In Wellington we moved to a COVID lockdown recently.

I began my daily lockdown walks, the same neighbourhoods I’d explored the first time we stepped into the Apocalypse. My girlfriend did the same but with a rubbish bag, so she could clean the streets as well as stretch her legs. Once again I level up thanks to her. And it’s great, virtue’s a useful feature of days well lived.

Then I discovered a fringe benefit.

On my first roadside rubbish walk I found a tiny mobile phone inside a condom. I know, was the benefit the free burner phone, or the joy of tracing the owner through trace DNA found in the tuck and folds of the sheath? Fortunately neither.

So many things I gathered set my imagination off. Was it human or dog who a tennis ball half buried? Who’s still drinking Double Brown? And sure, why was a phone stuck inside a condom, and left in the grass in front of the bowling alley?

Hence this Lockdown Mini-Series.

It started as postings on Instagram/Facebook, which limited things to 1200 characters, about 400 words. Then Facebook blocked Story Five, a tale which was trying to break down racism and homophobia. Presumably because the review-bot thought that my intent had been the opposite.

So now, it’s tiny stories on my old blog site, and links back from Facebook’s monopoly.

I hope that these stories provide simple, thought-provoking entertainment, in a time when we’re often looking for distraction.