Not in front of the children

The Lockdown School Journal

Greetings, tired and weary homeschooling parents still in Level 4 and feeling it.

The entire More Than A Feilding staff wish you well and thought you might appreciate a little help.

Here are some handy little primers on Politics and the Media and the Pandemic for the younger reader. You’re most welcome.

David Goes to School And Has Someone’s Lunch

This is David. David is a noisy boy. Noisy boys like to make noises.

Noisy boys like to make everyone turn around and ask:
Who made that noise? Was it you David? Gosh aren't you a clever little ratbag LOL etc

David is sad.

Everyone is listening to Jacinda From The Cover of Time or Pop-Up Leader Judith. No one is paying attention to David. 

Poor David. What can he do?

David sees Tama opening up his lunch box. He sneaks up behind Tama. He pushes Tama. Out come Tama’s sandwiches!

Now Tama’s sandwiches are on the ground! Poor Tama!

Hahahahahahaha! says David, look what I did, everyone! Crackup!

Everyone looks at David. 

Nobody says hahahahahahaha! Nobody says what a clever little ratbag you are, David LOL etc

David is sad. David pushes his bottom lip out.

David says in a great big voice: this is inimical to freedom of speech.

David says in a great big voice: if we cannot have the contrived equality of homogeneity we are quite lost. 

David says in a great big voice: I feel the menace of the State in this.

The Headmaster Lady comes over to David. She sits down beside him.

She says, Is this your hole, David?

Yes, says David.

It’s awfully big, she tells him. You should probably stop digging. 

The bell rings. David looks at the Headmaster Lady.

Is it twerking time yet? he asks her.

She says, kindly, If you want it to be, yes.

---

An Afternoon In The Beehive Theatrette

This is the Beehive Theatrette.

It is where the Prime Minister and Dr Saint Ashley go to say hello to the reporters who work at Parliament.

The reporters who work at Parliament work very hard.

They ask questions like: are you going to quit
and: are the people who call themselves your friends going to make you quit?
and: is the country about to blow a pile of dough on something stupid and if it does will you quit?

This is a Covid.

It is very sneaky. It has snuck into somebody who went to hospital because he had a sore tummy but actually he has a Covid.

If you have a Covid, you have to get a room of your own.

But the man with the sore tummy has been in a room with other people. So those people might have a Covid too, and they might have to go into their own rooms until they get better.

And so might all the doctors and nurses who came to look after any of the other people, even if it was just to say hello Mr Hooton how are you today have you been able to pass anything yet I’ll just turn this switch off because it’s not the light switch it’s the one that makes the bell keep ringing every five seconds all over the whole ward until someone is able to come to you.

It is bad that the man with the sore tummy has a Covid.

It is bad because there might be other people at home in their houses who have one too and do not know.

What would you ask if you were a reporter in the Beehive Theatrette?

Would you put up your hand and say:
If we only know about this one by accident where else in Auckland do you think it might it also be?

Would you put up your hand and say:
What are you doing to work out if there is anything more lurking out there, that no one knows about yet?

What a funny sort of reporter you would be if you did!

The questions they are asking today are:
He was in the hospital for hours and hours undiagnosed with Covid, are you going to quit?

And:
The people in the nearby beds might have got it, are you going to apologise and are you going to quit?

And:
What did you know and when did you know it and don't you think you owe somebody an apology I don’t care anybody really we just need one by 6pm.

Maybe we will come back later to find out if they get around to asking your funny little questions.

Getting Up With Mike

This is Mike.
Mike gets paid to talk on the radio.

Mike loves cars.
Mike loves being clean and tidy.
Mike loves other cars too.
Mike loves roads.
Mike loves clean and tidy cars that drive on roads made for cars.

But what Mike loves more than anything in the world is Scotty.

Mike used to love John.
But John went away.
Now Mike loves Scotty.

Scotty pretends to care about people.
But what Scotty says when no-one can hear is:
honestly I could not GA Flying F mate, just as long as I’m getting mine.

Mike likes that in a man.
So do the men who vote for Scotty.

Mike would like to vote for Scotty.
But Mike would have to live in Sydney for that.

So Mike would need to know if he was a goer over there.
Maybe people would like him and tune in.
But maybe they might call him a dud root.
A dud root is a thing you get called in Australia if you are no fun at all.
This is something they said about Mike’s friend Paul when he tried to be a goer over there.
Maybe Mike felt sad for Paul.
Or maybe he did not GA Flying F mate.

Quiet now! The red light is on.
Mike has two minutes to say a thing that he really believes, for money.
It can be about anything. As long as it is about the government being completely useless unlike Scotty who is a fricking genius mate.

If you have seen the episode of Seinfeld called The Bizarro Jerry then you would know how to write down the words that Mike reads out.
Whatever he says about the economy or vaccines or Scotty or living with the virus or anything that has happened at all, it will be the opposite of what has actually happened in the real world.

He would very much like to say: How fricken good is that Scotty?

But he knows that if he did that people would think Scotty had written it down for him. Even though he does lots and lots of his own thinking.