Last year we had our first lockdown to help cut down the spread of Covid-19 and one of the enjoyable parts of the end of lockdown was getting rid of my Covid mullet, which had my hair longer than it had been since the 1980s1.
Now we have been in a second long lockdown, which has lasted for 9 weeks or thereabouts. While there is still a long way to go, with infections still rampant although possibly having peaked, the rate of vaccination has increased dramatically, such that now in the Australian Capital Territory (ACT) the proportion of people 12 years of age or older having had at least one dose is 91.9%, with those having had two vaccine doses now stands at 73.4%2.
The ACT is expected to have 99% of those 12 or older vaccinated by the end of November, and will be one of the most vaccinated ‘city-states’ on the planet, despite many of them having a two-month head start in the commencement of their vaccination programs3. That delay in vaccination in Australia was largely down to the shemozzle that was vaccine acquisition by the federal government4.
All of my extended family over 12 have had two doses of vaccine, with the last two having had theirs in the last couple of days. So, in two weeks they should all be protected as much as full vaccination can protect them. This is a great relief.
At the beginning of the latest lockdown, I was about to get my hair cut, but because I had a mild cough, I had to first get a Covid-19 test. When you have this test, you are required to go into isolation until you get a negative result, which I received some 11 hours later. However, during that period of isolation, the ACT went into lockdown. So my Covid-19 mullet had a bit of a head start (excuse pun). Now my hair is longer than it has ever been, apart from the bits I cut off so I could see and hear clearly.
Now that the most recent lockdown is slowly being wound down, with Friday being the first day in which hairdressers were allowed to operate, I was looking forward to getting my second Covid mullet shorn off. So, I went down to the local shopping centre in the hope of having a Number 5. My regular barber had a queue outside the shop (there were restrictions on the number of patrons entering the premises), as did the one across the road, and when I went to the last of the three, I was told that they had a long list of bookings, and I’d likely have to wait a long time. So, I went home disappointed. Such are the trivialities of life.
Sources
Got this from Arthur by e-mail today, because he could not get into the website:
“I visited my local shopping centre this Tuesday. The waiting time for a haircut was four hours. I’ve now decided I need an exorcist more than I need a hairdresser. But when you phone exorcists they rarely call back and, like plumbers and electricians, don’t turn up when they say they’re going to. It’s so hard to get good help these days.”