Lockdown in Paris : Day Twenty-Two
Tuesday 7th April
8h54 : Finally managed to wake up (and more importantly, get up) before 9am. Obviously once up had absolutely no idea what to do with myself, so ate porridge and watched a documentary on YouTube and felt like somehow I had missed the point of getting up early - still can’t tell you what the point would be though. This doesn’t bode well for tomorrow morning.
10h52 : Find myself in the familiar pastime of search for houses I cannot afford on frenchproperty.com. To clarify, I cannot afford any property.com, but that does not prevent me from spending hours projecting myself into country houses in Provence or tiny hamlets in Normandy.
11h35 : Got into some kind of internet wormhole that ended with me watching Matt Lucas’ Baked Potato song.
12h45 : Decided that tonight I’m going to make mushroom risotto because if ever there was enough time to stand by a pan stirring constantly for five hours while a load of ar-bloody-borio rice stays as hard-as-nails then this is it.
14h04 : Well the good news is you can now fill in a digital version of the form that you have to take out every time you leave the house. The bad news is we can no longer go out between 10am and 7pm for exercise. The good news is that I never exercise. The bad news is that I might not fit out of my own front door by the time this is all over.
14h58 : You know, the cake may have defied physics by ending up heavier than the ingredients that went into it, but it’s really not that bad. Granted, its allure may be rooted in the fact that it’s the only thing with sugar in it between these four walls.
15h35 : Inspired by a not-very-good documentary I was watching about British castles, I decided to revise my timeline of the British monarchy, which I first committed to memory when I was a temp in Old Trafford. I was slowly going out of my mind in the office of a toilet-roll factory (true story) where to this day I’ve no idea what I was employed to do. I think I occasionally put a letter in an envelope and for some reason I remember the product code RB2400. And that’s it. It was easily the most depressing office I have ever seen in my life. The whole boxy 1970s retch of a building was made of asbestos - essentially the whole place was designed to kill your body as well as your soul. There were yellow labels everywhere screaming at you not to stick drawing pins in the walls or everyone would immediately drop dead. I remember counting the minutes until I could leave, literally crossing them off one by one on a piece of paper tucked under my keyboard, on which I had no reason to type. I remember that it was November and the heating was broken so everyone sat at their desks in their coats all day - in my memory every single interminable day of that “job” was a deep Manchester grey. However. The one good thing I did get out of it was the knowledge by rote of the British monarchy from 1066 to the present day, becauseI spent my days writing out the dates over and over and over again to keep from stabbing everyone and then myself with the nearest Bic biro. Even now I can get to the Georges without much hesitation, and so I’d say that - all things considered - the job was time very well spent. It’s aided many a pub quiz, and you can’t say fairer than that can you.
16h : This led me inevitably to a website that I have ruined many a person’s life with and that is www.sporcle.com , which has timed quizzes on just about every subject under the sun. It all started with naming all 50 States in America, then went on to countries in Europe and movie posters and I think that’s where I spent most of 2015 to be honest. For those of you who already know it - hurrah! For those of you who don’t, you’re welcome / I’m sorry.
17h33 : Have spent a bit too long chanting the names of previous prime ministers to try and get them in the right order and it has to be said, failing miserably. It’s amazing to think how much more you could know when you leave lockdown, though I feel sure that tomorrow I’ll be preoccupied by something else, like Netflix or sunlight. For now though, it does feel quite nice to draw very scribbly family trees of the kings and queens of old for no real reason. Under Henry VII’s name I took particular pleasure in writing TENUOUS in big letters - that rogue’s blood was about as blue as mine! He just went “My lineage? Ahem. Well, you see, on my mother’s side, three generations back via an illegitimate… OH LOOK I JUST KILLED RICHARD III AND HE WAS A RIGHT BAD’UN,” and they all went “Oh good-o we didn’t like him at all. Yeah alright,” and handed him the crown off Rick’s dead head. What a flipping chancer. (This is the history of Britain according to me.)
18h11 : A few days ago I remembered I had a Kindle and therefore did not have to wait to get my hands on the (ginormous) new Hilary Mantel, so just splashed out twelve British pounds for the Kindle version which has the benefit of being considerably lighter than the real-life physical object (and considerably cheaper to boot). Ironic given that carrying it around wherever I go is no longer a worry, but at least I can dive headlong into more Tudor madness (as soon as I’ve left 1940s Maine).
19h30 : I’d decided I could probably make it to Friday without having to go out to buy more food supplies, then realised I only have enough tonic left for two G&Ts so I supposed I’ll be at the shops first thing.
20h24 : All things considered is risotto really worth it? Is it not wiser to just, I don’t know - eat something else? I suppose that doesn’t say much for the risotto I just spent 12 hours stirring does it.
21h : Plan to spend the back end of the week reading constantly in the 25°C sun that’s coming our way (rather cruelly for some it must be said). Oh god and now people can’t even be out exercising before 7pm! I’d better ramp up that Catholic guilt a few notches, hand me the lash.
