One thing I will forever remember from this pandemic is our capacity for humour at a time of adversity. Every day brings new laugh-out-loud moments. The tweet below from the Scottish sports broadcaster, Andrew Cotter, commentating on the final suspenseful moments of his dogs struggling over a toy is superb.
Boris Johnson is home from the hospital yesterday and videoed himself giving this speech.
Whatever your opinion of Boris Johnson he’s a top orator. It was particularly nice to hear the shoutout to two nurses: Jenny from New Zealand and Luis from Portugal. That makes it more personal and heartfelt. I’m not sure who else listens to the daily press briefings but I’m getting pretty fed up with Matt Hancock and Dominic Raab. On Saturday it was Priti Patel and that was a disaster. She was asked whether the government is going to apologise to health workers for the lack of PPE (personal protective equipment) and her response was, “I’m sorry people feel there have been failings …” which is basically saying I’m sorry you think that because it’s making things difficult for us. But this has prompted lots of funny responses on Twitter. This one is my favourite.
Why can’t they just say sorry? “Yes, we stuffed up and I’m sorry. We weren’t prepared for this and now we’re struggling to catch up. We should have prepared years ago with stockpiles of PPE and we should have developed local diagnostics that could scale up quickly. There’s going to be a full review when this is all over and right now we’re giving 110% to sort these problems out.” I think people would be more understanding if they accepted responsibility for these failings.
rachel.blog 
yep, agree totally; Hancock has gone from maybe okay to team mosquito… the scientists are much better, if only they did the speaking. And apologies? Wouldn’t that be nice though there aren’t many who do while in power, except for previous governments failings. Still waiting on Blairs for Iraq, Blair and Brown for the crash, Cameron for Brexit, May for…actually I’m not sure… and up your end Salmond for getting away with it and Sturgeon for not doing something about it when it must have been apparent to one and all… sad really.
Yes, when you list them out like that it does look like politicians find it impossible to apologise. I also wish the scientists would do more of the talking. I’m always happy when I see Chris Whitty at one of the press briefings. Dr Chris Smith also did a fantastic Q&A on the BBC yesterday.
I was talking to my other half about how impressed we have been with Boris. The right person in the right position at the right time. It has helped that the other parties have chosen not to engage in the usual political mud flinging for the last months too.
Yes, it’s refreshing to see what looks like all the political parties working together. I think this is a time more than any when politics needs to be put aside. It’ll be a relief to see Boris back at the press briefings because I’m getting sick of the others!
I loved how your post talked about focussing on something positive during such dark times.Anthing to keep our minds of the pandemic, works! Hope you are keeping safe!