Well yesterday was Freedom Day. So this morning I went to the funeral of a dear friend at a local village church in searing heat. There was plenty of room in there. Everyone was wearing a mask, but, in view of the oppressive heat and the prospect of 45 minutes suffering with my sinuses, I quickly removed my mask. Five minutes after that, two of our erstwhile friends, who are COVID deniers, swanned in without masks. So that made three of us. Once the service had started, the vicar (Doug - we go back an awful long way, Doug and me...) invited us to wear masks but said it was up to us. A few minutes after that, it was time for the first hymn. Doug told us all we could take off our masks to sing. Well, well, I thought. You sit there being all quiet with masks on, then you take them off to do some superspreading singing...

By the time we got to the second-last hymn, around half of the people in church hadn't bothered to put their masks back on. I hope that this will be the way things go from now on. There's always a mask in my pocket, and I wish it a long and interrupted sojourn therein... It was a lovely, heartwarming funeral, by the way.