Sad, sad. Our period of near-ish normality is over. Covid infections in Central London are rising rapidly and I suspect we’ll be in full Lockdown again before long.

Despite the new rules about mask-wearing, those serving in shops and restaurants round here, if they weren’t wearing masks before, are still not, risking the £200 fine. The NHS Covid app. downloaded yesterday, tells me we are at “Medium” risk level in Soho and pulses away, assuring me it is “active and scanning”. So far, it seems to have encountered nothing untoward.

On our walk to St. Jame’s park, we become aware of massed police vans, full and obviously waiting for something to happen.

On our way back, a rally is coalescing in Trafalgar Square.

Although it’s billed as Anti-Lockdown, it’s a rag-bag of protestors, some of whom will surely be surprised to find themselves hugger-mugger with those whose views are anathema to them. What does the advocate of Bitcoin share with the man telling us Jesus will save us, for example? Calls for the jailing of Bill Gates and Matt Hancock intermingle with ernest, muttered conversation about world conspiracy . The police, most of whom have not been wearing masks over the past weeks as they patrol the Soho streets are now wearing them as a badge of affiliation with the law and, as they banter good-naturedly with protestors, they are seemingly unfazed by those nearby carrying banners protesting against “Gestapo Policing.”

False statistics -and no doubt some real ones- vie with crazy predictions. It’s a Covid carnival, ignorance is King and nuance is the first casualty.

Resting against the wall before entering the fray, one woman carries her clear and uncompromising message on a banner obviously too heavy to carry for long. Not for her sophisticated slogans. or the subtleties of statistics………

So far, the crowd is small and calm. We will have to wait to watch tonight’s news to discover whether it stays that way.

As we leave the square, I glance at my NHS Covid app, expecting it to be bleeping ( or whatever it does) to tell me I have been close to any number of infected people – but it is still quietly pulsing its pastoral shade of green – and then I remember, none of these protesters will have succumbed to the tyranny of downloading it.