I don’t think I’m alone in saying that I will be glad to see the back of 2020. Normally when it reaches the end of the year I find myself in reflective post-Christmas bonhomie, buoyed by the occasional glass of sherry and mince pie. Through the rose tinted optics of hindsight I find myself mulling over the year and its many joys. A warm fire, a Val Doonican jumper and grandad slippers and the illusion is complete. Gosh, is that snow outside?
Not this year. Not in 2020.
If ever there was a year to see the back of, this is it. Australian bushfires to start with. Huge news story in any other year but this. Climate change as a global emergency. Wasn’t that enough to be going on with? We are in a full tilt race to save the planet. A full-time job in its own you might think. But no, the media circus moves on. And what happened to little Greta? Nowhere to be seen. Or, more accurately I think, avoided by the press who have other fish to fry. Never mind the planet frying. As far as I’m concerned that’s high enough on the apocalypse-o-meter
But apparently not.
You can be forgiven for missing it but there it was, some tiny little news item, buried in between the Wichita under 30s Bake off challenge and the list of unpaid parking tickets. Something about a virus crossing over from wild animals to man. Hardly a news item really. Within a month there was cause for concern in China. Another month and the rest of the world was beginning to wake up to the defining news story of the year. Suddenly attention was focused on China and its food markets. And before you know it, it is ‘traced’ to bats. Specifically people eating bats. I ask you.
For goodness sake what kind of a person eats bats? There are no bat recipes, no bat cookbooks and not a single Internet bat bistro devoted to the bat gourmet.
Perhaps I’m mistaken. Perhaps, in the Far East, the Burger King Bat Super Whopper is competing for the stomachs and minds of the Chinese with the McDonald’s Big Bat combo platter?
And to follow? The bat pavlova, bat cobbler, sorbet de bat? And then there are the canapés – bat goujons, pate de bat, bat fricassee, bats on horseback? No, the reason there are no bat recipes is because we are not meant to eat them. It’s not discrimination. It’s not being Battist. It’s just common sense. Besides, they’re very crunchy.
Back in China, some clown ignores common sense and tucks into the bat sushi platter. All well and good (even if rather disgusting). Unfortunately his particular selection of choice bat cuts contains a previously unknown respiratory virus.
Viruses don’t normally cross species barriers. They snuggle up to the same species. But when they do cross species, they do so with a vengeance. Before you know it, we have an epidemic in China. It turns out to be such a hit that other adjacent countries take it as well. Another couple of weeks and it’s a pandemic. Short for panic epidemic. (No it isn’t but it sounds good). People start filling hospital beds. Then they start dying. Some wear face masks, some don’t. Panic breeds more panic. World leaders, used to fluffing news about a new national traffic management scheme, or a regional document archive plough their collective ostrich heads into the sand. Then there is a vaccine. Then there are two. Then more. Then the virus hits the gas pedal, reluctant to be outdone by mere humans. A feeling of déjà vu? Wait till the third wave.
And to think that we were concerned about forest fires in January. At the end of December, we are virtually praying for forest fires – to kill the virus or kill the news stories.
Dear Sir, my year 2020 is faulty. Can I have my money back please.