Well, having just tested positive for COVID, I now find myself, and indeed the whole family, in self-isolation until Christmas Day. Great – not! I was rather looking forward to Boxing Day with the grandkids, a party or two, a few drinks in the Turks Head etc, but now… nothing. No carols, no Crib Service, nothing. Obviously I do get to be in isolation for 10 days with my two favourite people but, as Heidi would say, “Even so!”

One big question is how will it compare with last year? Christmas 2020 was a bit crap realy, and not just because we were all forbidden to visit each others homes. I’d been suffering from toothache for a lot of the year, and had had 3 dentist appointments cancelled, but finally I got seen on Christmas Eve, at 3.00pm. A charming eastern european dentist took one look it at and said it really had to come out. He could fill it, but couldn’t guarantee it lasting very long or a even an appointment to re-do it if it broke. So that was it, and the next 30 mins were spent with a face full of anesthetic and the tooth being gently but firmly wiggled until being finally removed. “If it hurts, take some paracetamol”, he said, in true NHS fashion. (The NHS has an amazing, and in my view unwarranted, belief in the power of paracetamol). It didn’t work, and neither did the additional brufen and the bottle of gin I bought on the way home.

A miserable Christmas Day followed.

Fortunately I had some codeine tablets in the cupboard, left over from a previous incident. They were a little out of date, but they’d been brilliant when I broke my arm, so what could go wrong? Quite a lot, as it turned out. Unlike on that occasion, they had the effect the medically minded readers here will know all about, and the rest of you probably don’t want to know.

It did improve eventually, but how will this year compare? I’ll let you know!