Box rest isn't all it's cracked up to be.

Box Rest - not all it’s cracked up to be.

One of the side issues with this damned infection - (slowly, slowly, thanks, but not dead yet!) - is that it painfully swells the leg, which then requires it to be elevated - ideally above the heart. It has been a while since I spent any period with my leg above my chest, and with the damaged back disk playing a secondary medical disruptive role, the leg gymnastics are likely to see it level at best - but certainly not above! Sorry darlings.

This also means I must type quickly, as I can only do that sitting down. I would lie down and dictate, but I have failed to master Google speech, Siri chat, Alexa scribble, or whatever I’m supposed to be able to do. Almost all these things require vast amounts of equipment or, counterintuitively, your smartphone. So I sit, type, dash, feel leg pressure, retire and read. Or race, or watch sport, or watch the box.

A friend of mine, Peter, once had a collapsed lung and was on significant box rest. He spent the best part of three months on a sofa, watching daytime Television and his daily torment was to sit through Linda McCartney’s endless advertisements for her vile vegan bangers. They used to have a “hi-di-hi” style jingle that could become the most feral of earworms. I recognise that Purgatory now, punishment for a life badly lived… God’s reminder to mend one’s ways.

Why else would he inflict Rivals on the population?

“Madame made me, Your Honour!” is no legal defence, but it is my only one. And the inert leg trapped me, preventing my escape. The depth of smugness from the actors is manifest. “Have you seen how much I’m being paid for this shit?” they seem to be screaming at each other. “It’s Fabulous!”

Each actor has already vowed eternal gratitude to their agent, who told them after they had nailed that audition. “I know it’s not art, darling, but this is called Money, and you will always have it now.” It is loud, brash, lazy, poorly crafted, and dreadfully scripted and if anyone dares to tell me that it is a social commentary in the manner of Richard Sheridan’s own The Rivals or his School For Scandal, I shall scream, but only after I have plucked out their heart.

If it is a social commentary, the commentary’s point is on how much nuance we have lost