News of the World

A little figurine I had purchased from the USA on eBay turned up this morning. Quite impressed because the suggested arrival date was mid January, and I was thinking that might be optimistic if covid was affecting the delivery process due to staff sickness or isolation. I did have plenty of time though as it’s a present for a February birthday.
What was even more impressive was how well it was wrapped - tissue paper, bubble wrap, crumpled newspaper, stout cardboard box, brown paper and loads of tape made sure it was well protected on its 3,000 mile journey. Smoothing out the paper revealed they were pages from a Maryland daily paper published on Thanksgiving. A couple of stories caught my eye - a candidate endorsed by Donald Trump had suspended his Senate bid, and Thanksgiving celebrations were still going ahead despite covid concerns. The main thrust of the latter article was that the people dying of the virus now are almost 100% unvaccinated, and that most of those deaths could have been avoided. Very similar to what we’re being told over here, though the story does predate the Omicron variant taking over, so the situation may be different now.
Sorted out the various scene changes for the Panto quite quickly last night and will be putting it all into practice tonight at our combined Tech and Dress rehearsal. Which means we’ll be in full costume and make up, but the show will stop if necessary to sort out any technical difficulties. Unlike tomorrow and Thursday when we do the proper dress rehearsals and will only stop for major catastrophes!
Talking of which, it seems that Boris is determined not to impose any more restrictions so it looks like we can definitely go ahead with the Panto. We just have to hope none of the cast test positive in the next fortnight….