Doyet and Jong had gone to Christchurch for the week so I decided to spend my two working from home days in Papakura just to see how the kids were. And of course they were fine; I forget that two of the kids are over 20 and that Chini at 10 has enough vocabulary to solve the Wordle game I left open on my phone. She got the word EPOXY.

Plus, the fridge is groaning with food, and I remember how we were back at my house during the pandemic when we were locked in with our $300 per fortnight food budget. That didn’t include snacks and we rationed those. But it was fine. I had started working out again and I felt physically great so non-essential food wasn’t really tempting at all.

And then ‘normality returned just before Christmas. We started trusting the supermarkets again. We were snacking twice a week again. We thought we could plan fabulous birthdays again (private dining room with a custom menu).

And just like that, we’re standing on the precipice of another Covid wave with omicron. Like WTF (though of course, we all knew this, but still..)

For a minute there (exacerbated by working on some work-comms when I’m actually on leave), I thought I couldn’t do it all over again. All 4 months of it or longer who knows, no matter how well planned or how well-oiled I made my daily routine to be.

By request from the kids, we had Papa’s Korean chicken for dinner- those crispy, Moorish bites, your palate cleansed with cool, slightly astringent radish cubes. It was only at the end of last year’s lockdown that we were able to have some takeaway food, not that it really mattered enough to line up at the crack of dawn which is so stupid.

But you actually thought, you were finally back to whatever place you were before all this happened; when you felt safe. When you could make plans and make them happen.

But who am I kidding? This is where I am, and I have to adapt fast before it gets the better of me.