Strange days indeed

The last few weeks have felt like the world has taken acid. It’s been very trippy.

And yesterday was another spin out.

I mean, when was the last time you saw an Australian Premier release a statement like this after a former Cardinal was acquitted?

Whoa!

There’s enough being said on the subject without me putting my oar in.

So I’m going to tell you about the other moment that totally threw me yesterday.

I watched The Ugly Truth on DVD.

It was a TERRIBLE movie, full of awful messages and values.

Gerard Butler was quite cute in it, but that doesn’t forgive the dreadful premise – uptight TV producer discovers her hidden sexiness at the hands of a bloke who reckons a woman must be thin to be attractive.

As for the restaurant scene with the vibrating undies … oh Katherine Heigl, why did you read the script and say “Yes!” … and Alana why did you let your 14-year-old watch the finished product?

But that’s not the reason I’m talking about the movie.

It threw me because I realized romantic comedies no longer bear the slightest resemblance to real life. They are filled with freedoms we no longer have. Ironically, many of them axed by the aforementioned Dan Andrews.

We can’t snog on first dates, or in hot air balloons or elevators or paddle pools full of cherry jello.

There’s no flying to San Francisco, drinking champagne in hotel rooms, picnicking on river banks or dancing in nightclubs.

And it freaked me out that we took so many things for granted in our lives. Well, I’ve never snogged anyone in a hot air balloon or a paddle pool full of cherry jello, but you get the idea.

I watch romantic comedies with the youngest because she doesn’t like fantasy or sci-fi stuff. She’s the Gilmore Girls type. She doesn’t entirely share my taste in retro boy-meets-girl B-grade movies, but we can convivially spend time on the couch together watching them (although she drifted off during The Ugly Truth to make sugar-free strawberry ice-cream).

But again, I digress. What I’m trying to say is that the romantic comedies feel like sci-fi to me now because they are so far removed from the new reality of COVID-19 lockdown.

Strange days indeed …

Song of the day: John Lennon “Nobody told me”