Funfare for the Common Man

  © Joe Woodhouse, The New Yorker Plus, my attempt to be an armchair epidemiologist: my triage take (this is not going to end well) We’ve somehow survived just over 2 weeks of quarantine in our cramped flat without managing to strangle each other. It’s amazing that as parents, you can spend months and months trying to get your child into a pattern and set of routines, only for it all to get thrown out the window when something like self-isolation comes into force. To hell with what all the so-called ‘baby experts’ say about limiting your kid’s screen time and giving them a balanced diet and establishing clear routines and getting fresh air and…and…and…our daughter has been watching 8 hours of cartoons a day, eating pizza and pastries and other unhealthy crap, running around the flat attacking the cat with various household objects like a maniac and generally causing all sorts of havoc. She has yet to wreck one of my online lessons, but it’s probably only a matter of...

I figured this is as good a time as any to kick off my latest little ‘project.’ It’s been in the works for a few months but I’ve been putting it off. It was prompted by a student who asked me, quite some time ago, what else I read besides books. I think I was complaining when I said that I ‘only’ read 40-50 books a year and if I gave up reading articles (news, business, sport), I could probably double that. She then asked ‘what the hell do you read and where do you find it?’ and I sort of rambled off a few websites and sources of inspiration. Here we are, many months later, and I’m finally getting round to it. If social media is anything to go by, seems like people need something to keep them occupied at the moment, and reading is always a good idea – right? – so I am more than happy to oblige. (So much for my ‘try to be more social’ resolution for 2020!) Loyal and devoted readers will know that I’m forever making empty promises that I have little chance of keeping....