Another day, another 4pm

Mood: Fraught

Gee David, various people have been saying, I’m not sure I can agree with you there.

Hello readers of the free editions! Before we go on, it might help to repeat a couple of paragraphs from last Friday’s edition. 

I wrote:

What comes now? One possibility is we just continue to make our way along bumpily, fractiously, managing day by day to stay just ahead of large-scale outbreak and large numbers of death and illness as we vaccinate, vaccinate, vaccinate and protect, protect, protect.

Another is that we don’t. In that case it probably won’t take long for the national mood to shift to somber and anxious and aghast and desperate to find protection as we witness gathering snowballing misery. At that point, people may prove to be altogether more open to doing whatever it takes to get safe.

If that’s not pessimistic, I’d call it at least a bit downbeat. 

Nonetheless, friends asked: are you really feeling that positive?

They wonder whether the government is getting the staggers as the ultramarathon enters its millionth hour.

They wonder whether its war effort no longer draws on the same kind of supercharged whole-of-government brain power assembled in those first scary days.

Maybe there is a deficiency, now, to the government's efforts. Maybe they need to be freshly galvanised.

And maybe this long week of unease might do the trick; because you couldn't say this government is not sharply attentive to dissatisfaction.

But even the most inspired of strategies would still have to deal with imperatives that cannot be avoided.

• This Delta variant spreads far more readily, far more consistently. Wildfire, in other words, and that makes everything much more unpredictable
• In the face of this greater transmissibility, Level 4 lockdown is not the bulletproof protection it was last time
• Vaccination is the absolute best way out of this, and the sooner we get everyone protected the better 

Arguably we went back into level 4 in the confident expectation that we’d whip this thing just like we did last time. Instead Delta showed us that was then, this is now.  

The team of 5 million has been, variously:
discouraged to learn this variant can’t be beaten,
or disbelieving that it cannot be overcome,
or tired of it all and wanting to take our chances with it,
or simply anxious about find ourselves in a state of vulnerability after a year of feeling comfortingly protected and shielded.

There’s really no way that wouldn’t add up to a public mood best described as: fraught. 

Maybe the comms messaging has not been good enough or clear enough to address all of this. But it's also possible there’s no way you can deliver the news that we’ll be no longer relying on Lockdown the way we were without bringing on a sense of puzzlement, or dismay, or bandaid being ripped off.

Now we begin to adjust to a new landscape. And day by day the jabs keep going into the arms because that, more than anything, is how we get the hell out of this.

And by that I mean something as near as possible to the entire population vaccinated,  including, as soon as approvals make it possible, the 5 to 12s as well.

Possibly, meanwhile, infection numbers continue to be contained, possibly they get away. But today’s announcements - things in Auckland stay just as they are, schools stay closed next week - suggest the horse continues to have not all that great a bolting opportunity.

Whatever the frustrations might be right now, that thing we can see in the distance is no mirage. It is where we want to be: hugely vaccinated. And that’s potentially just weeks away.

87% first vax in Auckland now! Go Auckland! Keep going Auckland!

You really hope people are thinking about how vastly much better things stand to be the day we get there. We’ll still be needing arrangements and protections, finding the best way to live in a changed world, but it will for sure be better than this.

That's what keeps me positive.

Mood: Baffled

Having said all that, this from Grounded Kiwis could not be more true.

We don’t understand why direct requests by DHBs to expedite MIQ for urgently needed health workers seem to be falling on deaf ears, especially when priority spaces are found for sports teams and other individuals.

Mood: Inspired

Reader Scott - Hi Scott! - has a splendid story to share. His life experiences keep overlapping with mine: coronary care; trying to figure out where the fricking underground services to the house are; finding great satisfaction in DIY and precision technology; adventures in Palmerston North, just ten minutes from Feilding. Behold his magnificent art work and be inspired by the idea of a fresh pursuit in your life.

Mood: Entertained

Reader Andrew - Hi Andrew! - writes a play in one paragraph.

Mood: Suburban Glow

Reader Michèle - hi Michèle! - didn't let lockdown stop her from getting glammed to the max for a magazine. Also contains a lovely memory of her glamorous Mum.

Mood: Now That’s What I Call Music

This here is an astonishing effort. 500 of them. I salute their stamina, I look forward to reading the full thread. But there’s no way you tackle this in one go.