I walked into my office and met the usual two early risers: one cleaner employed to vacuum-clean, mop the floors and wash dishes. The other was contracted to neutralize the Corona virus handle detailed cleaning, disinfecting and sanitizing of every visible surface in the entire office space. I knew the latter was hard at work from the offensive bleach odours invading my nostrils. No doubt about it – when it came to hygiene my office could go toe to toe with a 5 star hospital.
My colleagues began to troop in one after the other in mask-off mode. We had all gotten quite acquainted to sitting beyond spitting distance from each other. The result – tendency to focus more on the work at hand and less time for idle chit-chat or probable virus transmission. Lunchtime was implicitly observed at one’s desk or in the lunchroom if only one person had a 4-seating table to oneself. Unfortunately one could not exercise proper social distancing in the restroom (at least I can speak for the males). The urinals were not designed for this new era as evident from the distance between them.
Curfews had been extended gradually every fortnight by the state government until midnight but nothing beyond. This was obviously bad news for night crawlers but for old fashioned family men like me (Disclaimer: I have been known to have quite a few doppelgangers on the bar scene) I was happy to close from work and get home as early as I could. On that day in particular my wife and I were not eager to walk into a sea of scattered toys, a gallery of amateur graffiti walls and a solo-performance from our unsigned artiste (no amp required). We heard that a new movie experience was in town – at least new to Lagosians.
The pandemic took its toll on the local movie theatres while Netflix and Cable TV giants were cashing out on both the health-conscious and the care-free couch potatoes. One movie theatre decided to launch a drive-in cinema. You could enjoy your own air space, recline your seat to 180 degrees, mount your feet on the dashboard, binge on whatever picnic basket you prepared. Only thing I’d have to worry about is getting good seats parking space also within pee-holding distance to the restrooms. Movie wasn’t due to start for another half hour so we decided to stroll to a nearby bar to see what anti-COVID enhancements may have been made. We were pleasantly surprised…
Image credits: autojosh.com