have also not been

able to work due to the lockdown, it has given them the opportunity to re-evaluate the future direction which they aim to take for their lives when the lockdown restrictions are eased. With this in mind, ‘The Daily Groaner’ home affairs correspondent has been conducting numerous interviews over the last fortnight with local people who have used the lockdown as a breathing space in what they felt was the daily hamster wheel spinning lives they were leading prior to the pandemic. These people provide very interesting insight into their thinking behind the significant changes they are planning to make. All the interviewees intend to not only give up their current jobs but also their caree rs. They intend to pursue very alternative directions to their lives. Skimming through the correspondent’s articles, the predominant motivation behind the intended changes can be best summed up by a local plasterer. He had woken up to the dawning realisation that he does not get any fulfilment from his job. He is now determined to fulfil a lifelong ambition and go to University because he is actually board with plastering and recognised that there is much mortar life. 117 July 19th Sunday Today ‘The Daily Groaner’ has reported on some rather sad news. Having been an iconic symbol for many good years reaching back into the early days of motoring, the French Michelin tyre company has announced that their marketing symbol, the Michelin Man, has finally come to the end of the road and been retired. 118 July 20th Monday And now, as they say, it’s time for the final curtain on ‘The Daily Groaner’. Now that the jockey badly injured in a fall during one of yesterday’s races is in a stable condition, the Eczema Society has abandoned its plan to raise money via a scratch card scheme and lockdown easing is removing the need for a daily corny bulletin, the editor has decided that ‘The Daily Groaner’ has run its course. Consequently, today’s edition is the last. So, thank you to the reader. You may now return to a life without a daily groan.