I've been quiet. Here's an update from Melbourne.

I mentioned late last year that we'd bought our first place. I may not have mentioned that it is located on what has now officially been recognised as the coolest street in the world.[1]

Melbourne has just come out of another snap two week lockdown, during which we appear to have eradicated the delta variant locally (helps that the Victorian Government ordered the shut down as soon as it was detected). Across the border in NSW, things appear to be deteriorating much like it did for us last year (and which led to a truly traumatic three and a half months of hard lockdown). It's weird seeing another city, one which up to now had done so well during the pandemic, falling to the same mistakes and hubris we demonstrated 12 months earlier.

Despite the comparative success of six out of seven states in locking the rest of the world (and hence COVID) out, vaccine rollout remains a fiasco. COVID vaccination rate in Australia is worst in the OECD. Which means we'll soon be locked out of the rest of the world.

Lockdowns aren't all bad. For instance, and further to my first paragraph, our apartment is located directly above a bar. We bought this apartment during the first lockdown, when the bar was closed. We had previously known it as a wine bar, but at some point in the year or so before we bought it had turned into a live music venue. This was not something we realised until after we moved in. I've caught up on a lot of sleep in the past two weeks. Tonight, the music is back on. Still, it is good to see Smith Street returning to life.

[1] Individual results may vary.